In Heaven and on Earth

	Fr. Roger Vermalen Karban

The readings for Sunday, May 12, 2002, the Ascension of the Lord, are Acts 1:1-11, Ephesians 1:17-23, Matthew 28:16-20.

When most Christians think about Jesus’ ascension, they zero in only on Chapter 1 of Luke’s Acts of the Apostles, and ignore what other biblical authors have to say about the event.
Not even Luke did that. Since he had at least a copy of Mark’s Gospel in front of him when he composed his double volume work, he knew there were opinions about the ascension which differed from his own.

The most obvious difference: Mark and Matthew mention nothing about Jesus ascending to heaven. Today’s Gospel pericope, for instance, is the end of Matthew’s Gospel. Though we presume, because we’ve read Luke, that Jesus’ next act, after promising to be with us “. . . until the end of time,” will be to start rising from the mountain into the sky, Matthew says nothing about it. For him and Mark, Jesus is still “out there” among us. Even John — whose Jesus tells Mary of Magdala about his ascending to “my Father and your Father, my God and your God” — places the event on Easter Sunday, not on Ascension Thursday, and has Jesus return (permanently) by nightfall.

What a mess!

The first step in sorting out the different opinions is to listen to our second reading: Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. Writing about 25 years before Luke, Paul mentions God “seating him (Jesus) at his right hand in the heavens . . . .” This statement seems to mirror the earliest Christian belief about the ascension. It simply was part of Jesus’ resurrection. Being with the Father is one of the rewards Jesus receives for a job well done. Sometimes Paul even goes so far as to “replace” the resurrection with the ascension. For him, they’re just two dimensions of the same event.

But even when Paul writes about Jesus being with the Father, he’s quick to remind his readers that he’s also here on earth among us. Notice how he ends today’s pericope: “God put all things beneath Jesus’ feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body . . . .” Where the Christian community is, there Jesus is.

Luke certainly accepts this early belief that the ascension is Jesus’ reward. But, not content with just reflecting on the past, he adds a new dimension. It’s also the prelude for the Holy Spirit entering the day by day life of the church.

By the mid-80s, Luke’s no longer expecting Jesus’ immediate, glorious return in the Parousia. Those who thought his second coming to be just around the corner were mistaken. So preparing his community for the long haul, Luke emphasizes the importance of the Holy Spirit. Without the Spirit present and working among Jesus’ followers, they could never be his “witnesses . . . to the ends of the earth.” In a sense, Luke has to “get rid” of Jesus so the Holy Spirit can arrive to help Christians carry on the ministry of Jesus.

Trained to regard events narrated in the Gospels and Acts as historically accurate, we have problems when someone speaks about not taking them so literally. Perhaps the key to interpreting today’s Acts passage, as the author originally intended it to be interpreted, lies in Luke’s use of the “two men dressed in white garments” who interpret the occasion for the awestruck disciples. Our sacred authors employ angels only when there are different levels of interpretation possible for a given event. The angel always conveys the author’s own theology about it.

Instead of looking at Jesus’ ascension as an either/or situation, we’d do more justice to our sacred texts by thinking of it as a both/and episode: something which has different — even contradictory — levels of interpretation.

But to do that, we have to develop a faith deep enough to know why different levels of interpretation are necessary.