Following the statement about Christ’s crucifixion, death and burial, the Apostle’s Creed says that he then descended into Hell. This is all that is said about the day between Black Friday and Resurrection Sunday. But some churches and some variations of the Apostle’s Creed don’t include that line at all, leaving us to wonder what Jesus was up to on the day in between.
The cynic might say he did nothing. After all, he was dead.
For the Evangelical Christian, this line raises questions. For us, Hell is the place of eternal punishment for those who reject God’s forgiveness, so why did Jesus go there? The Catholic Church Catechism says that the second day was spent “in the realm of the dead prior to his resurrection… … that Jesus, like all men, experienced death and in his soul joined the others in the realm of the dead. But he descended there as Savior, proclaiming the Good News to the spirits imprisoned there.”
Early teachings refer to hell — Sheol in Hebrew or Hades in Greek — as the abode of the dead where they await the Redeemer. According to the Catechism, that is the case for all who die, righteous and unrighteous alike. Jesus descended into hell to free the righteous; not to deliver the damned nor to destroy the place of punishment that is reserved for them.
Other teachings say that Jesus went to the place of the dead to give those who died before the Messiah appeared a chance to believe in Jesus as the Christ and redeemer of their sins.
I don’t know what the truth of the matter is. It’s likely one of those things that God intentionally left vague in the scriptures because it makes no significant difference to our salvation. It was Saturday, the traditional Jewish Sabbath, so my guess is that cynic is partly right; Jesus took the day off for a well deserved Sabbath rest.