Mark 16:14-20; Acts 1:1-11; 2 Kings 2:5-15
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.
The Ascension of Our Lord Jesus Christ is a Feast of the Incarnation. It is a celebration that the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, became Man. He took up our flesh by means of our distant kinswoman, that royal peasant of David's line from Nazareth, the Virgin Mary. His Holy Spirit overshadowed her. He was conceived within her without the aid of a man, with only God as His Father, His only begotten from eternity, and His only begotten of a woman in time. All this that He might raise up for Himself, in Himself, a worthy sacrifice to atone for all the sinners who ever sinned. God provided the Lamb. The cords binding us to Hell's altar were severed. By being Man, God fulfilled the Law, in His dying, in His rising, and in His ascending.
By becoming one of us, God elevated our position. One of the Holy Three is one of us. God is our Brother. By virtue of that holy Incarnation, His Father is our Father. The Spirit proceeds to us and is our Guide. We enjoy, in this way, greater honor and privilege than did Adam and Eve before the fall. Heaven is better than Eden.
To heaven, that Body, mocked, beaten, nailed to the cruel tree, but raised again, has gone. From there, He sends His Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, who lives in us, leads us into all Truth, and bears witness of what He has done. From there, He mediates and intercedes. He advocates. At the right hand of the Father, He pleads our case in the scars of His holy office. And yet His Body in heaven is exalted, glorified, for this Man, flesh of our flesh and bone of our bone, ransom for our sin, is also God, has always been God, and will never cease to be God. There is no division between His natures. There is only one Christ. He is capable of being everywhere, for He is omnipresent. He has no limitations save those He sets for Himself. And so, He who ascends into heaven promises to His disciples, and to us, “Lo, I am with you always.” And He is.
His Body ascended. But He is not gone. He is present for us in Word and Sacrament. He is present for us in His Body in the Holy Communion. He who died, lives. He who went away, is here. In His last testament, His dying promise, He said, “This IS my BODY given for you. Do it. Eat it.” It was given on the cross, a sacrifice for guilt, and it is given now as the benefit of that sacrifice, the removal of that guilt, by being eaten. It is the Body crucified, risen, and ascended for you. It joins you to Him by His entrance into you. This is Holy Communion: the uniting of the God-Man to your sinful flesh, sinful no more, but pure and immaculate, as He is pure and immaculate.
This Body is Jacob's ladder. In the Holy Communion, the Feast of His Body, we join with angels and archangels. They descend by this living Bread and join us. Christ has ascended into heaven, and yet Christ is here. He joins us to heaven, to angels, to the saints who have gone before us. We are in heaven, though we stand on earth, for we are with Christ and the holy angels. Our sins are removed, forgiven by Divine declaration and Grace. We feast on the foretaste of the feast that will not end.
This is what the Ascension is about. Not about Christ leaving us, for He has not left. It is about Christ preceding us. He goes to prepare a place for us, even as He is still with us, still for us, still in us. He who broke down the gates of Hell that locked us in has also broken down the gates of heaven that kept us out. His holy, precious blood, and His innocent suffering and death, has paved the way and broken the trail. He is our Captain. He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
There is no one to accuse you. There is no more guilt, shame, or regret. Your sins are forgotten. Death is dead. Life lives. Heaven is open. For Christ, our Brother and our Savior, has ascended. He has gone up with a shout. Let the shout be: “Hallelujah!”
In the + Name of Jesus. Amen.
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