Scripture: Isaiah 53:8-10; 1 Kings 3:16-28; Deuteronomy 21:23 Series: 2022
Part of a series on the Apostles’ Creed, this sermon meditates on the clause that Jesus ‘was crucified, died, and was buried,’ reading it through Isaiah 53. The preacher argues that the death of God, far from being a scandalous atheist taunt, is the heart of Christian faith. He examines the brutality of crucifixion, the reality of Jesus’ death as an act of faith (we trust others’ reports of death just as we trust the Gospel accounts), and surveys atonement theories (substitution, satisfaction, ransom, moral equivalency) while warning they can distract from the cold fact of death itself. The cross, once a tool of death, has become a symbol of life. Christ’s real death and burial matter because they mean God has entered human suffering and bridged the distance to us, so that neither our death nor our suffering is the end of the story. Closes with a prayer and an original hymn-poem on the cross.
Illustrations: time-is-god-dead-1966, nietzsche-death-of-god, solomon-divide-the-baby, spartacus-slave-revolt-crucifixion, thor-zeus-would-not-die, burgess-jesus-big-lungs, trusting-doctors-declare-death, marie-antoinette-let-them-eat-cake
November 13
was crucified, died, and was buried
He was eliminated from the land of the living, struck dead because of my people’s rebellion. His grave was among the wicked, his tomb with evildoers, though he had done no violence, and had spoken nothing false. But the Lord wanted to crush him and to make him suffer. If his life is offered as restitution, he will see his offspring; he will enjoy long life. The Lord’s plans will come to fruition through him. Isaiah 53:8b-10
On the cover of Time Magazine in 1966 were printed the words, Is God Dead? It caused a big uproar and prompted the most letters in Time’s history.
This modern idea about the death of God started with the 19th century German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche. Often, it’s presented as this scandalous claim. Like adolescent atheists who are trying to trigger Christians by saying What if God is dead? Assuming that this would collapse their world.
Maybe in other religions it’s scandalous. In the Christian religion, the death of God is the central action of the faith. But what is unique in the Christian religion is that the death of God is not the end of the story. And we’ll get to that next week. But before we get to Easter Sunday, and even though it’s the middle of November, we need to rest a little longer in this Good Friday moment.
Series Intro
My friends, we are continuing our series on the apostles creed, the historic doctrinal statement of the faith. We are going to look at how the creed encapsulate scripture and offers it to us in a way that shows us what has been revealed from God about who God is, how the world is, why we are in need, how Jesus saves us, and what we should do about it.
Today, “I believe in Jesus Christ, who was crucified, died, and was buried.
He suffered to the point of death. Here are the words of Isaiah again.
He was eliminated from the land of the living, struck dead because of my people’s rebellion. His grave was among the wicked, his tomb with evildoers, though he had done no violence, and had spoken nothing false.
The word translated here as ‘eliminated’ is nigzir. It is usually translated as divide or cut. The first occassion it is used in the old testmanet is 1 Kings 3 when Solomon is asked by the two women whose child is it. His response is divide the baby, cut the baby. Same word used here. Separate totally from the land of the living. This total separation we see on the cross. Crucifixion was a heinous instrument of death. It was a process where people most often asphyxiated or suffocated due to exhaustion. The most famous instance of crucifixion outside of the Christian history is the rebellions of Spartacus. The slave revolts. The rebelious slaves were crucified as a warning to others. Crucifixion is used not only to kill, but to intimidate. It’s not an easy thing. Christians share the cross as a symbol of faith.
Why is our symbol a faith an instrument of death? This is important because this is why crucifixion is in the creed. Christians use the cross as a symbol of faith. Not to mark death, but to mark the defeat of death. This tool of misery has become a symbol of life. This tool of pain has become a symbol of joy. In Deuteronomy, it says, Cursed be the one who hangs upon a tree.” Early Christians saw this as a prefiguration of the crucifixion. Cursed be the one who hangs upon the tree. But then we go a step further. Not only was Jesus crucified. He died. God is dead. Real death, an actual death. People understood, in the ancient world, what happens when people die. It wasn’t just a more supernational era where they assumed that death was not final. No. People saw others die all the time. It was a present reality.
This is an act of faith to believe that God died. It is a scandal to believe that God died. Scandal means stumbling block. A scandal isn’t something racy but what causes you to trip and fall.
