King of all Worlds
King of all Worlds
To “feast” in the church-geek definition, is to celebrate, which makes Ascension Day one of the seven “principal” celebrations, or “feasts” observed in this Episcopal Church. But hasn’t Jesus left us behind? Should we be feasting or fasting, celebrating or mourning? Should the Paschal candle still be burning? And aren’t the Romans still in charge? What good is being more powerful than death if you don’t show it? Isn’t today as good a time as any to restore the kingdom?
Why does The Episcopal Church call this day a feast, a celebration? “Q. What do we mean when we say that he ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father? A. We mean that Jesus took our human nature into heaven where he now reigns with the Father and intercedes for us.” (Outline of the Faith, p. 850, Book of Common Prayer)
We celebrate, we feast because Christ has taken our human nature into heaven. His physical body, scarred by us, Jesus has taken to that place where no physical body before had gone. And because his natural body, made transphysical by Resurrection, is now in heaven, then we know that we who follow him as our Lord and savior shall too be there in our natural bodies made transphysical someday. That is the promise of Resurrection that Jesus has made to us, and confirmed by his ascension with that human nature. That seems worthy of a feast, something worth celebrating.
Still, the question that Jesus’s first disciples asked is one that all his disciples since could reasonably ask — Lord, are you going to restore the kingdom to Israel now — finally and for good? If not even death could keep you down, then how can the Romans, or all the other empires that have come and gone since then? If nothing is more true than that you have died and live forever, then why keep the human race arguing about the truth?
This Jesus whom we his disciples have always worshiped as God, then and now, excels in not giving us the answers we want to hear — It isn’t for you to know the times and seasons that the Father has set by his own authority. Rather, you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.
And so we, hearing our Lord and Savior’s promise through nearly two millennia, have been given power, but clearly not the kind of power that allows us to coerce and destroy our opponents. Too many of those claiming to speak and act in Jesus’ name have tried that. The power that Jesus promises in the Holy Spirit, I think, is first, power over ourselves, our sadness, our bitterness, our anger, our fear. We are promised the power to proclaim the truth and mercy that we have found in God through Christ Jesus, the kin we have found in his Body the Church, and the power to fearlessly invite everybody into that kin.
And that power comes from the truth that we celebrate this day; that he who physically died for us has taken that transphysical body to that place of spirit beyond our imagining. And where he has gone, we his saved shall surely be also. And when we are called to share his death, we shall most surely share his life. So instead of asking to Jesus to restore kingdoms that are destined to pass away, we can say this Ascension day that:
Whoever is President, Jesus is King. And his kingdom does not conquer territory and create empires with nervous borders. His kingdom is already around us and within us, in every seed and speck of creation. Whoever the great powers of today and tomorrow are, Jesus is King. Whatever obstacles the Church has faced, as the Roman Catholic bishop, Romano Guardini said — The Church is the cross on which Christ was crucified, and who could ever separate Christ from his cross.
With Jesus ascending far above all heavens that he might fill all things, this day the countdown begins to the birthday of the Church on Pentecost Sunday. Stay tuned.
Ascension Day
May 29th, 2025
The Rev. David Kendrick