Word of Salvation – Vol. 46 No. 04 – January 2001
Christ Suffered the Pains of Hell
Sermon by Rev M P Geluk on Lord’s Day 16B (Q&A 44 Heid Cat)
Scripture Reading: Luke 16:19-31
Suggested Singing: BoW 310, 426, 514, 16:1,5,6
Beloved in the Lord.
The article of the Apostles’ Creed we are looking at today says, “He descended into hell.” It refers to Christ. We use these words whenever we recite the Creed. But the question is – did Christ really descend into hell? Most of us, if not all of us, believe that Christ suffered the agony of hell whilst on the cross, where He was punished for the sins of all God’s elect. The first Form for the Lord’s Supper sacrament puts it like this: “He is the One who humbled Himself into the deepest desolation and agony of hell, when on the cross He cried: ‘My God, my God why have you forsaken me?’ This was done so that we might be welcomed by God and nevermore forsaken.” [BoF.p.214]
Because it is believed that Christ suffered the pangs of hell on the cross and did not literally, nor bodily, descend into a place called hell, a number of church members have over the years had difficulty with this particular article of the Apostles’ Creed. They ask, ‘why do we confess that when we believe something else?’ They put their grievance to one of our Synods and a study committee was appointed. It would seem a simple matter to change the wording of the article. But it wasn’t that simple. There were a few problems. Let’s look at these first.
Difficulties with this Article in the Creeds
The fact is that difficulties with the statement, ‘He descended into hell’ have been voiced for hundreds of years. Luther, Calvin, and their contemporaries, were already aware of the dispute back in the 16th Century. Actually, the first versions of the Apostles’ Creed did not even have this article. You may remember that the Apostles’ Creed is not from the apostles themselves. It was so called because it is a brief summary of their teachings, which in turn reflects the teaching of Jesus. It took quite some time before the Christian church finally used just the one version of the Apostles’ Creed. Maybe as late as the 4th Century AD. By then the article ‘He descended into hell’ had been included.
To give you an idea of the difficulty of this article, let me take you into the catechism class. The minister explains the article something like this. The Lord died on the cross when He said, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit” (Lk.23:46). So Jesus’ spirit, or His soul, went immediately to be with His heavenly Father when He died. His body was taken down from the cross and put into the tomb, where it stayed until it was raised on the third day. Before the Lord died, so whilst He was still on the cross, there was this period of darkness which lasted three hours, and at the end of that time Jesus cried out, “My God, my God why have you forsaken me?”
This darkness represented the awful separation between the Father and the Son. It came because our sins were on Christ and He was being punished in our place. It was during this darkness, and His cry confirms it, that Jesus suffered the God-forsaken agony of hell. So not a literal or bodily descent into hell, but the pains of hell were suffered by the Saviour as God the Father executed His judgment on our sin on Christ. After this explanation by the minister, and he has only repeated what Reformed theology has always believed to be the Scriptural view, a catechism student asks a question, which many students before have also asked: ‘If Jesus suffered the agony of hell on the cross before He died, then why does the creed have, ‘He descended into hell’ after ‘He was crucified, dead, and buried’? Should not the article about descending into hell come before the words ‘dead, and buried’?
The minister then explains that the order of the articles in the Creed does not represent what took place in sequence of time. If the articles of the Creed followed a time order then it would have to go like this:
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified,
He descended into hell,
died and was buried.
But it doesn’t, therefore the Creed follows an order that shows Jesus’ suffering going from bad to worse. “He descended into hell” follows “dead, and buried” because it was the deepest point of His suffering. In other words, the Creed follows an order of intensity and not an order of time.
However, that explanation, whilst convenient, is open to challenge. Jesus’ body died and was buried, and whilst that was part of His humiliation, His suffering did not continue on after the point of death. So if the Creed meant to convey an order of intensity, then “he descended into hell” should still come before “dead, and buried.” And also, what did the early Christian church have in mind when it formulated the Creed? Were those Christians back then thinking of an order of intensity rather than an order of time?
Reformed scholars, as over against Lutheran, Catholic and Anglican scholars, have generally been saying that the early church never meant to say that Jesus had literally descended into hell. The word ‘hell’ is our English word and a good dictionary will say that the first meaning of ‘hell’ is “the place or state of punishment of the wicked after death; the abode of evil and condemned spirits” [The Concise Macquarie Dictionary]. The report to Synod 1997 said that no Reformed theologian holds the view that Jesus went to such place, an abode of evil and condemned spirits.
