Christ Ascends to God's Right Hand

Ascension icon.

Ascension

Later He appeared to the eleven as they sat at the table; and He rebuked their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they did not believe those who had seen Him after He had risen. And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will follow those who believe: In My name they will cast out demons; they will speak with new tongues; they will take up serpents; and if they drink anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.” So then, after the Lord had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God. And they went out and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word through the accompanying signs. Amen (Mark 16:14-20).

Jesus appears to the eleven and rebukes them. This makes sense; they certainly deserve a scolding. Jesus had chosen specific people to be the first witnesses of His resurrection: Mary Magdalene and the other Mary. He appeared to them and told them to bring the news of His defeat of death and the grave to His disciples. But, when Mary Magdalene went and told them, as they mourned and wept, the disciples did not believe. Jesus also appeared to two of them on the road to Emmaus;[1] they went and told the rest of the disciples, but they did not believe them either. Isn’t it a little ironic that the disciples, who would soon be the Apostles (the sent ones), did not believe the ones sent to them?

How could the disciples expect others to believe them, when they in turn would be sent out to proclaim the risen Lord, if the disciples themselves persisted in unbelief? Besides, Jesus had even prophesied his resurrection while he was still with them.[2]

Then Jesus speaks what we have come to call The Great Commission to His disciples, though Mark records it differently from Matthew:

Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.[3]

What Mark writes here is often interpreted, particularly by certain factions of American Protestantism, as commanding that Christians only baptize those who profess faith beforehand: First, a person declares that they believe; then, and only then, they are to be baptized. This is not so. Through the sacrament of Holy Baptism God creates faith, saves, and washes away sin. This promise, Peter will later proclaim to the crowd:

“Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you, and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord Our God will call.”[4]

Baptism is connected to repentance, to the remission of sins, and to the giving of the Holy Spirit; it connects us to Christ’s death and resurrection;[5] in baptism we are clothed with Christ.[6] The order of the actions is not as important as the one who is doing the actions; and the person doing all the actions in conversion is God.

What I mean is this: It is the means of the Word that creates faith, by the working of the Holy Spirit.[7] Baptism, which God calls a washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit,[8] is a way God has instituted of delivering the Word that creates faith, using a physical thing. In baptism, God bound His word to a physical thing, water; He promised when water and His Word were bound in the way He gave it, it would be for creating faith, forgiving sins, and giving the Holy Spirit - just as with His preached word. The power working in baptism is the power of the Gospel of Christ, or as Peter says, the resurrection of Jesus Christ;[9] that is the same Gospel that is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes.[10] The preaching, teaching, and baptizing cannot be separated from one another.

Continuing His commission of His disciples-turned-Apostles, Jesus describes a list of signs that would go with them as they preached: exorcism, speaking in tongues, taking up serpents, drinking poison, and healing the sick. If these are the signs that will follow those who believe, then I am in trouble, as are most people who have called themselves Christians for the last 2,000 years. I have cast out no demons; I speak a foreign language, but only due to hard studying; it was no miracle. I have not ever taken up serpents or imbibed poison. The only healing I have ever done by my own hand was to provide medicine to members of my family when they were sick. Not only have I not performed any of these signs and wonders, but I also know no one personally who even makes such a claim. If we are to understand what Jesus says here as applying to all people at all times, as many in the Pentecostal movement do, there are far fewer Christians out there than previous assumed.

Mark, conveniently enough, explains the purpose of these signs:

And they [the Apostles] went out and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word through the accompanying signs. Amen.[11]

Amen indeed! These signs were promised to the Apostles, not to every individual Christian as a sign of faith. These signs were the credentials of the Apostles to verify that what they were saying was true. All of these signs

were already promised (Mark 3:15) when he [Jesus] called the Twelve and were put into practice when they went out on their first preaching journey (Mark 6:13). Examples of all of them are recorded in the book of Acts...Nowhere did Jesus say that they would continue to the end of time. What is to continue is the preaching of the gospel.[12]

And the thing that each Christian is given, that they may cling to, that will reassure them that they are connected to Christ and His righteousness, and are a child of God, is their baptism - the preaching of the Gospel through physical means - not signs and wonders, or personal, inward encounters with God.

