| Andrew Lim
22 June 2008 - Isaiah 53:1-1-2
It seems strange that the creed of a religion
should talk about the suffering of its purported Savior
And yet it would seem like the life and work of Jesus
is compressed into one single word / “suffered”
This is not something of an after-thought
The entire Hebrew nation begins with the groaning of a people oppressed
And right through its history / the Jewish people
have suffered grave anguish / distress and deep sadness
But the OT Jews did not see this suffering
as coming from some meaningless / whimsical forces
They understood that their suffering is an integral part
of their destiny as a covenant people of God
In their suffering the Jews will not look to an Utopia
they didn’t try to make up some fanciful make-belief world
they will not capitulate to fatalism / stoicism
they will not despair
they will not embrace a theology of hopelessness
This was partly because they didn’t believe
that suffering will not have the last word
they looked forward to the coming Messiah
And the coming of Jesus Christ / is the coming of the Messiah
Through Him / the world will be delivered from ultimate suffering
and this is accomplish through the suffering of the Messiah Himself
The suffering of Christ / is also called the passion of Christ
- It was prophesied right from the beginning
- It was foretold by God Himself
Gen. 3: 15 / And I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers
he will crush your head / and you will strike his heel”
In the Book of Isaiah
the Messiah takes on the role of the Suffering Servant of Israel
He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows / acquainted with grief
We considered him stricken by God / smitten by him and afflicted
But he was pierced for our transgressions,
He was crushed for our iniquities / He was oppressed and afflicted
He was cut off from the land of the living
He was assigned a grave with the wicked
It was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer
Isa. 53: 3-10
Christ’s suffering and death
also foreshadowed by the offering of Isaac by Abraham
And Christ Himself predicted it
Luke 18: 31-33 / “Jesus took the Twelve aside and told them
“We are going up to Jerusalem / and everything that is written
by the prophets about the Son of Man / will be fulfilled
He will be handed over to the Gentiles
They will mock him / insult him / spit on him / flog him and kill him
On the third day he will rise again”
The creed affirms the suffering of Christ
Christ suffered
He suffered a torturous beating
He suffered humiliation at the hands of his accusers
He suffered rejection at the hands of his followers
He suffered a deep sadness of heart
He suffered physically, emotionally and spiritually
The suffering of Jesus assures us that God shares
in our darkest moments / and He can be found in our suffering
He knows what it is like to suffer / He suffers along with us
He does not detached Himself from us
And in the midst of life’s darkest moments / He will save us
And the creed tells us under whom Christ suffered
It says / “He suffered under Pontius Pilate”
Pontius Pilate is mentioned by name
Three personal names are mentioned in the creed
Jesus / Mary / and Pilate
The mention of Pilate’s name has disturbed many people
The creed is centrally about the holiest man who ever lived
and all of a sudden we find an insertion of a name
that grates our heart and mind
Why is Pilate mentioned in the creed?
Karl Barth compared Pilate’s presence in the creed
to that of a mangy dog wandering into a beautiful parlour
smelling up the place
But why is Pilate / so well-known for his brutality / even mentioned?
For one reason / Our faith is concretely anchored in actual history
By mentioning his name
the creed identifies both the time and the place of Christ's death
We have a reliable document here in God’s Word / which says
that Pilate was the Roman procurator of Judea from 26-36 A.D.
