Why Does Jesus Leave Us?

May 8, 2016
Ascension
First Reading: Acts: 1:1-11
http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/050816-ascension.cfm

We spend our whole lives looking for perfection—the perfect job, the perfect house, the perfect workout, the perfect vacation. Normally, we don’t find what we’re looking for, but instead end up with coffee brewed a little strongly, with a steak a little overdone, or with a great job that’s a little too far from our almost-perfect house. That phenomenon leaves us thirsty for the real kind of perfection that we are always seeking but never really finding. In fact, it is that particular thirst that causes us to light up when we find Jesus. Finally, a man who is not like other men! Jesus, as the Gospels present him to us, breaks our categories, shakes up our reality, and confronts us with his perfection. He is truly wise and humble, loving and sacrificing, able to work miracles and to comfort the grieving. He shows us what is really means to be human. After his death and resurrection, he has accomplished his purpose and it looks as though we could crown him as king and finally live under the reign of the perfect ruler. Yet he decides to go. He leaves us and floats up to heaven. Why?

A Beginning Clue

The first clue in this Sunday’s reading from the beginning of Acts is hidden in the first verse, which describes how the first book of this two-volume set (Luke-Acts) is about what Jesus “began to do and teach.” We normally think of Jesus’ ministry and teaching as coming to an end with his Ascension, but the author, Luke, tells us that in fact Jesus’ “doing” and “teaching” had only begun in the gospel. Now, the implication is, Jesus is continuing to “do” and to “teach” in the Book of Acts. Yet he leaves the scene in the first scene—how is able to “do” anything? This is the crucial key to reading Acts. It, in fact, reads as a continuation of the gospel. Jesus has not truly left his followers, but in fact, he is going to remain with them as he says, “Lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age” (Matt 28:20 RSV).

A Double Story

The second clue Luke offers us lies in the fact that this scene of the ascension is actually a recapitulation of the final scene in the Gospel of Luke. Fortunately, this Sunday, we get to hear both the end of Luke and the beginning of Acts. Both of these readings depict the same scene by the same author! What is Luke up to? Why retell this story? I think two things are afoot that cause him to tell the Ascension twice. First, Luke is using a common storytelling technique often called “synoptic-resumptive,” where the same story is told twice in order to emphasize certain elements in the second telling and, in this case, to glue the books of Luke and Acts together. Second, and more importantly, the Ascension is the only story from Jesus’ life that he tells twice. If we view Luke-Acts as a literary whole—they are written by the same author, after all—then this scene falls at the center of this “book.” While for modern writers, the “climax” about three-quarters of the way through a book is the most important part, for ancient writers, the center of a work is usually the one that carries the most emphasis. Luke is telling us that the Ascension is the most important part of his whole book, the central part of the story, the apex of what he is trying to tell us.

The Center of the Story

This prompts us to wonder what Luke is trying to tell us. What makes the Ascension so important? I hate to get too technical, but if you look at the whole of Luke-Acts it is set up like a pyramid with the Ascension at the top. On either end of the book you find references to Rome (Luke 2:1; Acts 28:14-16), the reigning power of the day, and at the middle you find Jesus ascending to heaven. In general, Luke-Acts is teaching us how God is extending his plan of salvation to include the Gentiles, “the end of the earth” in Jesus’ speech (Acts 1:8). This radical idea is played out in multiple ways—Peter’s vision of the unclean animals (Acts 10), the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15), even in Simeon’s prophecy over the baby Jesus (Luke 2:32). If the salvation of the Gentiles is so central in general, then here, at the very center of the book, Luke is showing us what salvation means. He is offering us the definition of salvation when the apostles watch Jesus float into heaven. The point is not that we’re supposed to watch Jesus float away, but that we are supposed to become like him.

“Divinized”

The Ascension of Jesus recalls a passage from the prophet Daniel: “behold, with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man” (Dan 7:13). Jesus is now literally fulfilling this verse. But he is also demonstrating for us what it means to be saved (see Acts 2:21, 4:12; 16:30). Just like Jesus was the first one raised from the dead, after whom all of us can be raised from the dead too, now he is raised to heaven so that we might hope to be raised into heaven with him. The Ascension effects “the irreversible entry of his humanity into divine glory” (CCC 659). While of course, all along in his earthly life he enjoys all the rights and privileges of being the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, he allows himself to be bound by his humanity in certain ways. His ascension then becomes a way for him to demonstrate what it is like when a human being is saved and becomes like God. Through him we are supposed to become “partakers of the divine nature” (2 Pet 1:4). Not only that, but “we who are alive, who are left, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and so we shall always be with the Lord” (1 Thess 4:17). Jesus ascends to heaven to show us what it is like to partake in the divine nature and to set the stage for each one of us to enter “into divine glory” as well.

So Jesus “leaves us,” but not really. He continues to “do” and “teach” through his apostles and followers, his Church. The Church is not just a haphazard, wannabe recapitulation of the ministry of Jesus, but in fact, it is the institutional continuation of his ministry. He is still at work. Not only that, but as a parting gift to his followers, Jesus promises that they will “receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you” (Acts 1:7) and so will be empowered to tell others about Jesus. “You shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8). Jesus thus invites his followers to join in his mission, being given the power to do so through the Holy Spirit. Their job is not to simply call people to adopt a new religious philosophy or a set of mores, but to show them the path to becoming “partakers of the divine nature,” to become divinized, and to follow after Jesus in his life, death, resurrection and ascension.

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Mark Giszczak (“geese-check”) was born and raised in Ann Arbor, MI. He studied philosophy and theology at Ave Maria College in Ypsilanti, MI and Sacred Scripture at the Augustine Institute of Denver, CO. He recently received his Ph. D. in Biblical Studies at the Catholic University of America. He currently teaches courses in Scripture at the Augustine Institute, where he has been on faculty since 2010. Dr. Giszczak has participated in many evangelization projects and is the author of the CatholicBibleStudent.com blog. He has written introductions to every book of the Bible that are hosted at CatholicNewsAgency.com. Dr. Giszczak, his wife and their daughter, live in Colorado where they enjoy camping and hiking in the Rocky Mountains.

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