THE ASCENSION OF OUR LORD – celebrated May 16, 2010

SCRIPTURES – Ps. 110; Acts 1:1-11; Eph. 1:15-23; Matt. 28:16-20

Thursday evening Anna Berger and I from our congregation gathered with our brothers and sisters at Zion Lutheran in Bridgeport to celebrate the Ascension of Christ.  40 days after He rose from the dead, and as Jesus’ disciples were looking on, “he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.” Jesus ascended to the right hand of the Father in heaven.

In his sermon that night Pastor Coffey asked, “So what? What difference does Christ’s ascension make?” Yes, so what? What is so important about Jesus ascending into heaven?

Let me tell you about Jim and Lisa. They were a young couple who had recently become engaged. They now had so much to do to prepare for the wedding! They had to choose the date; find a hall for the reception; decide upon a guest list; pick out invitations; choose who would be the bridesmaids and groomsmen; Lisa had to shop for her dress and decide upon her bridesmaids’ dresses; Jim had to make sure his groomsmen got measured for their tuxes; they had flowers to consider and decorations for the reception; there was the honeymoon to plan. Of course, in the midst of it all they also had to meet with their pastor. With him, the wedding Service itself needed to be planned. What Scripture readings did they want? What music for the processional and recessional? Would there be any special music during the ceremony? And, they needed to meet with the pastor a number of times to talk together and listen to what God said in the Bible as they considered such things as: What is love? What is marriage? What would they be promising each other when they spoke their vows? What impact would children and family have on their marriage?

Many times all of the things that need to be done before the wedding become a burden and result in irritability and arguing and an “I can’t wait until this is over!” feeling. It was not so with Jim and Lisa. The more they had to do and consider the more they enjoyed it and the closer they became. In fact, they so enjoyed everything they were doing together that one week before the wedding they made a momentous decision: they would push off the wedding for another year! So what that there would be one more year of dating and of living separately in their parents’ homes while they continued planning and discussing and preparing. They would have another year to get even closer!

So what?! Who could imagine this? All of the planning and preparing and working an engaged couple does are not for their own sake. They are for one purpose: to be married, to be one, to have and enjoy a new life together!

And so with Jesus, all that He did before His ascension: coming down from heaven and assuming flesh and blood; living a life of perfect obedience and thereby fulfilling all that God requires of us in His commandments; taking our sins and the sins of the world upon Himself and by His death satisfying God’s judgment of them; rising from the dead to break death’s hold on us and prepare a new life for us; all of this He did so that He could make you new, take you to Himself as His own bride, and govern your life so that all things would work for your good. It was about the marriage, not the preparation. All that Jesus did finds its fulfillment and completion in His ascension. “[God] put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all,” we are told in Ephesians 1. Jesus came into this world to put to death our sins and our sinful flesh and prepare a new body and life for us. He ascended to pour out upon us the Holy Spirit, “the Lord and Giver of life,” who would give us this new body and life and nourish it continually through the preaching and Baptism of Jesus. Rejoice in Christ’s ascension! It is the beginning of your new life with Him!

Another reason Christ’s ascension is important is also illustrated by marriage. At the end of the wedding Service, what happens? The pastor pronounces the couple to be husband and wife, and they kiss. He introduces them as Mr. & Mrs. ___, those who now share the same name. They then go down the aisle hand in hand; they leave the church hand in hand; they walk into the reception hall hand in hand, after again being introduced as Mr. & Mrs. ___, those who now share the same name. When they return from their honeymoon and come to the place where they will now live, the husband may even pick up his new bride and carry her in.

This is what Jesus is doing by His ascension. He has not left us and left everything up to us. It’s not us now shouldering the burden, carrying the load, and getting ourselves to heaven. How wrong and sinful to think this, to think that attaining heaven is up to you! Sure, our Lord gives us work to do. We are to baptize and teach everything that He has taught us, and so follow His teachings and live the new life we have received in Baptism. But, we then are to leave things in His hands and not worry about or focus upon times and seasons and the success of His kingdom. We don’t need to worry, for Jesus, our Bridegroom, is carrying us! You are His body, “the fullness of him who fills all in all.” He has put the Name of the one holy God upon you in your Baptism; through faith you are one flesh with Him!

What we are to do is keep our eyes on and rejoice in “the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints.” Because your Head has ascended to God’s right hand in heaven, you are there, also! Heaven is yours! Our sermon hymn, “See, the Lord Ascends in Triumph” (#494 LSB) puts it well:

He has raised our human nature on the clouds to God’s right hand;

There we sit in heav’nly places, there with Him in glory stand.

Jesus reigns, adored by angels; Man with God is on the throne.

By our mighty Lord’s ascension we by faith behold our own. 

Luther on Ps. 110

“We Christians must hold fast and know this fact: Christ never discarded or abdicated or transferred His priestly office to anybody else. He is and remains the true Priest before God. As such He speaks to us, sacrifices for us, and forever prays for us. Neither St. Peter nor any other man on earth is a priest in such a way that Christ has abdicated the office in his favor or transferred it to him. God preserve us from having any other priest but Christ! If we had not had this Mediator before God, all of us would have been damned and lost long ago, together with our own works, holiness, and worship.

But He is the only one, and He must be the only one, who brings us to God by His priestly office and shares the office with us. Just as we are all comforted and saved by the power of His priestly office, so all who are saved share in it, not merely St. Peter and the apostles, or the pope and the bishops. He also bestows the title upon all Christians. As they are called God’s children and heirs for His sake, so they are called priests after Him. Every baptized Christian is, and ought to be, called a priest, just as much as St. Peter or St. Paul. St. Peter was a priest because he believed in Christ. I am a priest for the same reason. Thus we all, as I have said before, have become priest’s children through Baptism. Therefore it should be understood that the name “priest” ought to be the common possession of believers just as much as the name “Christian” or “child of God.”