Jesus – His Death
Series: CREED: Truths that Unite
Brad Bailey – February 7, 2021
Intro...
Well... good morning Westside Vineyard friends and family.... each of you joining today... as well as those who may connect sometime in the future.
It’s a PRIVILEGE to have this time to share with you...and I’m EXCITED to continue together in our series entitled Creed: Truths that Unite.
In this series we’re engaging the central truths captured in the Apostles Creed. As I shared in previous weeks, The Apostles Creed is the oldest known and most widely accepted Christian creed... recognized by all branches of Christian tradition - Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox. And each week we are engaging one of the great truths declared in this creed ....truths that can center us, form us, and unite us. And each week we are starting by first having different members read the creed... which we can say aloud as well by following the words we will put up.
And today it’s a pleasure to welcome Dean and Flora Guevara. Some may know Dean as one of our gifted worship leaders. Some may know Flora as a teacher of French and some social science classes at Crean Lutheran High School. And others may know them simply as Aviela and Asher’s mom and dad. Here’s Dean and Flora. [1]
Thanks Dean and Flora.
A few weeks ago we began at the start of the creed... with what it means to believe in God, father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth... And we then we engaged what it means to believe in Jesus Christ... God’s only Son, and our Lord... and then last week... the significance of his being “conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary.” And today...we engage the significance of the next line... of believing that Jesus... suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried; and descended to the dead.
The Apostles Creed...
I believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.
I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,
who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,
born of the Virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried;
he descended to the dead.
One might notice that there are several significant and notably sobering words here... all connected together by how Jesus died.
Suffered... crucified ...died... buried... descended.
It could strike someone that the creed seems to leap from his birth directly to his death. It may seem like a strange loss that nothing is said of everything he said and did.... the profound words he spoke...the lives he healed. There’s no doubt that ever word and act as testified to in the Gospel accounts is vital to knowing him. But the point of the creed is to declare that Jesus was not simply another good teacher...or an honorable priest or a prophet.
God had spoken through the prophets over hundreds of years... and when he spoke about sending a savior... God predicted his birth...and his death... because they are what define who he is. It is his birth that would set him apart as being the incarnation of divinity and his death being the real sacrifice of divinity. Jesus himself spoke of what he must fulfill in his suffering and death. His sacrificial death would define this life. And so it isn’t surprising that this is what the creed affirms.
And so the creed affirmed that Jesus entered our human nature and suffered as a representative of our human nature. And this was significant, because it stands in contrast to some who viewed the material world as something too inferior for God to actually engage. There were, and still are, some who see this whole material world as a façade ... who believe that the material world is just a deception... a matrix or mistake. They believed in discovering a secret knowledge to exist merely as spiritual beings free of the false material nature. Those who believed such things are referred to as Gnostics...and they wanted to recast Jesus as one who held such secrets...and who never truly lived or died a physical life. [2]
Such ideas were entirely bizarre to any of the Jews at the time...let alone those who personally knew his flesh and blood life... from his mother to his brothers to his team of disciples to those who would beat him... crucify him...and bury him. No matter how much he spoke with an authority unlike any earthly teacher... he was not simply some spiritual ghost.
And the creed sets forth the profound truth that this Jesus was really born in the flesh....and he really died in the flesh. These words we engage today...bring that home... he suffered... was crucified ...died... buried... and descended to the dead. Now that last line... “he descended to the dead.”... may seem a little unusual.
This is the one line of the Creed that has not been included throughout history. It has been a line of interest because it can lead one to consider....what did happen to Jesus between his moment of physical death and his being raised on the third day. There are versions which translated this as descending into hell... but the word translated as hell...is not the word that speaks of the place in which evil is bound and judged...but rather simply to the place of the dead. [3]
When the Creed says that Jesus “descended to the dead,” the idea is simply that Jesus experienced what we experience when we die. It’s the emphatic grasp that he was not merely sleeping... and waiting to be resuscitated. He descended into the fulness of death. It means that no matter how much authority he had proved...no matter how much love he had shown... no matter how much hope he declared... his physical life had come to an end.
