1 st June: Ascension Sunday

While Jesus was blessing them he left them and was taken up into heaven. Then they worshipped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy.

Within the calendar of the Christian year today we celebrate the Ascension, the moment Jesus’ earthly ministry ended and he was ‘taken up’ into heaven.

Although it doesn’t have the immediate appeal of the other great Christian festivals of Christmas, Easter and Pentecost, Ascension matters and no less a person than the early church father Augustine said

(Ascension) is that festival which confirms the grace of all the festivals together………for unless the Saviour had ascended into heaven, his nativity would have come to nothing …….and his passion would have borne no fruit for us, and his most holy resurrection would have been useless. ¹

St Luke is our source of information.

At the close of his gospel Luke tells us Jesus appeared one last time to his disciples in Jerusalem. Once more he explained to them everything had happened to fulfil what had been written about him in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.

Having opened their minds to understand these scriptures, Jesus gave them the task of being witnesses to all these things. However, before the disciples set off to preach the gospel of Christ crucified and risen they had first to wait in Jerusalem for the promised gift of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus then led the group out of the city as far as Bethany and, as he raised his hands in blessing, Luke describes Jesus being taken up into heaven, a cloud hiding him from their sight.

This is the Ascension, the festival which according to Augustine confirms the grace of all the festivals together …………… but I suspect it poses as many questions as it provides answers.

Are we really to think of heaven as somewhere up in the sky beyond the clouds?

Another of the early church fathers, Origen, didn’t think so.

Given that a cloud was a common Biblical symbol for divine glory, Origen said the Ascension had to do with spiritual exaltation rather than physical movement.

So that clears it up then?

No, I didn’t think so.

Heaven might not be a place somewhere beyond the clouds but I am not quite sure what Origen means when he speaks about Jesus being spiritually exalted?

So let me approach it in another way: what is the truth we are being led to grasp, the truth about Jesus, the truth about ourselves, the truth that makes the Ascension the crown of all the Christian festivals?

Following the events of Calvary and Easter dawn, Luke reports the risen Jesus appearing to women at the tomb, meeting two disciples on the road to Emmaus and then the whole group of disciples back in Jerusalem.

If, as one commentator suggested, it was unthinkable that the appearances of Jesus should grow fewer and fewer until finally they petered out, ² it is equally evident that without these appearances coming to an end there would be little occasion for faith.

Quite simply, there had to come a moment of parting, a time when the Jesus of earth finally became the Christ of heaven.

Luke’s account of the ascension describes that time.

The ascension marks an end of the various appearances of the risen Christ to his disciples when as Jesus raises his hands in blessing, he is taken from their sight into heaven.

Yet while marking an end the blessing also marked a beginning.

You will remember some months earlier Jesus told the disciples that he was going to Jerusalem where he would suffer and die before being raised on the third day (Matt. 16.21ff.). On hearing this news the disciples were beside themselves with grief. You will also recall Peter was adamant that no such thing would be allowed to happen.

Yet it did happen; it happened exactly as Jesus told them it would happen.

Now on the Mount of Olives once more Jesus prepares to take his leave.

Once again you might imagine the disciples would be distraught yet far from being broken-hearted Luke describes the disciples as being filled with great joy.

So what changed, what brought about the transformation in their attitude?

The transformation came as it dawned upon Peter and the others that rather than losing him, the risen Christ would always be with them.

In the course of his ministry, Jesus sought to open the hearts and minds of his disciples to God’s way of looking and God’s way of thinking and acting.

He told parables about a lost coin, a lost sheep, a lost son, a pinch of yeast, an injured man and a farmer sowing seed, wonderful stories that sought to awaken their imagination and deepen their understanding of God’s presence and purpose.

Time and again he pushed people to see beyond the boundaries of their religious traditions and culture and the limits of their expectation.

If it was possible to help an animal fallen into a ditch on a Sabbath, why was it not allowed to heal a crippled man?

And if a man pleaded with him to save his daughter, did it matter that the man was a centurion in the Roman army?

Most importantly by declaring that whenever people helped someone hungry, thirsty, a stranger, naked or in prison, that is helping one of the least, was helping him, Jesus dared to wonder if God’s loving purpose was restricted to the people of Israel or embraced all creation.

Now at last the disciples understood that whenever they turned the other cheek or walked a second mile Christ would be with them.

Whenever they washed someone’s dirty feet, Christ would be with them.

Whenever they fed someone hungry, clothed someone naked or visited someone in prison, Christ would be with them.

Whenever they obeyed the command to love their neighbour, Christ would be with them.

And whenever they broke bread together and shared a cup of wine, Christ would be with them.

And because of what had happened at Calvary, his dying and rising, there was no need to hang on to him any more because Christ would be with them always.

So Luke tells us far from being distraught at the thought of him leaving, the disciples worshipped Jesus and when he left them they returned to Jerusalem with great joy.

Now perhaps we can glimpse something of what Augustine meant when he spoke about the Ascension confirming the grace of all the other Christian festivals together, Christmas, Easter and Pentecost, for unless Jesus had ascended into heaven, they would have come to nothing and borne no fruit for us.

Ascension matters, despair is turned to hope, sorrow is transformed into joy, and faith awakens as today we give thanks Christ is with us now and always.

Almighty God, whose Son our Saviour ascended far above all heavens that he might fill all things, grant that Your Church on earth may be filled with his presence and that he may remain with us always, to the end of the world, through the same Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.