His suffering, death, and resurrection. In the liturgical readings for this season, the gospels highlight various aspects of these three themes. The Old Testament readings have not been chosen to complement the gospels, as is the case for the rest of the year, but rather to provide a more or less independent survey of the history of salvation, a review of the interventions of God in human history that led up to redemption in Christ. However, while our live letters are intended to straddle or link the other two readings during Lent, they sometimes have a way of inclining more to one of them than to the other. The first letter of Peter was written in Rome by Peter or one of his followers and is intended to offer encouragement to Christians in distant provinces of the Roman Empire who were finding difficulty in the profession of their faith.
Most scholars look on it as a baptismal sermon cast in letter form.
In the section we read today, the author is calling on his listeners to find encouragement in the risen life of Christ which they share. He is apparently quoting and commenting on an early formula for the profession of faith. This profession of faith seems to have proclaimed Jesus as the one whose unique suffering and death put sinners back in touch with God. His life continued in the Holy Spirit. Jesus' ministry was a cosmic event.