What kind of God lets himself be killed? Would Thor let himself be killed? Would Zeus let himself be killed. What is going on here? Some people thought that Jesus didn’t really die. This is how he’s able to rise from the dead. If he’s not really dead, he can’t really come back from the dead. There’s a novelization of the book of Acts by Anthony Burgess that has people saying that Jesus really had really big lungs. That’s how he was able to survive. But this also misses the point.
What is often rarely mentioned is that all reports of death are acts of faith for most of us. That is, most of us here are not legally able to declare someone dead. We trust the people who tell us. We trust the doctors who make that call. There are not as many open casket funerals as there used to be, but I trust the doctors at their word. I trust the family at their word. I don’t seek extra evidence or confirmation to make sure someone is actually dead. This is an act a faith. We trust the authority of another. And so we have to ask ourselves, are the accounts of Jesus trustworthy? Do we believe that Jesus actually died a real death?
But what sometimes interests me is not necessarily why someone should believe that Jesus died and rose again, but why someone should not. Why do people doubt the resurrection? Because as far as I’ve been able to see, and what it ultimately comes down to is, someone doubts the truth of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ because they doubt the possibility of a miracle of any kind. So then the question is no longer about Jesus or this moment of crucifixion. It becomes about metaphysics. The supernatural, the existence of God.
But christians don’t just stop at any old death but a particular kind of death. Jesus was crucified. This is how he was separated from the land of the living. and then he died, and then he was buried. It matters that he was buried. His body was taken to a certain place to rest because that rest is not eternal. The body is put away so that it can come back again redeemed and renewed.
Now with Christ’s death. The theological significance of Christ’s death is manifold. It’s enormous throughout the centuries, what John Wesley would call justification hinges on Christ’s death. That Christ died for us. Isaiah 53 has it.
He was eliminated from the land of the living, struck dead because of my people’s rebellion. His grave was among the wicked, his tomb with evildoers, though he had done no violence, and had spoken nothing false. But the Lord wanted to crush him and to make him suffer. If his life is offered as restitution, he will see his offspring; he will enjoy long life. The Lord’s plans will come to fruition through him. Isaiah 53:8b-10
He offered his life for our redemption. His death marks something significant for us. The way is that the death of Christ impacts us in theology is often called atonement theories. It is an old english word for At-One-Ment. How do we become one with God? How are we reconciled with God? How do we connect with God? How does Christ’s death mark this? There are a number of theories over the years. The most prevalent in, in many theological circles is, is called substitutionary atonement. That is, Christ suffers the death we all deserve and substitutes himself for us. There are lots of Bible verses to back this up. There is also a theory called satisfaction that says that Christ satisfies the wrath of God the Father towards sin. There’s another way of talking about atonement that is called the ransom theory, that basically the Christ pays the ransom with his life to the devil. The devil thinks he gets God, but really, God gets him. There’s another theory called moral equivalency. And I could go on and on about these.
Seminary classes are focused on atonement theories. And yet, one of the reasons why I mentioned them is that I think atonement theory sometimes gets us away from the brute and cold fact of death, crucifixion, death and burial. These are acts of faith. They’re not the end of the faith, but they are part of it. And it matters. It matters because if Christ didn’t die, then Christ couldn’t rise again. It matters because we see people die all the time. We’ve experienced death all the time. I can relate to his friends grieving on Good Friday. I can empathize. I can connect. I have grieved. You have grieved and lost loved one. We can connect to that experience, we can connect to that suffering. And it matters in itself. It matters for its own sake. It matters that God saw us in our suffering, saw our brokenness, became human and carried part of that with him. The sufferings we face in this world are not foreign to God. They aren’t unknown. There isn’t this moment like Maria Antoinette in the French Revolution when when people come to the throne room starving for bread and she says, Let them eat cake because the distance between her and them is so far God has bridged that distance in Jesus Christ. We can hold onto hope that in the midst of our own suffering and the suffering around us, God is not far away. And so my brothers and sisters in this season, in this time, even as Christmas is approaching, in life, may you not be afraid of the scandal of the death of God. It’s not a got you moment by atheists. It is in fact the heart of our faith because it is not the end of the story. And when we suffer in this world and we see our friends suffer and break, that is not the end of their story either. This is our faith. This is our hope. May this hope stay with you.
Let us pray,
Heavenly father we thank you for your love in Jesus, who transformed the cross from a tool of death into a symbol of life. May we live out a cross-shaped life offering ourselves for others. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Why do we wear a cross When it is a sign of death In wood or silver or gloss, We wear it under our head.
For Jesus has turned our pain into joy A symbol of death now shows death is destroyed. So wear this cross well for your life is restored For Jesus has turned our pain into joy