Dear Hope family,

Thought for the Week

Ascension

Acts 1v9  “[Jesus] was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight.”

Ascension Day is often forgotten. There’s no Bank Holiday, no giving of presents and it is mid-week. We understand being born, we understand dying, we even have some understanding of rising from the dead. But rising up to “heaven” as Jesus did nearly 2000 years ago, raises many questions in our minds such as – exactly where did he physically go? None-the-less, this God-man with a resurrected body physically ascended beyond the clouds (Acts 1v9). There is mystery that we do not fully understand.

Ascension was not totally without precedent, for in the Old Testament, two individuals were taken up without dying:

• Enoch who “walked with the Lord.. and then God took him away” (Genesis 5v24).
• The great prophet Elijah who was separated from Elisha by a chariot of fire and “taken up to heaven in a whirlwind” (2 Kings 2v11)

In the New Testament, only Jesus’s bodily ascension is documented, though both Paul and John had comparable spiritual experiences (2 Corinthians 12v2 and Revelation 4v1). There is however huge emphasis on the future resurrection bodies of those who are the Children of God. We look forward to the glorious day when we will all be with him in our new bodies!

While we wait, we also know this glorious truth – that Jesus is right now at the right hand of the Father interceding for us. We also know that he is proclaimed Lord and King of all creation. He has all power and authority. And it is his ascension which made the way for the Holy Spirit to be sent on His Church.

The record of the ascension gives us truth of Christ’s position today, and a certain hope for our place tomorrow.

With love and blessing,

Roland