What the creed emphasizes is that Jesus... really suffered... really died... and was really buried.
And that is the first major point for us to hear. When we state this, we are embracing that...
1. His suffering was REAL.
We can see that the entire nature of Christ coming and the life he bore...including the sufferings of this world. He was born in a manger for animals... to a peasant couple from nowhere... who had to flee as refugees when the governing ruler sought to kill him as a child. When he began to declare what God was doing... he would face every type of rejection. He left the perfections and prerogatives of heaven and bore all of this for us. But here in the Creed... we are affirming that in which it all culminated... how he suffered under Pontius Pilate. [4]
The Creed’s bold declaration begins affirming how Jesus suffered UNDER Pontius Pilate. He is the one who was serving as a Roman governor of Judea at the time of Jesus...the one who was forced to decide Jesus’ earthly fate.
One could wonder why the Creed bothers to mention Pilate’s name? It doesn’t mention any other names other than Jesus and his mother Mary, Pilate is the only other person named in the Creed. Why? This was the church’s way of reminding us that the Jesus we are talking about lived in real history.
It is telling us what they knew so well... that his suffering took place in a real moment in time and space.... when Pontius Pilate, was the Governor of Judea... in that historically specific seven or eight-year period when he had been appointed by Caesar in Rome to control his interests in the land of Palestine, it was then that our Lord and Savior died. It drives a stake down at a particular moment in history. The point is, it really happened, this is history, it’s not myth, it’s not saga, it’s not a parable, it’s not an illustration. It’s history.
The Roman Empire was at the center of western world... they really did rule over the Jewish nation... and they really did use a form of execution that expressed the ultimate statement of who ruled... that of crucifixion... one that was really used under Pontius Pilate
Flavius (long A) Josephus was a Jewish historian born in Jerusalem in AD 37...four years after the crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth in the same city. He became the most prolific historian of Jewish history. In his Jewish Antiquities, he wrote [5]...
Flavius Josephus – Antiquities 18: Chapter 3
“At this time there was a wise man called Jesus, and his conduct was good, and he was known to be virtuous. Many people among the Jews and the other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned him to be crucified and to die. But those who had become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that he had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion and that he was alive. Accordingly, he was perhaps the Messiah, concerning whom the prophets have reported wonders. And the tribe of the Christians, so named after him, has not disappeared to this day.” Antiquities 18: Chapter 3
What this and other historical sources affirm, is that when we say he suffered under Pontius Pilate... we are declaring that what we believe cannot be cut off from real history as some religious myth. This is at the root of what changes the world. It calls us to realize that what these beliefs represent are not an expression of some feeling or experience that you have had. They are not a mere philosophy upon which we construct ethical principles. They are rooted in the creator of all that exists actually entering time and space...and enacting something that reclaims our entire existence.
It’s not a philosophy that will change the world... it’s not your feelings that will change the world... it is the love of God actually engaging our world. What will resolve human history is the fact that God has personally entered into our mess to transform it. It is not the imaginary effect of a placebo. It is the power of an actual spiritual vaccine that changes our fate. This is what transforms our understanding... our understanding of ourselves...our understanding of what is good and ultimate.
And those words “Under Pontius Pilate” also remind us that imperial authorities hate challenges to their absolute power to order the world as they wish. This reference to Pilate is not an indictment about the Roman Empire being the sole enemy of God. The Roman Empire was actually quite remarkable in various developments and virtues ... but every empire will do what is has to do to maintain their authority. And Pilate understood this issue of responsibility.
