The Ascension

 

Acts 1:1-11

In the first book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and teach ² until the day when he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. ³ After his suffering he presented himself alive to them by many convincing proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God. ⁴ While staying with them, he ordered them not to leave Jerusalem but to wait there for the promise of the Father. “This,” he said, “is what you have heard from me; ⁵ for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”

⁶ So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” ⁷ He replied, “It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. ⁸ But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” ⁹ When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. ¹⁰ While he was going and they were gazing up toward heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them. ¹¹ 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.”

            On Thursday, 40 days after Easter, we celebrate the Ascension, as detailed in Acts 1. But the book of Acts begins by Luke addressing the book to a certain man named Theophilus. The gospel of Luke started that same way, with an address to Theophilus. It seems like an unimportant detail. I mean we know basically nothing about this Theophilus. He has a cool name. It means both friend of God and lover of God. But one early church father from the 4^th century named John Chrysostom had this to say about the importance of the address: for the sake of a single individual, Luke took pains to write for him an entire gospel. And on top of that he also wrote for him an entire history of the early church, which is the book of Acts.

I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to write a book, but it sounds like a lot of work. Most don’t undertake such a project like writing a book unless they think hundreds or thousands will read it. You will likely have to sell at least 500-1000 books to just break even on publishing costs. And that’s nowadays when publishing is much cheaper with modern technology. You’ll probably need to sell at least 20 thousand books just to make a living off of being an author for one year. But Luke considered it worth the effort to write these two books just for Theophilus. Now perhaps he hoped that his book would be read by others over time, that Theophilus might pass it on to others after reading. But he couldn’t have known if God would use it beyond just Theophilus. I mean copying a book was no easy task in biblical times. People have to consider a book really important to enter the labor of handwriting a copy. But Luke knew it was worth all his effort as an author if only it strengthened the faith of one man. That would have been enough. Now of course we know in hindsight that God blessed Luke’s labor beyond what he could have ever imagined. Luke’s two books are now among the most read books in the entire world.

            But I’m bringing this up for two points. First, all your work of ministry is worth it if it just impacts one person. That’s enough. Often it is easy to get pessimistic or sad when not as many people show up as we’d like to our Sunday School classes or our prayer groups or our children or youth events. But if we can just impact one person, impact them eternally. Well then of course our labors were well worth the effort. Do not overlook any opportunity God gives you to influence another, even if it is just one other. But secondly, don’t be surprised if the things you did just to help one person, have far wider ripple effects than you could imagine. For who knows how what you did for the life of one person will impact the family and friends of that one person whom they interact with the rest of their lives. You might bring one person to faith in Christ only to find out generations later that a great multitude of descendants from that one person all trace their faith back to that one person you helped. Like with Luke, the effort you do for one person may be magnified by God to help thousands or even billions.

            Well, as we continue in Acts 1 we learn that the resurrected Jesus only stayed on the earth for forty days after his resurrection before he left earth and ascended into heaven. Why only forty days? Why not stay around a while longer? Or forever? Well, 40 days was enough time for Jesus to have given a sufficient number of convincing proofs of his resurrection, and to reiterate the teachings he had given his disciples. But Jesus could not stay forever, for it was not yet time to inaugurate his kingdom. Because if Jesus were to bring about the kingdom of heaven here on earth, he’d need to begin the last judgment to sift out only those who are worthy of heaven. But Jesus wanted there to be time for the gospel to spread across the earth and for people to have a chance to come to faith before he ushered in the kingdom with the last judgment.

But I’ve often wondered why Jesus didn’t stay and do that evangelizing work himself, traveling the world spreading the gospel. One possible answer is that it’s because Jesus wants people to come to him by faith, not merely because they’ve seen, but, having not seen, still believing… such that faith really is a choice. But I also wonder, if Jesus went and did the evangelistic work himself, would it really have been any more effective than sending his disciples as witnesses? I mean Jesus, when he first came, did plenty of miracles, and yet many still disbelieved, and ultimately he was crucified. Is it possible that if Jesus stayed around on earth, that many people would still disbelieve him and that many people might actually try to crucify him again and again? I mean that was the fate of many of his disciples, disciples who would themselves do miracles by the power of the Holy Spirit, and yet were still disbelieved and persecuted and killed.

