Jesus said it is finished, but we all know with the benefit of hindsight, that there is an encore still to come. But what was Jesus doing while waiting for his final on stage appearance? If it really was finished, mission accomplished, you would think there would be a celebration dinner with the father and the spirit.
There is a story on social media that a bishop once asked a group of children what they thought happened when Jesus died. One child answered he went looking for his friend Judas.
Where would Jesus look for Judas, well in the apostles creed it states that Jesus was crucified, died and was buried, he then descended to the dead. In Jewish belief the place of the dead was called Sheol. It was a place of torment because it was a place of complete separation from God. Man has separated himself from God by his actions. According to the gospel's Judas killed himself after Jesus' arrest. What man could be more separated from God than Judas? So Sheol the place of the dead, was where Jesus would have to look for Judas and it wasn't just Judas that was there. The souls of all the dead from Adam and Eve onwards would have been there, the good, the bad and the ugly.
One of the questions I have sometimes been asked about faith was what happens to people who died before Christ, they have never had the chance to know Christ so do they miss out on salvation? Christ's activity after death is what allows for their salvation. By descending into hell he carries salvation to all those that have been trapped there.
In orthodox iconography, icons for Easter often show Christ's descent into hell in order to lead the souls trapped there to freedom. In these icons the souls of the dead led by Adam and Eve are shown being led out of hell. Meanwhile satan is shown either crushed beneath the broken down gates of hell or chained up in his own fiery pit.
So, Jesus' death on the cross allows him to descend into hell and let glory fill it and the souls of those who never had the chance to know Jesus can be redeemed and led to freedom and leave Satan defeated.
However the harrowing of hell as it is called has further implications than just redeeming those already there who had never known Jesus.
The child I quoted at the beginning said Jesus was looking for someone who had known him, his friend Judas. His friend who had also betrayed him.
We are not Jesus, which means that at some point we also will all fail to act the way that Jesus would want us to and betray him. To an extent we are all Judas. However, The harrowing of hell tells us that Jesus will still keep looking for us in order to bring us to salvation despite our betrayals and failures.
At the moment of Jesus's death in Matthew's gospel account, the curtain in the temple was torn in two. The curtain was there to keep people out of the most holy place in the temple, the place that was seen as where God dwelt on earth. Only the most holy people, the priests could access God. The splitting of the curtain changes that. Direct access to God is available for all, not restricted to the holy few. God no longer dwells in one specific place on earth. Rather he dwells within each of us.
I have recently read the novel Grantchester, which is a prequel to the Grantchester novels that the TV show is based on about the crime solving vicar of Grantchester, Sidney Chambers. The novel opens with the 18th birthday celebrations of Sidney's best friend Robert. However within a few months they are in Italy fighting in the second world war. There is a priest attached to their regiment, Rev Nev as he is known. When asked how he manages to keep faith with the misery of the battlefield all around him he responds by saying Christ descended into hell, therefore Christ knows what suffering is.
Whilst thankfully most of us have never had to fight in a war, we do all experience suffering of one sort or another. To be alive is to love and lose, to feel happiness but also pain and despair. Jesus has lived, suffered and died as a man. God is not some wonderful person sat on high who has never known what it is to feel hurt and pain and loss and despair. God in Jesus has known and felt all that and more for our sakes and so he can strengthen and support us to deal with it in our lives.
Why is it called Good Friday when the events are so bleak? Because by facing death and suffering Jesus brought about a new relationship between man and God. It is the day when Satan thought he would celebrate victory dancing in the fires of hell and instead finds himself sitting in cold ashes and ruins.
Amen
