Is the Ascension equal to the Ressurection in importance? A sermon for May 12th 2024

 

Andrea Mantegna - The Ascension of Christ (1460)

A sermon for the Seventh Sunday of Easter. the Sunday after Ascension Day   

Let the words…
On Thursday we marked Ascension Day, recalling the moment Jesus ascended to heaven. This was exactly forty days later after Easter, although as we know, the date of Easter changes from year to year.
Of course, this can be a problem when trying to find Easter Island, because it’s in a different place every year.

Then, ten days after the Ascension, we celebrate Pentecost, the coming of the Holy Spirit to the church, which is next Sunday.

Today’s Gospel is part of a prayer Jesus is making on behalf of the disciples, it is a prayer, a conversation between God and Jesus.

The lectionary which decides our readings jumps around the timeline because Jesus made this prayer just before he was betrayed and crucified, but it predicts what will happen to the disciples after Jesus has gone. That they will be alone and left without him.

So Jesus is asking God in this prayer to protect his friends, because that is what they are to him now, from the evil one, but to also enable them to see the truth.

What is interesting in this prayer, is that as the story unfolds after this, we see the prayer answered.
Jesus dies and is resurrected, and the resurrection shows us there is life beyond our earthly lives on earth.

The, Jesus stays with the disciples for another forty days until the ascension, when he returns to heaven.
And what happened in those forty days?

Jesus, as requested in his earlier prayer, had the opportunity to teach the disciples the truth about Him, God and their purpose afterwards, to proclaim the Good News about the Kingdom of Heaven.

The request for the disciples to not be left unprotected is also answered, because the Holy Spirit come to baptise his followers at Pentecost, which we will hear more about next week.

With the forty days celebrating the resurrection of Jesus from the dead coming to an end perhaps it’s time to see the ascension in a new way.

Where it is an event which is as fundamental as the resurrection.
Without it, how can Jesus be exalted to the right hand of God, or the highest place, as Peter in Acts and Paul in Philippians put it.

In fact, at the beginning of Acts Luke says, he wrote all about what Jesus did and taught before being taken up to heaven.

Perhaps, instead of the forty days of easter being a resurrection celebration, they are instead, as other forty day, or forty year, periods are, a time of waiting, testing and preparation.

This time, it is the disciples turn to be tested, as they learn all about the true nature of Jesus, the kingdom of God and his purpose.

And this is through the power of the holy spirit, in the same way Jesus was sustained in the wilderness by the power of the holy spirit, when tempted by the devil.

Jesus does not teach the apostles alone, neither was he alone in the desert, he is aided, empowered and filled with the Holy Spirit, as he was at his baptism.

It also interesting to note that Jesus teaching, continued in Acts and Pauls letters, focusses on the Kingdom of God, with much less emphasis on resurrection and salvation, or how we are saved.

The kingdom of God to the Jewish people, was the focus, where God was king and their hope was and is for a king who will come to reign and lead the people to freedom.

Which is why in Acts, when Jesus says they will soon be baptised in the Holy Spirit, the disciples ask Jesus, is now the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?

Which is probably why they needed a forty day crash course of teaching, where Jesus tells them, in answer to his earlier prayer, that the holy spirit will be the enabler to help them be witnesses to the 

testimony and works of Jesus, not only to Jerusalem, but Judea, Samaria and the ends of the earth.

In all this it became clear that Jesus was not only the Jewish king long promised, but a Lord of all people, who ascends to sit at the right of God.

Then by being enthroned at the right hand of God after ascension, now, Jesus would also share in the worship received by God by us.

Therefore, the ascension is important because it gives Jesus equal authority with God.

The ascension gives humanity a place with God. Jesus was God incarnate, fully human, sharing in all our joys, pain, pleasure and sorrow. Jesus was resurrected to be a human.

When Jesus ascended bodily to heaven, he became one of a small handful of people to enter heaven as a human, the only others being Enoch, Elijah and Moses. As a result, we have a high priest interceding for us who knows what it is to be human.

The ascension marks the end of Jesus ministry on earth, a ministry which he delegated to his disciples and also to us, but empowered by the Holy Spirit.

The ascension is also a promise, that Jesus will return in the same way he ascended. Not, a second coming, to be incarnated as a baby again, but as fully formed as he the day he ascended.

Now, as is often the case, I get quite involved in the reading and realise there are some big ideas here.

Big ideas need digesting and reflection, but one big idea to hold onto most of all, is the involvement of the Holy Spirit in all of this.

Jesus opened the eyes of the disciples over 40 days, by the power of the holy spirit.
Jesus when tested in the wilderness, had the holy spirit with him.
Jesus was baptised in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus promises the disciples that they will be baptised in the Holy Spirit in the days to come.
Jesus assures his followers the Holy Spirit will be the enabler, to help people witness to God’s saving grace and grow the kingdom of God.

So it is that we await Pentecost, the coming of the spirit, with great anticipation.

It is possibly one of the most underrated but significant times in the church calendar, which is why many churches around the world are follow the Thy Kingdom Come novena, and there are resources linking to it in the last church email and elsewhere.

Simply put, we invite the Holy Spirit to help us pray for five people or priorities until Pentecost.

Personally, as you may know, my wife Louise went off on a walk on Palm Sunday, which has been a time of readjustment and reflection for me, which is far more polite than some words I could use for how I’ve coped.

But on the Saturday after Easter, Catherine, our curate, invited me to an Alpha course study day, as much to get me out of the house, but at the end, we all prayed the simplest of prayers, Lord, fill us with your spirit.

And that prayer has helped sustain me, and perhaps when prayer seems difficult, as it does for me, very often sometimes. You could also pray, Lord, fill me with your spirit.

Because the spirit is coming, in only a few days, and then then we can be filled once again, ready, to make disciples to the end of the earth. In the name of Jesus. Amen.

Preached at St Cyr Stinchcombe. 

A shorter version was preached on Ascennsion Day, Thursday 9th May at St George's, Cam

A Reading from the Gospel of John 17.6–19
‘I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. ⁷Now they know that everything you have given me is from you; ⁸for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. ⁹I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. ¹⁰All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them. ¹¹And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one. ¹²While I was with them, I protected them in your name that you have given me. I guarded them, and not one of them was lost except the one destined to be lost, so that the scripture might be fulfilled. ¹³But now I am coming to you, and I speak these things in the world so that they may have my joy made complete in themselves.¹⁴I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. ¹⁵I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one.¹⁶They do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. ¹⁷Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. ¹⁸As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. ¹⁹And for their sakes I sanctify myself, so that they also may be sanctified in truth.

Acts 1.15–17, 21–26
In those days Peter stood up among the believers (together the crowd numbered about one hundred and twenty people) and said, ¹⁶‘Friends, the scripture had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit through David foretold concerning Judas, who became a guide for those who arrested Jesus— ¹⁷for he was numbered among us and was allotted his share in this ministry.’ ²¹So one of the men who have accompanied us throughout the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, ²²beginning from the baptism of John until the day when he was taken up from us—one of these must become a witness with us to his resurrection.’ ²³So they proposed two, Joseph called Barsabbas, who was also known as Justus, and Matthias. ²⁴Then they prayed and said, ‘Lord, you know everyone’s heart. Show us which one of these two you have chosen ²⁵to take the place in this ministry and apostleship from which Judas turned aside to go to his own place.’ ²⁶And they cast lots for them, and the lot fell on Matthias; and he was added to the eleven apostles.

Some parts of this sermon were adapted from here: https://www.psephizo.com/biblical-studies/why-is-the-ascension-of-jesus-the-most-important-event-in-the-new-testament/