Or if Jesus did the evangelistic work himself, how would people know that Jesus really rose from the dead if he went around telling people about his resurrection? If Jesus traveled to a country where no one saw him die, why should they assume he really died and rose again, and that it’s not just some fantastical story he’s peddling? How do they know that he was not really alive the whole time and never died? The only way to verify such a claim like the resurrection is to ask witnesses to the event about it. We need witnesses. Right? Who are you more likely to trust: some random guy who comes up and told you he broke a 4-minute mile, or if you hear from a few witnesses who were at the track meet who said, “I saw him break 4 minutes in the mile.” Witnesses are needed for credibility. Those who won’t be convinced of the resurrection by the testimony of the witness of the disciples, neither would they be convinced if Jesus himself told them he rose from the dead.

            So Jesus ascended to heaven and left the work to the disciples, the witnesses. But of course the mission work could not be begun until the Holy Spirit was sent. We will celebrate the coming of the Spirit on Pentecost in a couple weeks. But the disciples were instructed to simply wait until the Spirit was given. John Chrysostom said that if the disciples tried to go and begin the work of evangelism before the Spirit had been given, that would be like an army trying to go out into battle before they had been armed with any weapons. They needed the power of the Spirit if they were going to be effective. For remember how ineffective the disciples were without the Spirit. How not long ago they had all fallen asleep on Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, they had all fled at his arrest, and how Peter had denied Jesus to protect his own skin. But the Spirit would soon enable them to do things that they could not do merely by the power of the flesh. They would be given boldness and courage, they would be given the right words to say to testify to Jesus, and they would be led by the Spirit into chance encounters that helped spread the gospel, like with an Ethiopian eunuch.

            But having been told that the Spirit is coming, the disciples understandably ask Jesus, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” In hindsight we know that this expectation of the disciples was obviously mistaken. It was not yet time. But why they misunderstand is easy to understand. On Pentecost we will hear from the prophet Joel that “in the last days God will pour out his Spirit upon all flesh.” The disciples knew their Bibles, they knew, oh the Spirit is coming, it must therefore be the last days. And indeed it was the last days. But a day in God’s sight is like a thousand years. We are still in the last days 2000 years later. But it is the last days because we are in the age of the Spirit, we are in the age where we know about the death and resurrection of Jesus. This is an age radically different than most of human history. The last days was going to be a longer time period than they realized. And understandably the disciples must have thought, ok the crucifixion, that was a surprise, we didn’t expect the Messiah to die. But now Jesus is risen. Surely it is time for him to fulfill the rest of his Messianic duties and restore the kingdom to Israel. But not yet. They will have to wait longer. Jesus says, “It is not for you to know the days or the hours.”

            We do not need to know the days of the kingdom; we must merely trust that Jesus will bring it about. Jesus says we don’t need to know the days of the kingdom, but we do need to know the power of the Holy Spirit. The power to be Christ’s witnesses. And if God gives us power, he wants us to use it. God doesn’t give us power to go and bury our gifts in the sand. God gives us power to use, and the power of the Spirit is meant to be used to spread the gospel in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the ends of the earth. And indeed there was power in the Spirit, for we see that the message of those twelve disciples, those twelve ragtag disciples of fisherman and tax collectors would see their message and their gospel spread rapidly such that it is now believed by billions. No other message has so shaped the world as Christianity has.

            And yet the work is not done. We must continue to be witnesses. And I love how Jesus takes the time to name different places those first disciples were meant to be witnesses. He starts local with the city of Jerusalem they were in. Then he goes regional, to the region of Judea. Then he goes to a neighboring area, Samaria, and finally to the ends of the earth. Friends, our heart for Jesus should impact the city of Albemarle, it should impact the state of North Carolina, it should impact South Carolina, and it should impact the whole world. Now sometimes as Christians we get in disputes as to what the greatest priority is. Some want to prioritize local. They say why not prioritize the person in need who lives just down the street. Surely it is easier to help them than someone halfway across the world. Others say we must prioritize international. They say in the United States there is one pastor for every roughly 700 people. But look at other countries like Japan. There they have just one pastor for every roughly 28,000 people. The need for workers is greater there. Both sides make great points. But my thought is that God calls us to help locally, regionally, and internationally. Whatever you feel God calling you towards, work there. And rejoice in other workers working where they feel called or inspired to work. We need workers in America and in China and in Africa. We need each other to fulfill this Great Commission from God. We’re coworkers who need to encourage and celebrate each other.

