June 5, 2011

 This has been one of those weeks where being a priest seems a whole lot like being a victim of whiplash. Four parishioners are dealing with the deaths of parents, either in the last week, or in the past few weeks, and chance encounters with them, or planned meetings became occasions for making room for the presence of God in the midst of grief. Someone else is dealing with an unexpected diagnosis of cancer but uncertainty as well until there are further tests. And one of the children in our parish is looking forward to hospitalization and possible pacemaker surgery. For all of these people, and their loved ones, the world they knew no longer exists—they are entering uncharted territory.

So, too, with others I’ve encountered this week. On Sunday, I officiated at a wedding for friends and in the course of the week, I’ve dealt with other couples who are soon to be married. They are entering uncharted territory, but unlike the people I mentioned in the first paragraph, they are filled with joy, excitement, and wonder as they look forward to creating new lives with those they love.

Here I might crack a joke about the uncharted territory we inhabit at Grace. Last Sunday was quite literally uncharted—because I knew we wouldn’t have access to the alley on W. Wash., I took the bus. But by the time we made it to W. Johnson, it became clear to me that the busdriver had no idea how she was supposed to complete her route and get across town to the eastside. I jumped off at Marion and W. Wash, and walked the rest of the way. We’re in uncharted territory in another way, with the uncertainty of overnight campers just outside our doors.

All of this, whether it is life changes, or grief, or illness, or even the consequences of our location on Capitol Square leads to uncertainty and disorientation. We are in something of a similar situation liturgically, on this, the Sunday after the Ascension.

In the liturgical year, we are looking backward toward an Easter celebration, remembering once more the joy we experienced the first time we heard the Easter acclamation this year—Alleluia, Christ is risen. We are also looking upward, into the skies, with the disciples who watched Jesus’ ascension. Like them, whatever they experienced, we too feel loss as we move away from Easter and toward the uncertainty of the future. They felt loss because they were without the presence of the Lord in their midst and only the promise of the coming of the Holy Spirit offered them solace and hope as they looked into the future.

I remain convinced that of all Christian doctrines, of everything scripture claims about Jesus Christ, including the virgin birth and the resurrection, to contemporary people, the ascension is the most absurd. It may be because of its secondary role in Christian liturgy and practice. Because the Ascension is always celebrated on the fortieth day after Easter, which always falls on a Thursday, most of us have never attended a service on the Ascension. Indeed, we didn’t have a service this past Thursday at Grace. Instead we worshiped with other Episcopalians at an Evensong service at St. Andrews.

The story of the ascension in Acts with all of its spectacular detail, raises questions, and not just about the science and historical evidence. Like the disciples, though, our attention is so focused on the event itself that we tend to miss the significance of those other details that Luke puts in the story. We also miss some of the humor. For what can it be other than humor, to have the disciples ask, after they had walked with Jesus from Galilee to Jerusalem, witnessed his arrest, crucifixion, and resurrection, and been with him through the forty days of his appearing with them—that they should ask, after all of that, “Is now the time that you will restore the kingdom of Israel?” In spite of everything that had happened, all Jesus had taught, and suffered, after all of that, the disciples still seemed to have been looking for a political deliverer who would restore the kingdom.

Isn’t there just a little humor, perhaps dry, in the question the two angels ask the disciples—Why are you looking up into the skies?

And isn’t there just a little humor, perhaps deadpan, in the fact that after the disciples saw all of this, plus now the ascension, that they went back home, to the place where they were staying, and went about their lives.

With these little details, Luke makes the story just a little bit more homey, a little bit more accessible to us. We might wonder whether we could see ourselves in the story, told with these little touches. Of course we would be looking up into the skies, hoping to catch a last glimpse of our Lord and Savior. We might be looking up in fear, sadness, or even disbelief.

But looking upwards would distract us from Jesus’ words and from the disciples’ response. Before departing from them, Jesus promised that they would receive the Holy Spirit: “But 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.” What’s most interesting about these words is that in Luke’s version, Jesus is not telling the disciples to do something—to go and be witnesses. Rather, he is stating a fact: you will be my witnesses.

And how did the disciples respond? They returned to Jerusalem, to the place they were staying. In fact, according to Luke, it was the upper room, where they had gathered with their Lord to celebrate the Last Supper. They returned there, the eleven and Luke is concerned to make clear that it was not jus the eleven named disciples, but that others, especially women were among the group. They returned and devoted themselves to prayer. They were waiting, I suppose, for the gift of the Holy Spirit to come upon them, waiting to see what would happen next.

In a way, the ascension is like so many other aspects of our faith—elusive, incomprehensible, unsettling. In a way, it is like our encounter and relationship with Jesus Christ, fundamentally disorienting and re-orienting. Like the situations I mentioned in the first paragraphs of my sermon today, the ascension raises all kinds of questions about who we are and where we are headed, both as individuals and as the body of Christ. Its meaning may remain tantalizingly beyond our grasp. Nonetheless, our encounter with it does invite our response, in faithfulness and in hope.

You will be my witnesses. Even those words seem to be more than we can face, especially as Episcopalians or casual church-attenders. How do we bear witness to Jesus Christ in our lives? How do we show forth the excitement and joy of our experience of him to others? Even if we are hesitant to proclaim our faith publicly; even if we are reluctant to say anything to anyone about the ascension. Believe it or not, I am as reticent about that particular doctrine as anyone. Still, Jesus’ statement to his followers remains as powerful and real now as it did 2000 years ago.

How do we show forth our faith in our lives? How do we help others see and experience what we ourselves have? It might be in quite simple ways—by telling those with whom we work or live that we attend Grace Church and what Grace does in the community. It might be by choosing to volunteer at our First Mondays—when we feed shelter guests and people from the community, or volunteering in the food pantry, or later today, helping with one of our most important witnesses in the community—our courtyard garden. It might also be by volunteering to take a Saturday shift in the church during the Farmer’s Market. All of these are small, simple ways to bear witness to the transforming love of Jesus Christ, and to share that love with those around. As we go forth from this place today, to our very different lives and worlds, let us take our experience of the risen and ascended Christ with us, and share that experience with a broken world.