“With visions of the heavens – and eyes on the earth”

Seventh Sunday of Easter

Sunday June 5, 2011

Acts 1: 6-14

Psalm 68: 1-10, 32-35

1 Peter 4: 12-14, 5: 6-11

Today’s suggested reading from the Book of Acts recounts the experience of the disciples, shortly after Jesus’ resurrection.  In the verses immediately preceding today’s text, the author of Acts wrote about how Jesus had told his followers that, after he departed, they were to go to Jerusalem until they had been baptized with the Holy Spirit – an event which we will remember next Sunday, on the day of Pentecost.

But, before the day of Pentecost came, Jesus departed from among them – an event which is often referred to as the “Ascension”.  How literally or metaphorically we read this text, with its portrayal of Jesus being lifted up into the clouds, is less important than the meaning that the scene is intended to convey.  That is, that Jesus, having completed his work on earth, both returned to God and sent his followers out into the world in the power of the Spirit to continue his work, and to share his good news to the ends of the earth. 

But the disciples were still filled with questions.  Their question in the opening verses of today’s reading, about whether the time had come for the kingdom of God to be revealed in its fullness, reflected their confusion.  They had heard him speak, throughout his time with them, about the coming of the kingdom of God; they had seen him crucified by the powers of this world; they had seen him resurrected from the dead; surely, they thought, the kingdom was about to be revealed in all it fullness. 

And so they asked, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” 

Jesus’ response to that question?  “It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority.”

These words, although we have all likely read them many times before, bear a rather pointed relevance to our culture, at this moment in time. 

Only a few weeks ago, after all, there was a tremendous amount of attention paid to the dire predictions of a certain American radio evangelist who – by a strange mathematical calculation based on the bizarre interpretation of certain biblical texts – came to the conclusion that May 21, 2011 was going to be the end of the world as we knew it.   Then, fuelled by a combination of factors – including a rather bizarre billboard campaign, an explosion of interest on social media sites, and a gaggle of media outlets who seemed completely unable to tell the difference between real religious movements and the deluded ramblings of the lunatic fringe -- the predictions of the end of the world received an inordinate amount of attention. 

Personally, I tended not to pay a great deal of attention to the matter, or to any such speculations about the end of the world. 

After all, it seems quite plain that Jesus’ words, in this passage and in many like it, suggest that none of us are going to know – or even that we are supposed to know -- when the reign of God will be revealed in its fullness.  “It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority” seems quite clear.  It seems rather ironic, of course, that the infamous radio preacher seems fixated on the literal interpretation of certain passages about the end of the world, but seems to have overlooked the fact that this passage, quite literally, makes no suggestion that God is going to forewarn American radio evangelists so that they will have enough time to get their billboard advertising campaigns ready.

In spite of Jesus’ own words to them, however, the disciples in today’s text found themselves in a state of confusion, perplexity, and amazement as they pondered the implications of Christ’s absence and their hopes for his return.  As verse 10 describes the scene, we read, “when he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.”  The disciples were left there, gazing up into the skies. 

But their confused heaven-ward gaze was interrupted by the appearance of two men dressed in white.  “Men of Galilee,” they said, “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.” 

It’s really quite a ‘human’ scene.

After all, when some unexpected event takes place, we seem to have a tendency to want to stop and watch what is happening.  A car accident happens, even on the other side of a divided highway, and the traffic in both directions slows down so that people can try to see what happened.  A loud argument or a physical altercation breaks out on a city street, and bystanders all slow down to see what is about to happen.  Or some famous celebrity passes by, and a crowd of onlookers gathers to catch some glimpse of the star, as if the mere sight of them will change their life in some bizarre way.

And then, usually in an attempt to get the traffic moving again, or to break the crowd’s focus on the street fight, or to encourage the gaggle of starstruck fans to move along, a police officer or another bystander starts encouraging people to move on, to get back to focussing on what is actually important in their lives. 

