Ascension

“Beyond the Space Age”

Peace Be to You

Creed

In this lesson we consider the Creed, particularly those words that refer Ascension of Our Blessed Lord and the fact that He is seated at the Right Hand of God the Father Almighty. 

 

After the Resurrection, Our Blessed Lord remained 40 days on earth.  During that time, He instructed the Apostles about the Kingdom of God and laid the structure for His Mystical Body, The Church.

 

Moses had fasted for 40 days before giving the law, and Elias had fasted 40 days before the restoration of the law.

And now for 40 days the Risen Savior laid the Pillars of the Church and New Law of the Gospel.

40’s were about to end, and the Apostles were bidden to wait the 50^th day, which was the Day of Jubilee.

 

When the Thursday came for the Ascension of Our Divine Savior, He led His Apostles out to Mount Olivet.

Not from Galilee, but from Jerusalem, where He had suffered, would He leave earth for His Heavenly Father.

The Sacrifice was now completed, He gathers His Apostles about Him as He prepares to Ascend to the Heavenly Throne.

He raises his hands in Benediction over them, and the Hands that were pulled down from Heaven to earth, to give them that Blessing, bore the imprint of nails.  Pierced Hands best distribute Blessings.

If you ever want good counsel go to someone who has suffered. 

 

Scripture now speaking of the Resurrection, these are not all the texts but one or two:

 

• “… And even has He blessed them He parted from them,… He was carried up into Heaven and is Seated now at the Right Hand of God…”  (Mark 16:19)

 

There are several words here that need explanation such as the fact that Our Blessed Lord Ascended, that He is seated, and that He is at the Right Hand of the Father.

 

“ Our Blessed Lord Ascended ”

The Ascension – we are not to think of locomotion.

We are not to think of Our Blessed Lord for example, as going beyond the furthest star, or think of Him as being so many million light years away, nor are we to think of Him as going up, from one point to another.

And certainly not, are we to envisage Him in the Ascension as a form of space travel.

Our Blessed Lord once had a Descent, that is to say once came down from Heaven, but that really did not mean a physical descent, it was rather a drawing aside of the veil in which Divinity was revealed to humanity.

So, too, the Ascension, not like a rocket.  Our Blessed Lord is no closer to Heaven when He passes for example, we imagine Him passing the planet Arcturus.

Rather the Ascent and the Decent that are mentioned in the Creed and in Christian Doctrine refer rather to humiliation and exaltation  (referring to humbling oneself).

When Our Blessed Lord came to this earth He humbled Himself.

When He ascended into Heaven He was Exalted and that is the way the Scripture always speaks of Him. He ascended into Heaven because He had humbled Himself and was made obedient to the death of the Cross.

 

Word “seated,” mean?

But what does the word “seated,” mean?

That He sitteth at the right of God the Father Almighty.

The word “seated” here means: repose after conflict.

The cross is left behind with all of its dust and thirst and struggle and pain.

Being seated does not mean that our Lord is passive.

You remember in the book of Genesis God was said to have rested after creation. (Genesis 2:2)

Did that mean He was tired?  Certainly it did not imply that His Creative Arm was weary.

Our Blessed Lord seats not to recuperate but because His Work is done.

On the Cross Our Blessed Lord said: “It is finished.”  All the types and figures and symbols of the Old Testament had now been completed, every word of scripture had been fulfilled.

There is no other Mediator; the Cross is the Perpetual Atonement and satisfaction for the sins of men.

As our Lord had said to the Apostles:  “I have finished the work.”  Rather praying to His Heavenly Father He said: “I have finished the Work that Thou has given Me to do.”  (ref John 17:1-25) That is the meaning of our Lord being seated.

 

“.. Right Hand of the Father..”  ?

But what does it mean to say that He is at the right hand of the Father?

Well the Right Hand implies Power, and it means therefore, that He is the Power of God and has Power throughout the Universe.

The right hand does not mean a physical nearness, it means a Sharing of Glory. Our Lord is acting as a Mediator between God and man.  That is His power. 

