The Joy of Easter

'So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.' Colossians 3:1

The joy of Easter runs through the lectionary readings for May, as we should expect. Then it culminates in the Ascension, right at the end of the month.  Modern, literalist minds seem to find enormous problems with the idea of Jesus going ‘up’ into heaven, back to the Father - as he had told his disciples he would. But if we see the Ascension as the inevitable and final act of triumph in the story of the Messiah we shall also see that the story would be incomplete without it. We know that the incarnation came to an end. Jesus of Nazareth is no longer on this earth, not still treading the lanes of Galilee or making his way through the noisy streets and squares of Jerusalem. He said that he would return to his Father, and he did.

It was, of course, a journey from the finite world of earth to the infinite glory of heaven, and in that sense it was a journey ‘upward’, just as we
speak of going ‘up’ to London or a student of going ‘up’ to Oxford. It wasn’t rocketry or first century space travel, but the prototype of all our
journeys from the finite to the infinite, from the kingdoms of this world to the kingdom of heaven. Where he went, we can follow. Just as we are called to share in his cross and resurrection - events symbolised in baptism - so we share in his ascension.

Later this month the Church commemorates two great English Christians whose ministry is part of the heritage of us all, John and Charles Wesley (May 24th). This year, indeed, a memorial will be dedicated in Christ Church to these remarkable brothers, who through the preaching of the one and the hymnody of the other changed the face of the Church in Britain. Charles, as usual, has just the words to illuminate the meaning for us of the resurrection of Jesus:

Soar we now where Christ has led,

Following our exalted Head;

Made like him, like him we rise;

Ours the cross, the grave, the skies.

David Winter