with our Presbyterian denominations campus ministry called Reformed University Fellowship.
And so it's a real delight to serve on your behalf.
I always like to tell people that RUF is your ministry.
As members or as participants with Cheyenne Mountain Presbyterian Church,
it's your involvement on a college campus.
And so it's really a delight to work with you for the faith, long-term, short-term,
and of our college students.
I'll just give a quick update.
RUF, we're having a great summer.
We're studying defeaters this summer in our Tuesday evening,
which are the feelings, the thoughts, the narratives that we feel like maybe would make Christianity feel unbelievable or implausible.
And so we're looking at some of those and why are they not defeaters?
Why does Christianity hold up to them?
And then the more exciting thing is that we have in the last week, week and a half,
formed our first student leadership team, which is really exciting
because our goal in RUF is to not just me doing ministry to students,
but equipping students to do ministry to students
because then they go into churches when they graduate, hopefully,
and they know they're gifting and they're ready to serve.
And so that's the dream.
So please pray that the Lord would bless that student leadership team
as we start game planning for the fall,
as we start looking to meet new students.
My wife is going to be on maternity leave during the fall,
which is like the college version of Christmas and Easter slammed together.
So I will be also on paternity.
And so that's not great timing, but we'll be ready for it.
So please pray for those things.
So turn, if you will, in your Bibles to John chapter 16.
John chapter 16, or I think it's printed in your bulletin as well.
We're just looking at one verse today.
And this will be our starting place, our anchor,
but we'll pivot around to a couple other places throughout the Bible.
And I will read our text for us, and we will dig in.
This is God speaking to us in John chapter 16, verse 7.
Nevertheless, I tell you the truth.
It is to your advantage that I go away.
For if I do not go away, the helper will not come to you.
But if I go, I will send him to you.
This is God's word.
Would you pray with me?
Father in heaven, we pray now that as after we have sung,
asked you to be present with us, confessed, given, greeted one another,
all these things that you give us for a worship of you,
that you would now send your spirit to us
in the only and special way that your spirit can come to us.
That these words would be more than just a lecture,
more than filling the air,
but that they would be the spirit warming our hearts to you,
each one of us in the unique way that we need on this day.
You would be glorified, and your kingdom would be built.
It's in Jesus' name that we pray.
Amen.
So most of us, if we've grown up in a church,
we're comfortable or familiar with a little process,
a little thing that we do most Sunday mornings
where we confess our faith.
We stand up in front, we stand or whatever.
We just did it when we read the Catechism,
and we say, hey, this is something that we believe as Christians.
This is a part of the Christian faith.
And one of the ways that we have,
Christians have done this for years,
thousands of years across the world,
is the Apostles' Creed.
It's what I'll call the lowest common denominator
that every Christian everywhere believes.
I believe in God the Father, maker of heaven and earth.
I'm sure I've done it with you here at Shine Mountain Press.
And it's the creed, the creedal statement,
the confession of faith that all Christians across time,
around the world, say, we believe this.
And I say it myself, I believe it,
but there's one line that stands out to me.
As I'm going along, I say, yeah, this makes sense.
This is great.
I understand this.
There's a line that says,
he suffered under Pontius Pilate, talking about Christ,
was crucified, dead, and was buried.
He descended on the hell.
On the third day, he rose again.
And then it says this.
It says, he ascended into heaven.
And for a while, I've always stopped,
and I've said, this made the cut.
This was so important that it made it
into the lowest common denominator
of every Christian faith across time.
He is this thing called the ascension
that we don't talk about very much
in the Christian tradition.
We believe it.
We say it's super important, but what does it mean?
What is this ascension that we are talking about?
And so today, what I hope to do
is to sort of squeeze some meaning out of the ascension.
See why is it good, and see why, in particular,
it ministers to a particular hole or thin spot
that I experience often in my faith,
and that I bet you experience in your faith as well.
And so we'll ask, what is the ascension?
And what does it mean, and why does it matter?
And my major claim, I would argue the Bible's major claim,
is that Christ's ascension offers true comfort
to the Christian and reason for trust
in the non-Christian, for the non-Christian.
