Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 125, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 May 1913 — The Ascension of Christ [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

The Ascension of Christ

By REV. JAMES M. CRAY. D. D. Dws rs *• Mm* !■**»

TEXT—When he had spoken thee* things, he was taken up and a clond received him out at their sight. Acts l->.

This period of the Christian year is especially appropriate to consider that transcendent event in, the elfethly history of our Saviour referred to in these words viz: His ascension into heaven. The incarnation, death and resurrection of JesusChrist are each and all of them incomplete witL-

out the ascension, lust as that event awaits the fruition of Its purpose in his return again to the earth; for it is not till then that the divine plan concerning his manifested kingdom will begin to approach fulfillment. *■ But that which gives peculiar Interest to Christ’s ascension is its bearing on our spiritual life today, for if we are being established in the faith, enlightened in the knowledge of God, sanctified in our souls and anointed by the Holy Spirit for service, all blessings are the result of our Saviour’s presence in heaven as our interceding high priest at the righthand of God. At the ascension the body of Jesus did not vanish into nothing, for not only did the desciples see him as be went up, but Stephen beheld him afterwards, standing at the right-hand of God (Acts VII. 65-56). Moreover, the angels on Mount Olivet said to the desciples that he would so come In like manner as he was seen to go Acts, 1-11). In other words, heaven Is a locality and Jesus Christ, the glorified God-man, is there. We cannot understand how the original body of Jesus was transmuted into his resurrection and glorified body, any more than we can understand how heavy wated is changed into light vapor, or dark flint Into transparent glass, by heat; but we know that he Is In the same body, although now In another form of existence and standing under ' other laws. How the thought dignifies our conception of human nature and broadens our idea of the scope of the atonement! The presence of his glorified body In heaven takes away any vagueness as to our own glorified bodies being there, if we have been united to him by a living faith—because he lives, we shall live also. Was it not the reward of his obedience to the father in his sufferings and death on behalf of guilty men? Was it not the Joy set before Mm for which he was willing to endure the cross, despising the shame? And yet there is more to follow, when, in the regeneration of the heavens and the earth, he shall sit upon the throne of his power in the sight of the whole universe, and every knee shall bow to him and every tongue confess that he Is lord, to the glory of God the father (Philippians 11. 9-11). Of course we speak now, only of hie human nature, of the God-man considered as the mediatorial prince. Such - terms do not pertain to his deity, in which sense his glory .could not be enhanced and the thought of reward . Is entirely excluded. But the ascension of Jesus Christ means great things for us who believe on him as well as great things for himself. It means the reinstatement of our nature in all its lost honors, in reconciliation with God. It means our reception into Paradise and participation in endless felicity. If Christ had risen from the dead and still remained on earth, we might have been assured of deliverance from the grave, and possibly a protracted residence here; but what we desire before all things is reunion with God, the habitation of glory and the communion of his presence. The ascension secures this. Oh, you to whom these truths have no meaning, In whose esteem they are as foolishnesses, think what you are losing now, and shall forever lose, If they be trues I would have you follow the example of John Keble, who, conscious of his groveling thought* which lay half buried, roamed lawlessly around this earthly waste, exclaimed, i “Chains of nay heart, avaunt, I say— I will arise, and In the strength of love Pursue the bright track ’era It fade away. My Savior’s pathway to His Home above." But it is useless to urge a man to do this without telling him how to do it When, or how, can one obtain this “strength of lore” of which the poet speaks? How can he pursue The right track” whose eyes are blinded by sin other things of the present world.” Who will seek the “home above” unless he shall be awakened to its glories? It is God only who can accomplish these things in human experience, and he begins the work by weakening the ties of earth, and revealing the loathsomeness of sin an{ the peril of unbelief.