Do not misunderstand: It isn’t that God can’t cause signs and wonders to happen. God is able to do whatever He wants to do. If He chooses to give someone the gift of healing, of speaking a language that they previously did not know, of speaking to someone directly, He can and will. The issue is that God does not want to do these things. He has made that clear to us in His Word. Those things are the incredibly rare exception, not the rule. The author of Hebrews writes,

"God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds;"[13]

And what does Jesus, through whom God the Father has spoken to us in these last days, say? Rather than looking to perform signs and wonders, He tells His Christians that the people who will perform signs and wonders are the false prophets:

“And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect’s sake those days will be shortened. Then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ of ‘There!’ do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand.”[14]

Since Christ ascended to the right hand of God the Father, we have no more need of signs, wonders, and direct revelation. He does not wish to deal with us in any other way than through His external Word.[15] It is in that Word, proclaimed by the Apostles, attested by God through their signs and wonders, that He creates faith, forgives sins, teaches good doctrine, and brings us to everlasting life in Christ Jesus. We should praise God that He has given us such a wondrously simple, and gracious, way to reach all people, infant or adult, hearing or deaf, mentally sound or mentally handicapped, with His saving Word through baptism, which now saves us through the resurrection of the ascended Jesus Christ.

  

Bibliography

McCain, Paul T, Robert C Baker, Gene E Veith, and Edward A Engelbrecht,. Concordia, The Lutheran Confessions: A Reader's Edition of the Book of Concord. 1st. Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2005.

Wicke, Harold E. People's Bible Commentary: Mark. Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2004.

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[1] Luke 24:13-35

[2] Wicke, People’s Bible Commentary: Mark, p.238

[3] Mark 16:15-16

[4] Acts 2:38-39

[5] Romans 6:3-5

[6] Galatians 3:27

[7] Romans 10:17

[8] Titus 3:5

[9] 1 Peter 3:18-22

[10] Romans 1:16

[11] Mark 16:20

[12] Wicke, People’s Bible Commentary: Mark, p.239

[13] Hebrews 1:1-2

[14] Matthew 24:22-25

[15] SA III VIII 10-13, McCain, et. al., Concordia, the Lutheran Confessions,p.307

Sending Out the Twelve

And when He had called His twelve disciples to Him, He gave them power over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease. Now the names of the twelve apostles are these: first, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother; James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James the son of Alphaeus, and Lebbaeus, whose surname was Thaddaeus; Simon the Cananite[1], and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed Him. These twelve Jesus sent out and commanded them, saying: “Do not go into the way of the Gentiles, and do not enter a city of the Samaritans. But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And as you go, preach, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give. Provide neither gold nor silver nor copper in your money belts, nor bag for your journey, nor two tunics, nor sandals, nor staffs; for a worker is worthy of his food. Now whatever city or town you enter, inquire who in it is worthy, and stay there till you go out. And when you go into a household, greet it. If the household is worthy, let your peace come upon it. But if it is not worthy, let your peace return to you. And whoever will not receive you nor hear your words, when you depart from that house or city, shake off the dust from your feet. Assuredly, I say to you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city! Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents and harmless as doves” (Matthew 10:1-16).

Jesus, going through the cities and towns, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, sees the multitudes. He is moved because He sees that they are weary and scattered, like sheep without a shepherd. Jesus commands His disciples to pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into the harvest. He then grants their prayer by sending. The disciples, now called Apostles, or sent ones, are given power to cast out demons, and to heal sickness and disease, and sent out as laborers into the harvest. He gives them specific instructions as to how they should conduct themselves. They are to go among the lost sheep of Israel. They will preach the same message that Christ preached. The kingdom of God which will rescue man from sin and death, and crush the devil’s head, is coming. In Christ, it has arrived. Jubilee! It is the year of the Lord’s favor.[2] Since they are going out with Christ’s authority, preaching His message, they will also be treated as He is treated. He tells them to be wise as serpents, but harmless as doves. This is dangerous work. They are sheep among wolves.

Jesus sends his Apostles to Israel first. They are, after all, the ones who should recognize the message and accept it. They should be the ones who recognize Jesus as the Messiah, the fulfillment of Scripture. Of course, we know that the Christ is also a light to lighten the Gentiles.[3] That will come later. For now, the gospel of the kingdom is proclaimed to Israel alone. And just as Jesus demonstrated the authority of His preaching through the miracles He performed, His Apostles will do likewise. Since the closing of the Apostolic age, however, there is no need for such authentication by miracle. We have the external, written Word.[4] Holy Scripture is the rule by which all messages are to be judged, even if a messenger comes performing miracles. In fact, Christ teaches us that false christs and false prophets will rise up and do great signs and wonders.[5] We learn from Paul that the devil masquerades as an angel of light. He has his own false ministers and false apostles.[6] On the contrary, it is the doctrine, or teaching, that matters. Jesus wants us to judge preachers based on their message, and he wants teachers to teach all that he has commanded. If they teach what Jesus and His Apostles taught, the miracles of Christ and the Apostles continue to authenticate the message.