If there are those of you who are questioning your faith,
or maybe don't yet profess faith in Christ,
the ascension offers true comfort
for those of us who are Christians,
and reason for trust for those of us who are undecided.
And I hope that I can persuade you
that the ascension is good news.
It's not just an add-on.
It's not just something that we wonder about
in the Apostles' Creed.
It's actually good news,
and that it is inseparable from God's saving work
in your life and in our world.
And so we'll look at this in three main ways
if you're a note-taker.
First thing we'll look at is,
is it really better that Jesus goes away?
Is it really better?
Second thing we'll look at is,
it indeed is better.
It is better that Christ goes away.
And third, so what?
Monday morning comes, so what does this mean?
So first thing we'll look at, is it really better?
And I want to try and create for us,
at least in my heart,
what often feels like a little problem
when I start thinking about at least the ascension,
maybe even my own Christian life.
If you remember from Acts chapter one,
or the end of the Gospels,
Jesus has just been raised from the dead.
He has appeared to the disciples.
He has appeared to many of his other followers.
First Corinthians tells us up to 500 other people,
and he's shown himself for who he is,
the risen Messiah, God himself,
who has done this incredible act of power over death.
And then in Acts one, he leaves.
He leaves.
And it tells us throughout the Gospels
that the apostles are confused.
They're sad.
They're nervous.
They're scared.
And there's this moment where he ascends into heaven,
and they're just standing,
looking up into the sky saying,
what just happened?
We thought we had this Jesus figured out.
He died.
He came back to life.
He's going to now bring his kingdom.
He's God.
He's the Messiah.
It's going to happen.
And then he leaves.
And there's this incredible deflation
that you can feel as Jesus goes into heaven.
And these angels appear and say,
yes, he's gone.
He told you he was going to go.
And I can imagine that first moment of them saying,
uh, that's disappointing.
We wish Jesus was here.
And I think I'm often in that same position
with the disciples.
I wish Jesus was here.
The problem, it's a problem that I think
that most of us as Christians feel,
and I'm pretty sure that if you're not a Christian
or you're non-Christian neighbors,
definitely feel it.
I wish Jesus was here.
First, for those of us who are Christians,
how many times have you thought in your devotional life,
I mean, this would be so much easier
to connect with Jesus
if he was just sitting on the couch with me,
talking to me about the Bible,
rather than me having to cut through my phone
and my fatigue to try and have a quiet time?
How many of us have experienced the real pains of life,
the traumatic moments of life,
and have felt,
I wish Jesus was here to make sense of all of this?
I think of Mary or Martha when Jesus' friend,
their brother, dies,
and they come to him and they say,
Jesus, where were you?
If you had been here,
our brother would not have died.
And then, well, Jesus does come three days later,
but he comes and he raises him back.
And I think of the painful moments in my life,
perhaps in your life,
why did my father have to die this way?
Or why did my child have to leave the faith?
Why did we have to have a miscarry?
And if Jesus was here in this world,
I could ask him this
and maybe begin to make some sense of it.
Or on a less acute level,
just think about daily wisdom.
Jesus, how should I navigate faith and my job
when I have a difficult boss?
Help me think through this.
Or how should I raise my kids in 2023
when it's such a strange time to be a parent?
How should I navigate this crazy world
of faith and politics, Lord?
I don't understand.
Just simple confirmation of my faith.
Often I feel like many of us are Thomas
who would say it'd be so much easier for me to believe
if Jesus was just here and I could touch him.
We feel the absence of Jesus in our lives.
Let me try and illustrate this way.
A couple, about a year ago,
a little over a year ago,
my mom passed away.
And one of the things that I miss particularly
is that my mom was a really accomplished cook.
If you ever knew her,
you probably had some of her food.
She was particularly good at cooking
like Mediterranean cuisine.
And I love cooking myself.
That's something she passed on to me.
And so I'll be often cooking.
And when she was alive,
I would call her and I'd say,
hey, I'm doing this and I'm trying this.
And what should I do?
And she would go, oh, this is easy.
Put this in, try this technique.
And it always turned out really well.
And so now as I'm cooking,
there'll be moments where I will say,
I miss mom.
