The Ascension: Going Up?

In Acts 1.1-11, we read that Jesus ‘goes up’ to heaven.  When I hear this, all I can hear is an elevator

Dali's Ascension - a ground's eye view

operator asking, ‘going up’?  It just seems so . . . ridiculous. This ‘going-upedness’ of Jesus, lifted into the sky on a God-cloud, seems . . . so . . . silly . . . as if Jesus were Superman or better, Lois Lane, being flown into the sunset . . . it . . . is . . . ridiculous . . . isn’t it?

But the author of Ephesians has it more right than I do when he prays that the people of God’s church may ‘see with the eyes of your heart’.  That helps . . . a little.

The eyes of the heart and the words of Barbara Brown Taylor help me to understand a bit better what this ascension thing is all about:  “It was not enough that through him God was born into the body of the world; that was just his Christmas gift to us. His ascension gift was that through him the body of the world was borne (carried) back to God. . . Jesus has not only brought God to us; he has also brought us to God.”

John Calvin says, “Since Christ entered heaven in our flesh, as if in our name . . . in a sense, we already sit with God in the heavenly places in [Christ].” Thus does Jesus open the way to the heavenly kingdom, by which Calvin means that without Jesus, you and I just can’t get ‘there’ from ‘here’.

Using my elevator image, we might say Jesus ‘went up’ in order that we won’t ‘go down’.  By opening the gates of heaven, Jesus closes the gates of hell forever.

Brown Taylor puts it this way, “It was almost as if he had not ascended but exploded, so that all the holiness that was once concentrated in him alone flew everywhere, flew far and wide, so that the seeds of heaven were sown in all the fields of the earth.”

Silly as it sounds . . . We do worship a flying Jesus . . .

But it’s a bit like an airplane . . . no matter how well crafted it is, it can’t fly simply because it ‘decides’ to . . . [This might be a good time to make your own paper airplane and try to fly it to heaven.  That’s what we did in church today, anyhow.]

What is astonishing is that neither could Jesus . . . Jesus didn’t decide to go to heaven . . . Jesus didn’t fly ‘there’ on the power of his own might or even the power of his own decision . . . Jesus didn’t go to heaven . . . Jesus was taken to heaven . . .

Grace is the word we use to understand this simple, crucial truth . . . of our own power, we can do nothing.  Yes, we have work to do.  But if we are not very careful, it is oh so easy to believe that the work, and not God, is our pathway to heaven.

Like paper airplanes, human beings who try to fly themselves to heaven will always fall back to earth.

Think of it as the difference between the grateful and the guarded.  The grateful share what they have . . . it wasn’t theirs to begin with, so what’s the big deal?  The guarded live their lives like characters on apocalyptic television shows, willing to kill to protect their bread from starving others . . .

The guarded always have a plan . . . the grateful simply trust, for they know their plans mean nothing . . . they’ve failed too often not to know.

The guarded know how much work they have done and how much pay they’re entitled to for the work . . . the grateful simply offer thanks for whatever they get, knowing they didn’t earn a bit of it . . .

The guarded think in terms of ‘mine’ and ‘yours’, for they have earned what is theirs and expect that you should do likewise. . . the grateful know there is no earning all the bounty they have received, so they simply say ‘thank you’.

The guarded are often angry at the injustices done to themselves by others . . . the grateful are angry with the injustices done to others . . .

The guarded are productive and hold those who are not in contempt . . . the grateful are not productive and so are free to love others simply because they are, and not because of what they do . . .

The guarded are jealous of the successes of others . . . the grateful rejoice in them . . .

The guarded compete . . . the grateful cooperate . . .

The guarded believe good fences make good neighbors . . . the grateful know good fences make only good fences . . . and that a good neighbor is made from being invited in, not being kept out . . .

The guarded believe the path to heaven is a ladder they must perpetually climb lest they be left behind . . . the grateful know the path to heaven is an elevator and their ticket was bought for them by Jesus a very, very, long time ago.

Going up?

A Significant Pause

[A reflection-sermon on Ascension Sunday and Acts 1 from last year.  The phrase "a significant pause" is from theologian Karl Barth.]