In fact the Scriptures are clear that Pilate tried to avoid his responsibility for condemning Jesus. You may recall how he told the crowds of religious leaders.... and those they had turned against Jesus...that he saw no wrong in Jesus... no basis to condemn him. And when he accepted their desires...he said he “washed his hands” of the blood... of the responsibility. [6]
But the truth is that Pilate did share in the responsibility.... he didn’t free Jesus.... he wouldn’t pay the price to follow what he knew. But what becomes so clear...is that such responsibility was shared by everyone
The creed says that Jesus suffered UNDER Pilate... it does not say “BECAUSE” of him. Pilate would bear governing responsibility... but the responsibility was far wider...it was coming from a force that was calling out from the crowds. The religious leaders called for his crucifixion...and incited the crowds to do the same. It was they who called for a murdering Barabbas to be set free rather than Jesus. But the responsibility went far wider still. And no one knew this more than Jesus. He was not suffering because of them...he was going to suffer because of everyone.
Some may recall the last night with his disciples... it was the Passover... and it set the stage for all that was at hand...as he called for them to prepare the Passover meal to shared one final time. And the historic meaning of the night becomes transforming... as he says the bread now represents his body broken for THEM...and the wine now represents his blood poured out for THEM. And even as these words settle in... the false sense of their own innocence comes into the light. Jesus speaks of them seeing him again...and following...but that they could not bear what he was about to bear. One of them he says...will betray him.... speaking of Judas. Peter had said he would never deny him ...Jesus tells Peter he will betray him three times before the morning. And when he has been put to death.... they would soon find themselves hiding away together in their common shame. All their pride and pretense was gone. Imagine how quiet they must have become as they faced themselves.
I recall havening visited the Holocaust concentration camp at Dachau Germany on a couple occasions... and the feeling that emerges as one considers the horror of such genocidal killing. It’s not uncommon for there to be a variety of American tourists... perhaps enjoying some summer fun... and one can only hope that it won’t be one those moments your embarrassed by some loud fellow Americans.
But as one author described in his is own experience, “something surpassingly strange happened when we Americans entered the camp gates ...Silence fell over us. Everything became eerily quiet. As we walked through the dormitories and past the crematoria, no one clucked confidently about the terrible thing that the Germans had done to the Jews. We all seemed to sense, in a subterranean and unconfessed way, that we also could commit such unspeakable crimes. I had no desire to shout, “They did this,” but rather, “We did this”—we human beings, who also killed the ultimate Jew.... named Jesus the Christ. [7]
It is that soberness that we must allow ourselves to face...and feel.
When we say we believe that he suffered...died... was buried...and descended to the dead... we are saying not only that his suffering was real... we are saying that ....
2. His suffering was FOR us
When we say that we believe that Jesus suffered and was crucified and died and was buried...we should grasp the soberness that it was because of us.
The meaning of Jesus’ existence as a whole is expressed by his dying “for our sake.”
In Paul, we find expressions like these [8]:
“Christ died for the ungodly” (Rom 5:6)
“Christ died for us” (Rom 5:8)
“Christ died for our sins” (1 Cor 15:3)
“for our sake he became sin” (2 Cor 5:21)
“Christ loved us and gave himself for us” (Eph 5:2)
“Christ became a curse for us” (Gal 3:13)
No one understood this more clearly than Jesus. When he shared that Passover meal... he said “This is my body, which is given for you,” and “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood” (Luke 22:19—20).
This was a sacrifice that was being given. They may want to fight it. They might have a hard time seeing what they were about to see happen... something of profound horror... as they saw what they understood to be God in his goodness being crucified....God the creator of all... being killed at the hands of his creation. They must have wondered: How could God let this happen? The answer is that a sacrifice was being made.
Jesus was not being taken because the world was powerful...but rather he was giving himself because the world was powerless to overcome it’s defiant destiny.
He had explained earlier...
“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep . . . I lay down my life for the sheep . . . for this reason, the father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have the power to lay it down, and I have the power to take it up again.” (John 10:11-18)
Jesus knew...what they would do....he knew what we will do. The whole point is that he was choosing to die for them...and “for us.”
