After spending several weeks on the Resurrection, it’s time to move on to the next couple lines of the Creed.

He ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
(et ascéndit in cælum,)
(sedet ad déxteram Patris.)

The Ascension of our Lord into Heaven runs the risk of being overlooked. This is tragic. The Ascension is dramatically important for us and our salvation! I want to point out just two things about it today.

First: when our Lord ascends into Heaven, the Head of the Body of Christ (Jesus) takes his seat at his Father’s right hand, and the bridge between Heaven and Earth is finally revealed. When Jesus returned to his Father in Heaven, he took that humanity–our humanity with him. As members of the Body of Christ, we are united to Christ, and through that Body of Christ we will be brought to eternal life. As members of the Body of Christ, can bring God more fully into the world every day, because we are united to him through Christ!

Second: the Ascension the first of three moments where Christ’s followers recognize the fullness of their calling. At the Ascension, Christ left his Church in the care of the apostles. Just as the Davidic kings entrusted their kingdom to a group of 12 ministers (one per tribe), Christ entrusted his kingdom on this earth to his apostles. Just as Davidic kings had a prime minister to be head of his council, so did Christ: he had called Peter to lead and strengthen his brothers, saying “I have prayed that your own faith may not fail; and once you have turned back, you must strengthen your brothers.” (Luke 22:32)

But Christ’s council was incomplete. Judas had, tragically, hung himself instead after betraying Jesus instead of recognizing that even then he could have sought our Lord’s mercy. (Matthew 27:3-10) The apostles determined that another must take his place, and determined that Matthias, who had been a disciple from the Baptism by John and witnessed the Resurrection, would do so. With their number complete, they devoted themselves to prayer and prepared for the coming feast of Pentecost.

At Pentecost, the Holy Spirit was breathed into the Church and gave it new life. This moment reminds me of the spirit of life being breathed into the dry bones of Ezekiel 37:1-14. The Jewish Feast of Weeks, called Pentecost by Greek speaking Jews, was the fulfillment of the feast of Passover. It celebrated the giving of the Law on Mount Sinai. The Christian feast of Pentecost if the fulfillment of our Passover: when the Lamb of God was crucified to take away the sins of the world. Just as the Israelite people escaped Egypt by the blood of lambs, we have been freed from enslavement to sin and death by the Blood of the Lamb. When they worshiped God for the first time on Sinai, he gave them the Law and cut a covenant with them. (Covenants are “cut” in the Bible.) When the apostles celebrated the giving of the Law after the Resurrection of our Lord, God filled their hearts with the Holy Spirit and cut with them a new covenant. He fulfilled a promise to his people, “this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days—oracle of the LORD. I will place my law within them, and write it upon their hearts; I will be their God, and they shall be my people.” (Jeremiah 31:33) “I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.” (Ezekiel 36:26)

The Ascension, Election of Matthias, and Descent of the Holy Spirit show us what Jesus set out to do from the very beginning: to establish his Church on earth, so that through it all people might be brought back to the Father.

Rejoice! The Lord is Near!

Fr. Matt