The Christians of the 4th Century did not use our English word ‘hell’ of course. They used Latin and Greek words. And the Latin word was ‘inferna’ from which our word ‘inferno’ comes; and the Greek word for ‘inferna’ was ‘hades’ or ‘lower parts’. But what do these words mean? Well, in the Old Testament, for example, Jacob, in deep grief when he believed that his dear son Joseph was dead, said, “My grief will bring me down to sheol.” Jacob could not have meant hell. ‘Sheol’ is general Hebrew word for ‘the realm of the dead.’ It can mean the grave or the pit. Jacob was simply saying that his sorrow over Joseph would bring him to an early grave. You probably remember reading this word ‘sheol’ in some Old Testament translations or in a footnote in your NIV. The reason why it was not translated is because we don’t have a word in English that means exactly the same.
We already mentioned the Greek word in the New Testament that pretty well matches that Old Testament word ‘sheol’. It is the word ‘hades’.
You may also have come across that word in some New Testament translations, or in a NIV footnote. So both words, ‘sheol’ and ‘hades’, generally mean the place where the souls of dead people go without saying whether this was punishment or bliss. We say generally because there are exceptions. Sometimes the New Testament uses the word ‘hades’ as also meaning a place of torment. It means that in the parable Jesus told about the rich man and Lazarus, Lazarus went to heaven and the rich man to hell.
Now if the word ‘hades’ generally means the realm of the dead, what meaning did the early church attach to the article in the Creed? Some say that the original intent of this article, ‘He descended into hades’, was merely to say that Jesus really died and was really buried. It was not a pretend death, nor a pretend burial. But Calvin argued that the article in the Creed must have meant more than that, for why was it added if the Creed had already clearly said that Jesus had died and was buried?
Well, it certainly came to mean different things to different churches. The Roman Catholic church has taken ‘He descended into hell’ to mean that after His death Christ’s soul went into Limbus Patrum, by which is meant a place where it is believed the souls of Old Testament believers were waiting the results of His saving work. The Roman Catholic church believes that Old Testament believers could not have gone to heaven when they died because Christ had not yet come to die for their sins. So the souls of these believers were in transit. They were no longer on earth but they were not yet in heaven either. In this in-between place, it is believed, Jesus, after His death, preached the gospel to them and brought them to heaven. The Reformers firmly rejected all this and held that Old Testament believers went to heaven to be with God as soon as they died, because Jesus’ death for sinners holds good for all believers irrespective of when they lived or died.
The Lutheran church has taken the article to mean that Christ, after He died, went to the realm of the dead to there proclaim His victory over Satan and the powers of darkness and pronounce over them their condemnation. Some parts of the Anglican church hold that Christ in His soul went to the place where the souls of the righteous dwell to explain to them more clearly the truth of the gospel.
Now not all Roman Catholics, or all Lutherans, or all Anglicans, would unquestioningly hold to what may have been, or still is, the general view of their church. There is probably not a common agreement among all the Reformed either. You can see now why there are difficulties with this article in the Apostles’ Creed.
Interestingly enough, since the 1970s, the Anglican, Roman Catholic and Uniting Churches in the English speaking world have been looking at a wording of the Apostles’ Creed with which they can commonly agree. In 1988 these three churches formally agreed to replace ‘He descended into hell’ with ‘He descended to the dead’. This was also proposed to Synod 1997 but it was not agreed to. The wording ‘He descended to the dead’ might stay clear of the idea that Jesus literally descended into hell, which the Bible nowhere teaches, but Jesus’ soul going to the dead is contrary to Him being in heaven with the Father to whom He committed His spirit when he died.
So where do we stand? Well, we have accepted the Heidelberg Catechism as a faithful interpretation of the Bible’s teachings. And it has given an answer to the question, why does the Creed add ‘He descended into hell’? In that answer the Catechism has, of course, also its own understanding of the meaning of Christ’s descension into hell. But before we go into that, let us look at some passages from Scripture.
2. A Look At Some Scriptural Passages
We have, of course, lived with this article in the Creed for a long time. Countless times we have confessed together, “He descended into hell”, and it is not surprising that some may well have thought that a passage or a verse from the Bible does teach that Jesus after His death and burial went to the place of extreme suffering, called hell.
