Home > Sermons > May 20, 2007 (Ascension Sunday)

Gazing Up

It is a rather amusing picture – the disciples standing there dumbfounded, – gazing up into the heavens.  Then that trademark Lukan character – the mysterious man in the white robe –  calls out to them, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven?”  I can imagine the disciples looking at one another and perhaps saying, “Well, why are we standing here looking up?”  Of course there are reasons why they were immobilized and why they stood gazing up. 

On Your Own

I want to begin with a story I’ve borrowed, that speaks of the immediate panic the disciples may have felt.  It goes like this: A successful businessman had built up his corporation from a whim and a dream to a global economic powerhouse. His story was the American dream, and he liked telling it. By the time he reached his mid-fifties, he had become an internationally best-selling author and a hot ticket on the speakers' circuit. Traveling was almost more home to him than his post office address, and awards were tossed his direction from organizations he had never heard about. 

A few folks had marked the journey with him, including his trusted administrative assistant. Originally, he had hired her as a "secretary," but now he grew in stature and political correctness, and carried her along as a constant help and indispensable support. She knew him so well, in fact, that not only did she log his calendar and make his travel arrangements, but she even prepared his speeches, for she had heard so often the things that he said people wanted to hear from him. 

One afternoon as he breezed through his office again, in between yesterday in Tulsa and tomorrow in Tampa, he grabbed the sheaf of papers she had neatly stacked on his desk, took the files and the tickets, stuffed everything into his briefcase, and tossed her a tiny nod as he rushed off to the airport. The next morning he walked up to the podium at a large convention center amid anticipatory applause, and opened the file marked "Tampa Speech." Quickly, he gave a brilliant introduction that got the crowd laughing and hanging onto his every word. He was good and he knew it.

At the bottom of the page came the transitional line, "and now we shall discuss these things further under seven separate headings." But when he flipped to page two, only five words were printed boldly on an otherwise blank sheet: "YOU'RE ON YOUR OWN NOW!" In that moment he realized how much he had taken his administrative assistant for granted, and just how much he had underpaid her (Emphasis from www.csspub.com). 

Jesus and His Befuddled Disciples

The situation of Jesus and his disciples was much different from this businessman’s story.  But the businessman’s feelings at the moment of impact might have been reminiscent of the experience of the disciples in their moment of impact. What are we going to do now? 

After their years spent with him – years in which he struggled to help them understand what he was really about – and in which they seemed to never get it – Jesus was killed.  The disciples, nevertheless had experienced his presence in their group – the Easter experience.  But now they are convinced that he was finally gone. They were on their own now – but they are still the bumbling bumpkins they had always been.  What now? 

Befuddled Christians

Friday night we saw the comedy play “Rosencranz and Guildenstern Are Dead” in the Piccolo Theater at the Main Street Metra Station.  Perhaps you’ve seen it or read it.  Jesus’ disciples are a lot like Rosencranz and Guildenstern – always about one beat off what is really happening. And yet this is the cast of characters to whom Jesus has assigned the continuation of his work on earth. The mysterious man in white calls to them:  Hey, you, why do you stand gazing up into heaven? 

Sometimes we feel a lot like the befuddled disciples, like Rosencranz and Guildenstern, or even like the successful businessman whose comfortable rug was pulled out from under him. My brother likes to use the phrase to describe that feeling as ‘the look of a deer in the headlights’! 

There are a lot of things that can happen that put us suddenly into a situation where we haven’t a clue. Things that happen are life-changing  – the death of a loved one, an illness (ours or a loved one’s), the loss of a job, the loss of a relationship, a crisis of faith. And although it seems impossible at the moment of the impact, with the help of friends and the help of God, internal strength and internal direction return and we are  not always the deer caught in the headlights.  Maybe a friend or a loved one speaks to us, or the Spirit within us says, why do you stand gazing into heaven? And we realize that we need to ‘get up and do what has to be done,” in the words of Garrison Keillor.  

Churches experience things that put them into a time of uncertainty, too. Things like changing demographics – a church is growing rapidly or losing membership – either one, a financial crisis, a crisis of leadership or faith within the church, the change of pastoral leadership.   A lot of things can leave a church standing and gazing like the disciples, and the Spirit says,  why do you stand gazing into heaven?

Can We Learn?

