From working at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries to co-editing an anthology called True Reason to earning a D.Min., it's fair to say that I love thinking. But after I saw RZIM fall apart despite building a team of highly credentialed speakers, I started to question everything (again). So, I returned to look at 1 Peter 3 with fresh eyes. What was Peter actually saying? Notice the context: It's not a university debate club, but a community of Christians suffering for righteousness. The point of persecuting a group is to diminish the benefits of joining it and to encourage people to leave it. So, how does Peter encourage them to persevere? He doesn't give them the cosmological argument, but exhorts them to regard Christ, the Lord, as holy. In other words, as they worship Jesus as their Lord and remember his example of sacrificial faithfulness, they will be able to remain faithful. This leads to the next question. If someone in the community asks them, "Despite your suffering, why are you hopeful?", what kind of response will they give? Again, the apologia, or the defense, won't be an intellectual argument. Peter is telling the Christian to reply: "I have hope because Jesus is Lord. No matter what you do to me, I trust he will raise me to eternal life." When a community says, "Jesus is Lord" and starts living accordingly, their behaviors change—they stop paying bribes, they honor women, and they give generously to meet the needs of their neighbors. People notice! "Why do you do that?" For most of my life, I thought I needed to have an intellectual answer to every skeptical question. But now I see that Peter wouldn't agree. He isn't asking the persecuted church if they're reading enough books. He's asking them, "Are you living like Jesus is Lord? Will anyone notice that God has changed your lives and community?" In 2004, I co-led a summer missions trip to Tajikistan. I lived in a home with a mix of American and Tajik college students in Dushanbe. After twelve college-aged men ate, the kitchen was filthy. It was rare to see someone make the effort to put their plate in the sink. So, I decided to thoroughly clean it after every meal, and then I invited the Christian students to join me. We did it with joy. The camaraderie turned a chore into a celebration. Hot, soapy water was our opportunity to honor Jesus and love our neighbors! When our Tajik friends asked us why we so happily cleaned, it was time for our defense: Jesus is Lord.