The Sunday after Ascension Day
Given at St. Mary’s Church Kansas City
on Sunday May 8th, 2016
+In the name of God: Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen
‘I believe in God the Father Almighty,
Maker of heaven and earth:
And in Jesus Christ his only
Son our Lord,
Who was conceived by the Holy
Ghost,
Born of the Virgin Mary,
Suffered under Pontius Pilate,
Was crucified, dead, and
buried:
He descended into hell;
The third day he rose again
from the dead;
He
ascended into heaven,’
In my experience of the Church
we don’t do the Ascension justice. It is probably one of the least understood
and underappreciated tenants of the Christian faith. We don’t talk about it
much; Scripture tells us it happened, we profess that we believe it in the
creeds, and that’s about it. And if I
had to guess I would say that my experience is probably pretty close to all of
yours…am I right?
So
what exactly is the Ascension? The Gospel of Luke tells us that “he led them
out as far as Bethany, and, lifting up his hands, he blessed them. While he was
blessing them, he withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven. And they
worshiped him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy; and they were
continually in the temple blessing God.”
And in the Acts of the
Apostles we’re told that “he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their
sight. While he was going and they were gazing up toward heaven, suddenly two
men in white robes stood by them. They said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand
looking up toward heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into
heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.” And St. Paul
tells us in his letter to the Ephesians that God “seated him at his right hand in the heavenly
places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above
every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the age to come. And
he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things
for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.”
Okay,
so Scripture tells us that the Ascension is Jesus’ return to the heavenly
realms where He is seated at the right hand of the Father. That part is pretty
straight forward, but why is that one event so important; so important that the
Church says you must believe in it to be a Christian? The Ascension is
important because 1) it is the completion of the Incarnation, 2) and through the Ascension Christ becomes more
present to his disciples. 3) and the Ascension gives us hope for the world to
come.
1.) In the
Incarnation God took on our human nature, our flesh and bone and lived as one
of us. He was tempted; he knew what it meant to feel love, joy, anger, loss,
sorrow, betrayal, loneliness, fear and pain. Jesus suffered and died as one of
us, for us. And when He had died the
death we should have died and destroyed the power of sin He rose victorious
over the grave taking away the sting of death. He did all of this as a human
being like us in every way but sin, and when He Ascended He did so as a human
being. Jesus carried our humanity up into heaven with and in doing so united mankind with God, showing
us that in Him we are worthy of God and enabling us to grow in His divine life.
Jesus has gone before us and prepared the way for us to follow just as he
promised. I think St. Athanasius of Alexandria summed this idea up best when he said that “God became man so that
man might become God”
2.) The
Former Archbishop of Canterbury William Temple once said “The ascension of
Christ is his liberation from all restrictions of time and space. It does not
represent his removal from earth, but his constant presence everywhere on
earth.” In the Ascension Jesus was taken
up body and soul into heaven and so is no longer physically present with us but
being outside of time and space He is able to be present with us wherever we
are in a way He was unable to be present before. Anytime we call on His name,
or gather as His people, He is there. He is there sharing in our joys, and griefs,
pain and stuffing just as he did here on
Earth and we are able to find solace and strength in His presence.
3.) So
many times in this world we are faced with hardships, with violence and death,
with poverty and famine, with cruelty and so many other things, and we can lose
track of the fact that we already know the end of the story. The Ascension gives
us hope and reminds us that Jesus will come again just as he has gone away; to
usher in the fullness of His Kingdom where Justice and peace will prevail and
where violence, death and hunger will be no more and every tear will be wiped away and where we
will see God face to face.
The Ascension gives us the
assurances we need to continue on The Way even though the Lord no longer walks
among us, it assures that Jesus has not left us as orphans but that he will
always be with us and we with him, and it reminds us to have hope because we
already know the end of the story. God has won the victory and will return with
power and great glory to reign as King in the heavenly Jerusalem where all
things are made new. So let us go into the world strengthened by this knowledge,
and let us proclaim the good news that Christ is Risen and Ascended and will
come again!
