Last revised: June 17, 2011
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But once we grasp that ‘heaven and earth’ mean what they mean in the Bible, and that ‘heaven’ is not, repeat not, a location within our own cosmos of space, time and matter, situated somewhere up in the sky (‘up’ from whose point of view? Europe? Brazil? Australia?), then we are ready, or as ready as we are likely to be, to understand the ascension, described here quite simply and briefly by Luke. Neither Luke nor the other early Christians thought Jesus had suddenly become a primitive spaceman, heading off into orbit or beyond, so that if you searched throughout the far reaches of what we call ‘space’ you would eventually find him. They believed that ‘heaven’ and ‘earth’ are the two interlocking spheres of God’s reality, and that the risen body of Jesus is the first (and so far the only) object which is fully at home in both and hence in either, anticipating the time when everything will be renewed and joined together. And so, since as T. S. Eliot said, ‘humankind cannot bear very much reality,’ the new, overwhelming reality of a heaven-and-earth creature will not just yet live in both dimensions together, but will make itself — himself — at home within the ‘heavenly’ dimension for the moment, until the time comes for heaven and earth to be finally renewed and united. At that point, of course, this renewed Jesus himself will be the central figure.

That is the point of the event, and its explanation, as we find them in verses 9-11. Jesus is ‘lifted up,’ indicating to the disciples not that he was heading out somewhere beyond the moon, beyond Mars, or wherever, but that he was going into ‘God’s space,’ God’s dimension. The cloud, as so often in the Bible, is the sign of God’s presence (think of the pillar of cloud and fire as the children of Israel wandered through the desert, or the cloud and smoke that filled the Temple when God became suddenly present in a new way). Jesus has gone into God’s dimension of reality; but he’ll be back on the day when that dimension and our present one are brought together once and for all. That promise hangs in the air over the whole of Christian history from that day to this. That is what we mean by the ‘second coming.’

There are two other things which are, as we say, ‘going on’ in this passage. Some first-century readers would have picked up one of these, some the other, some perhaps both. First, one of the central Old Testament promises for the early Christians was in Daniel 7, where ‘one like a son of man’ is brought up, on the clouds of heaven, to the ‘Ancient of Days,’ and is presented before him and given kingly power over the nations, and particularly over the ‘beasts,’ the monsters representing the forces of evil and chaos. For someone who had long pondered that passage – and there are plenty of signs that the early Christians did just that – the story of Jesus’ ascension would indicate that Daniel 7 had been fulfilled in a dramatic and unexpected way, with the human figure who had suffered at the hands of the evil powers of the world now being exalted into the very presence of God himself, there to receive kingly power. This fits so well with the previous passage (verses 6-8) that it is hard to suppose that Luke did not intend it.

Second, many of Luke’s readers would know that when a Roman emperor died, it had become customary to declare that someone had seen his soul escaping from his body and going up to heaven. If you go to the top end of the Forum in Rome, stand under the Arch of Titus, and look up, you will see a carving of the soul of Titus, who was emperor in the 80s of the first century, ascending to heaven. The message of this was clear: the emperor was becoming a god (thus enabling his son and heir to style himself ‘son of god,’ which is a useful title if you want to run the world). The parallel is not so close this time, since Luke is clear that it was not Jesus’ soul that ascended into heaven, leaving his body behind somewhere, but his whole, renewed, bodily, complete self. But there is then a sense that Jesus is upstaging anything the Roman emperors might imagine for themselves. He is the reality, and they are the parody – a theme we will notice more than once as Luke’s story unfolds. And when, at the end of Luke’s book, the good news of Jesus is being preached in Rome itself, openly and unhindered, we have a sense of ‘Of course! That’s how it had to be.’ He is the world’s true and rightful king, sharing the very throne, and somehow even, so it seems, the identity, of the one true God.

The point of these remarks is that Jesus’ real concern is that people should know the Father, not him. At the same time he is aware that he is revealing the Father, and that it is only through him that a real knowledge of the Father is made available. That is: it is only in seeing the pattern of Jesus’ life, lived with the intelligence of the victim, that it becomes possible to know the Father, who is revealed only in the casting out. Let me try to make that clearer. The whole process of Jesus’ life, leading up to and including his death, is what defines who the Father is. This is because the life is lived in obedient response to the Father’s love, and is an exact imitation of the Father’s love lived out in the conditions of the human race. The imitation reveals the one imitated. It was Jesus’ life and death that made possible the human discovery of who the Father really is.

So, Jesus makes himself known, not as an end in himself, but strictly as the means of revealing the Father. His famous response to Philip in John 14 says exactly this: ‘I am the way, the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father but by me.’ What Jesus is, he is as revealing the Father. Later on, this is made clearer still when Jesus says, ‘and this is eternal life, that they know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou has sent.’ (John 17.3).

This reading takes seriously the play on the word “know.” Thomas is saying, “How can we have intellectual clarity on where you’re going or the route or technique to get there?” Jesus replies, “You don’t need intellectual clarity; you need personal knowledge. It’s not a matter of ‘knowing about,’ but rather ‘knowing.’” — Similarly, when Philip says, “Lord, show us the Father,” Jesus replies, “Philip, don’t you know me?” Remember, this theme of personal knowing as interactive relationship (closely related to friendship) is strong through all of John’s gospel. Just three chapters later Jesus says, “And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent” (17:3). “I am the life” in John 14:6, then, has a powerful resonance with John 17:3, in effect saying, “Eternal life is to know God and to know Jesus Christ, whom he has sent.”

This ‘eternal life,’ this life of the coming age, is not just something which people can have after their death. It isn’t simply that in some future state the world will go on for ever and ever and we shall be part of it. The point is, rather, that this new sort of life has come to birth in the world in and through Jesus. Once he has completed the final victory over death itself, all his followers, all who trust him and believe that he has truly come from the father, and has truly unveiled the father’s character and purpose — all of them can and will possess ‘eternal life’ right here and now. That, too, has been one of the great themes of this gospel (e.g. 3.16; 5.24).