He Ascended into Heaven

He Ascended into Heaven:

What the Ascension of Jesus Means to Us a sermon on Acts 1.1-11 by David C. Mauldin Westminster Presbyterian Church, Mobile, Alabama

The story of Jesus does not end with Holy Week. It certainly does not end with the cross. It does not even end with the resurrection. In fact it never ends, but there are a couple of important transitions along the way. These are his ascension and his coming again.

The ascension is a transition from his completed work to his ongoing work. Jesus successfully completed the work for which he came into the world. He became fully human and shared our limitations and suffering. He did this not only to help us understand the things of God, but also because by becoming like us he could make us like him. When he took human flesh he gave human flesh a new dignity and hope. Furthermore, while he was in the world, he explained to us who God is and how we ought to live. Think not only of his teachings but also of the things he did. Healing the sick, eating with sinners, and all the rest—these things make God’s way plain to us. And, of course, his work in the world reached its climax with his death and resurrection. When, on the cross, he said, “It is finished,” he was referring to the task the Father had given him, not just his life. Having completed his work of redemption, he ascended to heaven to begin his ongoing work. That is the subject of today’s sermon.

The ascension is part of Jesus’ story. It is there in scripture. It is there in the creeds. I’ve never run across a Christian who doesn’t believe it. Sometimes you run into someone in the church who doesn’t believe Jesus was “born of the Virgin Mary” or “he descended into hell.” Everyone who believes in the resurrection, however, has to believe in the ascension, because otherwise, where is Jesus? So we believe it. But we don’t make much of it because we don’t know what to make of it. What does it mean to us as Christians today that Jesus ascended into heaven? Does it mean anything beyond the fact that we should not expect to run into him in the flesh on the street?

Well, it does. And what it means is so encouraging and exciting that I thought you ought to know about it. That is why today I am preaching about the present work of Christ, and next week I will preach about the future work of Christ. My plan today is simple. After we examine our scripture reading, I will try to help you get a handle on the problem of how to conceive the ascension in your mind. Heaven is not in outer space somewhere. We know that, and the first century Christians knew it too. Given that fact, how can we make sense of the ascension? After that brief but necessary side road, we will get back on track and hear four ways the ascension benefits us today. Let’s get going, first with the scripture reading.

The first five verses set us up for the ascension. The Book of Acts begins with a dedication to someone named Theophilus. This may have been a real person, but then again maybe not. Theophilus means in Greek “Someone who loves God,” so maybe Acts was written for everyone who loves God, and hopefully this means you. Acts is a sequel to the Gospel of Luke. Luke narrates the life and work of Jesus. Acts takes up where Luke leaves off and follows the spread of the Good News from Jerusalem to Rome. Two features of the ancient style of writing history shape the Book of Acts. Ancient history writers saw events as driven by individuals, so they focused attention on the key players. Acts will do that too, especially with Peter and Paul. Ancient historians also used speeches to explain the significance of things and show how the plot advanced. Acts is full of sermons and speeches. I’m a bit squirrelly and love ancient history. Anyone familiar with it recognizes right away what Luke was up to in writing the Book of Acts. He was writing and explaining history.

The Holy Spirit is mentioned twice and dominates the first five verses of Acts. Jesus is going away, but he will keep his promise not to leave his friends as orphans. He has promised to be with them. He is about to give them an important but surprising commission. He is going away. Physically they will not see him. But he will be with them through the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is how the risen Christ is present with his people, so naturally the Spirit gains prominence as the ascension draws near.

Jesus tells them to wait in Jerusalem for the promised Holy Spirit. His disciples still have not understood his plan fully, so in verse 6 they ask a silly question: “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” Your teachers may have told you that there are no silly questions, but I think they were being nice to encourage you. The disciples didn’t see the cross coming. They expected Jesus to lead a political revolution to liberate Israel from Roman rule. Now that he has died and is alive again, that old agenda is still on their minds. “OK, you’ve rescued the world from sin and death. Good work! So now are you going to liberate Israel?”

Jesus sidesteps the question, “God’s timing is not your business,” he basically tells them. “But I do have a job for you. You will receive power from the Spirit, and you will be my witnesses to the ends of the earth.” They wanted to know what Jesus was going to do now. Jesus said the real question was what were they going to do now. His work of redemption was now complete. Their work (and our work) was about to begin. The years they spent with him in Galilee and Judea during his ministry had been hands-on training. Now the work was about to begin. This will be important for us as we consider how the ascension touches us. We can find a lot of comfort in it, as you will see. But if we grab at the comfort and forget the mission that goes with it, we understand nothing. Jesus returns to heaven to direct operations (among other things). His Holy Spirit and his people continue his work in the world. The ascension is all about a new way of Jesus being present and a new way of Jesus working. It was not what the first disciples were expecting, but it was God’s plan, and we Christians ought to have a handle on it by now.

