He's Still With Us :: Luke 24:44-53

O Most Excellent Friends of God ... why do you stand looking up into heaven? This Jesus who was taken from you into heaven will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.

Where is he? It’s one of the world’s greatest mysteries. 

Most excellent friends of God, do you know the answer? 

Where is he? Man’s various answers to this question are still driving a wedge through the various denominations of the church today.

Where is he? In heaven, seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth? Is he with you? Does he have real presence with us here? 

Where is he? At the heart of the issue -- a dispute that continues today -- is the understanding of who Christ is and what his ascension means for us. I will cut to the chase for a moment and tell you what it means ... 

HE’S STILL WITH US.

Our readings all highlight the Ascension of our Lord. 

Jesus, the word made flesh, the living God, who walked with us and talked with us, who lives for us and died for us, who rose from the dead for us, has now, most prominently, most amazingly, ascended into the heavens for us. 

Now people all around you are dying to know ... Where is he? 

For 40 days through the Easter season, Jesus was here, there, and everywhere. He appears in our midst showing us his hands and his feet and his side. He opens our minds to understand the scriptures, and breaks bread with us. He reminds us that he is the good shepherd, that he is the way, the truth, and the life. I will never leave you or forsake you. He blesses you, and declares peace to you. 

But brothers and sisters in Christ, we saw him go with the cloud. 

So ... Where is he? Why did this happen?

Whether celebrated on the 40th Day of Easter -- or whether it’s observed on the nearest Sunday, the Ascension of our Lord is one of the most important redemptive events we remember as Christians. In this moment, God delivers to us the promise that we too will ascend with our Lord Jesus to dwell there with him who lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen. 

The sitting of Christ at the right hand of God designates the unending dominion upon which Christ entered by his ascension. Now that he is there, he can always be with us, pouring out the Holy Spirit upon us, so that he is in us, and we are in him.

Sadly, too many people forget this, even when we confess it weekly in all three of our creeds -- the Apostles, the Nicene, and the Athanasian. Jesus was crucified, died, and was buried. And the third day he rose again from the dead. He ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty. 

These aren’t just empty words. In confessing our creeds, God reminds us of his promises. Jesus has ascended into heaven ... not to sit on the clouds ... as if he is some “Sky God” and be uninvolved in the affairs of men, as some people scoff. Jesus has ascended into heaven, reminding us that our Lord is not confined to a limited space like you and me. 

Although we cannot see him with our eyes, or rub elbows with him and dip our hand in the bowl with him, we know that he is ever with us because he has promised he would be. He is everywhere, as Saint Paul wrote in Ephesians. His fullness fills all in all. He has ever since we received power as he poured out the Holy Spirit upon us.

Our readings have been building to this point throughout the 40 days from Easter. 

Remember, the disciples were gathered behind locked doors, they heard the reports of the resurrection from the women, Peter rushed to the tomb, the Emmaus disciples described their daylong journey with the Lord, and Jesus came and stood among them, and he declared peace to you ... I am still with you. Now blessed are you who have not seen, yet who believe that Jesus has overcome sin, death, and the devil for you in this way. And that he will come again on the clouds as promised to judge the living and the dead.

We should have known this was coming. Jesus says had been cluing us into his eternal dominion from the beginning. Don’t ya’ll remember ... He said these are my words I spoke to you while I was still with you that everything written about me in the law of Moses and the prophets and the psalms concerning me be fulfilled ... then he opened their minds to understand how the scriptures that he always is with us. 

Never will I leave you or forsake you he tells us in Deuteronomy 31, Joshua 1, the Psalms and Isaiah 41, among many places.

The scriptures first and foremost remind us of Christ himself, they point us to him and reveal him. They show us our sin and for Jesus to be our savior. And thanks be to God, our savior has gone up with a shout. Because in that ascension Christ has given us the promise that we will always be with him. 

Hatred, jealousy, adultery, theft, unfaithfulness, envy, abortion, drunkenness, divorce, immorality, idolatry, greed ... had separated you from God. Those sins, and so many more like them, also why Christ suffered and died for you. He desires you always to be with him

And so he is. Behold, I am sending the promise of my father upon you so that you will believe, Jesus says today. 

Our Lord opens our hearts and minds to his Word and sacraments, pouring out his Holy Spirit upon us continually through our baptisms, opening our ears and eyes to see and hear the truth of Holy Scripture that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God and that by believing you will have life in his name. 

Our God with us, our Immanuel, our Lord Jesus, refused to ignore sin. So he himself paid the full ransom price for your sins by taking your place in death. He was beaten for you, crucified for you, forsaken by the Father for you, and died for you ... on the cross ... Then, descending into hell for you to proclaim his victory over sin, death and the devil, he redeemed you and freed you from sin’s payment demands. 

As the two men in white robes remind you, This Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven. 

We have the profound joy of proclaiming this great news. God has not only come to us, to be God with us, to heal us, to make us whole ... he has redeemed us, setting us free from sin, death, and the devil through his death and resurrection. 

Because of this great joy that he is risen as Paul told us in Ephesians, I don’t cease to give thanks for you ... that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you.  He is risen. He is risen Indeed. And his fullness now fills all and is in all. He is still with us into the ages. Amen