He Descended Into Hell, He Rose Again from the Dead

by Dave Wilkinson

1 Peter 3:18-19

September 1, 2002

How did you spend your Saturday?

Saturday is generally considered to be among the more peaceful days of the week. We enjoy trips to the country, visits with friends enjoy a good book, a ball game on television, and maybe, just maybe, a little yard work.

As far as Saturdays go, the Saturday of Easter week is no exception. We might attend worship on Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, and Good Friday. But Saturday is a day of rest. The Saturday of Easter week doesn’t even have a title. It focuses on the events of the past week or on the events of the next morning, but never on itself.

However, the Saturday of the first Easter week was not nearly so peaceful. And what Jesus did on that Saturday has a lot to teach us about what Easter really means.

In the Apostles Creed as its printed in hymnals, there is often an asterisk next to the statement about Jesus, that "He descended into hell," with the explanatory note at the bottom that "some churches omit this."

I cannot understand why any church would omit this part of the creed because it is very biblical. Listen to 1 Peter 3: 18-19:

1 Peter 3:18-19

"Having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in spirit; in which also He went and made proclamation to the spirits now in prison."

There is room for confusion in those words. We need to take a close look at them in order to understand what Peter, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, is saying to us about how Jesus spent His Saturday.

Some people interpret these verses to mean that Jesus, after He died, preached the Gospel to people who died before His time on earth so that they too might have an opportunity to believe.

That’s a natural reading. It sounds attractive. It fits with our sense of justice and our awareness of the depth of God’s love.

In fact, the only unfortunate thing about this interpretation is that it’s wrong. It’s wrong because it is just not supported by the language Peter uses.

First, the word spirit – used by itself – is never used to refer to departed human beings but only to fallen angels. As Jude 6 states it: "And angels who did not keep to their domain but abandoned their proper abode, He kept in eternal bonds until the judgment of that great day."

Second, when Peter says that Jesus "made proclamation to the spirits now in prison," he does not mean that He preached the Gospel to them. The word for preaching the Gospel is "evagellion" from which we get the word evangelist – one who brings good news. The word which is used by Peter is "kerussein" which means announce or proclaim.

What Peter is saying is that Jesus descended into Hell to break the bonds of Satan – to announce to fallen angels – rebellious spirits – that their dark power is at an end and the kingdom of evil is overthrown.

One of my basketball playing friends refers to this as Jesus’ great, cosmic "in your face!"

For when Jesus descended into Hell it was to take the shackles of sin which had bound us for so long and which had bound Jesus on the cross and dump them broken and shattered at our enemies’ feet – a sign of their own certain destruction and our liberation.

Easter is the proof that sin lost. Your chains were broken when He descended into hell They were left there. And that means that today we can have confidence even in the face of death.

Peter Marshall, in one of his sermons, tells of a little boy he knew, an only son, with an incurable disease. Month after month his mother tenderly nursed him, read to him, and played with him hoping to keep from him the dreadful finality of the doctor’s diagnosis.

As weeks went by, he gradually began to understand he would never be like other boys he saw playing outside. Young as he was, he began to understand the meaning of the term death and he knew he was going to die.

One day his Mother was reading to him a tale of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table and the last battle in which so many knights met their death.

She closed the book as her son sat silent for an instant deeply stirred. Then he asked, "Mama, what is it like to die? Mama does it hurt?"

Tears sprang to the Mother’s eyes and she fled to the kitchen supposedly to tend to something on the stove. She knew it was a question with deep significance. She wanted to answer it satisfactorily. She leaned for an instant against the smooth surface, she breathed a hurried prayer that the Lord would keep her from breaking down before the boy and that she would be able to answer him. Immediately it came to her how to explain death to him.

"Kenneth" she said, "Do you remember when you were a tiny boy how you used to play so hard all day, that when night came you were too tired even to undress and you’d tumble into Mother’s bed and fall asleep? That was not your bed, it wasn’t where you belonged. You would only stay there a little while, and much to your surprise, you would wake up and find yourself in your own bed in your own room. You were there because someone had loved you and taken care of you. Your Father had come with big strong arms and carried you away."

"Kenneth, death is just like that. We just wake up some morning to find ourselves in the other room. Our room where we belong, because the Lord Jesus loved us and died for us."

The boy’s face looking up into hers told her the point had gone home. There would be no more fear, only love and trust in his heart as he went to meet the Father in heaven. Several weeks later he fell asleep just as his Mother had said and the Father’s big, strong arms carried him to his own room.

We need to experience those strong arms. We will experience them because of what Jesus has done fore us.

When I was serving as pastor of a church in Northern California, a woman in the congregation came to me after worship with a question. Her seven-year-old son had been with her in worship when we read the creed. Her son asked, "What does it mean when we say that Jesus descended into hell?" She said, "I told him it means that Jesus has already experienced all of the suffering we can experience. Was that an okay answer?"

Well it sure sounded right to me – and it got me thinking.

Death is like a dark room – it may be scary because we don’t know what is in the room.

Children will often ask someone to go with them into a dark room.

Parents will say, "Turn on the light." They respond, "I can’t, it’s dark." "Well it won’t be when you turn on the light." "I need someone to go with me to turn on the light, I’m scared."

The creed tells us about death that Jesus has gone into every dark room before us. The light may not be on, but Jesus is there saying, "Come on in, I am here and it is safe. I’ve won! I have entered the darkened room of evil and absorbed all its blows, even the final blow of death, and have returned victorious. My victory is your victory."

True freedom comes when we no longer fear life or death for we know our heavenly Father has prepared a way for us through the victory of Jesus -- who descended into hell and who rose again from the dead.