This week, we will celebrate
the Ascension of Jesus. Jesus ascended to heaven 40 days after Easter, so
Ascension Day is always on a Thursday.
We won’t gather here on Thursday, so our scripture reading this morning
come from a teaching Jesus shared with his disciples at the Last Supper. Jesus
wanted his friends to know that even after he was present on earth, they would
not be left without the presence of God. Soon, God would share God’s Holy
Spirit with the people of the earth – Jesus wasn’t going to live among us
embodied in the form of a person, but the Holy Spirit will be constantly
present with us.
Hear Jesus’ teaching as it comes to
us from the Gospel of John, chapter 14 verses fifteen through twenty-one:
Proclamation of the Scripture John 14:15-21
If you love me, keep my commands.
And I will ask the Father, and he will give you
another advocate to help you and be with you forever—
the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept
him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he
lives with you and will be in you.
I will not leave you as orphans; I will come
to you.
Before long, the world will not see me anymore, but
you will see me. Because I live, you also will live.
On that day you will realize that I am in my
Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.
Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.”
The story of Jesus’ ascension is one
of the stories from our scripture we don’t cover a lot in UCC churches. In the
days and weeks after Easter. Jesus appeared over and over again to his
disciples and friends. At first, Jesus’ appearances were unexpected and were
amazing miracles. But, after a few weeks, Jesus’ friends and disciples adjusted
to them….they may have felt that Jesus would always be around, just showing up
in surprising ways and places.
Then, forty days after Easter, Jesus
led his eleven remaining Disciples to the town of Bethany. He told them to stay
in Jerusalem until the coming of the Holy Spirit. He didn’t specify when the Holy
Spirit would come, he just told them that it was going to come. He then blessed
the Disciples, said good-bye, and was carried up into heaven. The disciples
watched Jesus disappear and then they returned to Jerusalem.
After they returned to Jerusalem, the
disciples got nervous. When we celebrate the Pentecost events in a few weeks,
we will recall that the Disciples were hidden away in a room together with the
doors and windows sealed shut. Jesus had taught them over and over again that
God would send the Holy Spirit to be among them, but Jesus wasn’t specific
about when it was coming. While they waited, the Disciples became scared that
they were left alone….this group of Jesus’ followers, who lived with Jesus, ate
with Jesus, walked with Jesus, who witnessed tons of miracles including the
resurrection, and still got sacred when Jesus left them alone. They had a trust
problem….a trust problem that lasted until the Pentecost day events when the
Holy Spirit arrived and filled them with the breath of God.
Our scripture reading this morning
comes from the teachings Jesus shared with his friends at the Last Supper. Even
though Jesus was about to face his arrest, trial and execution, he had a lot of
things on his mind that he wanted to leave his disciples with. He wanted them
to hear, again, that God was going to send God’s Holy Spirit to be among them.
Jesus told them this during his ministry years, Jesus told them this at the
Last Supper, and Jesus told them this before his Ascension. God was not going
to leave them orphaned, all alone, without Jesus. The Holy Spirit of God as
coming – Like John reminded us last week – there is no escape from the Holy
Spirit of God. The Holy Spirit is always among us and within us.
The other thing Jesus wanted to
impress upon his followers in the teachings we read this morning is that we
show that we love God and Jesus by keeping Jesus’ commandments. Jesus says that
whoever follows Jesus’ commandments and keeps them will be loved by God and
Jesus, and we will be connected to Jesus as we keep the commandments. Our faith
is not something that we only practice between 10:15 and 11:15 on Sunday
mornings. Our work as followers of Jesus is to love God, to love Jesus, to love
other people, and to keep Jesus’ commandments…..all of the time.
Our work is to practice our faith,
to keep the commandments, all of the time. And, the Holy Spirit is here among
us and within us to strengthen our resolve, to help us as we endeavor to follow
the commandments. Which commandments did Jesus emphasize? Jesus wants us to
Love God with all of our heart, with all of our soul, and with all of our mind.
Jesus wants us to love each other, to love our neighbors, as much as we love
ourselves. Jesus wants us to work to control our anger, and to act out of love,
not out of spite. Jesus wants us to resist our more unhealthy base instincts,
to resist evil that externally attacks us and also the thoughts and desires we
have to that encourage us to harm others and ourselves. And, Jesus wants us to
love our enemies – not to attack them, not to ignore them, not to tolerate
them, but to work to love our enemies.
The Holy Spirit is the part of God
that is here with us all of the time, to fortify us, to encourage us, to listen
to us, to support us when we are weak or afraid or worried. Nothing we do in
this life is done alone because the Holy Spirit of God is here with us. The
Holy Spirit of God is a source of comfort and strength for us. We are never
separated from God because the Holy Sprit is with us. And, our work is to
remember that we are in the presence of God and that we must work to live our
faith by treated others with love and respect, with treating ourselves with
love and respect, and with treating God with love and respect. We are to love
God and to love one another.
Let us do so remembering we are
never alone, God’s Spirit is with us. We are motivated by that Sprit to live
out God’s love commandment.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
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