Witnesses to the World
The world seemed awfully vast and rather hostile to those eleven men on their way to Galilee. What did Jesus want to say to them there? What did he want them to do? I’m convinced that, as they talked among themselves about these matters, none of them were expecting the Ascension. The Ascension is an event we affirm as part of our faith—“the third day he rose again from the dead, ascended to heaven, and sitteth at the right hand of God the Father Almighty”; that’s typically as far as it goes. What does this Ascension mean for us? What bearing does the Ascension have on our lives as Christ followers? To put it bluntly, why should we care?
Over those three years with Jesus, the apostles had learned plenty about humility; they learned they had more to learn. Now, they would be called upon to put all they had learned into full, daily practice, even as they continued to learn about the Humble Way of Christ. Jesus once again shows them something unforgettable: He rises. He arose, and he rises. So shall we, so must we, in Christ. That’s part of what the Ascension tells us by showing us.
The English Victorian poet Robert Browning wrote, “Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp or what’s a heaven for?” What are we reaching for? That’s what Jesus is always asking. Christ calls us to reach out for him: God’s Word, God’s presence, God’s grace. That reaching always exceeds what we can lay hold of here—physically, intellectually, even emotionally. Always the gap, that aches. God exceeds our grasp, always just beyond us. Then, He reaches out and grasps us. The Ascension is another staggering affirmation of the promise that, in Christ, we shall be with God who has reached out and grasped us in Christ. The great chasm has been crossed. Again the strong assurance: we are no longer separated, no longer estranged.
Those eleven had no idea how they were going to get along without Jesus. Over the past three years, they had been through all kinds of situations, glorious to gory, heights and depths. Jesus had been there all along. He was gone, briefly; they had thought gone for good. Jesus came back. He had said he would, they now remembered and understood. There in Galilee again, as he rose beyond their sight, it looked as if Jesus was gone after all. Why does he keep leaving!? Only, how has he left us, really? Shall we walk by sight and not by faith?
They would have to figure these things out. They had one another. They had their experiences with Jesus, their memory of his words and teachings. They had all these, yet, as they watched him go away—on his terms, his way, his choice—those apostles were feeling a little lonely. Blessedly, they didn’t have to feel lonely alone. The wounds of betrayal and failure still quite fresh, broken fellowship, but also the radiant vision and presence of the glory and power of Christ risen and rising. Jesus always asks us to turn our eyes from failure—our own and that of others—to look to him. He will guide. He will hold. He will love us there, all the way. All the way, our Savior leads us. God leads His dear children along.
I fear I may at times come across as critical—too critical! Please know it’s never my aim to leave us in some torn-down heap! Jesus doesn’t! We begin to lose touch with Jesus when our awareness of our need for Christ’s lifting becomes dull, and why we need that lifting. Salvation is not routine. Righteousness is not routine. We come here to be built up, for some affirmation, something positive: we come here for Jesus. Jesus was clear that he could do nothing for those who needed nothing from him. What do you need from Jesus? In Jesus, the Word of God, we are being rebuilt.
This is how those apostles—and we—can and will continue: in, with, and by Christ risen, risen and rising. Christ risen is our courage, hope, and resolve. Just as for those apostles, feeling just a little lonely and exposed in the wide world, Christ risen is our inspiration and anchor. Christ’s physical departure from this world is not absence from us. He leaves bodily, remains spiritually, as he told that little band of brothers, the first saplings of the Church. Apart from Christ, they could do nothing; neither can we. Whatever we do for Christ, the kingdom, love for God—this is the gift of the Spirit. The Spirit of Christ remains with us and in us, by faith, to continue our transformation from glory to glory, to keep us connected in the glory power of God. That power constantly reminds us of the ability that comes to us from God for the kingdom. In Christ, with Christ, we can.
Our old friend William Barclay puts all this much more briefly: “the life of Jesus goes on in his Church.”[1] We are those who, together, strive to make Christ’s life sensible to others, and not just outside these walls. Jesus speaks of this striving as carrying our crosses. The life of Jesus goes on because Jesus is not dead. He is alive in us and also at this very moment upon the throne to which he ascended. We don’t understand how. We’re not expected to. Whatever understanding may come by God’s grace will come as we keep faith at the center of our daily living, carrying our crosses, praying that Christ might become sensible to others.
Luke is careful to remind us that Jesus, “After his suffering, [. . .] presented himself to [the eleven] and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God” (1:3). The suffering is past but not forgotten. The risen Christ is the same Christ who suffered, both for us and for all who would become his own. His suffering is our victory, his pain our relief.
The eleven knew it was him, truly, really. Alive and not dead; in his own familiar body that was also, now, different. Glorified is the only way we have to describe this same and different Jesus, though that doesn’t explain the matter to us. He “gave many convincing proofs that he was alive”: no reasonable person could say that Jesus was not truly alive—with a body, breathing, moving, eating, choosing, communicating, loving, sharing. Why did he give these “many” proofs? Because even his own closest friends, his most devoted followers, still couldn’t believe it! Until they did.