So, a part of the message of the Ascension story is for us to identify with the befuddled disciples, and to learn from them their secret for moving forward in faith and strength.  They went to Jerusalem and they waited.  They didn’t know what they were waiting for, but when the Spirit did come upon them, they did know and they did go forward in strength and in faith.  Do we have the patience to wait for the Spirit to guide us in strength and faith?  Like befuddled disciples? Like Rosencranz and Guildenstern? 

The Physics to the Theology

There is a completely different aspect to the Ascension story – an aspect which may be seem even more difficult for us to tackle.  That is the physical story itself.  What do we do with the story of Jesus being carried up into heaven?  Where would that heaven be?  Is it somewhere in the earth’s stratosphere?  Is it out beyond the scope of science’s telescopes?  Is it in one of those unseen places like a black hole?  The people who wrote the Scriptures didn’t have that problem.  They lived in a three storied universe, and heaven was just out there beyond our reach.  But we don’t understand the Universe in that way. 

I would propose that, for us to interpret the meaning of the Ascension – beyond the psychological feelings which we have already explored this morning– would be to tackle the theological meaning that the story had for the early church.  I believe that the Ascension story is here is to tie the story of Jesus to the story of Elijah.  The Ascension story is a proclamation that Jesus is somehow like the Elijah.  Not to say that Jesus was Elijah returned, though some were awaiting the return of Elijah (and Jews still may be). Some might have thought of Jesus as Elijah returned. 

The Theology of Elijah

It was advantageous for their own spiritual growth and in their relationship to their neighbors for the young Christian Church to state that Jesus was related to the revered prophet Elijah – the one who had been so close to God that he had never died, but was translated into heaven on the chariot of fire! 

The Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (Kittel) has 13 pages of small print about Elijah in Jewish theology at the time the New Testament was written.  It was indeed a rich mixture.  Some regarded John the Baptist as the returned Elijah. When Jesus had taken his disciples across the border into Caesarea Philipi, he asked them who people were saying he was.  And one of their answers was that Jesus was Elijah the prophet.  Elijah was also one of the two people that Jesus and the disciples saw in the vision on the Mount of Transfiguration. 

The figure of Elijah was huge in Judaism.  The very fact that people believed he had not died, but been transported into heaven, gave him a special relationship with God.  Some expected Elijah to return as a Messianic figure.  Others expected Elijah to prepare the sinful people for the coming of the Messiah. Even today in a Jewish Seder observance the empty chair is placed at the table for Elijah. 

Ascension Theology

The Christian story of the Ascension by itself cannot hold a candle to the drama of the horses and chariots of fire!  And the sort of Rosenkranz and Gildenstern nature of the disciples do not hold a candle to the clarity and certainty of Elisha.  But I believe that, in Luke’s own humble way his Gospel and his book of Acts are comparing Jesus’ post-resurrection departure to Elijah’s translation. 

Jesus’ Ascension was superior to Elijah’s in that Jesus was resurrected.  But the drama of the Ascension to heaven was a further statement of the reverence in which the Christians held their Jesus, and it compared favorably to Elijah’s.  When the stories were written, the Christians were just coming to grip with Jesus as the Messiah – not the sort of Messiah that everyone had expected, but a Messiah nevertheless, and one who would relate to the current theology of Elijah. 

Not about the Physics – But the Meaning of Jesus

So I encourage you not to get stuck trying to figure out the physics of the Ascension. But I encourage you to consider the meaning that Jesus held for the early church. And I encourage you to consider what Jesus means to us. 

Jesus does not and must not belong only to the conservatives and fundamentalists.  Jesus belongs to us.  I invite you to embrace him. And as you do, to take heed not spend too much time gazing into the heavens, or gazing into the past, but with Jesus we look forward and ask where he is leading us into the future.

A Closing Reminiscence

I close with someone’s written reminiscence: It was an incredible worship service. The music warmed my heart and the musicians were wonderful. I was with people I love and respect. The message seemed like it was given just for me. In fact, if it hadn't been for the 4,000 other people present I might have suspected that the preacher had been checking up on me and prepared the sermon with me in mind. When the worship service ended, I didn't want to leave. If I could just stay, the feelings I was experiencing would stay as well. But I had to go; not just because they were going to close the building, but because Christ fills us up like that so we can go and serve him and others (Emphasis, www.csspub.com , adapted). 

People of First Congregational Church, would you stand here looking up or looking back? ... There's work to do!   Amen.