 

“ … High Priest entering the Sanctuary beyond the Veil.”

The Ascension of Our Blessed Lord is described in Sacred Scripture, too, as a high priest entering the sanctuary beyond the veil. (ref Hebrews 10:19-22)

That is a rather unusual expression, beyond the veil, what does it mean?

It refers to something in the Old Testament.  In the Temple of Jerusalem and in the Tabernacle in the desert before it had hanging before the Holy of Holies-  a veil.  It was very heavy, gorgeous and mysterious.  It was hung and suspended according to the pattern that was given on the mount.  It was highly embroidered, of purple, blue, scarlet and finally twisted linen and then the golden cherubim were woven into it.  All of that is described in the book of Exodus.  (ref. Exodus 26:31-35)

 

Now behind that veil lay in shrine the gorgeous symbols of Jewish history and Jewish faith. Behind it was the Holy of Holies.  The priest was allowed to enter that Holy of Holies only once a year.  And then only after he had purified himself with blood and sprinkled this veil with blood.

When this happened, the people had for one brief moment some communication, thanks to their priest, with this Holy of Holies, but for the rest of the year it was hidden.

And from behind that veil the sound of bells and the rustle of the beautiful vestments of the priest and movement of feet there was some dim adumbration of a mystery.

But what must the Jews have said to themselves, as they looked at that veil they knew they could not enter it, they must have said “Separated, separated, cut off we are from God.”

That sentiment must have continued in the heart of every true man of the Old Testament.  Now the Veil in the New Testament is called the Flesh of Our Lord.  (ref. Hebrews 10:20)

 

When Our Blessed Lord died on the Cross that veil of the Temple was rent asunder.  It was rent from top to bottom as if to indicate that it was not done in any way by the hand of man.

In other words this barrier between Heaven and earth, between God and man was now destroyed.  Thanks to the death of Christ there was access to Heaven, access to the Heavenly Father.

There might have been indeed some symbolism in the fact that the centurion pierced the side of our Blessed Lord, where as I said Sacred Scripture called His flesh the veil and when that side was pierced that was indeed revealed the Holy of Holies which was the heart of the all loving God.

But in any case, simply humanity before the redemption could never enter behind that veil.

 

Our Human nature – He bore it

Now Christ took upon Himself our human nature He bore it, He lived it, He died in it and He resumed in it after He had laid it down.

He glorified it and He broke down that middle wall of partition between God and man and thus He made peace.

I look down to my nature laden with sin and I despair.  I look up to Christ’s nature, it is now Risen and Ascended and I am full of joy.

I look to my own nature and I see my helplessness.  I look up to Christ’s   nature and I see my hope.

I look down to my nature, see my sin, I look up to His and I see His Holiness.  And it is that Holiness of the Human Nature of Christ that is Risen now to Heaven.

 

What does it mean to us?  It means many things but we will just mention two.

One, it means that human nature like ours is in Heaven.  Think of it, the model of what our body will be if we live in it the very life of Christ.

Secondly, it means that we have a High Priest in Heaven who can sympathize with our weaknesses because He once bore our human lot.

(ref. 2 Corinthians 4:6-11)

Human nature in Heaven

First we say there is a human nature in Heaven.

When God came to this earth He took upon Himself a human nature.  That human nature we said was thrown into the fires of Calvary in reparation for the sins of man.

Risen, and now Ascended.  So that there is a continuity between the Incarnation and Ascension.

In the Incarnation our Lord took a Body, yes, but not just a body to suffer, otherwise He would have taken it for a time.

If He took that human nature just in order to suffer for our sakes, why did He not divest Himself of that human nature?

After all his garments had been soiled and stained and they had borne the heat and burdens of the day, why not throw them off?

No, because Human Nature was taken not just to atone for our sins, the end and purpose of God coming to this earth was to bring us to perfect union with the Father.