The apostle Peter brought this home as he began to declare the news. We read in 1 Peter 3:18
Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit. - 1 Peter 3:18
Here we have a profound summary of what took place. It captures what we are speaking about when we refer to his death. We are not speaking about a mere death...or even the death of a good man. It is about a death that represents the one and only exchange that meets us in our ultimate need. As Peter says... Christ died for sins once for all.... once for all.
Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. - 1 Peter 3:18
These words capture that this death took place in real time... in real history...but was resolving something “once and for all.” It speaks of something that the life and death of Jesus has provided that resolves what otherwise is a life of endless denial and despair... of repressing or recycling.
Human existence has always known the weight of it’s own inability to live as it should... and trying to meet this in countless forms of sacrifice...that never fully satisfy. In countless ways we can try to bring our different forms of sacrifices to atone for our sins... over and over...because of course we are never living a life fully responsive to God... to his love and goodness.
Or we try to repress the problem... we can just claim that everything is relative...and that we are better than those we think are really bad...and when we realize that we share some of the same things in those we condemn...we just try to ignore it... or we become even more focused on what we see in others.
Neither way ever resolves what is unresolved. We will never have a sacrifice that can satisfy our debt to God...and we will never escape our own shame by projecting it onto others.
But here in the sacrificial death of Christ... is that sacrifice that satisfies our debt once and for all.
Peter explains it was a death of the righteous for the unrighteous.
Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. - 1 Peter 3:18
... the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God.” At the center of human history, a transfer took place. It is the ultimate exchange... “the great exchange.”
We are the unrighteous. Most of us may feel that we are decent people. And in the way we perceive decency ... that may be very true. Sure... we have all lied,,, cheated... mistreated someone... lost our temper...made excuses....but we try to avoid acting out on the worst of our nature...so we run our lives decently is the light of the rest of this world.
But if we get near Jesus... we begin to sense more about our darkened nature. He lives as one whose very being is aligned with the Father. He has no other identity other than that of the Son. While his earthly nature may be aware of many potential things to want... his ultimate will is to fulfill that which he shares with the Father.
And this helps us understand the real nature of our sin. In contrast, we are those who Jesus described as prodigal sons...who declared that we wanted the goods in life... while wanting the one from whom they come.... to go away. We wanted to go off and run our own lives. At our core, we are self-proclaimed gods. We may be more decent versions...but we are still self-proclaimed gods... independent at the core. The truth is that Jesus didn't die because we were marginal offenders of God's law. We are not simply those who broke a few minor rules... we are those who have denounced the father...taken the goods...and set ourselves up as our own sovereign rulers...as our own gods. That is the position in which human life has defined it’s own destiny.
If someone said that tomorrow God will return to reconcile all things...and render judgment on our faithfulness to Him. Some may say that it’s absurd thought....and they simply don’t believe it could ever be true. But the more telling question is not whether they believe it is true...but whether they want it to be true. The answer to that question may be far more telling of what is really true about our relationship with God. If there is a God...who is good...and they were going to render judgement of our relationship to them... would we want it?
The point is that when all of creation is reconciled with God... human life will suffer the consequences ... the consequences of a separation we chose... and arguably still choose. Jesus died because we have committed the most serious offense of all - rebellion against God. It's a crime worthy of death and Jesus took our place on the hill of execution.
We are the unrighteous...and Jesus is the righteous. Jesus who is the incarnate Son of God... who has lived in eternal union with God the Father... in a perfect and unending love... is the righteous.
Theologians use words like ‘imputed” to describe this... how the inevitable consequences of our rejection of God is imputed to Jesus...that is... it is transferred to him. He pays for it in his own death. And this we should take in deeply. When we look upon all that he bore in his suffering...we are looking at what we deserve.
When they forced a crown of thorns into his skull...and mocked him as a false king... that is the mocking we deserve.
When they stripped him of all his clothes...that is the nakedness...the exposure and shame that we deserve.
When they nailed him to a cross to proclaim that he was among those cursed... that is the judgment that we deserve.
When the Father turned away and Jesus cried out “Father Father...why have you abandoned me”...that is the abandoning by God that we deserve.