We learn here that we should continue to pray that the Lord would send workers into the harvest. We should not be surprised to find that He is constantly answering this prayer using we, His people, through the vocations in which He has placed us. We must proclaim the same message as Christ and His Apostles: That the kingdom of heaven is at hand. The Scriptures are fulfilled. Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; that He was buried and rose again the third day.[7]

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[1] Cananaean

[2] Luke 4:16-30; Isaiah 49:8-9

[3] Luke 2:25-35

[4] Hebrews 1:1-2

[5] Matthew 24:24

[6] 2 Corinthians 11:5-15

[7] 1 Corinthians 15:1-11

Losing Faith and Falling Away

This is kind of an addendum to “Three Examples of How Lutherans Deny Justification by Faith Alone: A Response, Part Two of Two.” Here are a couple other verses I thought were good examples of how 1) conversion is entirely God’s work, 2) faith comes to us a gift from God through the Word, and 3) that faith can be lost by a person’s rejection. - THL

The apostles and the elders were gathered together to consider this matter [whether it was necessary for Gentile believers to keep the Law of Moses]. And after there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said to them, “Brothers, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. And God, who knows the heart, bore witness to them, by giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us, and he made no distinction between us and them, having cleansed their hearts by faith. Now, therefore, why are you putting God to the test by placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? But we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will” (Acts 15:6-11).

What do we learn from Peter’s address to the council? First, faith is created by means of the Gospel (v. 7). Second, the Holy Spirit is, “given by God,” working when and where He will, not according to the will of man (v. 8). Third, Peter says that God cleansed the hearts of the Gentile believers by faith, showing that faith is a gift from God (v. 9), rather than through works of the law (or by any other work, including “deciding” to believe by reason), which is impossible to achieve (v. 10). Fourth, this faith is given out of his unmerited good disposition toward those on whom he bestows this gift – i.e. out of his grace – and everyone who is saved, is being saved this way (v. 11). Whew!

And you [the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae], who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister (Colossians 1:21-23).

This one is pretty self-explanatory. Paul is writing to believers at Colossae. He tells these people, whom he counts as believers, that they have been reconciled in Christ’s body of flesh by his death, “…if indeed [they] continue in the faith…” He continues on, warning them not to shift from the hope of the gospel of which he was a minister, because if they shift from that hope, if they do not remain stable and steadfast in that hope, they will no longer be reconciled. They will go back to being alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds. They will no longer be able to be presented as holy and blameless and above reproach before Christ because they will have no faith. They will have fallen away. Faith in Christ must continue, just as it began – by hearing the Gospel[1].

[1] Engelbrecht, Rev. Edward A., ed. The Lutheran Study Bible. Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2009. 

Summer Vacation

And they devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers (Acts 2:42).

Everyone loves a vacation. It is a time to suspend reality, if only for a brief period. All year long we go about our hum-drum lives, doing the same tedious work, dealing with the same frustrating people and issues. Each day seems to melt into the next, as we mechanically repeat the habitual litany of meaningless acts that, summed up, total our working life. We get up. We bathe. We eat. We go off to work. We eat. We come home from work. We eat. We watch television. We go to sleep. Repeat ad infinitum, ad nauseum. We endure this hellish cycle for what seems to be an eternity until – Ah! The weather turns hot, the days become long, and the vacation season is upon us. For two weeks or more, depending on how much seniority you have at your job, this depressing existence will fade into the background and you will take a vacation.

Of course, if you have children, or have ever interacted with children, you know that they become just as excited about the prospect of vacation as adults. Ask most any school aged child what their favorite part of school is, and they will invariably answer, “summer vacation”. American children may not realize it – or, indeed, even care – but they have the British to thank for the concept of summer break. In Great Britain, the word “vacation” once specifically referred to the long summer break taken by the law courts and universities. This custom of what has morphed into the “summer vacation” was introduced by William the Conqueror from Normandy. William decided that everyone should take some time off from learning, and law, and get down to the important business of the grape harvest. To this day in England, and in most of the rest of Europe as well, they take the summer vacation pretty seriously. In the not-too-distant past, many upper-class English families would move to a summer home for part of the year, leaving their usual family home vacant.

