Fr Peter Helman
Vesper Hymn for Ascension Day
(ca. 5th century)
1. Author of salvation,
Jesus, joy of hearts,
maker of a world redeemed,
pure light of them who love thee;
2. What pity moves thee to bear our sins,
that thou guiltless shouldst bear death
to save us from death!
3. Thou dost break through the darkness of hell,
taking away chains from prisoners;
thou conquering in glorious triumph
dost sit at the Father’s right hand.
4. Let pity move thee to heal our woes,
to grant us to see thy face in the blessed light.
5. Leader to heaven and way of life,
be thou the end of our desire,
thou our joy after tears,
thou the reward of life for ever.
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Dear beloved,
We’re almost but not quite there, but Ascension Day is this Thursday, the fortieth day after Easter and ten days before the western Church’s celebration of Whitsunday, the Feast of Pentecost.
“On the third day he rose again …;
he ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.” (Nicene Creed)
Our Easter celebration of the resurrection of Christ finds its meaning and fullness in the Ascension. We behold in the mystery of his being lifted up to heaven in the sight of his disciples the eternal purpose of his appearance in the flesh: by his Nativity and at last his victorious undoing of death, Christ arose in a body of immortal and incorruptible glory to transform human bodies, free of the law of corruption; and what is still more by his rising again to newness of life to raise earth with him to heaven and indeed higher than heaven the whole race of humanity.
Now, as Saint John Chrysostom proclaims in his Easter Sermon,” no dead are left in the grave;” and again, as he writes elsewhere, “we who seemed unworthy of the earth, are now raised to heaven. We who were unworthy of earthly dominion have been raised to the Kingdom on high, have ascended higher than heaven, have come to occupy the King’s throne, and the same nature from which the angels guarded Paradise, stopped not until it ascended to the throne of the Lord.”
With Christ at his Ascension, then, heaven welcomed the inhabitants of earth. Christ unlatched the gate of heaven, approached the throne of God on our behalf and for our sake, and appeared before the face of God. In so doing, as Saint Paul wrote to the church of Colossae, Christ “rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins” (Col. 1:13-14). The Church is the body of Christ raised, for where the head of the body is there also abides the body.
For Christians, what then should we do with this vision?
Being born in human likeness, Christ revealed the original meaning of our lives that they are, as someone wrote, to be directed upward, "a continuous surging upward, ascent, ascension."
And so we exult with Saint John Chrysostom, who joyfully wrote: “Amazing! Look again, whither He has raised the Church. As though He were lifting it up by some engine, He has raised it up to a vast height, and set it on yonder throne; for where the Head is, there is the body also. There is no interval of separation between the Head and the body; for were there a separation, then would the one no longer be a body, nor would the other any longer be a Head.”
Remember today, beloved, nothing will separate you from the love of God (even when the darkest of times may seeks to sway our hearts to doubt). When we speak of the Ascension of Christ into heaven, we speak both about Christ and about ourselves too. We are one.
Yours in Christ,
Fr. Peter