We don’t have an account of what Jesus, over those forty days, was saying about the kingdom. I believe that what he taught over those precious weeks was not remarkably different from what he had been teaching all along. The difference was that it was the risen Christ speaking with them. Christ spoke and taught with authority before; how much more now! They understood he had been teaching a way of life; now they understood with brilliant clarity that he was the way to Life. He was teaching them Jesus. There in the light of the risen, glorified Christ, what before had seemed obscure and difficult was becoming clearer and nearer.
Perhaps most of the forty days with Jesus were spent in Galilee. Luke records that Jesus “gave them this command: ‘Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit” (1:4-5). It seems by this point that they had returned to Jerusalem. The promised gift will come. How eager they were for it: better than all Christmases and birthdays combined! Something—someone—holy, powerful is on the way, for us.
The apostles were most eager for one thing: what they have been wanting from Jesus all along. “[T]hey gathered around him and asked him, ‘Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?’” (1:6). Still their hearts remain tethered to earthly power, earthly glory—and security!—as are we all to a greater or lesser degree: success, wealth, happiness—the fulfillment and achievement that come by material and personal resources, rather than divine provision. The sense of security we can feel when we aren’t afraid everything may be taken from us tomorrow. Is it so bad to want to have a happy life? That probably depends on what people mean by happy. What makes people happy? Some can become positively miserable, pursuing such happiness.
What might Jesus mean? Has he shown us? What is the kingdom? This is a constant question throughout the gospels. It is not a political entity: no nation state with borders and a flag and all; we understand that, but the old dream was hard to let go. Peoples and nations to this day dream and plan and skirmish towards what Barclay more than half a century ago wrote of as the establishment of “world sovereignty.”[2] Americans remain justifiably nervous that ours is slipping; China has big dreams and the means to get themselves there—Look! In the sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane, it’s . . . !
Bible student Luke Timothy Johnson speaks of the kingdom as “the rule of God over human hearts.”[3] Barclay has written of the kingdom as “a society upon earth where God’s will is as perfectly done as it is in heaven.”[4] He goes on to say that, “[t]o be in the kingdom is to obey the will of God.”[5] The kingdom is where life is being lived—voluntarily—on God’s terms, where people—voluntarily—guide and govern their daily living, choices, actions, according to God’s will. We don’t bring the kingdom. God makes the kingdom possible in us, for, among, and through us, in Christ. We strive for the kingdom here in the hope—and confidence!—of experiencing the fullness of the kingdom on that day known to God alone and thereafter forever.
Jesus directs those eager, still confused, but teachable apostles away from concern with the day and time of the kingdom’s full and final arrival. That concern gets too easily tangled in thoughts of power. Thoughts of power too easily drift into thoughts of power as conceived by the world. What Jesus has been telling us and showing us all along is that the world has a very poor conception of what power truly is . . . a very poor conception about many things. We must wait: await God who is establishing His kingdom, who will complete His work when it pleases Him to do so. Patience and hope are also gifts of the Spirit.
With God and therefore for His people, power is possibility, never coercion. Jesus tells his apostles to await the Spirit, who is power, possibility, who makes it possible for Jesus followers to be guided and governed by the will of God, day by day. “[Y]ou will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses [. . .] to the ends of the earth” (1:8). The possibility power of the Spirit has a special aim: empowering witnesses to the world. Some make journeys to distant places, like Dan and Elizabeth Turk in Madagascar. Most are called to testify right where they are, making the kingdom a little more visible, blessing by blessing, by how we conduct ourselves among others and by how we conduct ourselves when no one is watching, because someone always is: our Lord. He wants us to know His grace, mercy, glory, and strength for living: His gifts to us.
Jesus doesn’t leave; he ascends. He arose and has risen; he isn’t gone. He oversees all things. They don’t see him, now. They no longer hear his voice, no longer touch his hand, arm, or shoulder—all the ways that, before, they had assurance that he was with them. Yes, Jesus had said things, but what good was it, if he wasn’t there, with them?! What could they do, if he wasn’t there?!
“They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. ‘Men of Galilee,’ they said, ‘why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven’” (1:10-11). Why are we looking into the sky? Well, it’s not every day you see a man rising to heaven! Elijah comes to mind. Luke Timothy Johnson suggests that the two suddenly speaking to the apostles are none other than Elijah and Moses, who previously had appeared at the Transfiguration. Long before, Elijah had told his disciple Elisha that if he saw Elijah being taken up, then Elisha would receive that “double portion” of the Spirit for which he had asked: the primary heir’s inheritance.[6] It’s that promise of the Spirit’s presence again: help, encouragement, guidance, a friend for lonely and difficult times and places. We need that Comforter, that Counselor, that Friend. The Ascension is another, staggering reminder that God doesn’t ask us to do what is easy; He calls us to do what is blessed. He is still and always with us, to do it.
Now to the One who by the power at work within us is able to do far more abundantly than all we can ask or imagine, to God be glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever.
[1] William Barclay. Acts of the Apostles. 1953. Daily Study Bible. Philadelphia: Westminster P, 1976. 10.
[2] Barclay, Gospel of Matthew. Vol. 2. 1957. Daily Study Bible. Philadelphia: Westminster P, 1975. 11.
[3] Luke Timothy Johnson. Acts of the Apostles. Sacra Pagina. Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical P, 1992. 29.
[4] Barclay, Gospel of Matthew. Vol. 1. 1956. Daily Study Bible. Philadelphia: Westminster P, 1975. 211.
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