Scriptures: Acts 1:1-11, Revelation 22:8-21, John 17:20-26, Luke 24:44-53
What does it mean to be a witness? If you’ve ever watched Law and Order or Judge
Judy or such, you know. A crime happens
– or someone is accused of a crime – and in their investigation, the police
call witnesses – and if the case goes to trial, these witnesses will tell what
they saw. Did they see the accused
person at the scene of the alleged crime, or not?. Did they see the accused person shoot or stab
or hit somebody, or not? Or if it was a
traffic case, was the driver exceeding the speed limit, or swerving and driving
erratically in a way that would indicate that the driver was under the
influence of alcohol or drugs. Sometimes
witnesses in a police investigation or a courtroom disagree – one will say they
saw something, and another will say they didn’t – or that they saw something
entirely different. And the outcome of
the police investigation or court case depends on which witnesses the police or
the jury or the judge believe.
On the church calendar, Thursday was Ascension Day, when we
recall that Jesus led his disciples to a high mountain and, after giving them
some parting instructions, ascended to heaven, returning to God the
Father. Since we don’t have an Ascension
Day service on Thursday, we read some of the Ascension Day texts today.
Luke gives us the fullest picture of Jesus’ return to the
Father. Luke was the writer, not only of
the Gospel of Luke, but of a sequel, which we know as the Acts of the Apostles
– and Acts picks up right where the Gospel of Luke left off. We’re told that, for forty days after his
resurrection, Jesus appeared to his disciples, proving to them that he had been
raised from the dead and speaking about the kingdom of God, about God’s reign
on earth. Then he gathered them together
one last time, on the Mount of Olives. The
disciples seemed to sense that something big was about to happen, but, as
usual, they misunderstood Jesus’ intentions, as they asked, “Lord, is this time
when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?”
They were asking whether Jesus was now going to drive off the hated Romans
so that Israel could be an independent country again. They were thinking on a nationalistic level,
but Jesus had something much greater in mind.
Jesus responds by telling them, “It’s not for you to know the times or
periods that the Father has set by his own authority” – in effect, to the
disciples’ question about when Israel would regain independence, Jesus tells
them, “Mind your own business!” But then
he goes on to tell them just how large their own business was about to become: “But you will receive power when the Holy
Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea
and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
Suddenly Jesus is talking a much bigger game: the disciples were concerned about political
independence in their own country, but Jesus is giving them a mission that,
while it starts in their country, would expand to cover the whole world. Just as an aside – this is where we get the
UCC symbol – it’s in the bulletin and you may want to look at it briefly - of
the cross and crown on top of the globe, symbolizing the Lordship of Christ
over the whole world, and the globe divided into three parts, symbolizing
Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, and the whole world. It’s scary to think about Jesus giving such a
huge mission to these disciples, because they’d misunderstood Jesus at every
turn, had even in that moment misunderstood him, but nonetheless Jesus was
giving them a mission to be his witnesses all over the world. But, Jesus had also said they would receive
power when the Holy Spirit came upon them – and so, with the Spirit’s power and
guidance, at last they would understand.
And then Jesus was taken up in the clouds! Kind of like the end of the old Warner
Brothers cartoons…..”That’s all, folks!”.
That’s all, folks, at least in the sense that Jesus would not be walking
around with them any longer in bodily form, that from now on he would be with
God the Father in heaven. And so this is
why when we celebrate the Ascension, we sing hymns about Jesus being crowned
with many crowns, crowned as Lord of all – as Philippians chapter 2 says,
having emptied himself of power and glory to be with us in his earthly
ministry, at his ascension Jesus was exalted and given even greater power and
glory, given the name that is above every name, so that every knee shall bow
and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the
Father. On the church calendar,
Ascension Day is basically coronation day for Jesus, and the point at which the
work shifts from Jesus to the disciples, to the church, to us.
“You will receive power….and you will be my witnesses.” To proclaim the good news of Jesus to the
whole world, to tell the whole world what they had seen and heard when they
were with Jesus is a huge undertaking – especially since what they had seen and
heard in their time with Jesus indicated that Jesus was greater than anything
else in their society. They would need
all the power they could get. In the
time of the disciples, to proclaim that Jesus was Lord in a society that said
Caesar was Lord was dangerous business. They
would face constant opposition. They could
get arrested – and the disciples did, frequently. They could be killed – and that happened
too. How could they keep going? What kept them from throwing up their hands
and quitting, from throwing in the towel and walking away.