And how could He do this by showing that our flesh is not a barrier to thine intimacy, by taking it up to Heaven itself.

By showing that those who pass through trials, sufferings, whatever they be in this life, misunderstanding, will have their body

 Glorified. By Sharing in Christ’s Cross we share in His Glory.

(ref Romans 8:17 1 Peter 4:13 Romans 6:5 Philippians 3:10 )

The goal of all humanity is in some way reached in the Ascension.  That’s the full beauty of our Lord returning again to the Father.  He brought back with Him something that He did not have when He came to this earth.  He brought His Divinity – yes, and took His Divinity back with Him.

But He also took something else back.  He took back the Human Nature and the most blessed and wonderful Truth is taught in that fact.

Remember our Lord reiterated it when He was talking to Caiaphas, when He told him that “…one day he would see the Son of Man seated on the Right Hand of Power.” In other words that human nature that was so humiliated was no longer a humiliated human nature.  It is now Glorified. (ref Mark 14:60-62)

 

 

Because He is the New Adam in Heaven-  you and I are there

His Ascension is the true carrying of that Real Humanity, complete in all of its part, Body and Soul up to the very Throne of God.

That is the purpose of the Incarnation to be our model, to be our pattern.  In a certain sense because He is the new Adam in Heaven, you and I are there.

We are not yet there actually but we are there potentially so long as we remain in the State of Grace on this earth.

But that’s not the only reason, He took with Him the human nature, He also took a human nature in order that He might be able to sympathize with our own weaknesses.

The Epistle of the Hebrews has a beautiful text on this point, it reads:  “…It is not as if our High Priest was incapable of feeling for us in our humiliations, He has been brought through every trial fashioned as we are-  only sinless…”

(ref. Hebrews 4:15)

Our Blessed Lord therefore in Heaven is our High Priest, He is our mediator.  He is one who can understand us.

He is not apart from us.  Because He had our human nature.  That human nature when it was on this earth was so sensitive, that it was thrilled with the beauty of the lily, it was moved with the fall of a wounded sparrow, it was keenly touched by anything that could touch a human heart, whether high or low, good or bad, friend or enemy.

 

No man can be beyond the reach of that all comprehending sympathy because no man can ever be beyond the embrace of that love.

 

He can sympathize with the poor because He was poor, with the weary and heavy laden because He has been tired and worn, with the lonely and misrepresented and persecuted simply because:

• He has been in that position because
• He was tried, tried in mind as well as in heart,
• tried by fear, by sad surprise, by mental perplexity with a hard conflict with evil.
• Great spiritual depression He is able to feel to the uttermost with the keenest sorrows of our earthly lives
• and the beauty of it all is that this tried one is without sin.

And that is what enabled Him to drink in sympathy and nothing but sympathy and all of sorrow simply because He was without sin.

 

So that we have a human nature therefore in Heaven, a pattern human nature that knows all of our weaknesses and all of our trials.

What a beautiful hope this is to all.  A High Priest who can understand our infirmity.

 

• Right Hand of the Father, what does He do there?

But now that He had taken this human nature, now that it is in Glory at the Right Hand of the Father, what does He do there?

Has He a work?  Certainly, He is a Mediator, we might almost say that He is constantly showing His Scars to His Heavenly Father.

And He is saying “See these I was wounded in the house of those that loved me.  I love men, I suffered for them, forgive them Heavenly Father.”

 

He is our Sacrifice, He is ever present before the Father. As Scripture puts it, “ever making intercession for us.”

 

You see we very often get a wrong understanding of the life of our blessed Lord, we think of Him as just living on this earth, preaching the beatitudes and suffering.

No, Our Blessed Lord did not come down just for that.  He is living, making intercession for us. The representative of all whom invoke Him.  Certainly He has finished the Work of Justice on earth because He paid the debt of sin but the Work of Mercy in Heaven is unfinished.  That goes on and on and the reason it goes on is because we need His Intercession.

