Mark Tabata’s Weekday Devotionals
Friday July 10 2026
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1 Peter 3:7-Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding, giving honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be hindered.
The Apostle Peter discusses in this Epistle how God’s people are to live and work in this world. He pictures us as aliens and pilgrims here (1 Peter 2:11), sojourning on this Earth as we make our way towards Heaven (1 Peter 1:3-5). Part of what he focuses on is how God allows trials in our lives especially to make us stronger and to reach others with the Good News of the Gospel (1 Peter 3:15) In chapter 3, he discusses how wives may win their unbelieving husbands to the Lord through their example of loving kindness and humility. After that, he encourages Christian husbands to “dwell with” their wives “with understanding.” Husband are called on to give honor to the wife, “as to the weaker vessel.”
What does that mean?
Is the Bible here devaluing women and contemptuously speaking of them by referring to them “weaker?
Not at all.
In fact, the opposite is the case.
The weakness in view is physical, but the phrase does not mean “the weaker sex” in a generalized sense, σκεῦος is always used of a material object, often a piece of pottery, and metaphorically of the human body (BGD, 754.2; cf. 1 Thess 4:4; 2 Cor 4:7; Barn. 21.8)…The notion that women are “weak,” or “weaker” than men, was a commonplace in the ancient world (e.g., Plato, Republic 5.455D, ἐπὶ πᾶσι δὲ ἁσθενέστερον γυνὴ ἀνδρός, “yet for all a woman is weaker than a man,” LCL, 1.447; cf. Republic 5.457A; Laws 781A; Thucydides 2.45; Ep. Arist. 250; Philo, Ebr. 55; for papyri, cf. M-M., 84–85), but Peter uses it not to denigrate women but to foster “respect” (τιμή), the core of his advice to Christian husbands. (J. Ramsey Michaels, 1 Peter, Volume 49 (Word Biblical Commentary), 169 (Kindle Edition): Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan)
Husbands are to regard their wives as precious and fine china pottery. “Weakness” does not imply “inferior.” In my simple language, I would definite it here as meaning “too valuable to risk damaging through neglect and/or abuse.”
Far from treating women with contempt, the Bible here is admonishing men to treat their wives with love, honor, and respect.
Peter is also adamant here that when husbands and wives do not treat each other with mutual honor and kindness, “their prayers” may very well be “hindered.”
How we treat our fellow human beings has a direct impact on our relationship with God.
The Bible elevates women.
The question for us husbands is:
How can we better treat our better halves with the love and respect that they are due?
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit, be with you all. Amen.