I wish I could call her
and ask her what I should do in this moment
because she's just,
she was just more useful than YouTube, right?
That life is harder in her absence.
And I think that I feel the same way with Jesus.
That when our confession of faith says
he descended into heaven,
or I mean, sorry, he ascended into heaven,
it feels like a downgrade.
How about for you,
those of you who are still searching for in Christianity,
or maybe your friends or neighbors,
for this one, it seems like
this is a real downgrade in faith.
I often hear people say,
man, Jesus seems like a compelling person.
He was so moral.
He was such a great teacher.
But I just wish I was here.
I wish he was here
and I could ask him some of the questions I have.
And not only that,
it seems awfully convenient for you Christians
to say that Jesus was God
and then he died and then he left.
That's awfully convenient for you.
It's pretty far-fetched.
It's nice for you to be able to say
that he's God and he's not here.
You can't prove it now.
So maybe for some of you
who are searching spiritually,
it feels like believing Christianity
just feels untenable
because the founder of the whole thing's gone.
He's not around, presumably.
We can't see or touch him.
And I would, frankly,
I would challenge sort of your empirical need
to touch Jesus
because there were plenty of people
who did touch Jesus
and they still killed him.
They still didn't believe him.
But I empathize.
I resonate.
Christianity can feel hard to believe
when our founder isn't around.
Many of us,
here's my overall for this,
is that many of us operate under the desire,
maybe unspoken,
maybe even unacknowledged,
until this moment
that I wish Jesus was here.
The ascension feels like a downgrade.
It feels like a liability
to the Christian faith.
It's not that great.
And if that's you,
if that's resonating with you,
if you're a Christian or not,
I understand.
I feel it myself.
And I'd be happy to listen
and think with you about that.
But we'll move on here.
The overwhelming message of the Bible,
and this is what our text tells us,
is that it is to our advantage
that Jesus goes away.
That we are better off
that Jesus has left us.
How can that be?
Well, that's what we'll look into here.
So our first point is,
is it really better?
Is it better that Jesus leaves?
Second point, it is.
The overwhelming weight,
momentum, force of the Bible
is that it is better
that Jesus ascended into heaven.
And the answer is the ascension.
The doctrine and theology of the ascension.
Because what we have to understand here
is that the ascension is so much more
than Jesus just leaving earth.
The ascension is so much more
than Jesus no longer being present to us.
Because the ascension
is the final and ultimate vindication
of who Jesus is
and what he has done for his people.
It's the final proof
that Jesus is our redeemer,
as we confessed earlier today.
In the ascension,
the Bible does not just mean
that Jesus was just reabsorbed
into the divine,
like a drop of water in the ocean.
It's that when Jesus died,
he came back to life
with the same recognizable physical body
that he had.
And in that physical body,
he went to a place
that is somehow outside of our space
and time physical reality,
but is still present.
And then he sat down physically
on a throne
as the risen and reigning king.
That Jesus went physically and spatially
into a place called heaven
and physically and spatially
sat on a throne.
That means that Jesus is outside
of our space and time dimension,
and yet he's still involved
in our space and time dimension.
That's the ascension.
And what does this mean?
Well, a great theologian
from years ago wrote this,
a guy named Herman Bavinck.
He says this.
Listen carefully.
Carried up into heaven,
therefore, he, this is Jesus,
withdrew his bodily presence
from our sight,
not to cease to be present
with believers
still on their earthly pilgrimage,
but to rule heaven and earth
with more immediate power.
As his body was raised
up into the heavens,
so his power and energy
were diffused
and spread beyond
all the bounds
of heaven and earth.
Let me try and illustrate it this way.
How many of you
have a floodlight
over your garage?
How many of you
have a floodlight
over your garage?
If that floodlight
was just a few inches
off the ground
and you flicked
on that floodlight,
how much of your garage
and driveway
would it illuminate?
Not very much.
And so it's not useful at all
when you need the light
to flood over
the whole garage
and the whole driveway.
But when that floodlight
is way up high,
15, 20 feet high,
when you flick that light on,
it casts light
over your whole driveway
and you can see
what is in your front yard.
That is what Christ's ascension is,
but on a spiritual level.
