ROUGHLY EDITED COPY CUENet AUDIO TRANSCRIPTION DOGMATICS 2 LESSON 33 Captioning Provided By: Caption First, Inc. 10 E. 22nd Street Suite 304 Lombard, IL 60148 800-825-5234 *** This text is being provided in a rough draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. *** >> Dr. Scaer, you didn't mention the descent into hell. >> DR. DAVID SCAER: Eric, thanks for pointing that out. Because I actually was going to direct most of my answer in your previous question to the descent into hell. And I got off the topic. But I don't feel badly about that because St. Paul in explaining the life of Christ frequently gets off the topic and speaks about his own Apostleship. So I guess I can fall under the same century that applies to him. The descent into hell is one of those articles in the Creed of which there's not too much agreed opinion on what that really means. So it's very unusual that even the churches that use the Creed and even those that don't but recognize it as authoritative, they are agreed on the other items. But they are not agreed on the phrase the descent into hell. I think the typical response about -- the response about the descent into hell as one good lady said, "How could a good man like Jesus go to hell?" And then if you're new in the church and you hear the Creed for the first time he descended into hell. It almost sounds like it's not the best possible language to be using in church. There have been many explanations of what this meant. That the Roman Catholic Church doesn't just have one opinion about the descent into hell. But the most popular view -- it's kind of attractive even though it's probably not right -- is that the Old Testament saints were not eligible to go into heaven because Christ had not yet died for sins. So they went to an intermediate place. You know, the name for the intermediate place is called limbo. It's called the ***limbo proctorim, the place were Old Testament fathers went. And he released them out of that particular condition to go into heaven. That's what they call the descent into hell. John Calvin thought that Jesus did not suffer enough on the cross so to have a little bit more suffering, he went to hell to suffer. Another opinion is -- and it's very widely held -- is that he simply went to the dead. If you've -- if you're acquainted with the hymnal that's used in some churches, including the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America the ELCA, you will see either in the text of the Creed or in the footnote he went to the dead. And that's problematic. Because what does that mean? Does that mean he was buried? But the Creed already says that. Does it mean he went to some indeterminate place where all dead people go, some kind of fuzzy place? I think the best explanation is the one which is offered by Luther and which is contained in the Formula of Concord in Article IX. And that is that -- well, let's deal with the time. Let's deal with the time factor. The death of Jesus happens at the ninth hour, which would be 3 p.m. our time. He's buried before sundown. Being close to the springy equinox, it would have been close to 6 p.m. And the ancient -- the cities of the ancient world were not that widespread. He was buried in the vicinity of Golgotha where he was crucified. Remember they had to go and ask Pilate if they could take the body down? You know, today it's a crime to move a body. And it's always been a crime. And you know that to take a body across state lines, you have to have a death certificate. You can't just take a body. And so they had to take the body down. They had to get the certificate. Get to Pilate. Get the certificate. Then move the body and he was buried. And he was buried very rapidly. He was not given -- the shroud -- he was buried in a shroud which would be a body bag, a temporary container for a body before a proper burial. Because we know that the proper burial was going to happen on Sunday. He was in the grave for three days and three nights. Now some people get confused by that phrase and say, "Well, if he was dead on Friday and he rose on Sunday morning, well, that's not three days and three nights. Maybe he rose on Monday or maybe he was put to death on Thursday." Well, the phrase raised on the third day simply means on the day after tomorrow. Let me give you an example and that is when they say that you can have a hotel room for three days and two nights. That means from 4:00 o'clock on Friday to 10:00 o'clock on Sunday. It's not even 48 hours. It simply means the day after the next day. You count -- it's a way of counting days. The resurrection happened some time according to our calendar after sundown on Saturday night. The Jewish day begins at sundown. Not at sunrise. It begins at sundown. So the resurrection happened during that -- happened some time before the morning. We don't agree with John Calvin that the angel had to roll the stone away so