Suffered, Crucified, Descended and Rose

Colossians 1:15-23
1 Corinthians 15:1-8a, 12-20

On Sunday, 10 October 2004, Pastor Hunter continued his series on The Apostles' Creed by focusing upon the central message of the Epistles: "[Christ] suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried; he descended into hell; the third day he rose again from the dead . . .."

One of the interesting aspects of The Apostles' Creed, Mr. Hunter noted, is that it doesn't mention Christ's ministry but instead focuses upon the central message of the early church, which is distilled into the four words suffered, crucified, descended, and rose.

Suffered shows that God took no shortcuts as a human. Christ suffered all the emotional, psychological, and physical pains of our human life--God understood and accepted that life. As Isaiah predicted:

[3] He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. [4] Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. (Isaiah 53:3-4)

Crucified emphasizes Christ's sacrificial death to pay for our sinful nature. We must never forget, Mr. Hunter said, that our sin resulted in Christ's death, because God is a just God for whom grace is not free. It's a costly gift from Christ.

Within our church tradition, we have typified Christ's crucifixion in four different ways: reconciliation (Christ's self-sacrificing love brings us to God), justification (Christ has pleaded our case with God), sacrifice (Christ's perfect sacrifice atones for our sins), and redemption (Christ ransoms us from sin).

Descended into hell--a phrase upon which we frequently stumble--serves to remind us that Christ really died, experienced God's judgment, and was alienated from God during his crucifixion when He felt God had forgotten Him. Most importantly for Christians, however, Christ's descent into death prepared the way for the resurrection.

Rose from the dead is the essence of our Easter story and our life as an Easter people.

It is our faith in Christ's passion which leads us to righteousness.