It is Jesus going to
the highest place,
not just in our world,
but beyond our world
and diffusing
the whole universe
and beyond
with his power.
Christ's ascension
is not Christ
abandoning us,
but actually helping us
from heaven
in a bigger
and broader way.
And the Bible shows us
that Christ has done this
in three ways.
We talked about this.
This is funny, actually.
Matthew and I
didn't plan this.
This is just God
being good to us.
We talked about Jesus
as our Redeemer.
And we say that Jesus
is our Redeemer
in that he has three hats
or three offices
that he wears.
The prophet
and the priest
and the king.
And Matthew said,
hey, you can go read
the confession
or you can stay in here
and I'm actually going to
peel those back
a little bit.
So that Jesus redeems us
from the guilt of our sin
in our misery,
sin-soaked world
by wearing three hats
by accomplishing three offices,
prophet, priest, and king.
So as prophet,
Jesus guides us.
He guides us.
As priest,
he brings us close to God
and as king,
he wins for us.
As prophet,
he guides us.
As priest,
he brings us close to God
and as king,
he wins for us.
And the crucial point
is that those three offices
did not just happen
while Christ was on earth.
They are happening now.
In his ascension,
Christ is executing
his office as redeemer
as prophet, priest, and king
right now
in his ascended,
sitting on the throne
in the presence of God,
ruling over all things
as redeemer.
So let's look at these three things.
That it says,
so first we'll look at king.
Ephesians 4 says that
when Jesus ascended on high,
he led a host of captives
and gave gifts to men.
The way the Bible,
one of the ways that Jesus is pictured
is in his ascension
is as a victory parade.
As a king who is having
a victorious rule
over his enemies.
And the image that Paul has in mind
in Ephesians 4
when he talks about
Christ's victory parade
is the ancient Roman Caesar
when he had conquered
in military victory,
in military war.
So the Caesar marches
through Rome
and he's leading
all of the people
that he had triumphed
in front of him.
And he's coming behind him
as all the loot
that he had gotten
in the battle.
And then he goes up
and he sits down
on the throne
and says,
I am king
over the known world.
And he gives the loot
and the bounty
to his friends
and says,
thank you for helping me.
Jesus' ascension,
Paul says,
is the same idea
but on a cosmic
all-time scale.
That Jesus is the king
who has ascended
into heaven
and is ruling
and reigning
over,
as our confession says,
all his
and our enemies.
And this is incredible
because listen to what
Herman Bovink says
one more time about this.
This blows my mind.
He says this,
the ascension
is a bigger triumph
than the resurrection.
The ascension
is a bigger triumph
than the resurrection.
It is Christ's triumph
over the whole world,
over the laws of nature,
over the gravity of matter,
triumph over hostile,
diabolical,
and human forces.
Did you hear
what Bovink just said?
He said the ascension
is the bigger triumph
than the resurrection.
We think the high point
of the Christian faith
is Jesus coming back to life.
But no, Bovink says,
it's Christ ascending
into heaven
to rule and reign.
The ascension shows us
that Jesus is king
over everything.
And it makes sense then
as king over everything,
he should go to the place
where he can be
and rule most effectively.
When the president
of the United States
is elected,
he does not say,
I'm going to go down
to Pueblo
to be the president.
No offense to those
of you who are Pueblo,
but long live
the Pueblo Colorado Springs
tension.
He goes to Washington, D.C.
He goes to the place
where he can most effectively
rule his domain.
And in the same way,
Christ as king
goes to the place
where he is most effective.
Second, Jesus is our priest
in heaven.
He's our best priest in heaven.
So Jesus, as our priest,
he goes and atones
for our sins on the cross.
He is the one who dies
so that his blood
both covers over our sin
and washes clean
the pollution of our sin.
And he intercedes then
for us before the Father.
And Romans 8 says
that Jesus right now
as the ascended priest
is in the presence
of the Father
interceding his blood
on our behalf.
That he is constantly
before the Father,
the judge,
saying,
I have completed
the work that you gave me
to clean and cleanse
my people.
And it's the difference
between if you have a lawyer,
a lawyer zooming
into your court appointment
and showing up in person.