His suffering was truly for us.
The righteous suffers for the unrighteous. But this exchange is even more profound. The merits of his eternal righteous life with the Father is imputed to us... or transferred to us. You are clothed in the righteousness of Christ. Jesus bears the consequences of your sin, and you receive the consequences of his righteousness. This is the great exchange. [9]
As Paul explained...
For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. - 2 Corinthians 5:21 (ESV)
The righteous suffers for the unrighteous. If we receive him.... all of our sin...and shame...and separation are transferred to him.
Why? As our Scripture in First Peter concludes...to bring you to God.
1 Peter 3:18
Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God.
As the text of Peter finishes... it brings it home with this...Christ died to bring you to God. That is the truth that is at the center of it all. That is the truth that we need to pause... and hear most deeply.
Jesus has come as the priest who mediates between you and God. Jesus stands as the ultimate priest who knows that you have no sacrifice that could justify what lies between you and God... and he came himself to be the sacrifice. And he did so... because... as Jesus himself explained...God loves the world...and God loves you. Shortly before his sacrificial death.... he is praying to the Father...and acknowledging that the time has come... and he says in essence... “Father... I have saved these lives...and those who will believe in the future”...and you can hear the joy in which he says this... a joy that is shared between Father and Son. It is the joy of having brought lives to God.
And when Jesus brings us to God...he is bringing us out of slavery to the powers of this world.
Jesus knew that life on this planet was enamored with control and force and violence... and has given itself to the belief that these represent the ultimate forms of power.
But Jesus saw that what was actually the source of all destruction and death...is our lack of submission to God.
We are living outside the true orbit of life... living in relationship to the wrong gravitational pull.
He is restoring his life with God to us... his spirt which lives in the love of God and aligns in response to God.
And this leads to a final implication of these truths... which is that...
3. His suffering CALLS us... to follow
When we identify the suffering of Jesus... we are speaking of the way in which Jesus was revealing the radical difference between the nature of the kingdom of God and the nature of the kingdoms of this world.
As we noted earlier, the reference to having suffered under Pilate, reminds us that imperial authorities hate challenges to their absolute power to order the world as they wish. Pilate represents our desire for power and control... that will cause us to justify far more than we think. When we say that Jesus suffered under Pontius Pilate... it reminds us of how much we can all want to hold onto vain forms of power and control. History shows how those nations and leaders who are most consumed by control...will see those who follow the way of Christ... to be a threat. Even this week... stories are coming out of how the governing powers of China... Burma... India...and more... are trying to protect their control in a way that brings suffering to so many lives.
And such a desire for power has shown itself in those who are associated with Christ as well. History shows that when Christians have relied on the power of the state to advance their own goals, or thought they should follow the same model in their own ways of governing ...they have lost their distinctive identity and have become oppressors of others. Whenever we want to protect our own power over others... we are vulnerable to acting with expediency. Like Pilate, when faced with doing what is right or what is easier... we will often do what is easier.
As Timothy Johnson notes, Mary and Pontius Pilate represent these two edges, which are the two poles of human status and response to God. Mary is young, female, poor, Jewish, and—pregnant out of wedlock—socially and religiously suspect. Yet through her faith, God brings life to the world—at the cost of a sword piercing her own soul (Luke 2:35). Pontius Pilate is mature, male, wealthy, Roman, and safely wed (see Matt 27:19). Yet through his moral weakness, a holy and righteous one was taken to the cross and a murderer released, and through his legal concession, “the author of life was killed” (see Acts 3:13—14). Those reciting this profession of faith do well to pause and reflect on these two examples. [10]
Each reflects a fundamentally different disposition. Pilate does what is expedient. Mary does what is right. Pilate is controlled by his relationship to power and comfort. Mary is controlled by her relationship with God. When Mary is called...she responds, “May it be as you have said.”
This the responsiveness to God the Father that defines that nature of Jesus. And in this way, his submission to that which included his suffering and death reflects the way of Jesus. In this sense , his suffering calls for us to follow.