Later in the story
Saul persecutes . . . even kills . . . seeking to destroy . . . the church . . .
and Jesus pleads with him to know . . .
why do you persecute me?
But now, just now . . .
is the waiting time . . .
the gasping for air in-between time . . .
the time of silent symphonies . . .
and roaring silences . . .
It is the time of His gone-ness . . .
He is gone . . .
And I . . . I
Am
Bereft
Bemused
Bewildered
Gaping into space
like a domestic turkey
too stupid to come in out of the rain
In real danger of drowning in my own curiosity
while a world still loves and hates
watches and waits
and all I can manage is a stare
my hopes and dreams laid bare to the
Absence
The gone-ness
Of Him to whom I gave so much

***

how did it look on that day . . . ?
You may suppose that he looked like Superman
charging into the cosmos
Right arm extended in a fist
Or index finger pointed up -
a Sistine chapel moment if ever there was
Or, as Dali imagines,
His body falling into it
gracefully rising
As if lying on unseen hands
Like the hands that hold us up as children learning to swim

with only the soles of his feet visible to my peering eyes . . .
How fitting it would be his feet . . .
The feet that were kissed . . .
And wept over . . .
And anointed . . .
And pierced with hammering nails . . .
The feet that walked the land . . .
And supported his body through so much . . .
Balancing the body in knelt prayer . . .
Feet flying into the temple . . . slapping the marble with their rage . . .
Those were the feet I saw that day when He was taken up . . .

the vertical plane of up and down to us ‘below’
somehow horizontal to him . . .
An unwitting cross made even from his movement
From ‘this world to the next’?
Was it Dali’s dream that day?
Did he ascend into an atom so big and so small at the same time
that even the painters eye couldn’t quite capture the moment?
Did the openness of heaven look like a sunflower?

I think so . . .
I think it was more like Dali’s dreams
than Michaelangelo’s
but it’s hard to say
even though I was there
some things
defy description
and I am left groping
The mind simply too small to grasp
What it has witnessed

And this too-small-mind is what He wants me to use?
To ‘witness’
To all that was seen
And heard
And felt
And changed?

How can my little brain be up to this?
There aren’t enough atoms in all the world
let alone in my wee thoughts
To give voice
And so
I am silent
Slack-jawed
Vacant stared
Unaware even of angels

And yet . . .
Somehow . . .
Now
I . . . am . . . the . . . mystery?
Me?
Paul makes it sound so easy . . .
“When He ascended on high He made captivity itself a captive and He gave gifts to His people”
Paul was always a good one for a nice turn of phrase . . .
“He made captivity itself a captive”
Sounds nice, doesn’t it?
Sounds of freedom . . .
Yours and mine . . .
Oh, and it comes with parting gifts too?
Lucky me!  Lucky us!

***

Who am I?
I who was there that day
and am here still?

I am the body of Christ . . .
I am the people gathered in His name
Birthed by Christ . . .
I even have a birthday . . .
Pentecost . . . literally ‘the 50th day’ . . .
The 50th day after Jesus was resurrected . . .
Ten days after Jesus was ‘taken up’ (ascended)
The day the Holy Spirit ‘came down’

I am The Witness . . .
Swear me in and I’ll tell you truly . . .
My life is my oath . . .
And my testimony . . .
I was nothing . . .
Just a hand-full of folk . . .
And they died . . . as all humans do . . .
They died . . . but I didn’t . . .

I was nothing . . . I am nothing . . .
But . . . somehow . . . I was and I am . . .
Something . . .
Something amazing and wonderful . . .

I am the koinonia . . .
The fellowship . . .
The ‘where two or more are gathered’ folk . . .
There is no me without Christ . . .
And there is no Christ on earth without me . . .

The church . . . that’s me . . .
The place where no self-respecting, enlightened thinker of this century
would be caught dead . . .
The people and place who have made it their job to bore children to tears .
Purveyor of superstition . . .
Keeper of dead texts . . .
Defender of a faith long made irrelevant .
Flawed failure . . .

His people . . .
Receivers of gifts . . .
Followers of The Way . . .
Members of a family . . . dysfunctional as it may be . . .
The church . . .
The ecclesia . . . the gathered ones . . .
Dismiss me if you will . . .
But remember . . .
I was there on that day . . .
I saw and heard and felt what cannot be described . . .
And for all my foolish star-gazing . . .
Every now and then
I actually look around me
And with nothing more than my own two hands
Nothing more than God, that is . . .
I have changed a world . . .
And am changing it still . . .

***

I am still tempted to sky gazing . . .
Searching for the God standing right in front of me . . .
Looking for the Divine in the night sky
and missing that of God in the wrinkled hands clinging to mine
And even angels have a hard time getting me to look around and see . . .
But I am all He has . . .
And I am all He has!