and that could be checked for its accuracy and authenticity
Pilate is not mentioned by name
we Christians everywhere in history could go on hating him
- if so Judas would be mentioned
Pilate is mentioned
to nail down the suffering of Christ in actual human history
The creed wants to make it evidential clear
the Christian story of salvation is embedded in actual human history
and not some nebulous / airy-fairy metaphysical tale
In many other theologies / the gods are said to have appeared
in some remote and mythical period of prehistory
The Christian faith on the other hand
is securely / evidentially hung / on the peg of world history
The gospel story kicks off in Matthew with a concrete date attached to it
“Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the King”
Luke / as a gospel writer / on account of his profession as a physician
is even more meticulous about historical details
Luke 2:1 / the birth of Jesus took place when “an edict was issued
by Caesar Augustus for a census” / Luke 2: 1
Dorothy L. Sayers / in her book The Greatest Drama Ever Staged
says that when the creed says that God was executed
for being a public nuisance / “under Pontius Pilate”
its as good as saying / that someone prominent was executed
“when Mr. Johnson-Hicks was Home Secretary”
She says / “It is as definite and concrete as all that”
And Luke was concretely historical right through
He goes on to talk about what happened
to Zechariah / the priest / and to his wife
“in the time of Herod / king of Judea” / Luke 1: 5
All this / just to drive home the point that our faith
is based on the actual flow of human history
But let’s take a closer look at Pilate
The Jews then were under Roman domination
and Roman law didn’t permit them to carry out capital punishment
So the Jewish leaders were obliged
to bring Jesus before Pilate for disposition
Pilate found no fault in Jesus but in he weakness he caved in
and gave in to the wishes of the people
He knew what was the right thing to do / but for reasons of expedience
he went against the verdict of his own conscience
And he obviously thought little about it / because he really thought
that with a little soap and warm water / he could wash it away
Ronald Knox in his book The Creed in Slow Motion
says of Pilate “I can never think of him except as a hopelessly weak man
a fuffler and a shuffler who never ought to have got his job
as procurator at all
The trouble about him / I suppose
was that he was so anxious to please everybody
He wanted to please Caiphas / he wanted to please the Jewish mob
he wanted to please his wife / he wanted to please Herod
he wanted to please our Lord / wanted to please St. Joseph of Arimathea
and / like most people who want to please everybody
he pleased nobody”
History tells us that in about 36 A.D
the governor of Syria brought serious accusations against Pilate
with the result that he was banished to Vienne in Gaul
and there / south of France / according to tradition
Pontius Pilate committed suicide
And there is a legend
that Mount Pilatus in Switzerland got its name from Pilate
that Pilate's body lies in a lake near the top of the mountain
that at the foot of the Swiss mountain
over the waters of Lake Lucerne / there can often be seen
on moonlight nights / the ghost of Pilate
forever roaming / forever moaning / ever washing its hands
It is as if no amount of water is sufficient / to wash away
the stain of one who came face to face with the Son Of God
and chose to reject Him as Truth incarnate
Of course Pilate not being the only one to blame for our Lord’s death
There was Caiphas / there was Herod
there were the chief priests and the Pharisees
But having said that / it remains true / that for his act of cowardice
his name lives forever / in infamy
And every Sunday / in all the liturgical churches all over the world
the name of Pilate is mentioned on the lips of millions of Christians
Now the creed goes on to say that Christ
having suffered under Pontius Pilate / died
If the mention of Pontius Pilate
identifies both the time and place of Jesus' death
the mention of the crucifixion
identifies the means through which He died
We all know that He died through His crucifixion
But what does the crucifixion actually mean?
What is the precise significance of the crucifixion?
The correct theological answer has got to be this
- that on the cross / Jesus became the object of God's curse
That’s exactly what it means to be crucified
The cross is related to the curse that is found in the OT Covenant
Paul writes in Galatians / “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law
by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: "Cursed is everyone
who is hung on a tree” / He redeemed us in order
that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles
through Christ Jesus / so that by faith
we might receive the promise of the Spirit” / Gal 3:13,14
Paul is here quoting from Deuteronomy 21:22,23
“If a man guilty of a capital offense / is put to death
and his body is hung on a tree
you must not leave his body on the tree overnight
Be sure to bury him that same day
because anyone who is hung on a tree is under God’s curse”
The idea of a curse / is rather strange to the ears of us modern people
You think of a curse as something a voodoo doctor
in Haiti / or Trinidad / does when he puts a curse on his victim
by sticking pins in a doll which represents the victim
But the curse of the Bible is far from this
We need to know that when God and His people make a Covenant
the structure of the OT Covenant is shaped/patterned
after actual political treaties of those days
- common in suzerainty treaties between a king and his vassal state
in the Ancient Near East / in those days
The mighty king would make it clear to the captive people
of his subordinate states
that if they follow the stipulations of the covenant treaty
they will be blessed
and if they violate the stipulations of the covenant treaty
they will suffer the curse for it
Deuteronomy 27 outlines for us several curses
for any violation of the covenant stipulations and it ends with this line
“Cursed is he who does not confirm the words of this law
by doing them (27:26)
The curse is what the people wanted to avoid
The OT Jews were terrified of any defilement
for if they were found defiled / they would be pronounced “unclean”
and driven out of the camp
a place where God is thought to be absent
Adam and Eve were cursed / and they were driven out / Garden
The scapegoat of the OT was cursed
and driven out of the camp into the wilderness
