TEXT: Luke 24:50-53

SUBJECT: Luke #94: The Ascension

There’s nothing I hate more than going to an exciting movie with a boring climax. If the last scene is a dud, the whole movie fails, no matter well drawn the characters are or how clever the plot may be. Good stories need good endings!

And Luke’s story is a good one. The tension has been building from the first chapter, when an angel announces the Coming King. The King is born in a stable and for thirty years, He lives quietly in a small town way out in the boondocks.

At thirty years old, the King goes public and sets the nation on fire. Some burn with love for King, but others burn in rage against Him. You see, they don’t want the King to take His throne, and they do everything they can to stop it.

For a while, the efforts are quite successful. The enemies of the King turn the nation against Him and sick the Romans on Him. Finally, they have Him crucified and buried in a sealed tomb, with a guard standing by to keep it that way.

For three days and night, the enemies of the King celebrate their victory, but the party soon becomes a wake. The King has come back to life and broken out of His tomb. For the next forty days, He shows Himself alive by many infallible proofs. Not everyone sees Him, but more then five hundred do. And their testimonies agree. The Lord is risen! The Lord is risen indeed!

But even though He’s alive from the dead, He still hasn’t been crowned. He’s still tramping around Israel in the company of fishermen and other lowlifes, much as He has before.

But no more of that! Today, the King takes His throne.

The story occurs forty days after the crucifixion and ten days before Pentecost. During this time, the King has been showing His friends that He’s alive. Not alive in their memories or alive in their hearts or alive in their dreams or alive in their faith, but really alive—as alive as they are in body and soul.

Although He has shown up in several places over the last few weeks, He’s spent most of His time in Jerusalem, where the Apostles are staying along with some other disciples. They haven’t been very out doing much lately, but their time is not wasted. Mostly, they’ve been gawking at Jesus Christ, and that’s time well spent!

When the forty days are up, the Lord takes a walk with a few friends. When they get to Bethany, He stops and turns around to bless them. Lifting His hands to heaven, He wishes them God’s best. The scene is a moving one, full of tender feeling and memories from deep down inside.

Though the Lord is a young man, He’s blessing them as though He were a grandfather blessing his children and their children. This is as it should be, for even though He’s far from old, His dignity makes Him The Everlasting Father, the patriarch of God’s Family, the One who keeps us all together, the One we look to for wisdom and support and comfort.

But it’s not only a father blessing his children that day, but a Priest blessing the nation. The Lord was born in the Tribe of Judah and Moses gave them no part in the priesthood. It belongs to Levi and to no one else! But David said that one day, another Priest would rise in Israel, a priest not descending from Aaron but one who descends from nobody but God!

Abraham bowed down to this Man and gave him a tithe of all he had. In doing that, he stood for the whole people of God, who would one day pay tribute to the Priest who was to come. And Jesus Christ is that Priest!

Here we see something of our Lord’s character as well as of His calling. God has exalted Him into the Priesthood and is about to crown Him King of kings, but the Lord is not thinking about Himself and the honors He has coming. He’s still thinking of others. Not demanding the disciples worship or service or loyalty, but still giving them the blessing He wanted them to have. Even then, just seconds before His mighty ascent to God’s Right Hand, the Son of Man has not come to be served, but to serve…

After the blessing is pronounced, the Lord steps away from His friends and a cloud appears at His feet. It’s not an ordinary cloud, but a cloud of glory—the same cloud than stood over the Tabernacle in the wilderness, the cloud that long rested between the Cherubim on the ark of the covenant. It is the visible glory of God come to earth.

It has come to carry the King to His Throne. Other kings ride in chariots made of iron or wood, or maybe ivory, but this King makes the clouds His chariots and walks on the wings of the wind. Not even Elijah had an escort to match His!

As the disciples look on in loving wonder, the cloud lifts Him up and flies Him through the skies—and beyond.

From where they stood, the disciples lost sight of Him at a few thousand feet. But even that must have been mind-boggling. From where we are, we know what happened to Him after He disappeared.

He soon got to heaven where the Sentry gave the command:

But someone in heaven did not know of what the Watchman spoke. He asked,

The answer came quickly and without doubt,

The gate swings open and a legion of dignitaries are there to greet their King with a song,

When the King sits down on the Elevated Chair, everything in heaven, angels, elders, ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands fell down and worship Him who lives forever and ever. All crowns—human and superhuman—are put into His service and gladly surrendered to His Majesty.

The disciples had no special vision that day, but they knew their Bibles and the Lord had opened its prophecies to them. Thus, they knew where He had gone and what He had become. By faith, they saw His Coronation in heaven and now knew—as they never had before—that He was—and is—the Blessed and only Potentate, King of kings and Lord of lords.

To celebrate the crowning of their King, they…

Worshiped Him. "Worship", in a limited sense, can be given to a human king. To them, knees are bowed and services are offered. That’s no doubt included in this place. But there’s far more to it than that. Peter, James, John, and the others are now doing what no God-fearing Jew had ever done before: They are worshiping a Man as God! And rightly so, for this Man is God!

Were continually in the temple praising and blessing God…with great joy. The disciples were religious men and were used to praising God and thanking Him for His favors.

They thanked Him for common blessings like food and friendship and health and children and the other things that make life happy under the sun.

They also praised Him for the special blessings He had showered upon their nation. He had rescued them from Egypt and fed them in the Wilderness and gave them a land flowing with milk and honeyed. He had spoken to them in His Law and by His prophets. He had given them the means to worship Him and the promises to ease their burdens and lift their hopes. To no other people had He done such wonders—and they blessed Him for them!

But never like this! For in seeing the Lord rise into heaven, they saw all the prophecies fulfilled and all their hopes made sure. The heavenly country the fathers had looked, the Lord went to. And promised that some day all His disciples would join Him there. And there was a there there. Because He went there!

Luke, therefore, is the greatest comedy ever written! Not comedy in our sense, meaning something that makes you laugh, but in the old sense of the word. It’s a story with a happy ending. The happiest ending for Christ, for the disciples, and for you.

The meaning of our story has already been given. The Ascension of Christ means Jesus is Lord.

He is the Lord of prophets, first inspiring the Apostles to preach and write down His word for the world. Then He gifts pastors and others to understand the Word and teach it to others. Then He opens the understanding of all His people so that they can see the truth and love it.

He is the Lord of priests, first offering Himself as a sacrifice for our sins, and now in heaven applying that sacrifice to us and praying for us day and night, especially when we need it most.

He is the Lord of kings, ruling the Church by His Word and Spirit and controlling the world by His Providence, mercy, and justice.

This is what the Ascension means! It means Jesus is your Lord, a Lord to obey, a Lord to love, a Lord to be thankful for, a Lord to tell others about. So get to it. And the love of God be with you all. Amen.