Where? How? What? When? Why?
Commentary
NOTE: Charting The Course and illustrations are provided for both Ascension Day/Sunday and Easter 7. Clergy may choose which material to use on Sunday, May 15.
A cluster of parishes in northern California marks ascension each year by meeting together for worship and then serving homemade pie and coffee afterward. The celebration is jokingly termed by some the pie-in-the-sky feast day! It is indeed an apt description of a festival of the Christ faith which contains elements that seem almost too simple to be true and yet points to realities that cannot be denied.
The texts are very different from one another in form; the Acts text is a description of the ascension event itself. The epistle text is a combination of information and prayer and the gospel presents a longer and somewhat different version of the ascension.
Yet, each answers to some extent the questions that believers and seekers have had of the post-resurrection Jesus: How did he ascend? Where did he go and why? What does this mean for our daily lives now?
The task of the preacher is to draw listeners to the central reality of the texts -- the presence of Jesus Christ in the lives of the believers -- rather than the futile side roads of explaining the terms of an ancient cosmology; which in any event, are no less clear than contemporary definitions about what happened.
That one the three texts are in the form of a prayer and that there are two somewhat different versions of the ascension can assist the preacher in looking at the reality of Jesus' presence with God and with us in ways that can avoid the propositional and empirical. It is not that Jesus said good-bye and how but what his farewell means for us now which forms the center of the sermon.
OUTLINE I
Departure
Acts 1:1-11 (All 4 lectionaries)
A. vv. 1-5: The writer gives a brief sketch of Jesus' life, death and his brief post-resurrection relationship with them. Even with the proofs of the resurrection provided to the disciples, the word to them from Jesus is "Wait!" They are to wait. Wait in Jerusalem. Wait for instructions. Wait for the baptism of the Holy Spirit. This part of the text which emphasizes waiting is a good contrast to the latter verses which urge the disciples to wait no longer.
B. vv. 6-9: These brief verses do not record the possible stunned silence, the tears of farewell, the shock of good-bye which all present must have experienced to some extent. Jesus answers the disciples' questions about his relationship to Israel's well-being with another "Wait!" This is really an admonition to the listeners to refrain from useless speculation. Their task is quite something else. The disciples are, however, reassured that they can expect the fulfillment of two things shortly: they will receive God's power and they will, as a result, be God's witnesses.
C. vv. 10-11: The disciples stand and watch but a cloud obscures Jesus from their sight. He has left and will not be back in the ways they have experienced him the 40 days following the resurrection. This departure is wholly different. It is a turning point. The disciples are joined by two strangers who tell them, finally, that Jesus will return but gazing after him is not the solution to their consternation now.
OUTLINE II
A prayer for the middle times
Ephesians 1:15-23 (All four lectionaries)
A. v. 16: Paul lets his listeners know that he has their spiritual concerns and interests in his prayers. Their pastor is praying for them in their relationship to God.
B. vv. 17-19: Paul wants them to be aware of his desires for the Ephesians' community. He wants for them wisdom, insight into God's plans for them, and a deep sense that they are a part of God's community, God's saints.
C. vv. 20-22: These verses recap the history of the Lord Paul invites the Ephesians to worship. Indeed, they point the listeners to the nature of the Lord Paul invites them to participate in. There is a vivid contrast drawn between the One who was subjugated to death and then raised to be placed above everything; death and life; all powers, every name, through all time and eternity. Paul ends with a stunning statement that proclaims God is resident throughout all the created order in the person and spirit of Jesus Christ. So all encompassing is this statement, that it can certainly place the modern listener in the proper context of the meaning of the ascension -- an affirmation of God that Jesus Christ is Lord of all.
OUTLINE III
Another look
Luke 24:44-53(Revised Common, Lutheran, Episcopal)
It is a well-known fact that a witness to an occasion of some magnitude will have a slightly different understanding of it from anyone else present. A second version of the ascension events can enable the preacher to underscore the fact that the how of it is not the issue.
A. v. 44: As Jesus sits with the overjoyed disciples, he assures them that everything they have read and discussed, everything that has been was written in the ancient texts and that his presence is their fulfillment of hope!
B. vv. 45-49: The post-ascension event agenda is presented. Jesus is going to leave and what do the disciples do? They take the knowledge that he is the Messiah, that he has risen, that forgiveness and repentance are to be preached against that backdrop and they are to tell all they meet about this. Again, Jesus asks them to wait until they are given the requisite power to carry out the mission.
A sermonic path which might be quite fruitful with these verses is a view of the priorities which establish mission in Jesus' name. In other words, before the mission begins, the power of the Spirit is to be sought -- as Paul prays for it in the epistle text -- for the tasks of those who go in Jesus' name.
C. vv. 50-53: Again, the curtain of ultimate reality is drawn shut before the disciples. The Matthean account is even more vague than that of Acts. There are no strangers with words of encouragement, no clouds, no ascending by some accounts. Instead, Jesus was with them and then he was not.
