Feast of the Ascension: May 20, 2012

Feast of the Ascension: May 20, 2012

Preacher: Pastor Carrie B. Smith

 

Grace and peace to you from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, became a gazillionaire this week when his little college project became a public company. In a few short years, Facebook has profoundly changed the way we communicate with friends, share photos, advertize, evangelize, and topple governments. 

Zuckerberg has even changed the way we dress. He’s taken casual business attire to a new level by sticking religiously to his black hoodie sweatshirt—even in high-level financial meetings with investing bigwigs. In response to this style revolution, one clothing company has created a formal, lined, gray pin-striped hoodie for those who want to follow in the Facebook founder’s footsteps and bridge the gap between power suit and “college casual”. 

Clearly, Mark Zuckerberg has changed the world, in more ways than one. But amidst all the hype about his influence, his genius, his style, and the future of Facebook, I’ve been wondering: what would happen if Mark Zuckerberg one day simply ascended into heaven?

What would happen to Facebook if we saw its founder lifted up, floating into the clouds, his black hoodie flapping into the wind? 

Would we, Facebook’s loyal followers, stand around gazing into the sky after him? Would we be gathered around our computers and iPhones, staring at blank screens, trying to remember how we communicated before status updates and memes? Or would the Facebook phenomenon continue on, filling the world with cute cat photos into eternity?

Yes indeed, strange things happen when preachers read the Bible and watch the news at the same time. Clearly, Mark Zuckerberg isn’t Jesus. But with Facebook and its founder dominating the media hype this weekend, I couldn’t help making connections with that other young Jewish man who changed the world, and how his disciples responded when he was suddenly lifted up out of their sight. 

Admittedly, I am probably the only one in this room who was thinking about the Ascension of Jesus this week. This festival probably ranks in popularity somewhere between the Feast of the Circumcision and the Feast of the Slaughter of the Holy Innocents. It doesn’t help that the liturgical calendar places Ascension on a Thursday during a time of year packed with band concerts, sports practices and tee times. In fact, unless churches make a special effort to move this feast day to the following Sunday (like we did), most of us will happily skip from the story of Jesus’ resurrection at Easter to the sending of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, without so much as a thought about where the resurrected body of Christ went, or why Jesus stopped walking through locked doors and startling his disciples. 

So here it is again, in case you missed it: the Ascension story, first as it is told in our first reading from Acts, chapter 1:

“When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. While he was going and they were gazing up toward heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them. They said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.” 

And then, a few more details from Luke, chapter 24: 

“Then (Jesus) led them out as far as Bethany, and, lifting up his hands, he blessed them. While he was blessing them, he withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven. And they worshiped him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy; and they were continually in the temple blessing God.”

There it is—the story of the Ascension of Jesus and our post-Easter life as Christians. Jesus died. Jesus was resurrected. Jesus appeared a few times to the disciples to prove he was really alive. And then Jesus was teleported into heaven, at which time his disciples first stood around gazing after him, and then decided to hang out continuously in the temple.  

I would imagine that for most of your neighbors—or maybe for the rest of us, if we’re honest--this is exactly what Christian discipleship looks like. Some unbelievable, impossible, illogical things happened to a young Jewish guy, and now millions of Christians hang out inside a building on Sunday morning instead of going to the lake. End of story. Jesus is gone, taken up into heaven, and all we can do is hang out in buildings that are shrines to the way things used to be.

This past week I was in Atlanta for the Festival of Homiletics, which is just as thrilling as it sounds. Three worship services and at least six preachers a day—yee haw! It’s a preacher’s paradise, as well as something of a fashion black hole. There were exactly zero Zuckerberg hoodies, but sensible shoes, NPR tote bags and large cross necklaces were in abundance. I felt right at home. 

On Wednesday we spent the day at Ebenezer Baptist Church, spiritual home of Martin Luther King, Jr. After hearing the current Ebenezer pastor preach a spectacular sermon in the new worship building, and after touring MLK’s birthplace, tomb, and cultural center, we had the chance to visit the historic sanctuary, which is now a museum. 

Dr. King’s voice was being piped in to the church on a continuous loop of his most famous sermons. It was an eerie experience to be sitting there in a well-worn pew, staring at the empty pulpit, hearing the Gospel proclaimed from beyond the grave in Dr. King’s distinctive baritone. I was suddenly overcome with emotion. The tears flowed as I thought about that prophetic voice, silenced too soon. I wondered how awful it must have been for his fellow workers in the civil rights movement in those days following his death. I felt the weight of the loss of Dr. King, and of what might have been.

But then I remembered something I had learned in the King cultural center earlier that day. There was a special room dedicated to Dr. King’s wife, Coretta Scott King. I was especially drawn to the timeline of her life—especially the notation that on April 8, 1968, Mrs. King appeared at a civil rights march with 42,000 other people in Memphis. She gave a 14 minute speech that day. 

This is significant because April 8 was just four days after her husband’s assassination—and still one day before his funeral.  

Just four days after losing her husband, Coretta Scott King was already carrying on as a witness to the message of hope and the dream of equality. 

 

Just four days after an assassin silenced a prophetic voice, there were 42,000 people empowered to march in support of the rights of sanitation workers.

Just four days after losing Dr. King, it was clear that hope was not lost, and there were plenty of folks who remembered that “the time is always right to do what is right”.

Sitting there in that pew at the historic Ebenezer Baptist Church, I knew this was no shrine to the way things used to be. Instead, that church stands as a living witness to what can happen when Christians, empowered by the Holy Spirit, boldly carry the Good News to the ends of the earth.

For this is the part of the Ascension story we too easily overlook. Before he was taken up into heaven, Jesus said to the disciples: 

“You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” 

You will receive power, and you will be my witnesses. 

Through the gift of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost—which we will celebrate next Sunday!—we are witnesses to Jesus’ life, his death, and his resurrection.

We are witnesses when we pass on the faith to the next generation in Sunday school and Confirmation. Empowered by the Spirit, I am a witness!

We are witnesses when we house the homeless through PADs, when we feed the hungry through the food pantry, and when we care for children at HeadStart and the Bethany Preschool. Empowered by the Spirit, I am a witness!

And we are witnesses when we invite a neighbor to church and when we boldly share the story of what Jesus to us. Empowered by the Spirit, I am a witness!

Brothers and sisters, Christ has died. Christ is risen. And yes, Christ has ascended into heaven—and because we are empowered by the Holy Spirit, that is just the beginning of the story.