Ascension Day 2019

Lectionary readings: Acts 1:1-11 and Ephesians 1:15-23 and Luke 24:44-53

Back in 2007, I visited artist Antony Gormley’s Blind Light installation at the Hayward Gallery in London. A room-sized glass-walled box filled with cloud, and brightly lit, into which people were permitted to enter a few at a time. From the outside, you could make out those on the inside, looming out of the mist, whenever they approached the walls. From the inside, you could not see more than a foot in front of your nose; had to move cautiously so as not to bump into others. It was a profound meditation on walking by faith, not sight—which is, of course, how we all walk into the future, whether people of faith or not...

Today is Ascension Day, a principal feast of the Church. The era of Christendom made the birth of Jesus the pivotal point of history—BC/AD—but I would respectfully suggest that the ascension is the more fitting pivot-point, between ‘what Jesus did with his disciples’ [see the Gospel According to Luke, which ends with an account of Jesus’ ascension into heaven, forty days after he was raised from the dead] and ‘what Jesus is doing through his disciples’ [beginning with the Acts of the Apostles, Luke’s sequel, which starts with an account of Jesus’ ascension].

The pivot-point between what Jesus did with his disciples and what Jesus is doing through his disciples.

When the early church, including the writers of the New Testament, reflected on the significance of the ascension, they came to understand that we are caught up in it. Not in a standing-around-waiting looking-up-at-the-sky kind-of-a-way, but in a participating-in-the-rule-of-king-Jesus way. As the late American philosopher Dallas Willard put it, ‘Discipleship is the process of becoming who Jesus would be if he were you.’

This is mystery: that Jesus is exercising God’s reign of justice and joy through ordinary women and men going about their ordinary business in the world, enabled by an extraordinary empowering. This is mystery, not a puzzle to be solved, or relegated to the Too-Hard-to-Understand category; but a wonder to be lived, with a sense of wonder.

Are you a scientist or an engineer, pioneering new solutions to the problems we face? Jesus is exercising God’s reign of justice and joy through you.

Are you an artist or an activist campaigner, enabling us to see the world from a new and life-affirming perspective? Jesus is exercising God’s reign of justice and joy through you.

Are you in marketing or promotion, telling good news stories about a place or product and connecting people to opportunities? Jesus is exercising God’s reign of justice and joy through you.

Are you a healthcare professional, enabling healing or supporting preventative well-being so lives can flourish? Jesus is exercising God’s reign of justice and joy through you.

Are you a teacher or trainer, (or a parent or grandparent,) investing in the next generation? Jesus is exercising God’s reign of justice and joy through you.

And, of course, if you are retired, or if you have had to flee your familiar world and seek asylum so that you are currently living in a limbo, these circumstances simply mean that Jesus is exercising God’s reign of justice and joy through you in ways that might differ from your previous working life. Once caught-up in the ascension, you don’t drop out again. You—yes, you, my friend—are a gift of Christ to the world.

Today is the Feast of the Ascension. So, raise a glass to all the women and men caught up in the greatest unfolding drama the world has ever known, in a myriad of ways as they go about their lives. Beginning with the chalice of communion, the toast to Christ our risen and ascended king, and the being caught-up in him all over again.