Remember the fifth commandment
“Honour your father and mother / that you may live long in the land”
A man or woman who dishonours their parents
would not have a long life to live
because they would be driven out of the city wall into the wilderness
and there / life would not be long
not only because of the lack of food there
but also the lack of all the sociological support
an the dangers of exposure to wild animals in the night
This curse took the form of a being driven away
and becoming “separated” from God and His blessings
And this “separation” from the presence of God
was symbolized by the covenant sign of circumcision
The covenant in the OT was not made / Rather it was cut
The word “covenant” in Hebrew “berith” means literally “a cutting”
They were saying to God
“I am blesses if I keep the stipulation of the covenant
but I will be “cut off” from the presence of God and “cursed”
if I fail to keep the stipulations of the covenant”
Now / on the cross Jesus was cursed
because He represented the Jewish nation of covenant breakers
and He was “cut off” from the presence of God
The anguish and suffering of Christ was not primarily physical
though that was excruciatingly horrendous
Rather the anguish and suffering of Christ / is most felt
in the break-up of this deep-rooted heart-felt intimacy with the Father
On the cross Jesus was forsaken by God
The darkness and the earthquake were symbolic
of the withdrawal of the “light of his countenance”
On the cross God turned His back on Jesus
cut him off from all blessings
and that / is the deepest layer of His suffering
And like a criminal of the OT / driven out of the city wall
Jesus did not die in the temple
Jesus was executed outside the Holy City
at the hands of “unclean” Gentiles
Like a man who is driven outside the city wall
because he dishonours his father and mother
Jesus / as a covenant-breaker / was driven outside the camp
and he experienced the full measure of God’s wrath
RC Sproul says this
“Nowhere in Scripture is the reality of God’s wrath
more sharply manifested than in the forsaking of his Messiah”
This is the reason why Paul was so aggravated and belligerent and offended
when in Galatia / the believers tried to make it compulsory
that new believers be circumcised
It would repudiate everything Jesus did on the cross
It would mean discounting everything
Jesus suffered so much for / in order to accomplish for us
It would mean putting ourselves once again under the obligations
of the Old Covenant law
When the creed says / He was crucified and He died
let us remember the depth of this statement
The cross is inextricably tied up with the curse found in the OT Covenant
Jesus had to hang on the tree / the law requires that
The one who is cursed ought to hang on a tree
“Cursed is he who hangs on a tree”
On our behalf / He became a covenant breaker
and He was cursed with the curse of the cross
and that meant He had to be “cut off” from the presence of God
But He did it / not on account of His own sin / for He had none
He did it on account of our sin
Now / pushing further / he not only suffered / he was crucified
He not only was crucified / the creed goes on to say he died
Death as a penalty for sin / is as old as the world
Didn’t God say to our first parents
“But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil
thou shalt not eat of it
for in the day that thou eatest thereof
thou shalt surely die” / Gen. 2: 17
The verdict is repeated in Rom. 6: 23 / “The wages of sin is death”
It will cost you something to sin
Oscar Cullmann says / “Death is a curse
and the whole creation has become involved in the curse
Death can be conquered only to the extent that sin is removed”
The Christmas carol Joy to the World has a verse that says
No more let sin and sorrow grow
Nor thorns infest the ground
He comes to make His blessings flow
Far as the curse is found
Far as the curse is found
far as / far as the curse is found
Far as the curse if found / how far is that?
If He comes to make His blessings / flow as far as the curse is found
just how far is that?
Far back enough / to touch Adam
Christ's death removes the curse that reaches way back
as far as the curse of Adam is found
"For as in Adam all die / so also in Christ shall all be made alive"
1 Cor. 15: 22
But when the Creed says Jesus died
it does not mean that Jesus passively got himself killed
That is not true
Instead / After a very real struggle before the Father He chose death
In John 10 / He tells us / No man took his life from him
He laid it down of his own accord
He could have called on legions of angels to come to His rescue
He did not / He voluntarily died our death
We should have been hanging there
because the inescapable penalty for sin / is death
He absorbed God wrath on our behalf
And because He is the Righteous One
in Him God’s demand for righteousness has been met
and now God’s mercy is ours to have if we repent and believe
How very unthinkable that death should come
to the One who is life itself / but that / exactly / is what happened
God died
But there is a vital reason / why the creed insists
on making specific mention of Christ’s suffering and death
There was a heretical teaching in the early church called Docetism
The word ‘Docetism’ comes from the Greek word “dokeo”
which means “to appear like” / “to seem like”
The Docetists taught that Christ only appeared or seemed to be human
but He was not truly human
Like the Gnostics / the Docetists believed that matter was evil
the body / because it is material / was evil
a prison house of the soul
the body prevents a person from seeing his divine origin
And it was highly unlikely that God would take on a material body
So to them / the body of Jesus must have been an illusion
so / His crucifixion must not have really taken place
They taught that the death of Jesus was not a real death
They believed that Jesus succeeded in setting himself free
and that it was either Judas Iscariot or Simon of Cyrene
who died on the cross
And to combat such a heresy / the early church fathers
insisted that the fact of Jesus’ physical suffering and death
needed to be explicitly mentioned
Docetism as a teaching didn’t last very long
It was rejected by the ecumenical councils
and by the first millennium A.D. / it ceased to exist
Now / pushing further / the creed affirms that Christ not only suffered
he was crucified / He not only was crucified
the creed goes on to say he died “buried”
Now you say “What’s the big deal?” Of course he was buried
Wasn’t He dead
Don’t you naturally bury the dead / What’s the big deal?
