Previously we spoke on the fourth article of the Apostle’s Creed, namely wherein we exclaim that  Christ “suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried.”  This article describes the manner of Christ’s redemptive suffering and alludes to the fact that secular government will often fail to protect the innocent.  The fifth article of the creed, “He descended into hell; the third day He rose again from the dead,” describes what Christ did after His death.  This is our topic today.

Two thousand years ago, on a Friday at 12:00 noon, our Savior was nailed to a wood cross upon which He hung for three hours to win the salvation of mankind.  At the hour of None, 3:00 p.m., the time when the lambs were being slaughtered in the temple, our Savior, embracing His death, voluntarily gives up His soul.   From this moment - late in the first day - until early on the third day, Christ’s created human body will be without its created human soul.  His body is laid in the sepulcher; His soul descends to hell.  Both body and soul remain hypostatically united to Christ’s uncreated divinity which can never suffer or not exist.  Finally, early on the third day, the soul of Christ rejoins His body in the tomb and He triumphantly rises from the grave, conquering death.

When we say, “He descended into hell”...
We believe that after Christ died on the cross He went to the abode of the fathers, otherwise called the limbo of the fathers (limbus patrum).  In 1215, the Fourth Lateran Council more explicitly affirmed that Christ “descendit ad inferos...,” descended into the underworld or hell... “in anima,” in soul.     

Notice that we say “hell” not in reference to the hell of the damned, who cannot profit by Christ’s passion and death, but the hell of a temporary separation from God only.

We believe that such a place of temporary separation from God existed in the old testament as much as now.  As heaven was closed until Christ’s redemption, so all just men of the old testament went to the bosom of Abraham, the limbo of the fathers, after their death.  There, a place of comfort but also of separation from God, they awaited their liberation which finally occurs when Christ ascends into heaven.  Since the advent of Christ, the souls of men now go immediately to one of three places: to heaven, if they die in perfection; to hell, if they die in sin; to purgatory, if they die with venial sins only.  Purgatory is a place where souls suffer the absence of God and undergo a purging fire which removes imperfections in the soul.  Unlike the suffering souls in the hell of the damned, however, the holy souls of purgatory have hope ~  they know that one day, they shall be in heaven forever.  Indeed, the poor souls welcome their cleansing punishments and prefer them to seeing the all holy God in an impure state.

When we say,  “the third day”...
We believe that from late Friday until early Sunday Christ was in the hell of Limbo comforting souls but also to verify the death of the Mosaic covenant.   Christ dies on Friday at 3:00 p.m. and descends into hell where He spends a few hours until sunset and the beginning of the Sabbath, ending day one (I Vespers); He then spends all of the Sabbath (Saturday) in hell, before ending day two (II Vespers); and finally, Christ rises early (Matins) on Sunday, “rising early the first day of the week” (Mk 16:9), the third day of His death.   Again, Christ rose early on ‘the third day,’ having spent around 36 hours in hell not 72 as three full days would imply.

 Now Christ descends into hell primarily to free souls in limbo but notice the significance in the timing of this event.  Why three days in hell? and why a full Saturday? why not four days like Lazarus or a few hours like the daughter of Jairus (Mk 5:35)?  The long awaited Messiah of the world descends into the inferos where He spends a complete Sabbath, the Jewish holy day, to manifest the fact that the old law is now useless, void, and dead; as God will soon replace, fulfill, and glorify His relationship with man in the new law of the Risen Christ and His Church.

When we say, “He rose again from the dead”...
We believe that Christ rose again from a true death in His own body.  On the third day, the human soul of Christ reunited with His human body as caused by the Word together with the Father and the Holy Ghost.  We believe that the risen body of Christ retains its wounds and can be felt as Christ Himself told His apostle’s after His resurrection, “See My hands and feet that it is I Myself; handle and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as you see Me to have.” (Lk 24:39)

The risen Christ is the foundation of our faith.  Says St. Paul, “If Christ be not risen again, then is our preaching vain, and your faith in vain.”(1 Cor 15:14)  Recognizing its significance, the Jews paid a great sum of money to the soldiers saying, “Say you, His disciples came by night and stole him away when we were asleep.”(Mt 28:13)  The modern Jewish Encyclopedia dismisses the resurrection in this same way.      

We believe that Christ truly rose twice, once when His soul rose from His lifeless body on the cross to descend into hell and “again” when His soul rose from the dead to reunite with His body in the glory of the resurrection.

And just as our dear Savior received His own body back in His resurrection, so we shall receive our own bodies back at the second coming of Christ.  Some Christians believe that we become angels after we die.  This is false.  Men are men and will remain so for all eternity, whether forever in heaven or in hell... but more on this later.

These are some doctrines related to the fifth article of the Apostle’s Creed. 

A final note: as there was no resurrection without the crucifixion, so must we expect to suffer in this life to purchase any reward of glory.  Indeed, in the measure that we embrace our present sorrows with patience, magnanimity, meekness, humility,... we shall reap an eternal harvest of  happiness.  If, however, in the midst of suffering, we exhibit a spirit of complaint, impatience, bitterness, jealousy, undue sadness or anger... we can expect a diminishment or even total loss of merit for heaven. 

In his letter of today, St. Paul tells us, “Many walk (many, not a few), of whom I have told you often (often, not once or twice) and now tell you weeping (weeping, tears of great sadness) that they are enemies of the cross of Christ.”

To be friends of the cross of Christ, we must train ourselves to see our suffering as opportunities to advance in virtue, to prove unselfish love for God, and to edify our neighbor.  There is no reward without a combat; we cannot be above our Master; the heavenly glory far exceeds any earthly trial.  These are some considerations to comfort us when we bear the wood of our own cross; when its beam weighs heavy across our shoulders; when its rough splinters prick our back.