Suffered, Crucified, Buried: Jesus’ Work

He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried.

            I often tell young Christians that there are three things you need to know to really understand the Gospel: who Jesus is, what Jesus has done, and for whom He has done it. We covered the first in previous days. Jesus is uniquely fully God and fully human in one person. The second, what Jesus has done, is even more straightforward, even familiar, to us. Jesus is the One who died for my sins. Now, there are complexities, to be sure. I think I mentioned them in Bible study last week: are we supposed to think of Jesus as the sacrifice for the day of atonement or for the Passover, that is, are we supposed to think of Him primarily in terms of atonement (paying for sins) or liberation from our enemies. Clearly, they’re related ideas… Anyhow, the point is: there’s a lot to think about, but the facts are pretty simple. Jesus died for my sins.

            There’s really no more basic fact about the faith than this one. Jesus does not come primarily to shower material blessings on us—otherwise every Christian would be healthy, wealthy, and successful. He doesn’t come primarily as self-help guru, to help us get our lives back together. He’s not some wise man, spouting good advice about the good life. Sure, He tells us to pray for all manner of blessings; He brings all kinds of healing, including emotional healing; and He says some incredibly wise things. But, as we saw in Matthew, the whole story climbs to the climax of His suffering and death. I have a commentary on Mark called Apology for the Cross, the whole thrust of which is that the Gospel of Mark exists to defend the necessity of the Messiah’s death. Or as St. Paul puts it: “Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst” (1 Timothy 1:15).

            Of course, He didn’t stay dead. The resurrection must be mentioned, too. If He had stayed dead, He would have just faced the same fate that awaits every human. But Jesus rose from the dead. At the very least, the fact of His resurrection says something about His death. That God vindicated Him in this way says that Jesus did not deserve to die. It also says that the Father accepted Jesus’ death, not as the wages of His own sin, but as paying the price for the sins of others.

            So, the answer to the second question, “What did Jesus do?” He died for my sins and rose for my salvation.

            The Creed doesn’t directly answer the third question, “For whom did He do it?” But the answer is implicit in the death and resurrection of Him who is truly God and truly human. He did it for every human. In Lutheran theology, we call this objective justification or universal atonement. The fact is that regardless if anyone ever believes it or not, the condition of our forgiveness has been met. And, here’s the twist—if He did it for everyone then He did it for me. For Lutherans this is faith. Faith is simply the realization that all of this is for me. (We call this subjective justification, the application of what’s objectively true to me.) There’s incredible freedom in this: I cannot doubt it, if it’s true for every human and I’m a human, it must be for me.

            All of this tied up in a few words: “He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried.”