Feast of the Ascension

To fully grasp and articulate the ascension is beyond my ability, but like you, l confess this mysterious truth in the Creed we confess at every mass

 “He suffered death and was buried, and rose again in accordance to the scripture. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead and his kingdom will have no end.”

 We confess this in the closing of most prayers

 “We ask this in the name of Our Lord, Jesus Christ, who lives, and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, One God, forever and ever.”

 We know that this new sovereign kingship is foreshadowed throughout the OT.  200 years before Jesus was born we hear in the Book of Daniel about the glorification of the Son of Man.

 “Let us praise and exalt him above all forever.
Blessed are you, Lord, in the firmament of heaven.
Praiseworthy and glorious and exalted above all forever.”   Daniel 3 57-58

 These words capture the majesty of the transcendent Christ and it is in this all powerful transcendence that Jesus can accomplish what he promised us all -

 "I will be with you always, even until the end of time."

 Today we celebrate the mystery of the ascension and exaltation, when Jesus already risen from the tomb is raised again, and not only with a new and glorified body, but raised on high as the exalted Christ, to became not only our Lord, but the Sovereign Lord of all that was and is and will be. 

Paul captures the totality of Christ as

                “The fullness of one who fills all things in every way”

 In Acts we hear that the risen Jesus continues to teach the disciples about the Kingdom of God.  He instructs them to remain in Jerusalem and he promises the gift of the Holy Spirit which will come to them there. You would think that the disciples by this time would understand more, but they ask him

“Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?”

How limited their vision still is. The disciples still think in conventional ways and in the terms of earthy power. 

Princely, political, military power is a small thing, this power comes and goes, and are wiped away by the sands of time. compare this to Christ’s Lordship which includes all times and places, every empire that ever was, every culture that ever existed and every peoples that ever where or ever will be. God’s life-giving sovereignty and eternal authority is now Jesus’.  

 It is through this power that Jesus leaves them with the promise of the Holy Spirit, who will continue to teach them, remind them of all things, and drive them to witness that; Jesus was raised from the dead. He ascended into heaven and now sits at the right hand of the Father.  With the promise of the Holy Spirit still in their ears, the disciples surround Jesus and watch as he ascends into heaven.  While the disciples still look heavenward an angel questions them as to why they look into the sky as if it were the end – a farewell.

The angel declares

  "This Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven will return in the same way as     you   have seen him going into heaven”

The angel is clear -It is not the end - it is only the “in between” time. It is the time of both Jesus’ hidden but real presence in the Church & his temporary absence until he comes again in glory. This in between time is the time of the Holy Spirit - It is the time of the Church.

   In today’s Gospel we have the same story. Jesus reminds them that the Christ would suffer (which he did) and rise from the dead (which he did)And they would witness this by preaching the forgiveness of sins in his name (which they did & we still do). Again, we hear the promise of the Spirit, but now there is also a blessing and after the blessing the disciples did him homage and in joy they praised God in the temple.

 These two short descriptions in Acts & Luke are surely the “ascension experience” condensed.

Imagine trying to capture the mindset of the disciples; anguish and sorrow at the arrest and crucifixion of Jesus, three days of deep despair and fear, followed by unfathomable joy of the resurrection and the amazing encounters with, at first, the unrecognizable glorified Jesus, and now, after forty days Jesus leaves them again, but not by the hands of the authorities but by God’s own exaltation. And perhaps in those bittersweet moments of elation and sadness when their minds raced with questions - they remember (and begin to understand) Jesus’ words spoken at the last supper

“Now I am going to the one who sent me.  I tell you the truth, it is better for you that I go, for if I do not go, the Advocate will not come to you, but if I go, I will send him to you”

And perhaps they spoke and even argued amongst themselves about Jesus and where he went.

And perhaps those words they heard Jesus speak took on a new truth that could cut through everything laid before it

“I came from the Father and have come into the world. Now I am leaving the world and going back to the Father. I have told you this so that you might have peace in me.  In this world you will have trouble, but take courage, I have conquered the world”

These words cut through the lies of the world, and are worthy of homage and they are certainly worthy of Joy and praise. The simple, but divine truth that now colored everything the disciples and the Church ever knew about Jesus shone like bright light.

I have come from the Father
I return to the Father
I have conquered the world.

 “And you - are witness to these things”  

 And the disciples did witness, and Mother Church does and we do. We confess by our creed and prayers.  We witness by Christian lives lived out unafraid in the world. We sing in endless praise - that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God. 

 With the Ascension of Our Lord began a new reality, a new kingship, over the entire cosmos,

though sometimes this new kingship is; dimmed by our pride, hidden by our blindness, or clouded over by our sinfulness. In thinking only of ourselves we fail to give him homage that is his due.  Weighed down by secular society we fail to give him the joyful praise that is our duty. 

 Each Sunday we a confess His Lordship with our lips, but some turn away from this truth as fanciful.

 Others believe, but do not fully grasp it, and so do not live out its meaning in their everyday lives.

 Still others cling in faith, with open hearts, to the mystery of the ascension and they make Paul’s words their own confession of faith-

“Jesus is seated at the right hand of the Father far above every principality, authority, power and dominion and over every name that is named, not only in this age, but also the one to come.”

Brothers and sisters, let us take away and remember from time to time,That the ascension of Jesus was not only the beginning of His sovereignty over all and the start of our  in between time, but his ascension guarantees his two great promises to us;One already fulfilled at Pentecost, with the coming of the Holy Spirit - the light and grace that you and I still live in.The other promise yet to be fulfilled - Jesus’s own return, which we wait for in Christian hope and joyful expectation - our voices raised as one voice - Come, Lord Jesus, come.