Descended to Hell - What Does THAT Mean?

When I selected today’s Bible reading, I didn’t remember that tomorrow is Hallowe’en. It’s a weekend when people binge on ghost stories and horror movies, when yards & offices are decked with tombstones and cobwebs, and people dress up in scary costumes. Talking about 3 people being hanged at “the place of the skull” seems to fit.

Yet Matthew’s account of Jesus’ death on the cross is not written to be creepy. Quite the contrary: the gospel is written to comfort you. God’s word gives you the assurance that God will never leave you or forsake you.

Matthew actually downplays the horror of Jesus’ suffering on Good Friday at Golgotha. I’ve heard preachers and lecturers describe the gory details of being nailed to a cross ‘til it made you sick. Matthew had no need to dwell on Jesus’ physical suffering. Most of Matthew’s audience in the early church had seen people executed by crucifixion.

Matthew doesn’t even devote a full sentence to the crucifixion

When they had crucified him, they divided up his clothes by casting lots.

Matthew 27:35 (NIV)

Make no mistake, there is intense pain and difficulty breathing for a person who is severely whipped and then crucified.

Yet Matthew’s focus is on the loneliness of hanging on a cross. It’s lonely, not b/c nobody was around, but b/c of the intensity of the bullying and mockery.

The bullying is endorsed by the governor. What was the written charge against Jesus?

Above his head they placed the written charge against him: this is jesus, the king of the jews.

Matthew 27:37 (NIV)

It was official, but not honest. Pontius Pilate didn’t see Jesus as a genuine threat. With this charge, Pilate is mocking Jesus, mocking the Jewish leaders, mocking the Jewish nation.

Matthew describes 3 more waves of people insulting Jesus:

“Those who passed by hurled insults at [Jesus].”

“The chief priests, the teachers of the law, and the elders mocked [Jesus].”

Then: even “the rebels who were crucified with him also heaped insults on him”

Was there ever a lonelier, more terrible place than the centre cross on skull hill?

The loneliness gets worse when darkness comes. It’s not evening, but the sky turns black for 3 hours: from noon ‘til 3 pm! It’s unnatural. It frightens everyone!

And then those standing there heard Jesus cry out in a loud voice: “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” What does it mean?

Jesus is quoting the opening lines of Ps 22: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

This is the most intense suffering of Jesus on the cross. It’s also where we see the power of Jesus’ sacrifice.

Most of you have heard me describe how our sinful disobedience cuts us off from God. Sinful behaviour pushes other people away. It’s part of our confession of sin: I deserve to be forsaken by God b/c I’ve hurt other people deeply and my rebellion – treason – against God as King.

And sometimes, in the dark of night, when the brokenness and pain of the world is most intense, we might borrow the words of Psalm 22 and cry out to God. Have you been there: angry, scared, and feeling like you’re all alone in a godforsaken place?

Matthew’s description of Jesus’ suffering shows how Jesus was cut off from God and from other people in your place. B/c Jesus was forsaken by his heavenly Father, you are assured that you will never be left alone. He is your rescuer; Jesus will never abandon you.

It's there, on the cross, in the dark: Jesus descended to hell.

The Apostles’ Creed puts a spotlight on Jesus’ descent to hell. Sometimes it makes us confused about the order of events.

He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried; he descended to hell.

John Calvin alerts us that this list is not in order of events: first the creed describes Jesus’ physical suffering, then his spiritual suffering. It was when Jesus “was crucified” that “he descended to hell.” Jesus’ descent to hell was actually the worst part of his crucifixion, in Calvin’s words,

[Jesus] paid a greater and more excellent price in suffering in his soul the terrible torments of a condemned and forsaken man.[1]

To be cut off from God, the source of life, is to experience hell. That’s what Jesus faced in the darkness on the cross so we never have to.

That’s the power of Jesus’ being our substitute. He faced the wrath of God on human wrongdoing and took the whole weight of punishment for sin.

Being 100% human, he can take your place; your punishment.

Being 100% God, Jesus could bear it. He wasn’t destroyed by sin or death.

Matthew carefully makes it clear that the suffering did not kill Jesus. When the time was right, once the price had been paid, Jesus gave up his spirit.

The fullness of Jesus’ sacrifice to cover human sin and punishment on the cross was one of the re-discoveries of the Reformation roughly 500 yrs ago. Oct 31 is not just Halloween. It’s also Reformation Day. Reformation Day is still a civic holiday in Chile, Slovenia, and parts of Germany.

The Reformation was a time when Martin Luther and other Reformers rediscovered that our righteousness come by faith alone. Many people in our congregation are in small groups studying the book Body & Soul, looking at the HC.

In Q&A 44, the HC celebrate the comfort to us in what Jesus suffered on our behalf.

Why does the creed add, “He descended to hell”?

To assure me during attacks of deepest dread and temptation that Christ my Lord,

by suffering unspeakable anguish, pain, and terror of soul,

on the cross but also earlier,

has delivered me from hellish anguish and torment.

“Attacks of deepest dread and temptation” – I suspect a lot of people can identify with attacks like that.

It’s the deep sense of guilt that motivated Martin Luther to search the Scriptures and find reassurance and a sense of peace that was lacking in the preaching and pastoral care of the church in his day. In a eureka-moment, Luther found in Romans 3 that we have rec’d in Jesus a righteousness, not based on obeying the law, but our righteousness is by faith in Jesus.

· Jesus has fully paid for all your sins by his precious blood and has set you free from the tyranny of the devil.

· Jesus has delivered you from hellish anguish and torment.

Can you believe it?

Do you believe it?

As a result, when you feel alone in the darkness, when you are bullied by people or by temptation or guilt or shame, you are invited to remember Jesus’ sacrifice on your behalf. You are not alone. God’s OT promise is repeated in the NT book of Hebrews:

Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.”

Deuteronomy 31:6 (NIV)

[1] Calvin, Institutes II 10.