HC 37

Q37. What do you confess when you say that He suffered?

During all the time He lived on earth, but especially at the end, Christ bore in body and soul the wrath of God against the sin of the whole human race. Thus, by His suffering, as the only atoning sacrifice, He has redeemed our body and soul from everlasting damnation, and obtained for us the grace of God, righteousness, and eternal life.

Proof texts

• Isa. 53 — [1] Who has believed what he has heard from us? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed? [2] For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him. [3] He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. [4] Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. [5] But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. [6] All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned — every one — to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all. [7] He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth. [8] By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people? [9] And they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth. [10] Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. [11] Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. [12] Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors.
• 1 Tim. 2:6 — [6] who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time.
• 1 Pet. 2:24 — [24] He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.
• 1 Pet. 3:18 — [18] For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit,
• Rom. 3:25 — [25] whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.
• 1 Cor. 5:7 — [7] Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed.
• Eph. 5:2 — [2] And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
• Heb. 10:14 — [14] For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.
• 1 John 2:2 — [2] He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.
• 1 John 4:10 — [10] In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
• Rom. 8:1-4 — [1] There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. [2] For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. [3] For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, [4] in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
• Gal. 3:13 — [13] Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us — for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree” —
• Col. 1:13 — [13] He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son,
• Heb. 9:12 — [12] he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.
• 1 Pet. 1:18-19 — [18] knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, [19] but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.
• John 3:16 — [16] “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
• Rom. 3:24-26 — [24] and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, [25] whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. [26] It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.
• 2 Cor. 5:21 — [21] For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
• Heb. 9:15 — [15] Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant.

For discussion

1. The Assembly cited Isa. 53 in support of this answer. Read it in context — how does it bear on what is claimed here?
2. 19 passages are cited here. Which does the most work, and is anything claimed that the proofs do not obviously carry?
3. WSC Q20 treats the same ground. What does it add, and why might it put things differently?
4. WLC Q30 treats the same ground. What does it add, and why might it put things differently?

Read alongside

WSC Q20 · WLC Q30 · WCF 7.1 · BC 5.2 · BC 5.3 · BC 5.4 · 1689 7.1 · 1689 7.2 · 1689 7.3