The final word of this gospel is one of praise and joy. The disciples do not linger asking, How? When? Where? Why? Jesus has told them what they need to know and they return to praise the Lord in the temple.
A cluster of parishes in northern California marks ascension each year by meeting together for worship and then serving homemade pie and coffee afterward. The celebration is jokingly termed by some the pie-in-the-sky feast day! It is indeed an apt description of a festival of the Christ faith which contains elements that seem almost too simple to be true and yet points to realities that cannot be denied.
The texts are very different from one another in form; the Acts text is a description of the ascension event itself. The epistle text is a combination of information and prayer and the gospel presents a longer and somewhat different version of the ascension.
Yet, each answers to some extent the questions that believers and seekers have had of the post-resurrection Jesus: How did he ascend? Where did he go and why? What does this mean for our daily lives now?
The task of the preacher is to draw listeners to the central reality of the texts -- the presence of Jesus Christ in the lives of the believers -- rather than the futile side roads of explaining the terms of an ancient cosmology; which in any event, are no less clear than contemporary definitions about what happened.
That one the three texts are in the form of a prayer and that there are two somewhat different versions of the ascension can assist the preacher in looking at the reality of Jesus' presence with God and with us in ways that can avoid the propositional and empirical. It is not that Jesus said good-bye and how but what his farewell means for us now which forms the center of the sermon.
OUTLINE I
Departure
Acts 1:1-11 (All 4 lectionaries)
A. vv. 1-5: The writer gives a brief sketch of Jesus' life, death and his brief post-resurrection relationship with them. Even with the proofs of the resurrection provided to the disciples, the word to them from Jesus is "Wait!" They are to wait. Wait in Jerusalem. Wait for instructions. Wait for the baptism of the Holy Spirit. This part of the text which emphasizes waiting is a good contrast to the latter verses which urge the disciples to wait no longer.
B. vv. 6-9: These brief verses do not record the possible stunned silence, the tears of farewell, the shock of good-bye which all present must have experienced to some extent. Jesus answers the disciples' questions about his relationship to Israel's well-being with another "Wait!" This is really an admonition to the listeners to refrain from useless speculation. Their task is quite something else. The disciples are, however, reassured that they can expect the fulfillment of two things shortly: they will receive God's power and they will, as a result, be God's witnesses.
C. vv. 10-11: The disciples stand and watch but a cloud obscures Jesus from their sight. He has left and will not be back in the ways they have experienced him the 40 days following the resurrection. This departure is wholly different. It is a turning point. The disciples are joined by two strangers who tell them, finally, that Jesus will return but gazing after him is not the solution to their consternation now.
OUTLINE II
A prayer for the middle times
Ephesians 1:15-23 (All four lectionaries)
A. v. 16: Paul lets his listeners know that he has their spiritual concerns and interests in his prayers. Their pastor is praying for them in their relationship to God.
B. vv. 17-19: Paul wants them to be aware of his desires for the Ephesians' community. He wants for them wisdom, insight into God's plans for them, and a deep sense that they are a part of God's community, God's saints.
C. vv. 20-22: These verses recap the history of the Lord Paul invites the Ephesians to worship. Indeed, they point the listeners to the nature of the Lord Paul invites them to participate in. There is a vivid contrast drawn between the One who was subjugated to death and then raised to be placed above everything; death and life; all powers, every name, through all time and eternity. Paul ends with a stunning statement that proclaims God is resident throughout all the created order in the person and spirit of Jesus Christ. So all encompassing is this statement, that it can certainly place the modern listener in the proper context of the meaning of the ascension -- an affirmation of God that Jesus Christ is Lord of all.
OUTLINE III
Another look
Luke 24:44-53(Revised Common, Lutheran, Episcopal)
It is a well-known fact that a witness to an occasion of some magnitude will have a slightly different understanding of it from anyone else present. A second version of the ascension events can enable the preacher to underscore the fact that the how of it is not the issue.
A. v. 44: As Jesus sits with the overjoyed disciples, he assures them that everything they have read and discussed, everything that has been was written in the ancient texts and that his presence is their fulfillment of hope!
B. vv. 45-49: The post-ascension event agenda is presented. Jesus is going to leave and what do the disciples do? They take the knowledge that he is the Messiah, that he has risen, that forgiveness and repentance are to be preached against that backdrop and they are to tell all they meet about this. Again, Jesus asks them to wait until they are given the requisite power to carry out the mission.
A sermonic path which might be quite fruitful with these verses is a view of the priorities which establish mission in Jesus' name. In other words, before the mission begins, the power of the Spirit is to be sought -- as Paul prays for it in the epistle text -- for the tasks of those who go in Jesus' name.
C. vv. 50-53: Again, the curtain of ultimate reality is drawn shut before the disciples. The Matthean account is even more vague than that of Acts. There are no strangers with words of encouragement, no clouds, no ascending by some accounts. Instead, Jesus was with them and then he was not.
The final word of this gospel is one of praise and joy. The disciples do not linger asking, How? When? Where? Why? Jesus has told them what they need to know and they return to praise the Lord in the temple.