Let's say you have
a speeding ticket
and you need to get
a lawyer to defend you.
And you show up
on your court date
at 10 o'clock
and at 10.15
you get a text
from your lawyer saying,
I'm not going to make it.
Here's a Zoom link.
I hope that this is sufficient.
Is that a good lawyer?
No.
You want your lawyer
in the courtroom
right there walking in
saying,
I am here to defend
my client here and now.
Jesus is the lawyer
who shows up
into the courtroom of heaven
and is constantly
interceding
on his people's behalf.
His work is complete
but he is constantly
pointing back
to his complete work
on our behalf.
Jesus is the best lawyer
who goes to the courtroom
of heaven
to intercede
on our behalf.
We want him there.
Ascended as our lawyer.
Lastly,
Jesus is our best prophet
from heaven.
As prophet,
Jesus guides us.
He sends us,
he sends out the good word
and Jesus is our prophet
because he sends out
the good news
of the gospel
to,
as our text says
in just a few verses,
convict the world
concerning righteousness
and concerning sin.
He does this best
from heaven.
He tells us
even in our text
right here
that when he goes
to heaven,
he sends out
the Holy Spirit
who can work
more effectively
on a far greater scale
than even Jesus could
because Jesus was,
as our doctrine of Christ
says,
one man in one place
but the Holy Spirit
can send out the gospel
to all of Christ's elect's hearts,
to all places
at all times
and when Christ
is the ascended prophet,
he is diffusing
and scattering
the good news
of God's saving work
across the world.
As prophet
in heaven,
he is sending out
the good news
that Jesus is redeeming
and restoring
all things
in your life
and in our world.
Matthew 28,
all authority
on heaven
and earth
is mine.
Go
and make disciples.
That's Jesus' prophet.
It's the difference
between digital advertising
and telephone
pull printouts.
How many of you,
maybe when you lost
a dog as a kid,
would print out
a little flyer
of the dog
and go and nail it
to a couple
of telephone poles?
Not an effective way
to advertise.
Maybe three or four people
will see it.
But if you write
on a college campus,
if you do the right
digital advertising
on Instagram,
you can reach
thousands of people
in minutes.
That's what Jesus
as prophet
has done in heaven.
He is the digital advertisement
that is sending out
the news of God,
not on a telephone pole
for three or four people
to see,
but for everyone
to know
that Jesus is Lord
and he is coming
and he is our king
and he will redeem us.
And so these are good news
because we need
a prophet,
a priest,
and a king
in our sin-soaked world
to be prophet
and priest
and king
from heaven.
Jesus is our king
in heaven
because he rules
and defends us.
He restrains
and conquers our heaven.
We are still sinners.
We still do things
that are contrary
to God's law
and so we need
a priest
who is in the courtroom
of heaven
pointing to his finished work
to the Father.
We need a prophet
who is sending out
the good redeeming news
of the gospel,
the power of God
to salvation
to all those
who believe
in our world.
And so friends,
the ascension
is not just
unproductive Jesus
waiting in heaven
until the Father
says and go.
No,
the ascension
is the second person
of the Trinity
perhaps more active now
than he ever has been
for your faith
and for the church.
That is the good news
of the ascension.
It is to your advantage,
to our advantage
that he goes away.
So what?
How does this,
why does it matter?
Third and final point.
I'll try to apply this
first to those of us
who are Christians
and then to those of us
who are still searching,
those of us
who are not Christians.
So one of the most exciting,
I think,
so what's for Christians
is when we come
to the Lord's table,
when we come
to the sacrament,
the meal
of eating with Christ.
And so I'll try
and explain it this way.
There have been
several different views
of how to interpret
the Lord's Supper
across church history.
Our Baptist friends,
if you're Baptist,
we're so glad
you're here today.
I'm going to try
and explain a little bit
about a little
about Baptist theology
of the Lord's Supper.
But in Baptist theology,
the Lord's Supper
is eating and drinking
to remember
what Jesus has done
on the cross
and nothing more.
We call it
the memorialist view.
We eat and drink
and we feel pious feelings
towards God,
but that's it.
