In the Presbyterian Church worship, one of our main creedal statements is the Apostles’ Creed.  It is a creedal statement which is believed to represent the faith of the early Christian church, perhaps from around 100 AD-200AD.  It is used across many denominations and is part of our regular Sunday worship.

While practicing medicine in a Rural Health Clinic in Marlboro County, South Carolina, from time to time I was asked to preach in rural churches in New Harmony Presbytery, which covers the Pee Dee Region of South Carolina.  We preached in small churches in rural places like Clio, SC and McColl, SC and other congregations in even more rural places from time to time.

One Sunday morning, I was driving towards the McColl, SC congregation from the direction of another church in a more remote location.  The remote church was a very old congregation founded in the late 1700s by what is termed the “Highland Scots”.  Highland Scots are just what the name says, the parishioners were from the high part of Scotland (northern) and the other Scots who founded Presbyterian churches in South Carolina and North Carolina were from the “Low Scots”, or the southern part of Scotland.  Both are good Presbyterians, birthed from the Scottish Presbyterians of Rev. John Knox, the great preacher who established Presbyterian beliefs in the whole of Scotland as part of the overflow of the Reformation of John Calvin in Geneva, Switzerland, where John Knox trained in evangelical, Reformed theology prior to coming to Scotland.

As the parishioners of these various churches moved to America, some settlers quite naturally preferred “High Scots” worship and some were “Low Scots”, depending on what particular part of Scotland their forebears lived.  For some reason, of which I have never been able to discover, the “High Scots” omitted the phrase “He descended into hell” from their creedal statement during worship, but the “Low Scots” retain the phrase.  So, in rural South Carolina, where these churches are both today located, some are “High Scots” and some “Low Scots”.  As a result some use this phrase in the creedal statement and some do not.

The statement originates in the New Testament from I Peter 3:18-22 which (excerpted) says of Jesus following his death on the cross “By whom also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison, who at one time were disobedient, when once the long suffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was preparing, in which few, that is eight souls, were saved by water; the like figure unto which even baptism does also now save us…the answer of a good conscience towards God, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God, angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him.”

This rather obscure text has become the subject of a great deal of theological debate, as to what Jesus did after dying on the cross before he was raised from the dead and was seen by the first witness to the resurrection Mary Magdalene, before ascending to God the Father in his resurrected body (Jesus the Christ’s) redemptive act of sprinkling his own blood on the holy place in heaven in an act of holy, redemptive love for us all.

If Jesus went and preached to the spirits of those “in the prison of Hades=the place of the dead”, then there is ample reason to include the phrase “He (Jesus the Christ of God) descended into hell.”  If one does not hold to this belief about Christ’s work, then there is ample reason to exclude the phrase.

If deference to different congregations in the Pee Dee Region of New Harmony presbytery, whenever I preached in any congregation, I endeavored to find what their customary way of saying the Apostles’ Creed was for their worship service and as pastoral leader of the worship, I would do so accordingly.

In the particular case of driving across the area from and early service at 9:30am to a later service at 11:00AM, I had exactly 30 minutes to make it across country about 12 miles to the other church.  In normal circumstances this is not a problem.  On this particular Sunday, with my two children along (Ben, age 14, Hannah age 11), I got lost on the way across country.  When I finally discovered the correct route, we were late to the second congregation by at least 35 minutes.

I was gratefully surprised this congregation had remained in worship, as I had called the church on my cell phone to notify them I was on the way, so we arrived ready to robe up and lead worship, starting around 20 minutes before 12 Noon (when the service normally ends.)

As I entered the church, and met with the presiding elder of the day, and the organist, as I was placing on my robe, I asked the elder this rather pertinent question:  “Do you descend into hell or not?”  My 14 year son was standing next to me and heard the question.  The expression on his face as I asked the elder this question was priceless.  It is indelibly etched into the memory of my mind forever!  Now the presiding elder immediately knew what I was referring to, and he nodded “yes.”  My son, who was not familiar with “High Scots” and “Low Scots” was quite mystified.  I did explain this creedal statement to both children on the way home after worship.

I entered the pulpit with my normal ministerial presence and announced to the congregation, we would shorten the service and I promised to have them out in 20 minutes, in time to go to lunch at the regular time.  We had one song, the offering, a shortened sermon and the Apostles’ Creed, in that order, with final benediction.  On that Sunday, the whole congregation, my two children and I descended into hell.

The congregation was pleased that I had gotten them out on time, as they had expected a rather lengthy delay.  In fact, they were so pleased, I received several more invitations to that church to lead worship and had the usual length of service of one hour.

In remembrance of this “Low Scot” service following a “High Scot” service at the prior congregation, I developed a sermon which I have preached on occasion from time to time since then, which is entitled, “All Good Presbyterians Descend into Hell!” in which I argue for the veracity of the text from I Peter 3:19 and accompanying verses.  My point is that if Jesus descended into a place where spirits were imprisoned and offer them release from Hades and the place of the dead if they exercised faith in Him, and in the saving act of Jesus’ death and resurrection, then we as modern Presbyterians can find places of hell (Hades) in this life which equally are holding men and women in the bondage of sin and death today.  By going to those held in these “places of the dead” and preaching to them the good news of the gospel of Jesus, Christ may through the redemptive Holy Spirit liberate some from these places of the dead and bring these modern prisoners of the spirit (from “sin”) into the joys of eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord.

So my point is that good Presbyterians and other Christians should be willing to descend into the places of the dead and in imitation of Christ go there to liberate persons from their tombs in the name of the risen Christ Jesus and by the power of the resurrection life of Jesus Christ our Living Lord!

I write this story in honor of Jesus Christ, the Lord of both the living and the dead, and as the scriptures teach us, we all “live unto Him!” and also in honor of all those Christians of whatever congregational type or denomination or free church who today are reaching down into the tombs of this world to bring forth the dead into the land of the living!

“Glory be to God our Lord!  Glory be to God most High, through Jesus Christ our Lord to whom be all praise, honor, glory and blessing, both now and forevermore!”  “Amen!”

A Voice of One for the Voice of Many