For example, Ephesians 4:9 says, “What does ‘he ascended’ mean except that he also descended to the lower earthly regions?” Jesus descending to lower earthly regions – is that not confirming that He went to hell for us? But this is a doubtful interpretation. The previous verse is speaking about Jesus’ ascension from earth to heaven. But for that to have taken place it must mean that Jesus first of all had descended from heaven to earth. The “lower earthly regions”, therefore, simply mean the earth. Jesus came from heaven above down to the earth beneath. It refers to His incarnation. There is no reference here to hell.
Then 1Peter 3:18-20 has been understood by some to mean that Jesus went to hell. It says, “He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit, through whom he also went and preached to the spirits in prison who disobeyed long ago when God waited in the days of Noah while the ark was being built.” Now some commentators have interpreted this difficult passage to mean that after His death and before His resurrection Jesus went into hell and there He announced His victory to the souls of those wicked people who lived with Noah before the flood.
If this is the correct understanding, then the article, ‘He descended into hell’ means exactly what it says. But if Jesus descended into hell, why would He speak of His victory only to the spirits of the wicked of Noah’s day? Why not to all the wicked in hell? It is more likely that this passage speaks of Jesus being made alive by the Spirit. It refers to His glorious resurrection by the Spirit.
The next verse states that Christ existed in the days of Noah. He is, of course, the eternal Christ. Noah preached by Christ’s Spirit to the wicked people of his day. They remained unrepentant and died in the flood. When Peter writes all this, then they were, like all other unbelievers, spirits in prison. That is, their souls were in hell. But before they got there, before they died, they got a warning from Christ’s Spirit through Noah. Other interpretations have been given to this passage from 1Peter 3:18-20. And maybe none are completely right. But to base a descension into hell by Jesus on just one difficult passage is a bit risky.
One more passage that is sometimes used to defend Jesus’ descent into hell, is from 1Peter 4:4-6, verse 6 is particular, “For this is the reason the gospel was preached even to those who are now dead.” The passage is not saying that Jesus went to hell to preach the gospel to those who have died physically. It is saying that those who were spiritually dead were warned about God’s judgment when they were still alive. The gospel was preached to them. They refused to listen. They’re now eternally dead and God’s judgment is on them.
3. So Where Did Jesus Go After He Died?
Two sayings of Jesus whilst on the cross are important here. The first is, “It is finished” (Jn.19:30). Jesus said this when He came to the end of His suffering. The darkness had come and had lifted. He had already cried, “My God, my God why have you forsaken me.” And after the Lord had said, “It is finished”, He bowed His head and gave up His spirit. The Lord’s suffering was not only over, it had accomplished everything that was necessary to deliver us from the suffering and death that was due to us because of our sins. For that reason alone already it would be totally incorrect to believe that Jesus still then, after He had died, had to descend into hell and go through more suffering there.
The other saying is, “Father into your hands I commit my spirit” (Lk.23:46). The Lord must have said this just after He said the other words and before He actually gave up His spirit to His heavenly Father. So when Jesus’ dead body was taken down from the cross and placed into the tomb late that Friday afternoon, and where it remained until Sunday morning, then all that time Jesus’ soul, or His spirit, was with His heavenly Father. Jesus had committed His spirit with His Father that’s where it remained.
There is no teaching in the Bible to support that His spirit went into ‘hades’ or hell. When Stephen died he said something similar, “Lord, receive my spirit” (Acts 7:59). Stephen went to be with our heavenly Father from the moment he breathed his last. It was no different with Jesus. And it is no different with anyone else who belongs to the Lord. When you die in the body, your soul is immediately with God.
So whilst the Old Testament word ‘sheol’ and the New Testament word ‘hades’ have that general meaning ‘realm of the dead’, there is plenty of other biblical teaching that goes further and says that once you are dead and your soul has gone where the dead go, then straightaway your soul is either with God forever or separated from God forever. ‘Sheol’ or ‘hades’ are not some holding pens like you see in sheep or cattle yards. Perhaps these Old Testament and New Testament words were used in ways similar to how we might speak about someone who died. Like meeting up with some friends you haven’t seen for years and find that someone is missing. You ask, ‘Where’s Harry? What’s happened him?’ And someone says, ‘Didn’t you know? Harry is dead. He has been in his grave for years already.’ What you are being told is that Harry is not around anymore. He’s gone to where the dead go. The other fact, of course, is that he is either in heaven or hell from the moment he died.
