The Ascension
There is a silly joke about a preacher who found three
little boys sitting on a curb playing hooky from school. Thinking he could
motivate them into better behavior, he admonished them on the need to follow
the rules and ended his lecture with the question, “Don’t you want to go to
heaven?” There's nothing like the threat
of damnation to get people to toe the line.
“I sure do,” two of the boys answered, but the third
replied, “No sir.” “What’s the matter?” said the preacher. “You mean you don’t want to go to heaven when
you die?” “Oh, when I die!” exclaimed the youngster. “Of course I do, when I
die. I thought you were getting up a crowd to go right now.”
Today is Ascension Sunday. That day when the church focuses on the final
leave-taking of Jesus from his disciples. This is the day, or so the story
goes, that Jesus ascended to heaven, leaving his disciples staring into heaven.
If you have ever seen paintings representing the ascension,
you will find that they almost universally show a glowing, beautiful, perfect
Jesus, with clean flowing hair, and an amazing white robe, surrounded by
clouds, headed via the express lane to heaven.
And the hint is that Jesus is leaving all the travail of earth behind,
and is headed off to glory in the heavens.
I think those pictures have it wrong!
Think about all the other post-resurrection appearances
of Jesus!
The appearance to the disciples, and later to Thomas, and
to the men on the road to Emmaus. There
is his arrival by the sea of Galilee, where he sits by the fire and cooks
breakfast
The post-resurrection Jesus is not a repaired, sanitized,
ethereal Jesus
It is the same Jesus who walked through the dust of the
earth
Who ate meals with his friends
The same Jesus who was arrested, beaten, killed on a
cross, and pierced with a spear
Richard Rohr, in talking about that famous encounter
between Thomas and the Risen Jesus (John 20:19-28) says that this “is not
really a story about believing in the fact of the resurrection but a story
about believing that someone could be wounded and also resurrected at the
same time!
When Jesus went back to God, it was very much the same kind
of deal as when he came from God.
He came from God as a very human baby. Born in poverty
Delivered in humble place, surrounded by animals and the
dregs of society
He came fully entering into our mess
The pain and poverty, and all the rest
And whether we think about it symbolically or literally, I
believe that when Jesus went back to God, he went back with dusty feet,
And hands smelling like fish and robes smelling like
campfire smoke
I think he went back, as dark, Semitic man with frantic hair
And I believe he went back with holes in his hands and
feet
And a wound in his side
I believe Jesus was raised with Scars
Jesus descended to earth, bringing God to us
When on earth he experienced it all
He took it all on, the pain, the grief, the misery, the
joy, the love
And when he ascended, he took it all with him. He
maintained that intimate connection with we human creatures, and with our pain,
and hate, and fear and all the stuff of humanity.
There is a bridge between us and Jesus
Created by shared pain and hurt
A share woundedness
The Ascended Christ hasn’t relinquished his engagement
with us
He shared our experience,
And shares it still
I love the way Richard Rohr puts it. “God loves you by becoming you!”
To think about it another way, Jesus is a wounded healer!
As we read in Isaiah 53, “…he was wounded for our
transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the punishment that
made us whole, and by his bruises we are healed.
In the Spirit God becomes incarnate in us, and
experiences with us everything we experience.
God is present in our racing pulse when we are afraid
In our singing heart when we are in love, or the Aurora
Borealis
In our noisy brain when we are overwhelmed
In our gut when we are upset
God is in us through it all, as savior
Lover
Guide
Advocate
Comforter
Doing the God thing!
Changing
Challenging
Moving
Transforming
Reconciling, comforting, teaching,
Making us new
Lifting us up into a new way of doing life
And we, when we are lifted up into newness, are also
called to stay connected with this world.
With all its hunger, pain, homelessness, and addiction
And racism.
Our faith is not a ticket out of this world but is a call
to engage in this world more deeply.
We take it all on, touching the pain fear and hate
as best we can, with God’s love
and transforming it, with that love
We are the ongoing incarnation, the ongoing ministry of
Jesus
We are in the mix
And we can be present for others, we can engage with them
compassionately, and appropriately because we have been there.
And frankly, much of the time, we are going through the
same struggles as everyone around us.
Paul talks about it all the time:
I do not do the
things that I want, but the things I do not want to do I do (Rom 6)
I don’t mean to say I am perfect. I haven’t learned
all I should even yet, but I keep working toward that day when I will finally
be all that Christ saved me for and wants me to be (Phil. 3:12)
We may act as Christ’s ambassadors, but we represent
Jesus not as those who are above
Not as those who are better, wiser, stronger, but as
those who are WITH
We may be full of the Spirit and made new
But we are still fearful, angry, and all the rest.
We like Jesus are the resurrected wounded
So we do not need to be afraid of the depths and breadths
of our own lives
of our failures and mistakes, of those dark moments when
we wound ourselves or are wounded by others
Those moments give us understanding. And humility.
And compassion.
God uses it all, making “all things work together for
good” (Romans 8)
Enabling us to reach out to a shattered and fragmented
world
and touch not only our own wounds but the wounds of other
We can minister to those who are fearful, because we have
been fearful, because we are still fearful.
We know what fear is, we feel it in our bones….
So we can meet people in their fear, taking with us
Sacred Presence, and all the resources of God.
We can help them with their fear, even as we struggle with our own.
We can help with who are angry, because we have walked in
anger
We can help those who have failed, because we have failed
Henri JM Nouwen writes these powerful words in this book,
The Wounded Healer. “Who can listen
to a story of loneliness and despair without taking the risk of experiencing
similar pains in his own heart and even losing his precious peace of mind? ….Who can take away suffering without
entering it?
Who indeed?
Churches often have signs outside that say “come as you
are”
That is it exactly!
Comes as you are! With all your
baggage. All your fear. All your wounds. All your imperfections. Come as you are, saint and sinner.
For it is the fact that we are empowered and rescued “as
we are”
That enables us, in the power of the Spirit, to touch a
hurting world.
With understanding and compassion.
And love