            For Christ calls us all to be witnesses. Now yes, Ephesians 4:11 says God calls some to be evangelists, some to be prophets, some to be pastors or teachers or apostles. So we’re not all called to be missionaries going out to Japan. Nor are we all called to fulltime ministry. Only some are. But we’re all called to be Christ’s witnesses. And let me explain what a witness is. Some confuse being a witness with being an advocate. Being an advocate is when one is advocating for why others should believe in God. They are equipped with reasons and arguments for why we should believe. And that advocacy work is useful and part of what it means to be a witness. But primarily to be a witness is to testify to events you have personally experienced in your life. To be a witness is primarily to have a story about how Jesus has made your life better. An advocate says Jesus can save your life. A witness says Jesus has saved my life, and that’s how I know he could save yours too. A witness says, “My life was lost in sin and I was stumbling quickly towards places I did not want to be. But Christ forgave me, gave me direction, and purpose, gave me his spirit to make me a better person, and now I can’t imagine going back to living life without Christ. For Christ is my life.” That’s being a witness. And that’s what we’re all called to do. We’re all called to have stories of how God has been good in our lives, and that is something we need to share with others we know. Be a witness for your Lord.

            And I want to end by just talking a little bit more about the ascension. Why does it matter? One reason is that God is showing in Jesus that those who humble themselves the lowest are worthy to be exalted the highest. Jesus humbled himself by leaving heaven to come down to earth, and not just come down to earth, but to take on human flesh, and to suffer and die, and even descend down into Hades, the abode of the dead. Jesus went as low as you could go for us and for our salvation. And so it was only proper for God to exalt him to the highest station. And this began with the resurrection. God brought Jesus back up from the abode of the dead to dwell again on earth. But Jesus needed exalted higher yet. Jesus needed to be raised even higher, raised back into heaven, the highest heaven, and seated at the right hand of God and given a name above every name and given power above all other authorities.

            Easter is rightfully given prime place in the Christian calendar for in rising from the dead, Jesus conquered death for us. But the Ascension is just as important. For in ascending to heaven, Christ was exalted even higher, lifted even higher, and in being lifted higher, he showed to us that we are not merely ensured resurrection, to live again on earth, but we are ensured ascension, that we will get to live not just on earth, but also in heaven. And that’s crucial. Because as much as I like living on earth, there are still flaws here on earth. But life in heaven, wow, that will be perfect.

            And my final point is this. And this point comes from Tim Keller. The ascension of Jesus is not the absence of Christ. It can feel that way. It can feel like Jesus is leaving us. But the ascension is not the absence of Christ, it’s actually the increased and heightened presence of Christ.  Rather than being a loss of intimacy it is a magnification of intimacy. Now that seems hard to believe. Because if you’re like me, sometimes you wish that you could have lived on earth when Jesus was here. That you could have really seen him or touched him or been friends with him. But Tim Keller says this because of the very last verse of Matthew’s gospel, Matthew 28:20. There Jesus says, “And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” Jesus is with us always. And how is that true? How is Jesus with us if he seemingly left us to go to heaven? It’s because when Jesus left us bodily, Jesus sent his Holy Spirit to be with us spiritually.

And Jesus said in John 16:7, “it’s to your advantage that I go away, because then the Spirit can come to you.” And here’s why that’s huge. Because when Jesus was here in the flesh, you could be with him sometimes. You could go listen to him preach, or dine at table with him. But you could only be with him sometimes. Jesus needed time to be by himself and rest and pray. And sometimes Jesus was swarmed by crowds where you’d be lucky just to get a glimpse of him. He was limited by the flesh. But in the Spirit, Jesus is with us always. Every moment of the day, through the Holy Spirit, we are near to Jesus. And he’s nearer even than he’d be if we could touch him in the flesh. For Jesus is there in our hearts, in our spirits, inside us. Dwelling within us. So, the ascension is not the absence of Christ, it’s actually the increased and heightened presence of Christ; not a loss of intimacy, but a magnification of intimacy. Thank God for the ascension, and thank God for the Holy Spirit. And thank God that the day is coming when Jesus will return and he will be with us in both body and spirit, such that ultimate relational connection with God can be had.