Unfortunately, our spiritual life seems to play the yin to our secular life’s yang. By that I mean, all the while we are slaving away at our boring secular jobs, waiting for summer to get here, church life is busy and exciting. Beginning with Advent and running through Pentecost – the festival season, as it is called – gives worshipers something different and exciting to look forward to nearly every Sunday. First there is Advent, with the anticipation of the coming Christ. Advent is followed by Christmas, where we celebrate Immanuel – God with us, born in human flesh. Next come Epiphany and Transfiguration This is the “Time of Christmas”.

After the time of Christmas we enter into the “Time of Easter”. This begins with the solemn preparation for the Lenten season with Ash Wednesday. Lent, though with muted color and focused on repentance, has special music and, in many congregations, midweek worship services, complete with soup supper. Holy Week brings Lent to an intense close, focusing on the suffering and death of the Savior. We finish strongly with celebrating the Risen Christ with Easter, Ascension, Pentecost, and Holy Trinity.

Then, however, begins the long, dark, tea time of the church year’s soul. We enter the time after Pentecost. In the Roman Catholic tradition, this portion of the church year is known as “ordinary time”, and after a couple of Sundays you can tell why. The festivals are gone until November. The colors on the altar stay the same green for the duration of the summer. The church settles into routine, and it is difficult for even the most energetic of pastors and church musicians to focus on “ordinary time” with the same zeal that they brought to bear on the festival season.

Oh, sure, a congregation might try to spice up “ordinary time” by observing some of the lesser festivals on the church calendar. Let’s face it, though; It doesn’t matter how interesting the life of Polycarp of Smyrna was, singing a hymn verse about his life and crafting a collect around him just doesn’t compare to the Christmas Eve candlelight service; or to All Saints Day; or to the depression of Good Friday; or to the exultation of Easter. It just isn’t the same. Couple this perceived increase in monotony in the regular Sunday worship service with the fact that the beginning of “ordinary time” coincides with “vacation time” and maybe you can see the seeds of conflict.

In the summer, vacations are the order of the day, and vacations all too often separate the Christian, for a time, from his home, and home church. What’s the problem with this, you might ask? Surely it isn’t sinful to take a vacation! Certainly not. However, couple the “vacation” with the “weekend getaway”, the “Sunday drive” and the “mental health day”, and a disturbing pattern begins to emerge. Nearly every Sunday, the highways beckon the Christian to sacrifice the quiet hour with God for some new sights, some new pleasures, some new friends. This is much more than a harmless vacation. These days turn into an excuse to assuage the guilt that we feel at indulging our sinful human nature, by neglecting our spiritual health, growth, and welfare.

As a result of this subtle neglect, many a Christian’s life in Christ and with Christ lacks spiritual vigor and strength. Left to fester for enough time, this situation will result in our spiritual malnourishment. We all know of fellow Christians whose spiritual lives have sunk to the point of suspended animation. If you think hard enough, you may even call to mind someone – a friend, perhaps – whose ship of faith was eventually dashed apart on the rocky crags of neglect and worldly indulgence. In each and every case of such spiritual malaise, or spiritual death, that you can think of, the first step down that road was, most assuredly, taking an extended vacation from their Christian faith.

What are we to do, stop taking vacations? Are we to use every spare moment of our waking lives in attending worship services? May we never go out of town? Shall we only take trips that can be concluded between Monday and Saturday, so as not to miss church at our home congregation? Though we should seek to plan our lives around our Christian fellowship, and not vice versa, that isn’t exactly the point. Let us look to Holy Scripture, to the Christians at the church in Jerusalem for our example:

And they devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved (Acts 2:42-47).

The issue here is not so much the physical act of being in church, but more so the mindset of the Christians of whom St. Luke writes in the concluding verses of Acts, chapter two. St. Luke says that they “devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and the fellowship…” The word “devote”, according to Merriam-Webster, means, “To commit by a solemn act; to give over or direct (as time, money, or effort) to a cause, enterprise or activity.”

