Sunday, May 21, 2023
/The Seventh Sunday of Easter
Acts 1:6-14; Psalm 68:1-10, 33-36; 1 Peter 4:12-14; 5:6-11; John 17:1-11
The Rev. Clint Brown
On Thursday last, this church marked the Feast of the Ascension with a special service of evensong. It was our way of saying that this day, which usually falls in the middle of the workweek and tends to fly under the radar, is important. It is, after all, designated by the Prayer Book as one of the seven “principal feasts” of this Church (BCP 15). We refer to the ascension every time we say the Creed – any of the creeds – and declare that, “He ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father.” The ascension sits right there alongside the big three – the incarnation, the crucifixion, and the resurrection – in our confessional life. It is, in short, a pillar of our faith hiding in plain sight, absolutely equal in significance to all the others, and the scant attention we pay to it is in no way commensurate with its importance.
The death, resurrection, [and] ascension…of our Lord…so belong together that each event is indispensable for the story of our redemption. In fact, no one aspect of the mission of Christ can be stated properly without reference to the others. [Christ’s life is what gives significance to his death.] If Christ died, but did not rise again, our faith is vain. If he rose but did not ascend, he is not gone to God the Father Almighty, he is [somewhere out there still wandering] in our world….. If he is not [now] on the right hand of God the Father, he does not reign, and we have no King.[1]
Pull one thread and the whole garment comes undone. What the ascension is is the essential link between the Jesus of history and the Christ of faith.
The ascension of Christ as a physical event observed by witnesses is referred to only three times in the New Testament, and, of the three, it is noteworthy that two are by the same author, Luke, who penned both the Gospel that bears his name and the book of Acts. The third, an addition to the last chapter of Mark, almost certainly dates to the 2nd century and owes its existence to the influence of Luke. On the whole, the NT seems much more concerned with Jesus’s present exalted status in heaven than with the question of how he got there, but it is certainly intriguing to consider. It is a fact that, as any wag will tell you, if Jesus lifted off of the Mount of Olives on a spring morning around the year 33, even traveling at the speed of light, he would still not have made it out of the galaxy.[2] The thought amuses me. I’m sure you’re like me – it makes you stop and think. Thought-provoking questions like this help ground scripture in reality, and I do think there is a response. It is my personal belief that God does not override the laws of physics to accomplish the divine purposes and that whatever seems inexplicable has an explanation. There are simply things we just don’t know about yet. So, wherever and whatever heaven is, I’m convinced that Jesus got there and that he’s there now, not hurtling past quasars and asteroid belts somewhere en route.
Anyway, where the ascension really matters is not the “How?” but the “Where?”. “Where Jesus is” is at the right hand of God (Psalm 110:1), in a position of authority in the closest proximity to God. He is present to God in both his humanity and his divinity. And why that matters is this:
It is because the Son has ascended that he is able to act [in his threefold office as] King, Priest, and Prophet; to be with us in the preaching of the Word and in the Sacrament; to be with us when two or three are gathered together. His Ascension and his ubiquity, his life to God and his life to us; his presence to help us in our temptation, to convict us of sin and to offer us forgiveness; to protect, to comfort, to encourage us; to illumine, to free and empower us – to give us all the blessings of the children of God, everywhere, every time, in all states and conditions – all this is the consequence of his Ascension. He is with us because he is with God, and works with the omnipotence of God and his Spirit. When he ascended, he sent the Spirit, and with the Spirit, by the Spirit, he is God with us forever.[3]
The closest parallel I can think of to make this point comes in a scene from Star Wars. Old Obi-Wan Kenobi is in a duel to the death with Darth Vader, and it appears that it is only a matter a time before he will have to succumb; but, far from regretting his demise, he welcomes it. He says: “Strike me down, and I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.” If you have ever wondered why Christ had to go away, why he couldn’t just hang out with us and stick around, this is the answer, so that he could be released, no longer localized, no longer bound to a specific place and time; that he could be with all of us, throughout the whole world, always and forever. The ascension is the essential link between the Jesus of history and the Christ of faith. It is indispensable. Christ had to go away so that he could be near to us all. And because he has gone away, we know that he will come back, and as the Church has proclaimed since the day the disciples stood on the mountain gawking at the sky to this, we say, “Come, Lord Jesus.”
[1] J. Haroutunian, “The Doctrine of the Ascension: A Study of the New Testament Teaching,” Interpretation, 10 no. 3 (Jul 1956): 270.
[2] The Milky Way Galaxy is no less than 26,000 light years across.
[3]Haroutunian, “Doctrine,” 280.