Ascension Sunday

Father Murphy walks into a pub in Donegal, and says to the first man sitting at the bar, "Do you want to go to heaven?" The man said, "I do Father." "Then stand over there against the wall." Then he said to the very next man at the bar, "Do you want to go to heaven?" "Certainly, Father," was the man's reply." Then stand over there against the wall," said the priest.   

Then he walked up to O'Toole who was busy sipping his pint and said, "Do you want to go to heaven? O'Toole answered "No, I don't Father. The priest couldn’t believe it. “You mean to tell me that when you die you don't want to go to heaven?" O'Toole said, "Oh, when I die, sure. I thought you were getting a group together to go right now."

I’m sure we all can relate. Heaven is a wonderful place to be but not just yet, thank you very much. We are attached to the life we know here on planet earth and, as bad as things get—and they do get pretty ghastly at times—most of us, like O’Toole, aren’t ready to ascend any time too soon.

We are celebrating the Ascension of Jesus this morning, an event that occurred forty days after his Resurrection. We hear the account of the Ascension in the Gospel. The details are a bit sketchy, but we learn from Luke that Jesus led his disciples out of the city as far as Bethany, where he blessed them and was “carried up into heaven.” I don’t expect they were quite prepared for this turn of events and I’m sure they were not quite ready to follow right then and there.

Ascension was the day that Jesus “cut the kids loose.” It was time for them to grow up, to stand on their own feet, and with help from the Holy Spirit—a gift he would send them soon after— they were to go out and preach the Good News that would change the world. This bodily ascension of Jesus was for the disciples yet another miraculous event and came with his promise of power from on high. Still for them there was uncertainty and fear.

God’s story is always related to human need. If you have come here with concerns about your health, the gospel is about God’s healing power; if you have come with feelings of guilt, the gospel is God’s assurance that you are forgiven; if you have come in bereavement for someone you have lost, the gospel is God’s strong word of resurrection. For those who are hungry, the gospel may be bread; for those who have been marginalized in any way, the gospel may be liberation and affirmation; for the persecuted, the gospel may be freedom in a new homeland.

People don’t want to stand around looking up at the sky to see where heaven is, they want a God who comes down to them, to feel God’s presence in the places of their lives where they have been abandoned

Anne Lamott, in her book Traveling Mercies explains why she makes her son, Sam, go to church. She started going to church early in her pregnancy. One Sunday at the end of the service she stood up and told the congregation that she was pregnant and everyone cheered. She was not married, and she did not expect that reaction. She reported that even people raised in Bible-thumping homes in the deep South clapped and clapped.

They reached out their arms and adopted her. They brought clothes and blankets for the new baby. They lugged in casseroles that she could freeze and use later. The church members kept telling her that this new baby was going to be part of their church family. And then they began to slip her money. Older women on Social Security would stuff her pockets with tens and twenties. Old Mary Williams always sat in the back and brought Anne baggies filled with dimes week after week.

Anne brought Sam to that church when he was five days old. The members of the congregation stood in line and called him “our baby.”  It was the people in that little church that kept her going. They cared, reached out, prayed, and loved her and saw her through some hard days. Anne writes, “Why do I make Sam go to church? None of his other friends go. I make him go because when I looked around me in that place I she saw the face of God.”

You and I are the successors of that small community of folk that stood on the hill at Bethany. That small band of disciples has passed on their legacies to us today. They

were the ‘starter kit’ for the Kingdom, like a lump of leavened dough starts the next loaf going. God has entrusted us with important work—the sacred business of healing and transforming the lives of those in this world.

In his book, The Scent of Love, Keith Miller writes about how the great movement of the early church was how it transformed people. They were not trained in theology, were not skilled preachers and had no degrees that would impress others. What they did have was an experience of the Risen Jesus, a generous outreach, and a depth and quality of common life—together. As Miller says, “The way they lived together gave off a kind of haunting spiritual scent which drew people to them.”

The disciples left Bethany that day with a great deal of uncertainty. We live in uncertain times as well and may not know what’s around the corner. We may be anxious. And so, like the disciples, we wait. And pray. And wonder.

What we can be sure of is that when we carry a “scent” of love and generosity and a depth and quality of common life which draws others to ourselves, we will discover together the One who is at the center of it all because when we looked around us in this place we saw the face of God.