I believe in God the Father Almighty,
Maker of heaven and earth.
I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,
Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,
And born of the Virgin Mary.
He suffered under Pontius Pilate,
Was crucified, died, and was buried;
[He descended into hell.]
The third day he rose again from the dead.
He ascended into heaven,
And is seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty.
From there he will come to judge the living and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Spirit,
The holy catholic church,
The communion of saints,
The forgiveness of sins,
The resurrection of the body,
And the life everlasting. Amen.
A few days ago we saw that the word creed comes from the Latin Credo (I believe). In the second century Tertullian says that he would question baptismal candidates. “Do you believe in God the Father . . . . in Jesus Christ . . . .in the Holy Spirit?” Each time the candidate responded by saying “I believe” and was immersed in water. Acts 8 records the baptism of the Ethiopian eunuch. If you are reading an NIV or ESV you will notice that they quite correctly jump from vrs 36 to vrs 38. The reason for this is clear. All the reliable older Greek manuscripts do not have vrs 37. Vrs 37 does however reflect the early church’s baptismal practice. In response to the eunuch’s question why shouldn’t I be baptised Philip responded in vrs 37; ‘If you believe with all your heart, you may’. The eunuch answered, ‘I believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God.’ The early church did emphasise creedal formulas.
HE SUFFERED UNDER PONTIUS PILATE, WAS CRUCIFIED, DIED, AND WAS BURIED
It is interesting to note that the Creed jumps straight from Christ’s birth to his death, straight from the Manger at Bethlehem to the cross at Calvary. There is nothing said about his life. This is obviously not because the intervening years are unimportant. Our Saviour’s active righteousness (perfect life) is as essential to our salvation as his passive righteousness (death). However by moving straight from Christ’s birth to his death the drafters of the creed were emphasising the centrality of his death. He was born to die. In 1 Corinthians 15:3, 4 we read; for what I received I passed on to you as of first importance that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures. When we read modern biographies a page or two is devoted to the subjects death. But when it comes to Jesus one third of each of the gospels is devoted to his death. Christians cannot stop talking about his death on the cross. We preach Christ crucified (1 Corinthians 1:23).
- SUFFERED UNDER PONTIUS PILATE
Pontius Pilate’s inclusion in the creed places Christ’s death firmly in world history. Who was Pontius Pilate? He was a native of Seville in Spain. He was an ambitious opportunist, quite brutal, politically inept, and an anti-Semite. He joined the Roman legion and ended up marrying Claudia Procula the grand-daughter of Caesar Augustus. It was through her that he got his job as governor of Judea. Pilate served in this capacity between AD 26-36. In Acts 4:27, 28 we read, indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen. Interestingly, in 1961 in an archaeological dig around Caesarea a stone was unearthed that revealed Pilate’s name proving the historicity of Pilate. As 2 Peter 1:16 say; we did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. - WAS CRUCIFIED
Crucifixion was a barbaric form of capital punishment invented by the Romans. It entailed the victim being nailed to a plank of wood and hung up to die a long, lingering death by asphyxiation. The emphasis of Scripture is on Christ’s spiritual sufferings rather than his physical ones. RC Sproul relates the story of a friend who said “I hear Christians speaking a great deal about the blood of Christ. Suppose Jesus came to earth and scratched his finger on a nail so that he bled would that have been sufficient?” Of course the answer is NO! When the NT speaks about the blood of Christ it follows the Hebrew thinking that the life was in the blood. The shorthand expression of the blood of Christ really pointed to his death. In Deuteronomy 21:23 we are reminded anyone who is hung on a tree is under God’s curse. In Galatians 3:13 Paul interprets this verse for us. 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.” Paul means that Christ was cursed by God that we might be blessed. He was punished by God that the believer might be pardoned by God. In Isaiah 53:5 we are told he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. At the cross Jesus drank the cup of God’s wrath to spare us that ordeal. - DIED AND WAS BURIED
As we have seen from 1 Corinthians 15:3, 4 Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried. On that first Easter Saturday the Son of God was a dead man in the tomb. About a century ago there was a theory that did the rounds which suggested that Jesus did not really die on the cross. He fainted from exhaustion and loss of blood. Everyone thought he was dead but they were mistaken. Later in the cool of the tomb he was resuscitated. The disciples merely mistook his appearance as a resurrection. The theory was very quickly debunked even by sceptics. How a half-dead man could have moved the stone (a ton or so) and weakened from his wounds and in desperate need of medical attention, could have convinced the disciples that he had conquered death and the grave would be a greater miracle than the resurrection itself. According to Matthew 27:59 Jesus was buried in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. This was also a fulfilment of prophecy. In Isaiah 53:9 we are told that he was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth.
This clause of the creed reminds us that Christ suffered under a pagan ruler, that the manner of his death was by crucifixion and that he really died and was buried.