Where is Jesus?
The feast of the Ascension puts a question to
us: where is Jesus? Where do we really find Jesus? Are we disciples only of a memory? Or, are we disciples of a living person? And if of a living person, where does that
person live? Are we disciples of a
teaching once spoken in the past? Or,
are we disciples of a teacher still speaking?
And if our teacher still speaks, where – when – how does he speak?
Where do we find Jesus? That’s the question Luke is dealing with in
our first reading from the Acts of the Apostles. Quite graphically Luke pictures Jesus being
lifted up and disappearing into a cloud.
The imagery wants to tell us Jesus is now with the Father. That’s what the imagery of being lifted up
into a clou d meant in Luke’s day. It would
be like our saying: “He has passed on to his reward.” Jesus is now with the Father. So that’s one answer to our question. Where is Jesus? He’s with the Father.
But
Luke tells us something more. As the
disciples are looking up into the sky, two men dressed in white appear to them
and ask: “Why are you looking up into the sky?
Jesus is now with the Father – but he also returns to be with you.” The same two men dressed in white appeared to
the disciples at the empty tomb on Easter morning. There they asked: “Why do you seek the Living
One among the dead? He is not here, but
has been raised.” Jesus, the Risen One,
is among the living – not the dead. He
is to be found in the present – not the past.
And so too Jesus, the Ascended One, is not to be found up above in some
faraway heaven. Don’t look up; he’s not
there.
So where is Jesus? The gospel of Matthew has Jesus saying to the
disciples: “Behold, I am with you always, every single day, day in and day
out.” In Luke’s gospel it is this
realization that allows the disciples to leave the site with great joy. They return to Jerusalem and to the rest of
their lives in great joy: “Jesus is with us always.”
This feast of the Ascension is trying to teach
us that Jesus, the Risen and Ascended One, is kind of like a hybrid. We talk about cars being hybrids – they run
on both gas and electricity. Well, Jesus
works as a kind of hybrid. He runs on
the Father but also runs on us. In fact
the clear emphasis of the gospels and epistles is to show us how Jesus runs on
us – how Jesus becomes present in us and through us. In John’s gospel Jesus tells his disciples
they will recognize his presence when they “feed his sheep”, meaning: they will recognize his presence when they
actively see to the needs of others. It
is then they will know, as Jesus puts it, that “I am in you and you are in me.”
The Ascension gives us our mission as
Christians: ever to search for Jesus’
living presence – his nearness, his nowness – in us and through us. That search is going to lead us deeper into
ourselves and deeper into one another’s lives.
It will make a community of us – a church of us – a parish of us. Just think of it: being in a community where we actually search
for and find the Living Christ – in the love we have for one another – in the
lives we share with one another.
Where is Jesus? Where do we find him? Just think of it: in an awesome, utterly life-defining way, we
are becoming the Jesus we have been searching for. We are his new, risen presence. We are his return.
Our task is to live his new presence here and
now where we are – in Charlotte. We are
the ones who’ve got to show the people of Charlotte Jesus really lives. Jesus has really returned.
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