that Jesus could get out of the grave. We reject that belief entirely. Some time according to our calendar on Saturday Jesus entered into a state of glorification. The state of glorification for Jesus meant that his soul and his body were reunited. And in that one moment, he appeared in hell. No longer as the victim. No longer as the suffering crucified criminal. But as the victor. And it was an instantaneous thing. He was seen in all of the diabolical realms. Because it was not only a question that by his death he made atonement for sins, but by his death he satisfied the claims that Satan was leveling against us. And he basically wanted to show Satan where to go. And some of these things are picked up on our Easter hymns. The strife is over. The victory is won. And that is something which is sometimes lost in our theology that we see -- we see the death of Jesus simply as payment for sins and suffering rather than seeing this as being a victory celebration. I don't think that descent into hell can really be understood unless a person has been -- has been a fan at a high school or a college football game. There is something great about watching a team that's behind and is weak coming in to win the game. And that's Christ. From his humiliation, he beat Satan on his own turf. It's like tearing down the goal post. It's a victory. And throughout hell Christ is proclaimed his victory. Satan has defamed. His weapons have been taken away from him. Let's back up a little bit on this, too. When Christ died, he committed his soul according to Luke. He said, "Father, into Thy hands I commit my Spirit." And he was in his death in the bosom of Abraham. He was still in the state of humiliation. For as long as he existed in the soul without his body, he was in the state of humiliation. His exaltation was in one moment body and soul came together. God and man. Complete victor. Appearing in hell. Even if it was only instantaneously. This is something we cannot measure by time. And then after that, he went into the state of exaltation. In the state of exaltation he did not continue his existence on earth the way he did before. We know that Mary Magdalene thought that's the way it was going to be. And she gripped Jesus around his ankles. And Jesus says, "You can't do that. The old ways have now gone away." He is in a state of exaltation. So in the 40 days between his resurrection and his ascension, he was not living on -- in earth. We know when Jesus visited Jerusalem, he stayed with his friends, Lazarus. That's a common and ordinary thing. There were no hotels in those days. So you stayed with family and friends. No, he didn't stay with those friends anymore. He was already in the state of God, in the state of exaltation. And out of that state of exaltation within those 40 days he appeared to his disciples. He appeared to the women. He appeared on the Emmaus road. He appeared to Thomas. Paul speaks about that in I Corinthians 15. And the final state of exaltation is that he sat down at the right hand of the Father, which does not mean that he went to a place. It means that God would exercise his rule on earth and in his church in the person of Jesus. I'm glad you brought that point up about the descent into hell because I think that this is a point that in your preaching you should address. So how are you to preach on Maundy Thursday and Good Friday, you would preach on the death of Jesus. On Good Friday evening you are to preach on the burial of Jesus. And you could make reference that very famous piece of marble work by Michelangelo of the ***piata, the picture, the statue of the Virgin Mary holding the limp dead body of Christ. I think that has to be done. We don't do enough of that. But on Saturday night, this is the celebration -- this is the celebration of the exaltation of Christ. Many of our churches are now beginning to have Easter vigils. I think it's a good idea. I don't think it's a good idea to have it at midnight. I know I for one am not going to church after 9:00 o'clock at night. But it's not a bad idea to have it at 7:00 o'clock. Of course, you have to think the next morning you have a sunrise service. But during the vigil service, you can speak about the exaltation of Jesus. And this is something not new. If you go to hymnal -- whether it's the Lutheran hymnal or Lutheran worship -- and you turn to the -- to the pericopes, the -- for holy Saturday you will see these words "Oh, Lord God who has made this most holy night to shine with the Lord's resurrection." And then of course then on Sunday morning, you can preach on the discovery of the empty tomb. And then maybe in the afternoon you can preach on the Amais account. But of course by that time, you'll be so tired that you'll be looking forward to everybody -- all of your relatives going home. *** This text is being provided in a rough draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. ***