4. How Do We Now Understand ‘He Descended Into Hell’?
Let’s hear Answer 44 of the Catechism: “To assure me in times of personal crisis and temptation that Christ my Lord, by suffering unspeakable anguish, pain and terror of soul, especially on the cross but also earlier, has delivered me from the anguish and torment of hell.”
Now that answer is fully Scriptural and also very comforting to every believer. It is also clear and there is no confusion. But it is obvious that the Catechism understands the article in the Creed, about Christ descending into hell, to mean that He suffered the God-forsaken agony of hell on the cross. Not a literal descent into hell, nor Jesus’ soul or spirit going somewhere other than straight to the Father after He died. Strictly speaking, of course, the Catechism’s answer does not address the question about this article being in the Creed. The answer reinterprets the word ‘hell’ in the question to mean Jesus’ hellish agony on the cross.
So the Catechism’s answer does not take away the difficulties that the wording of the article might cause. And, therefore, Synod 1997 agreed to add a footnote that explains what we understand it to mean. That footnote should appear in any future reprints of the Book of Forms which contains the Creeds. With the article ‘He descended into hell’ will be added this footnote: ‘By this we understand that Christ suffered the God-forsaken agony of hell on the cross.’
We have done a similar thing with the word ‘catholic.’ The Creed says, ‘I believe in the holy, catholic church.’ For years we have explained to those who think the Roman Catholic Church is meant, that the word ‘catholic’ simply means universal, but the confusion remains. So we now have a footnote to explain ‘catholic’ to mean ‘the Christian church of all times and places.’
With regard to changing words in the Creeds we have to also consider that there are many believers in the world who hold to the Reformed faith and it is important that we keep unity in these matters. So it has been proposed to consider changing the article into, ‘Having suffered the pains of hell.’ The relevant section in the Creed would then read: “[Christ] was crucified, dead, and buried, having suffered the pains of hell. The third day He rose again…!”, and so on. [Cf. Art 33, Acts of Synod 1997]
And so today we have looked at the church’s struggle with an old formulation of the faith of which we don’t really know what those early Christians meant by it. In wanting to be faithful to the Word of God we also had to reject some interpretations that some denominations have put on it. In so doing we have mentioned the soul a few times. What is there in your soul, or your spirit, in those moments when you are weighed down because of your shortcomings and sins? Or in those moments when you are seriously thinking – what will happen to me when I die?
Sometimes we Christians are made to acknowledge that we are often not the way the Lord Jesus wants us to be. It may be the way we get ourselves out of trouble, or the way we get ourselves into trouble. Maybe we resort to lying to save face. Maybe we are not all what we like others to think we are – whatever. I am just saying that we have moments where we are uncomfortable knowing that the Lord is aware of every thought we think and every move we make. And I am thinking also of those moments where we might just be afraid of death because we have to stand before God. Some believers may not be troubled by such thoughts, but others are. So how does the Lord’s suffering the pains of hell on the cross help and comfort us?
Well, hear what the risen, powerful Jesus did to John, old and alone on the island of Patmos. The apostle had just seen the most awe-inspiring vision of his life. Christ, so pure, so holy, so mighty, had appeared to him, and John was overcome. He was so small and unworthy. He fell down before Christ as though dead. Maybe he fainted with fright.
But look what the Lord did. In a loving, tender gesture, He placed His right hand on John, and then said (Rev.1:17,18), “Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last. I am the Living One; I was dead, and behold I am alive forever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and Hades”
Death and ‘hades’ mean separation from God. Christ experienced that, too, when He was on the cross during those hours of darkness. But He overcame their power. He has the keys to lock and unlock the way to death and separation from God. For the believer He has locked it. You are mine, He says, I have suffered the pains of hell for you. You are not going there. You will always be with me, now and forever.
Yes, whenever there is a crisis in my soul about salvation or death, then I must remember Christ who suffered the God-forsaken agony of hell on the cross for me. He calms my soul and revives my faith. He has delivered me from the anguish and torment of hell.
Amen.