Sermon for May 29, 2014
Ascension Day
The Rev. Vicki K. Hesse
St. Philip’s In The Hills Parish, Tucson,
AZ
For readings click here
Lord, Open our lips
That our mouth shall proclaim your
praise. Amen
This
evening we celebrate
the
ascension of the risen Christ to heaven.
Since
the 4th Century,
Christians
have celebrated Ascension day
on
the fortieth day after Easter,
usually
on a Thursday.
Ascension
day is one of the main feasts
of
the Christian year
and one
of the five major milestones in the life of Jesus,
just
after the
baptism,
transfiguration, crucifixion, and resurrection.
While
we celebrate this special day only once a year,
the
ascension of Jesus is professed
in
the Nicene Creed and the Apostles’ Creed, as in,
(Nicene Creed)
… he rose again in accordance with the
Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated
at the right hand of the Father.”
Many artists have
have created imaginative ascension scenes.
Many of these scenes are painted
on the inside the domes of churches,
usually in two parts –
an upper (heavenly) part
with Christ making the sign of benediction
and the lower (earthly) part below him,
signifying the entire Church (big C).
So inside these churches, congregants,
like those appointed witnesses,
gaze up toward heaven
to witness, once again, the ascension of
Christ.
One
Ascension image stands out for me.
It
is a stained-glass panel from a church
in
Norfolk, England,[1]
dating from the 15th century.
In
the image,
we
see only the feet of Christ
ascending
into a blue cloud,
which
is surrounded in a glory of rays.
His
feet display their wounds
as
they disappear into the cloud.
Just
below,
we
see prominent footprints
on
the summit of the rocky mound
from
which Christ has ascended.
Two
angels are on either side.
Below,
the panel is crowded
with
the haloed heads of all twelve Apostles, with various hairstyles.
In
the center of the composition
is
the figure of Mary, richly dressed:
she
gazes up at her ascending son,
holding up her hands with their slender fingers.
The captivating image calls to mind
both the divinity of Christ
(with his feet ascending)
and the humanity of Jesus
(with his footprints on earth).
Since his feet were the last part of him to
touch earth,
it makes sense that the center of the
image is his feet –
also the last part to be visible
as he was taken up to heaven.
The captivating image also calls to mind
something my 12-step sponsor often asks me:
Where are
your feet?
Which is, of course, a rhetorical question,
but a question that invites me
to be present to this moment,
not anxious about the future
or resentful of the past
Where are
your feet?
This image reminds me that
Jesus’ feet are right here beside me –
us.
Historian and Author Diarmaid McCullough
writes, historians cannot fail to notice
the
“…extraordinary
galvanizing energy
of those who spread the story
after their experience of Resurrection and
Ascension.”
… “whether through some mass delusion,
some colossal act of wishful thinking or…”
and here is the interesting part,
“…through witness to a power beyond any
definition
known to Western historical analysis,
those who had known Jesus in life
and had felt the shattering disappointment of his death
and had felt the shattering disappointment of his death
proclaimed that he lived still,
that he loved them still,
and that he was to return to earth from
Heaven
… to love and save all …”[2]
Even this historian cannot deny the
extraordinary
galvanizing energy
of his
first followers
to know and see the invisible presence of
Jesus,
and his footprints right beside them,
infused with the power of his Spirit.
Through the power of his Spirit,
we hear in tonight’s Gospel that
“they worshiped him,
and returned to Jerusalem with great joy;
and they were continually in the temple
blessing God.”
In worshipping the ascending Jesus,
the disciples found their faith.
Their worship was not faith in Jesus’
resurrection,
but their acknowledgment of Jesus divinity. [3]
And this fueled their
extraordinary galvanizing energy.
How do we find our faith in Ascension, since
ascension is not part of our experience.
We believe we are created in God’s image
and God breathes into us life for our
earthly presence.
Yet when we die, the body is buried
and the soul returns to the creator.
Pastor Rosemary Brown offers a helpful
reflection
on the mystery of Ascension:
Consider the prayer that Jesus offers
at the Garden of Gethsemene.
“Father, if it be possible, take this cup
from me.”
He doesn’t say, “Let this death pass from
me.”
He says “cup.”
A cup is a receptacle. You fill it up, you pour it out.
Jesus tells his Father,
“I can die this death, Abba,
but do I have to pour myself out for these
people?
Can I just come on home?”
And God whispers back to his beloved Son,
“No, I need you to be alive forever
and to be the Savior of the World.”
“…It isn’t death that changes Jesus
from the human from Nazareth
to the Savior of the World.
It was his willingness to be spiritually
alive forever –
to be a Spirit set free from physical
limitations.” [4]
In this sense, all time flips over at Pentecost:
The body of Jesus returns to God
and his Spirit returns to us, to all of
us.
So adjust your watches to Pentecost Savings
Time.
God returned Jesus’ Spirit to us to be
alive for ever.
and prepare for his Spirit
to fill the empty places in our lives
where we need to be made whole.
to catch tears we shed over senseless acts of
violence
to galvanize us to do God’s work in the
world.
Perhaps, just for tonight,
you might join me in lifting your eyes
or hands
during the Eucharistic prayer,
when the celebrant says, “Lift up your hearts..”
and we reply, “We lift them to the Lord…”
In this way, our posture might reflect
our lifting up our selves – our bodies and
souls –
to be filled with the Spirit
especially in the empty places in our lives
where we need to be made whole.
Those first disciples
were so filled
with galvanizing energy and Spirit
that they could not keep from worshiping him,
and they founded a church with that
energy.
What will you do with a cup that is
filled with the Spirit and spills over?
Jesus was human and divine.
So are you. So am I.
How’s that?
Because God created us human
and Jesus fills us with the divine,
with his Spirit is set free from
the body that ascended into heaven,
so that he might fill our cups and make us
whole.
Tonight, as we gaze our eyes upward,
may we see the feet of Christ ascending
as we notice his footprints always beside us.
Amen
[1] Cited at http://www.english.cam.ac.uk/medieval/zoom.php?id=478 on May 26, 2014
[2] Diarmaid McCullough, Christianity, the First 3000 Years,
(Penguin Group, New York, 2009) p. 95
[3] Joseph Plevnik, "The Eyewitnesses of the Risen Jesus in
Luke 24," The Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 1987.
[4] The Rev. Rosemary
Brown, Sent Forth By God’s Blessing, cited at http://day1.org/570-sent_forth_by_gods_blessing
