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| "Christ Ascension" Fugel 1893 |
“All these were
constantly devoting themselves to prayer…” (Acts 1:14a)
Don’t you hate to have to
wait for stuff? The best piece of advice I think I was ever given was: Most of
life is spent waiting. So bring a book.
In the First Lesson in
the Revised Common Lectionary for Easter 7, Year A (Acts 1:6-14) we find the
Apostles standing around looking up at the clouds as Jesus ascends into Heaven.
This is actually the lesson for the Feast of the Ascension, one of the six principal
festivals on our liturgical calendar This festival should have been observed last Thursday, but for some reason we at
Faith Lutheran just never got really jazzed about it. I mean, there aren’t any “Happy
Ascension Day” greeting cards. Plus, we’ve just had Easter and Mother’s Day, and
there may have been proms or graduations and such for some of us recently. I
guess we’re kind of “festivaled out” at this point. We’d like a week or so to
catch our breath before we celebrate Pentecost. Fortunately, this reading about
the Ascension gets repeated in our Sunday lessons.
Personally, I find a lot
of meaning in the Feast of the Ascension—weird as the story seems to be. Jesus has
been making some surprise visits to the faithful off and on for the last forty
days. He’s hung around just long enough after his resurrection to let his posse
know about this eternal life thing. Then, suddenly, he takes them on a hike to
Mt. Olivet and—right in front of their eyes—he takes off like a Saturn 5 rocket
and leaves them standing there staring at the clouds with their mouths hanging
open. Then some mysterious guys in white show up out of nowhere and promise
that he’ll be back.
Someday.
And now the waiting
begins. Can you imagine these eleven Galilean dudes looking at each other
saying, “Okay. The Boss is gone. He promised us an Advocate, but he or she
hasn’t shown up yet. What should we do?” Luke has them hanging around, waiting,
and praying with the rest of the community they’ve assembled.[i] In fact, they were devoting themselves to prayer—which
isn’t such a bad way to spend those periods of uncertain waiting.
This then begs the
question: what were they praying for? In
our Gospel lesson (John 17:1-11) Jesus prays that they—and, by extension we—will be unified. Luke says the
disciples were still waiting for the restoration of the kingdom of Israel
(v.6). Boy! They’d have to wait an awful long time for that, and I suspect they might’ve been a bit disappointed when it
finally arrived in 1948.
I mention the restoration
of Israel as a nation because its seventy-fifth anniversary was observed this
past week. The United Nations chose to mark the event as the anniversary of
what Palestinians call the Nakba, or
the Catastrophe. Yes, Israel got her land back, but she did so by displacing
thousands of Palestinians and destroying their villages. This “restoration” has
given us seventy-five years of terrorism and brutal reprisals. Not exactly the unity
Jesus was praying for in our Gospel reading.
American Christians are
also divided on this subject. There are those who have been told that the
restoration of Israel is the first stage of the “End Times.” Once Israel
becomes a completely Jewish nation again, the Second Coming or the rapture or
something will happen. The rest of us believe that such eschatological thinking
will cause us to ignore climate change and other threats to our planet’s health
(Hey! Who needs to care for the earth if the Second Coming is right around the
corner, right?) and will encourage the Israeli government to further human rights violations.
Some in Israel/Palestine
are praying for a two-state solution, but more and more we hear talk of a one-state solution—a time when Israel
will realize that theocracy and democracy are inherently incompatible, and that
Arabs (be they Muslim of Christian) and Jews will live together under one
government in harmony with each other, recognizing that diversity is a gift and
not a threat. That would be something worth praying and waiting for—and not
just in the Middle East, but here in the US, too.
Waiting for change is
hard. I guess the Apostles must’ve felt it would be really cool if Jesus were
with them always, but Jesus had to go so these guys could grow up. He took his
leave praying for them and not for the world, because the world won’t change
unless the people of God change it. This liminal period of prayer and
reflection must’ve been the time when the followers of Jesus realized they were
moving into new roles. They were once Jesus’ students, but now they have to
become his ambassadors. And I’ll bet they felt scared and confused.
I feel like we’re in the
same place these guys and gals were in back at the get-go of our faith. We know
things aren’t going to be the way they were, but what are they going to become? Looks like we’ll have to wait
and see.
We don’t know where our
world, our congregations, or our own lives are headed. This might be just the
right time to devote ourselves to prayer. It might be time to say, “Okay, Lord.
You’re in charge. I don’t know what’s coming, but help me to face it with love,
acceptance, patience, understanding, and wisdom. Whatever comes next, help me
to proclaim the love that came from the cross.”
Do yourself a favor, okay?
If you’ve just read this, take a minute to pray for guidance and peace. And may
the Lord be with you.
[i]
This community, by the way, includes several women. They don’t get named in the
Bible because the Gospel writers wrote in a patriarchal society, but I think
it’s important to note that they were disciples too.
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