Then, the main event: While he was talking with them, Jesus was lifted up and a cloud took him out of their sight. They are left standing there gazing up at the sky with their mouths open, and suddenly two angels (like the two Luke describes at the tomb on Easter Sunday) are standing there. Like the angels at the tomb who ask, “Why do you look for the living among the dead?” these angels ask, “Why are you standing here looking up at the sky?” Then they announce, “This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way that you saw him go into heaven.”

That’s the account Luke offers us in the Book of Acts. At the end of his gospel he mentions the ascension and remarks that the disciples went back to Jerusalem “with great joy.” God had once again done something unexpected but wonderful, and in doing so had opened a new chapter in the saga of creation and his people.

An ascension makes sense. Jesus rose from the dead never to die again. He lives eternally. So where is he? He has to be somewhere. He is not here physically. Heaven is the logical place. From that perspective it makes so much sense that if Luke forgot to mention it, we would have to suppose it happened. The difficulty we have with it is conceptualizing it. Jesus ascends from the earth, which has an escape velocity of 11.2 kilometers per second, and disappears into a cloud. A Soviet astronaut who was, I think, the first human in space famously remarked, “We didn’t see God.” Which came as a relief, but not a surprise, to Christians. A god with a body to be seen who lives up in the sky is not the God of the Bible. Sometimes scripture uses the word heaven or heavens to refer to the sky, but when it talks of heaven as the dwelling place of God, we do not imagine it “out there” somewhere in the created universe. OK, fair enough, but what then should we make of the ascension?

Heaven, where God dwells, is not part of the physical universe—or if it is, it transcends it. No one can really explain how heaven relates to the physical world, except to say, “not spatially.” Perhaps an illustration will help. Imagine you are an artist, and you draw two-dimensional figures on a sheet of paper, and they come alive. Your little creatures would live and understand two dimensions. They could move around on the page, but not come up off the page into a third dimension. But then imagine one of them does. He suddenly stands up and begins walking upright on top of the paper. You have a nice chat, than back he goes to the flat surface. His friends are astonished, “Where did you come from? Where were you?” He replies, “Up.” “Up?” they ask and scratch their two-dimensional heads, “What is ‘up’?” Perhaps it is like that with heaven and us.

In scripture heaven is closer than most Christians today, with our modern ideas about the universe imagine. We think it has to be “out there” somewhere, and if the universe is big, it must be really far away. Not so. We do better to imagine heaven as right behind the world we can see, as if we could pull back a curtain and there it is. Yet of course we cannot pull back a curtain, and whether we talk about heaven being “up above” or “behind” the universe as we know it, we are simply struggling to get some kind of an idea around a reality we do not understand. Perhaps it is enough to trust that there is more to creation than what we can see and touch. Heaven is real. In his ascension, Jesus left this world, where God’s glory is hidden and doubt is possible and entered the heavenly world where God’s glory is overwhelming.

I fear that is the best explanation I can give, so let us move on to the four ways the ascension of Jesus benefits us. You will be comforted. You will hopefully be inspired.

1. Jesus’ ascension gives us hope for heaven. In John 14 Jesus told his friends, “I go to prepare a place for you.” Jesus was a human being like you and me. He was more than that, but not less. The fact that he has been taken up into glory gives us hope that we can be too. He is the pioneer. He leads the way and opens the way for us. He is the Way. That’s what he called himself. “If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.”

This truth comforts us when we lose someone and also as we contemplate out own mortality. All of us will die. Death is scary—even for Christians. You might think that solid Christian faith would remove all fear of death. I have seen cases where it does, but very, very few where some anxiety did not remain. And this is natural. We trust God, in death and in life, but death represents a big change and the unknown. Think about other transitions in life: beginning school, graduation, first job, changing jobs, marriage, having children, moving to a new town, and so on. We do not approach these with dread, but we do have trepidations and concerns. Will I like it? Will I succeed? Big change. Uncertainty. Look at death the same way. Now consider if having a brother, sister, or friend already there doesn’t make all these transitions easier. Your older sister already goes to your school. Your older brother is already in the business world. You have a friend in the new town where you will be living. The ascension of Jesus means that whatever death will be like, and life beyond it, you have a friend already there. He has already gone where you are going, and he has prepared a place for you. That is priceless … but wait, there’s more!

2. The ascension means Jesus is there for us. Today is Mother’s Day, and some of you are wondering why I not preaching a Mother’s Day sermon. Sometimes two things fall on the same day, and I have to make a choice. The ascension is this Thursday, forty days after Easter, which makes this ascension Sunday. I have preached several Mother’s Day sermons, but never one on the ascension. So there you go. However, I do see a point where Mother’s Day and the ascension intersect. One of the best things about having a good mother is knowing someone is there who will always love you, always support you, always sympathize with you. A good mother will discipline her children, but no matter how disappointed she gets with them, she will always love them. Someone is there. Someone you can count on. Someone you can turn to. That person is Mom.