And if I'm honest,
I don't think
that that takes seriously
John chapter 6
when Jesus says,
unless you eat my body
and drink my blood,
you have no part in me.
I think there's holes in this.
Our Catholic friends,
if you're Catholic,
again,
we're really glad here,
but I would argue
that there's an error here.
Our Catholic friends
would argue
that at the Lord's Supper,
at the Mass,
Christ is re-sacrificed
for our sins again.
And I would argue
that this does two errors.
First,
it shortchanges
the once and for all
atonement
that Christ has done
on the cross
that Hebrews talks about.
But I also would argue,
as Calvin argues,
that it's pulling apart
the dual nature,
the union of who Christ is,
that he is both God
and man inseparably
at the same time.
And it's pulling Christ
down from heaven
and then spreading his body
out throughout
the whole universe.
That's a big problem.
Calvin,
the Reformed tradition
at the Lord's Supper,
says that through
the Holy Spirit,
when we eat
and drink
the Lord's Supper,
the Holy Spirit
lifts us up
to be with Jesus.
Not that we pull
Jesus down
to be with us,
but the Holy Spirit
lifts us up
to commune,
to unite
a little bit more
with our risen
and reigning
prophet,
priest,
and king.
That we are made
to partake
of Jesus' body
and blood spiritually
just as our bodies
are nourished
by bread and wine.
Communion is not
God coming down
to be with us.
Communion is God
lifting us up
spiritually
to be with him.
It's practicing
for heaven.
When we eat
and drink,
even a meager
little cracker
and a small
tablespoon of drink,
we are practicing
for heaven.
And in this way,
Christians,
when you eat
and drink this meal,
you walk out
of this building
more united
to Jesus
than when you came in.
Mysteriously,
I don't understand this.
At the end of his section
on this
in Calvin's Institute,
he says,
I don't understand it,
but I experience it
and I know it's true.
When you walk in
and take the Lord's Supper
and you walk out,
you are somehow
more united to Christ
than when you walked
in this building.
That's true
because of the ascension.
I'll try to make this
practical for a particular
group of people
who I am a part of right now,
which is parents
of young children.
My daughter is four.
Sitting through church
can be hard for her sometimes.
My wife is expecting
another one
in five weeks.
And I read this blog
on Mere Orthodoxy,
a great blog,
a couple of weeks ago,
and it says,
parenting in church
is really challenging
right now.
It's challenging
because it's wrangling
toddlers the whole time
because they're just wiggling
and so it's hard
to pay attention.
It's hard to get them
to pay attention.
But the Lord's Supper
and our doctrine
of the Lord's Supper,
meeting the ascension,
means that at this sacrament,
grace happens to us.
And even in our distraction,
the Holy Spirit
is actively bringing us
into presence.
So even if there are moments
when you as a parent
are like,
I don't know
what the pastor said today,
when you eat and drink this,
God is being faithful to you
even in your distraction,
lifting you into his presence.
And that's true for all of us,
but especially for those of us
who struggle to sit
and wiggle.
Christ's ascension means
that Christ the God-man
is sitting in his throne
and we are united to him
when we eat and drink in faith.
That second,
last thing,
how does this relate?
So what for those of us
who are searching,
who are not convinced
of Christianity yet?
What does this ascension mean?
Briefly,
I think it tells us
that this world
is not all there is to life.
This world is not
all there is to life.
There's a book
by two secular atheist philosophers
named Hubert Dreyfus
and Sean Kelly.
The book's called
All Things Shining.
And as secular atheists,
they try to say
that there's no real purpose
to life.
We're materialistic beings,
ultimately lights and clockwork,
atoms spinning around,
and that there's nothing
really more to life
than physics and chemistry.
And so all you can try to do
is scratch out
some shiny,
sacred micro-meanings
out of a gray,
dull universe.
And that's what they call
it,
All Things Shining.
There's nothing to life.
Just try and create
a little bit of happiness
in your life.
It's depressing stuff.
So tough way
to be a human being.
But if I'm honest,
and if you're here
and you're not a Christian,
I want you to think hard
with me on this.
I don't think
that that actually corresponds
with how most of us live.