So, what St. Luke is telling us here is that these early Christians were committed to Christ by a solemn act (Holy Baptism). As a consequence of this commitment, they were giving over and directing their time, money, and efforts, to their endeavor, which he describes as the apostles’ teaching, the fellowship, the breaking of bread, and the prayers – in other words, worship and Christian fellowship.

It could have been so easy for these Christians to fall back into the routine of their daily lives. At the time of which the words of our text speak, the exciting events of the Day of Pentecost were past. The rush of the mighty wind, that sound that had gotten the people’s attention, and focused them on the Apostles, was now silent. The flaming tongues of fire which had manifested, divided, and rested so dramatically on the heads of the Apostles – the symbols of their God-given power and authority to preach the Gospel of Christ – were no longer seen upon them. The words of St. Peter who had preached to the crowd that Pentecost day were no longer ringing in the people’s ears. Many of those who had heard St. Peter’s sermon and who were “cut to the heart”, as the Scriptures describe the scene, had most certainly departed Jerusalem after the feast was over. The streets of the city had returned to their “ordinary” hustle and bustle.

With all the eventful, exciting things seemingly at an end, it must have been a powerful, albeit subtle, temptation for these new believers to lose the enthusiasm they had at Pentecost, at their conversion and baptism. In the absence of such visible wonders, it would have been comfortable to lapse into their former ways, their former habits, their former associations which had filled their past lives. It would have been easy to drift away from “the fellowship” and to forsake their fellow Christians for the friends, companions, and diversions they had in former days; Easier still, in the face of the persecution they were beginning to feel at the hands of the Pharisees, and later, the Romans.

None of that happened. What is documented by St. Luke is not a church with an attendance problem. He doesn’t write, “many of the people have left the fellowship, but the fellowship is still surviving with good attendance numbers since it began contemporary worship services on Saturday nights at the local forum.” On the contrary, he says, “…the Lord added to their number day by day, those who were being saved.” God, through his means of Grace, by the power of the Holy Spirit, builds and nurtures His Church.

The faith created in these Christians, just like the faith God created in each one of us at our conversion, by His means of Grace, was alive. How could it be otherwise? That faith was created by the preaching of the Gospel of Christ – the Word of God – which is described by the author of Hebrews in dynamic terms:

For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart (Hebrews 4:12).

These Christians had, from the mouth of St. Peter, heard preached the living and active Word of God, and it pierced their hearts. Never again would they be the same. They knew and acknowledged the evil of sin, and their own sinfulness. They also knew the remedy for sin – the life, suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. They knew Jesus as their Savior. They believed that Christ’s blood, shed on the cross, cleansed them from all sin, and they ached to be fed with the life-giving, faith-nurturing food of God’s means of grace – his Holy Word and Sacraments.

We are no different from these Christians at the church in Jerusalem after Pentecost. More accurately, we began our Christian journey no differently from them. We sinners, dead in our transgressions, came to faith in Christ by the same means of grace as they. We received the same living faith, by the power of the same Holy Spirit. We run the risk of stagnation, however, if we take a vacation from our faith. A living faith, just like any other living thing, must be fed and cared for, in order for it to grow and mature. If it is neglected it will weaken, wither, and die.

It is evident from St. Luke’s description of the congregation of believers in Jerusalem after Pentecost that they were no part-time Christians. They were Christians every day of their lives, at all seasons of the year. Their faith took no vacation. They fought the “old Adam” living in them – their sinful human nature – when it called them to neglect the fellowship of believers, and thus weaken their faith, to Satan’s delight. Their confidence in the Gospel led them to partake of the holy Sacrament frequently for the strengthening of their faith. And, the joint prayer with their brothers imposed upon them the welcome necessity to join with them regularly in public service.

Our faith, our steadfastness, our perseverance must never be made dependent upon days, festivals, and seasons. Let us be sure to be Christians all the time, every day of our lives, during all seasons of the year, and in every place where we happen to find ourselves. It is vitally important for our spiritual wellbeing that we gather around Word and Sacrament, and nourish our faith at every opportunity we are able. If we do not partake of the rich spiritual banquet Christ has provided us, that faith in us will become weak, emaciated, and it will ultimately die. St. Paul writes in Galatians:

But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law (Galatians 5:16-18).

Let us then, on the basis of the early Christians – those first generation believers of the church at Jerusalem – under the guidance of God’s Holy Spirit, remind ourselves that, while the Christian may, from time to time, go out of town, the Christian’s faith takes no vacation.