Jesus said...
“If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross daily, and follow me. - Luke 9:23 (NLT)
It’s important to realize that we cannot fulfill the unique suffering and death which Jesus had to fulfill. It’s important to understand that the death of Jesus was the only death that could pay for our debts...his death was once and for all. And his suffering is not something we are to try to simply replicate in itself... as if to think that suffering in itself is good. It’s not.
The point is that his suffering and death flowed from his living in this world...but submitted to God. And that is what he is calling us to. That is why he refers to it as taking up our own cross daily. Our call is not simply to accept him as a savior...and then to stay enslaved to the powers of this world... but rather to be united with him... becoming united in the heart of responsiveness. Instead of defying God to serve this world.... we are able to defy this world to serve God. [11]
CLOSING:
The truth is that when we declare our recognition that Jesus suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried; and descended to the dead.... we are declaring something that should changes everything.
Our culture has tried to develop some vague sense of respect for such a sacrifice ...while actually looking away and avoiding what it means.
The truth is that when one looks at the suffering and sacrificial death of Jesus... the human heart will look with either pride that will judge him...perhaps with pity at best... or with humility and worship him.
We will see a picture of either human weakness...or the divine power of love.
We will see that which we can judge...or that which judges us.
We will see one who got more than he deserved...or one who gave more than we deserve.
God described the truth long ago. God spoke through the prophet Isaiah of this sacrificial death. Listen to how it was understood hundreds of years before Christ saying...
Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. 5 But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. 6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all. - Isaiah 53:4-6
With these words we see that we cannot separate ourselves from what is at hand. Four times the word “our” is used... because what is taking place is that which is engaging Our infirmities. Our sorrows. Our transgressions. Our iniquities. In some profound way we were there that day; it was our sins that nailed Christ to the cross. “And the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all”
Many years ago Nathaniel Olson related a story about a poor crippled man who was cruelly nicknamed "Old Rattle Bones" by a group of boys on the street. The ringleader named Freddie got worried when the man was seen coming towards the boys own home one day. Because his friends were with him, the boy tried to hide his anxiety. "Go on, Old Rattle Bones," he shouted, "see who cares if you talk to my mother." The man they mocked was welcomed by the boy's mother...who told her son to come in also. It was time for the truth. Turning to Freddie, the man said, "Years ago when you were just a baby, your nurse took you out in your carriage for a ride near the river. When she let go of the handle for a moment, it suddenly began to careen down the hill. Before she could catch up with it, the buggy had plunged into the water below. I jumped into the river and after a difficult struggle brought you safely to shore. The icy water affected my physical condition ...so I can scarcely hobble along."
Freddie hung his head and began to sob. "You saved me.” And then he said...” Forgive me...for the way I saw you. I didn't know who you were."
In a similar but far greater way...we must ask: Do we know who Jesus is? When you see him on a cross...do you know why he is suffering?.... whose suffering he was bearing?
Let’s stop....and take a moment to come before God in prayer. I invite us to close our eyes and focus on being present before God.
PRAYER:
See you... see in your suffering... that you were bearing our sins...and our sorrows.
Forgive us.
We receive... your righteousness.
And finally, I want to invite us to conclude by taking these elements we refer to as communion.
They are such a striking reminder in themselves...that Jesus himself said that of all the things he wanted us to unite in remembering most often...it was his death for us.
In receiving these elements, we are reminded that his suffering was real... and fitting to remember in these physical elements....and that his suffering was for us....as we now remember his words that this represents his body broken for us...and his blood poured out for us.
Resources: Johnson, Luke Timothy. The Creed The Crown Publishing Group; Hamilton, Adam. Creed (Creed series) Abingdon Press; Cannata, Ray; Reitano, Josh. Rooted: The Apostles' Creed, White Blackbird Books. ; Ligon message - “I believe in Jesus Christ who suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried”, Matthew 27:1-2; 32-60
Notes:
1. The Apostles Creed
I believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.