Move along; the show’s over folks; nothing more to see; let’s all get back to work.

It seems that this may have been the same sentiment that was motivating the two unnamed men in today’s reading.  Although the two individuals are often assumed to have been some form heavenly, angelic messengers, they were, according to the text, simply described as two men standing there beside them.  Stop looking up into the skies, they seem to be saying to the disciples; stop gazing off towards heaven.  Jesus will be back, but in the meantime, get on with doing what he told you to do.

And what had he told them to do?  He had told them to go to Jerusalem; wait for the gift of the Holy Spirit; and then head out to declare good news to the ends of the earth; head out to proclaim a word of love, a word of grace, a word of hope for the world.  But in order to get on with doing what they were supposed to be doing, they had to get their eyes back down to the earth.

We do well to read this passage these days.

After all, there are so many movements, these days, which invite us to live in fear and anticipation of the end of the world.  Sadly, it is not only the strange ramblings of radio evangelists in which we hear these dire predictions about the end of the world as we know it.  The modern secularist might scoff, but the reality is that apocalyptic, end of the world scenarios are not the sole purview of religious extremists.  

Every day, we are inundated with similarly apocalyptic scenarios in almost every dimension of life – scenarios which try, time and again, to view life, and the world, and the future, with dread and fear. 

We are told that we should hoard what we have and fear for our retirement – after all, the economic system is in peril, and the future is uncertain.   

We are told that we need to spend billions of dollars to build bigger prisons and mandate tougher sentences to house the dangerous criminals among us (regardless, it should be noted, of the fact that the crime rate is going down). 

We are told that the environment is in a state of chaos, and it is too late to reverse the terrible effects of climate change and global warming. 

We are told that the problems associated with a lack of food will soon envelope the world will send food prices skyrocketing, will cause widespread famines, and will lead to death, destruction and war on a grand scale.    

Without minimizing or assuming some laissez-faire approach to the challenges that confront us, it is troubling, these days, that the same message seems to be coming at us, loud and clear, from almost every direction – everything from eating food to breathing the air to making love to going out in the summer sun is dangerous, and is a terrible threat to our health and safety – and that we should be very, very afraid.

But what if there is hope?

What if there is a mysterious presence, at the heart of all things, who actually loves this world?

What if that love is so powerful that not even death can stand in its way?

And what if that mysterious, powerful, loving presence explicitly told us not to spend our time gazing off into the heavens, trying to predict when the end of the world was going to come – but sent us, instead, out into the world, in a Spirit of death-defying hope, to show, in our words and in our actions, the true power of that love at work in this world? 

And what if that love can transform this world – this world that is so broken, yet so beloved; this planet that is so scarred by war and poverty, but also so filled with wonder and diversity; this earth in which there is such great pain, yet also such great beauty.

A world to which that great power chose to come, in the person of a humble child, in order to help us to learn how the world might be transformed –  by using our power for the benefit of others; by helping us to see that through the act of sharing what we have, there will be enough for all, with a surplus left over; by calling us to draw the poor, the vulnerable, the excluded and the marginalized back into community; by realizing that forgiveness is both the wisest and the most transforming response to evil; by showing us that not even death is to be feared.  It is, in its own way, a vision of heaven on earth.

The disciples, in this story, had caught sight of that vision in the presence of Jesus Christ; their calling, then, was to lower their gaze from the skies and to go out into all the earth to share that vision, to share that hope, to share that good news with the whole world. 

And we, sitting here today, are not only the result and the recipient of their obedience to that command; we are invited to become participants in that great work. 

We are invited to participate in the reshaping of this world in accordance with that vision of heaven that we have caught sight of in the person of Jesus Christ – or, to put it in words that we all know well, to live in ways that reflect our prayer -- thy kingdom come, on earth as it is in heaven.

May God grant us the faith, the hope and the love to make that vision a reality in our world.

Amen.