 

 

 

Mystery of the Ascension

I would very much like to continue speaking of this mystery of the Ascension but we ought to teach on another little point in the Creed namely “..that from Heaven our Lord will come to Judge the living and the dead.”

(Ref 2 Timothy 4:1-2)

Our Lord on this earth said that He would come to judge the world.  No other teacher ever said that and He said that as the judge He would return seated on a throne of glory, attended by angels to judge all men according to their works.

Imagination recoils at the thought of any human being able to penetrate into the depths of consciousness to fetter out the hidden motives, to pass judgment on them for all eternity.

 

But this Final Judgment is not hidden from the eyes of God as well as man.  And scripture puts it, rather as our Lord put it, “Then the sign of the Son of Man will be seen in the Heavens.”  “Then it is that all of the tribes of the land will mourn and they will see the Son of Man coming upon the clouds of Heaven with great power and glory and He will send out his angels with a loud blast of the trumpet to gather His Elect from the four winds from one end of Heaven to the other”  (ref. Matthew 24:30-31)

 

And when He comes it will not be just to judge a mere circumscribed area of the earth in which He labored and revealed itself, it will be to reveal Himself and to judge all nations and all empires.

 

When that time is, nobody knows.  He refuses to tell us.  He only says that it will be sudden, sudden like a flash of lightning.  He the Savior is the judge and what a beautiful way to have a judgment.

 

The bar of Divine Justice

Can you imagine any earthly judge saying to a criminal before “You are guilty, I am going to take all of your sins and crimes upon myself, I will suffer for you.”

 

What a judge he would be but Our Blessed Lord took upon Himself all of our sins as we stood before the bar of Divine Justice and He who suffered for us will come to judge us and what a judgment it will be when we will see the one who loved us so much and as the Gospel of Matthew puts it:

(ref Matthew 25:31-46)

“….and He will sit down upon the throne of his glory and all nations will be gathered in his presence, where He will divide men one from the other, as the shepherd divides the sheep from the goats.  He will set the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

 Then the King will say to those who are on his right hand “Come, you have received a blessing from my Father. Take possession of the kingdom, which has been prepared for you since the foundation of the world.  For I was hungry and you gave me food, thirsty and you gave me drink.  I was a stranger and you brought me home, naked and you clothed me, sick and you cared for me, a prisoner and you came to me.  Whereupon the just will answer “Lord when was it that we saw thee hungry and fed thee? Or thirsty and gave thee to drink? When was it that we saw thee a stranger and brought thee home or naked and clothed thee?” And the King will answer them: “Believe me when you did it to one of the least of my brethren here, you did it to me.”  

 

Then He will say to those who are on his left hand: “Go far from me, you that are accursed into that eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you never gave me food, I was thirty and you never gave me drink, I was a stranger and you did not bring me home, I was naked and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not care for me.”

 

 Whereupon they in their turn will answer “Lord when was it that we saw thee hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and did not minister to thee? And He will answer them: “Believe me when you refused it to one of the least of my brethren here, you refused it to me. And thee shall pass on to eternal punishment and the just to eternal life.”

Such is the Gospel of Matthew and the story of the return of our Lord.

 

Our Blessed Lord took upon Himself a pattern of human nature,

The point now is that Our Blessed Lord took upon Himself a pattern of human nature, that human nature was something like a die that a government makes when it wishes to mint coins.

When the die is fashioned, millions of coins can be fashioned like unto it.  Christ our pattern Man, was born, He suffered, He overcame temptation, He rose from the dead and was Glorified at the right hand of the Father.

 

We are the coins. Because He was born we are to be born, not physically but Spiritually.

Because He denied Himself and suffered we to deny ourselves.  The Cross becomes the condition of the empty tomb and once our life is patterned upon His Crucifixion, then our life shall be patterned also upon His Glorious Resurrection and His Glorious Ascension.

 

Are we his coins?  He will ask for coins and He will say “Whose inscription is thereon?”  “Is it Caesar’s?”  Do we belong to the world or do we belong to God. May it be so.