I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,
who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,
born of the Virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried;
he descended to the dead.
On the third day he rose again;
he ascended into heaven,
he is seated at the right hand of the Father,
and he will come to judge the living and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy Christian Church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting.
2. The designation gnosticism is a term of modern scholarship. It was first used by the English poet and philosopher of religion Henry More (1614–87), who applied it to the religious groups referred to in ancient sources as gnostikoi (Greek: “those who have gnosis, or 'knowledge' ”). According to the Gnostics, this world, the material cosmos, is the result of a primordial error on the part of a supra-cosmic, supremely divine being, usually called Sophia (Wisdom) or simply the Logos. Gnostics were dualists and worshipped two (or more) gods; Christians were monists and worshipped one God. Gnostics focused on eradication of ignorance; Christian concern was the eradication of sin. Different gnostics believed different things about the death and resurrection of Jesus. But some were people, whom we know as docetists, [who] believed that the death and suffering of Jesus were things that only appeared to happen, or if they happened, didn't really happen to the core of Jesus' spiritual reality. As one gnostic source describes, “To worship the cosmos, or nature, or embodied creatures is thus tantamount to worshipping alienated and corrupt portions of the emanated divine essence.” A further source of confronting these ideas includes: Gnosticism Unmasked by D. Jeffrey Bingham
3. Some drawn from Dr. Thomas A. Erickson “Descended into Hell, Rose Again from the Dead”
It is of interest that this phrase first appeared in one of the two versions of Rufinus in AD 390 and then did not appear again in any version of the creed until AD 650. - Grudem, Wayne A (2004), Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine, Leicester, ENG; Grand Rapids, MI: Inter-Varsity Press; Zondervan, p. 586
Hamilton notes...
“The church also came to believe that Jesus, during the time between his death and resurrection, offered salvation to those in death’s clutches since the beginning of the world. Jesus’ actions during that time are referred to as the “harrowing of hell.” This triumphant event is often captured in icons that show Jesus tearing the gates of hell off their hinges in order to release the righteous dead from Sheol or Hades. He is often portrayed holding Adam and Eve by the wrist and pulling them out of hell and to heaven. Though the phrase “descended to the dead” represents speculative theology about which we have limited data in Scripture, I think there is great power in the image of Christ descending to the realm of the dead, tearing the doors off their hinges, and offering salvation and life to those who had died from the beginning of the human race up until his time. In this image, Christ is seen as triumphantly defeating death itself in keeping with his words, “I have the keys of Death and the Grave” (Revelation 1:18).
Hamilton, Adam. Creed (Creed series) (pp. 70-72). Abingdon Press. Kindle Edition.
However, the word translated as “hell” in the single New Testament passage from which such an idea arose, is not “Gehenna”....the New Testament word for the physical hell of punishment and fire but rather hades.