I don't think that's existentially,
day to day,
how most of us
go through our lives.
And think about it this way.
Think about some of the most
satisfying moments
in your life.
Sipping a good drink
by a creek
with some friends.
Or the smell of barbecue
on a Saturday afternoon.
I did some barbecue ribs yesterday,
and it was amazing.
Just this extra sensory experience
or sweet rolls
coming out of the oven
on Christmas morning.
Right?
These are moments
that are more than
just biological life.
They're more than just
nourishing our bodies.
Right?
And they point us to,
if you're honest,
they point us to
that there is something
more to this life
than just electrons
spinning around protons.
that there is actually
some good,
true,
and beautiful things
in our world.
And Christ's ascension
affirms
what you already
intuitively know.
It affirms
what you already
intuitively know,
that there is purpose
to this world.
And not only that,
it puts what you
intuitively know
into a place
and a person.
The risen
and reigning king.
And it affirms it
and it puts it
in a person.
It says that there are
good,
true,
real,
beautiful moments
in our life.
And it says it's Jesus
and he is the place
and the person
where all of those things
find their culmination.
He is the one
who is the center
of the enjoyable things
that we all
intuitively experience
in our lives.
So if materialism is real,
the most you can hope
to get out of life
is just as much dopamine
as you can squeeze
out of this world.
And that's all you get.
But if Christ is ascended,
then all of those
joy-filled moments
point us to a place
and a person.
That is Jesus Christ
where the ascension
is both validating
and personifying
the goodness
that you experience.
And without the ascension,
all you have
is to just try
and get one more hit.
And if that's true,
you might as well do heroin
because that's the most
bang for your buck.
I'm serious.
The ascension points us
to the place
where all goodness
is centered.
That is Jesus Christ.
If it's true,
then what you already
intuitively experience
is real.
And I think that's
reason to trust.
I think that's reason
to believe.
I think it's reason
to say Jesus is different
from anything else.
I've covered a lot
of territory today.
I hope you see
that the ascension
is not a liability
to the Christian faith.
it's not a downgrade
for your spirituality.
But it's good news.
It is better,
as Jesus says,
that I go away.
It's to our advantage
because we have
a prophet, priest, and king
who is ruling and reigning,
who is bringing us
slowly and more
but progressively
into the presence of God
and who is sending out
the good news
of God's redeeming activity
in our world.
And that that is
reason to believe.
And it is comfort
for those of us
who are Christians.
It matters,
and I hope
that all of you
can trust it a little more.
Would you pray with me?
Father in heaven,
we pray that you
would encourage our faith,
all of us,
in the unique way
that we need
to be ministered to
by the ascension.
Thank you that Jesus
is not waiting around
in heaven
until he comes back,
but that he is indeed
active right now
bringing his kingdom,
bringing us to the Father,
building his church,
help us to trust that,
bring your kingdom
and be glorified in it.
It's in Jesus' name we pray.
Would you please stand
for our final hymn?
God sent his son,
they called him Jesus,
he came to love,
heal and forgive,
he bled and died.
He bled and died
to buy my pardon,
an empty grave is there
to prove my Savior lives.
Because he lives,
I can face tomorrow,
because he lives,
all fear is gone,
because I know
he holds the future,
and life is worth the living
just because he lives.
How sweet to hold
a newborn baby
and feel the pride
and joy he gives,
but greater still
the calm assurance
this child can face
uncertain days
because he lives.
Because he lives,
because he lives,
I can face tomorrow,
because he lives,
all fear is gone,
because I know
he holds the future,
and life is worth the living
just because he lives.
And then one day,
I'll cross the river,
I'll fight life's final war with pain,
and then as death
gives way to victory,
I'll see the lights of glory
and I'll know
he lives.
Because he lives,
I can face tomorrow,
because he lives,
all fear is gone,
because I know
he holds the future,
and life is worth the living
just because he lives.
Christians, lift your hands
and receive a blessing
not from me,
but from the living God.
The Lord bless you and keep you.
The Lord make his face
to shine upon you
and be gracious to you.
The Lord lift up
his countenance upon you
and give you peace.
Have a happy Lord's Day.
Be well.