Well the big deal is this
But clearly affirming that Jesus was actually historically buried
the early Christians wanted to nail the coffin of Docetic teaching
By affirming that Jesus was buried
the creed strongly confirmed the reality
of both the physical crucifixion / and the physical death of Jesus
His suffering led to His crucifixion
His crucifixion resulted in His death
His death was sealed and ratified in His burial
Jesus was buried
The burial of Jesus is a well-attested fact historically
The biblical scholar Raymond Brown reminds us
that many have pointed out that the normal procedure
following the execution of an accursed criminal
Deut 21:23; Gal 3:13 would have been to dump the corpse
into a common burial place reserved for criminals
The gospel makes an exception in the case of the body of Jesus
All four gospels affirmed that a person called Joseph of Arimathea
gave Jesus a decent burial
This means that someone / whose actual name was given
knew exactly where Jesus had been buried
There are strong evidences / there has generally been scholarly acceptance
of the reliability of the tomb burial of Jesus
But there are sceptics that question the fact of the burial of Jesus
One of these / is a minority group / called the Jesus Seminar
led by people like J.D. Crossan
They break rank with this scholarly consensus
and taught that the belief of the burial of Jesus is “wishful thinking”
They believed that Jesus was never buried
His body was either eaten by birds on the cross
or was buried in a shallow common grave
where his carcass was devoured by wild dogs
This view is so highly odd
William Lane Craig writes these words
and since he last spoke to us in person two days ago
you could almost hear the ring of his voice here
He writes:
“Having carried out fairly extensive research
into the historicity of Jesus' resurrection
I was well aware that the wide majority of New Testament critics
affirm the historicity of the Gospels' assertion
that Jesus' corpse was interred in the tomb
of a member of the Jewish Sanhedrin, Joseph of Arimathea
Thus it puzzled me why a prominent scholar like Crossan
would set his face against the consensus of scholarship
on this question” / [JUF 142]
But like a good number of sceptics
Crossan simply made the statement that he made
He does not bother to furnish any compelling argumentation
to back his exorbitant claim
But in reality / the burial of Jesus of Nazareth is a fact
well documented historically
It becomes even more pressing / when we remember
that Jesus himself prophesied his burial / He says
Just as Jonah was three days / three nights
in the belly of the great fish
so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights
in the heart of the earth” / Matt 12: 40
Paul in his preaching / mentioned His burial / 1 Cor. 15: 4
He emphasized the burial from the very beginning of his preaching
Acts 13: 29
And now right here / the Creed affirms it in no uncertain terms
Westcott says that the efforts
that Joseph of Arimathe and Nicodemus went
to procured from Pilate / Christ's dead body
and prepared it for burial were
“the last tribute of love from friends
who had ceased to hope: He was buried”
I believe God has a purpose for mentioning his burial
God wants to assure us that we need not fear our own death when it comes
He will not let us go through and door
that His Son has not himself gone through
If we suffer / He has suffered
If we die / remembered He died too
If we have to be lowered into the heart of the earth
where it is all dark and cold and so alone
remembered He too was buried
But the light that shines in darkness / the light of God
will even be right there in the darkest vault of the grave
Jesus assures is “I am the resurrection and the life
He who believes in me though he dies / yet shall he live”
So He suffered / and then He died / and then He was buried
Now that must surely be the end of the journey of his soul
But no / the journey of his soul has not yet ended / not in his burial
He has still one more lower place to walk into
He has yet to descend into hell
And that is what we will talk about next week
But I mention it to help us see how / to what great depth
our Lord must sink / in order to save our souls from hell
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