Differences between the Nicene and Apostles’ Creeds by Dr. James Merrick - https://media.ascensionpress.com/2020/02/07/differences-between-the-nicene-and-apostles-creeds/
The confusion posed by the Apostles' Creed: Did Jesus descend into Hell? - http://helpmewithbiblestudy.org/2JesusChrist/CrucifixionConfusionApostlesCreed.aspx
4. As Ligon describes, “the Creed is bidding us to contemplate the redemptive suffering of our Lord, the suffering described so painfully... Now it is true, of course, that Jesus lived a life of humiliation. There’s a sense in which His very birth was the first step in His condescension and humiliation. And then the fact that He was born in a poor family and wasn’t born in a palace amidst riches. He was born in a stable and laid in a manger because there wasn’t even room for Him in the inn. And He lived a life of suffering. As an infant, He had to escape with His family into Egypt simply to stay alive because the authorities wanted to kill Him. He would say one day to His disciples, “The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but God’s own Son, the Son of man, doesn’t have a place to lay His head.” Now He lived a life of suffering on our behalf, but the Creed is pointing us to Jesus’ cross sufferings–the sufferings surrounding that complex of events in the death of Jesus Christ.” – LIGON - “I believe in Jesus Christ who suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried”
5. For a good assessment of Josephus, see: Josephus and Jesus By Paul L. Maier, Emeritus Russell H. Seibert Professor of Ancient History, Western Michigan University found here. As Luke Timothy Johnson notes, “That Jesus did not die from natural causes but rather was executed as a criminal by means of crucifixion by command of the Roman prefect, is a statement on which both believers and non-believers can agree. The writings of the New Testament uniformly testify to it, both in story (Matt 27:15—37; Mark 15:1—39; Luke 23:28—49; John 19:19—30; Acts 3:13—16; 4:27) and in letters (1 Cor 1:18—2:8; 2 Cor 13:4; Gal 3:1; Phil 2:8; Col 1:20; 1 Tim 6:13; Heb 12:2; 1 Pet 2:24).” Other non-biblical, non-Christian references to Jesus in secular first-century sources—include Tacitus (Annals 15:44), Suetonius (Claudius 25), and Pliny the Younger (Letter to Trajan)
Johnson, Luke Timothy. The Creed (pp. 164-165). The Crown Publishing Group
6. "I am innocent of the blood of this just person" - Matthew 27:24
7. This story cites the author Ralph Wood.
8. Other references by Paul include - Rom 14:15; 15:3; 1 Cor 1:13; 8:11; 2 Cor 8:9; Gal 1:4; 1 Tim 2:6; Tit 2:14
Other New Testament writers equally understand the human Jesus as the one for others. Hebrews says that Christ died “in order to sanctify the people by his blood” (Heb 13:12). Peter declares that Christ “bore our sins in the body to the tree” (1 Pet 2:24), that “Christ suffered, the righteous for the unrighteous” (3:18), and that “Christ suffered for you” (2:21).
9. C.S. Lewis describes this in a far richer way in some of his writings...
“Now the proper good of a creature is to surrender itself to its Creator - to enact intellectually, volitionally, and emotionally, that relationship which is given in the mere fact of its being a creature. When it does so, it is good and happy. Lest we should think this a hardship, this kind of good begins on a level far above the creatures, for God Himself, as Son, from all eternity renders back to God as Father by filial obedience the being which the Father by paternal love eternally generates in the Son. This is the pattern which man was made to imitate - which Paradisal man did imitate - and wherever the will conferred by the Creator is thus perfectly offered back in delighted and delighting obedience by the creature, there, most undoubtedly, is Heaven, and there the Holy Ghost proceeds. In the world as we now know it, the problem is how to recover this self-surrender.” --C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain, Ch 6, pp. 90-91
Unfortunately we now need God's help in order to do something which God, in His own nature, never does at all - to surrender, to suffer, to submit, to die. Nothing in God';s nature corresponds to this process at all. So that the one road for which we now need God's leadership most of all is a road God, in His own nature, has never walked. God can share only what He has: this thing, in His own nature, He has not.
But supposing God became a man - suppose our human nature which can suffer and dies was amalgamated with God's nature in one person - then that person could help us. He could surrender His will, and suffer and die, because He was man; and He could do it perfectly because He was God . . . - -C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, Bk 2, Ch 4, p. 60+
10. Drawn from Johnson, Luke Timothy. The Creed (pp. 167-168). The Crown Publishing Group.
11. As Johnson notes, “Jesus is the human whose character was entirely defined by his saying “yes” to God (2 Cor 1:19—20) even to death (Rom 3:21—26; 5:12—21; Phil 2:5—11). That obedience to God took the form of a life of self-giving to others, which, through the power of the Holy Spirit, is the pattern disciples themselves are to follow.” -
Johnson, Luke Timothy. The Creed (pp. 162-164). The Crown Publishing Group.
As Paul says in Galatians,
Galatians 2:20
“I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”
and Galatians 6:2... “Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.”
