Bulletin

‘While he blessed them, he parted from them and was carried up into heaven.’

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In many and various ways, the Ascension of the Lord Christ was foretold by the prophets, who sang in the Psalms: ‘God ascends with shouting, and the Lord with a clear trumpet; sing praise to our King, for now God is King over all the earth.’ ‘The Lord is among them in the holy Sinai, You have ascended on high, and have captured captivity.’ And as St. Zechariah prophesied: ‘On that day his feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives that lies before Jerusalem on the east, and the Mount of Olives shall be split in two from east to west by a very wide valley, so that one half of the Mount shall move northward, and the other half southward. ‘

That the Lord’s kinship to God the Father might be manifested, He was taken up into the heavens, even as Holy Enoch, who walked a godly life, and was taken away, and was no longer seen.

That the Lord’s mission from God the Father might be completed, He was assumed into the Divine Majesty, even as Holy Elijah, who by chariots of fire and flaming horses went up.

This, that it might be fulfilled what was written in the Prophet Daniel: 

‘Behold, with the clouds of heaven
    there came one like a son of man,
and he came to the Ancient of Days
    and was presented before him.
And to him was given dominion
    and glory and a kingdom,
that all peoples, nations, and languages
    should serve him;
his dominion is an everlasting dominion,
    which shall not pass away,
and his kingdom one
    that shall not be destroyed.’

He has now risen from the dead, that death might be undone by death, and hell shut up by the rain of heaven. For by His death, we have been reconciled with the Father, atonement being made through the sacrifice of His beloved Son; and by His resurrection, we have been justified, being declared innocent of Sin, for we are made one with Him who knew no deceit.

So now the Lord Jesus ascends Jacob’s ladder, and enters into the heavenly places, that what the prophet Micah foretold might come to pass, ‘Then One who breaks through shall ascend before the LORD. He shall break through and go in and out of the door.’ For Christ, our High Priest, now breaks into the forbidden Garden of Eden, the heavenly Paradise, to bring out for us the fruit of the tree of Life, that in Him, we might never die.

He stands forever in the courts of heaven, our Advocate with the Father, the atonement not only for our sins alone, but for the whole world. There He speaks a better word than that of Abel, and on our behalf.

And He has gone forward before us, to prepare a path, to make straight the way of the Lord, that where He is, we might be also. He goes to prepare a place for us, that in this body and life, we so might walk, that through every trial, we are brought closer to the our true and only home.

Yet it is written that the disciples returned to Jerusalem with great joy.

It seems a little strange that they would be so happy, seeing as how, at least to them, in that moment, their Lord has, to put it bluntly, abandoned them. He has left them as sheep before wolves, even sheep without a shepherd. And yet they rejoice.

Let this be the lesson, dear Christians, that you too should now rejoice; for in Christ’s ascension to the Father, He has not merely taken the place He has always had as the Son before the Father. He is not merely God returning to His own land. Rather, in Him, He has seated our human nature in the cloud of glory; He has established our humanity within the Godhead. For we are bone of his bone, and flesh of his flesh, and where His flesh and bone and blood and body now dwell, within the hypostasis, the person, of the Son begotten of the Father, so will the Church, those united to His flesh through the most holy Eucharist, reign forevermore.

Indeed, we, as man, united to God in Christ, will reign, for this was always the will of Almighty God, that we would grow up, and fulfill the earth, and have dominion over it, and subdue it, that is, that we would have all things placed beneath our feet.

The journey of Christ, it may be said, is brought to completion in the Ascension, but this is only half true. The journey of Man is brought to its end, for man’s original mission is fulfilled, for now Man reigns from heaven. Now Man completes the creation. Now Man fills all things. For in Christ, mankind has been filled with heavenly benediction and grace; we, who are the body of Christ; Christ, who is the head of the Church; Christ who fills all things.

Indeed, the Son of Man has been glorified in His crucifixion. And now in His Ascension, Man, within the Son, has been brought into glory, that all that Adam lost might be restored; that what Adam was given would be given back, and given twice greater.

For now, dear Christians, even in the misery and temptation of this world, we reign, for Christ, the crucified, even reigns now through our suffering, that we might count even our sufferings as joy, and our death as gain.

Rejoice, therefor with exceeding joy, even as the Holy Apostles, O Church, for:

‘For God is the King of all the earth;
    sing praises with a psalm!
God reigns over the nations;
    God sits on his holy throne.’

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