The ascension means that Jesus is for his people what a good mother is for her children. He is more and does more because he is God, but Christians have that same comforting assurance that someone is there to love and care. Jesus made it clear to his disciples (and scripture makes it clear to us) that his ascension did not mean he was leaving them (or us). Instead, he would be present with them in a new way. This new way would be better and more appropriate to the next phase of God’s plan. No longer would Jesus be bound by time and space. In the flesh, Jesus could be in one place at a time. If he was in Jerusalem, he was not in Galilee. Having ascended to the Father, and having poured out his Holy Spirit, he can be present here with us and at the same time present with Christians in China, Africa, Latin America, and with our shut-ins in their homes. “I will never leave you or forsake you,” he promised [Heb 13.5]. His Holy Spirit is how he keeps that promise.

As the Spirit empowers us for mission, Jesus himself intercedes for us with the Father. He is praying for us. Have you ever known a saintly person whose personality overflows with the love of God—and then that person tells you, “I am praying for you”? Or when you are sick, the whole church prays for you? I can tell you, it is humbling, but it also gives you strength. Now consider this: Jesus himself prays for you.

When you have an unusual problem and you need to get something done, it makes a difference to have someone on the inside, someone in a position to help you. Your old college roommate is now in congress. Your next-door neighbor is the chief of police or the mayor. Your daughter is married to the chairman of the board. Your other daughter is an oncologist. Friends in high places can help. How comforting is it to know that you have that sort of connection to the Creator of the universe? Jesus intercedes for you.

One quick note on this score: Jesus’ intercession makes our prayers effective. Our prayers are weak, sometimes confused, often too selfish, and always imperfect. Why should we suppose God pays attention to them? The intercession of Christ. He takes our prayers and presents them to the Father; then they, together with the Holy Spirit, delight in our prayers.

3. Jesus sends us and goes with us. I repeat my warning. If you draw comfort from the ascension but ignore the mission, you understand nothing. The last thing Jesus said was, “You will receive power. You will be my witnesses.” Matthew’s gospel ends with the Great Commission, which says the same thing. The ascension is a transition in the life of Jesus, from one way of being present to another and from one way of working to another. In the flesh, he did the work of redemption—all those thing I mentioned at the beginning. The ascension was necessary because God’s plan moved to the next phase. Now Jesus works through his Spirit and his people.

Of all the things God wants his people to know, the one we have gotten wrong the most—from the time of Abraham until today—is this: God chooses us for service and mission. We think he chooses us for privilege. The prophets said it. Jesus said it. “You are the light of the world.” God did not choose you, give you faith, and empower you because he loves you more than other people. Or to make your life easier. Or to spare you from pain and suffering. The terrifying truth is: God chose you because he loves the whole world, and he wants you to do something about it. The ascension means Jesus has handed his work on to us!

That’s scary, unless we take seriously his promise to be with us and give us power. Be advised that mission means doing the whole work of Jesus. We tend to separate service and evangelism, but in reality it is all the work of Jesus. The work he gave us includes things like providing medical care (think of our missionaries, the Morgans, in Bangladesh), clean water (think Living Waters for the World), or a safe place to stay (our Interfaith Hospitality ministry). It includes inviting friends to church and sharing our faith. At presbytery last week, the moderator of the General Assembly came, preached, and had a question and answer session. A man asked her, “What is Louisville doing about evangelism?” She answered by asking for a show of hands, “How many of you invited someone to church in the past seven days and offered to give them a ride?” About 6 hands went up. “In the last 30 days?” A few more hands, in a room of about 150 people. “That’s more than I usually get,” she noted, then said, “You don’t need Louisville to tell you how to do evangelism.”

The work Jesus gave us is teaching, preaching, caring, and loving. His ascension was the handoff from him to us.

4. Last and quickly, the ascension means Jesus reigns. Do you know which Old Testament verse is quoted most frequently in the New Testament? Psalm 110.1: “The LORD says to my lord, ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.’ ” It was a psalm sung at the coronation of Israel’s kings, and every part of the New Testament picks it up to explain how Jesus is now the world’s true King and Lord.

He has taken up his power and begun to rule. Some day he will return to establish God’s kingdom in all its fullness, but that is our topic for next Sunday. Today it is enough to celebrate his ascension: Jesus Christ lives; he rules; he is with us; and he sends us out with power to do his work. Amen.

rev_mauldin@yahoo.com
May 13, 2007

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