Two things kept them going:
the coming of the Holy Spirit, which we’ll celebrate next week, on
Pentecost, and Jesus’ prayer that “they would all be one, as he and the Father
are one.” Jesus would no longer be in
the flesh, walking beside them. Instead,
the Holy Spirit would be inside them, teaching them and reminding them of
everything that Jesus had taught them. Before,
Jesus was in one place; now, the Spirit would be everyplace. Jesus had assured his disciples that even
though he would be going away, he was not abandoning them – that their lives
mattered to him, and that he would send the Holy Spirit so that they would not
be alone. Anyplace that Christians went,
the Holy Spirit went with them.
And then there is Jesus’ prayer for his disciples, that they
would all be one. Our reading from
John’s Gospel is part of Jesus’ high priestly prayer for his disciples at the
Last Supper, as he knew his time with them was almost over. Notice what Jesus didn’t pray for them: he didn’t pray that they would become
superheroes, or be able to shoot laser beams out of their eyes to incinerate
their opponents. He didn’t pray that
they’d be able to walk on water or leap tall buildings in a single bound. He did ask the Father to protect them from
the evil one. But he didn’t pray for
them to be invincible or indestructible.
He was sending them out into the world fully vulnerable, like lambs
among wolves. Instead, he asked the
Father that they would be one, as Jesus and the Father are one. Jesus’ prayer for the disciples was
community, a community so close as to be inseparable, a community that would
give them the strength to stay in mission in a world that has other priorities,
a world that would try to kill them, as it tried to kill Jesus.
Indeed, before the coming of the Holy Spirit, the disciples
act like lost sheep, staying together, but with little power. Our reading from Acts 16:16-34 – my last
minute substitution for one of the readings – demonstrates the power that comes
from the Holy Spirit, and from Jesus’ prayer that they may all be one. In last week’s reading from Acts, Paul and
Silas had met Lydia, been arrested and released and cared for after their
release by Lydia. In this week’s
reading, they were going to the place of prayer when they are stalked by a
slave girl with the power of telling fortunes – which the writer of Acts
attributes to her being possessed by an evil spirit. This slave girl made money for her owners by
telling fortunes. As Paul and Silas tried to move about from
place to place, this slave girl started heckling them: “These men are slaves of a Most High God, who
proclaim to you a way of salvation.” She kept stalking Paul and Silas and heckling
them, following them wherever they went.
You’d think they’d have appreciated the publicity, but we’re told that
Paul was very annoyed and cast out the evil spirit that gave her the fortunes
she told. We’re told that when the
girl’s owners realized that the girl’s evil spirit was gone and she could no
longer make money for them, they had Paul and Silas arrested, beaten severely,
and imprisoned. We’re told that at
midnight Paul and Silas were locked in their cell, singing hymns, when an
earthquake came and broke all the chains and prison bars. But they didn’t leave. The jailer thought everyone had escaped and
was going to kill himself, but Paul shouted, “Don’t harm yourself, we’re all
here.” The jailer and his family
welcomed Paul and his companions into their home, washed his wounds and fed
them, ended up being baptized and becoming disciples of Jesus.
Last year during the
Wednesday night services, we were reading through the book of Acts, and as we
were reading, one thing that struck me is that Paul and Silas and the other
disciples were major league jailbirds – they were always getting arrested for
proclaiming Jesus. While it’s much safer
to be a Christian today in this country than it was in the time of Paul and
Silas – not safe at all in other countries – but even today, even in this
country, following Jesus is not always a walk in the park. Of course, so long as our faith goes no
further than the church door, so long as it goes no further than singing hymns
and listening to sermons on Sunday morning, nobody will bother us – but if we
try to take our faith out of the church building and into the world, when we
try to live our faith the other six days of the week, life can
get…..interesting. As a follower of
Jesus, you’ll probably enjoy some walks in parks, but you may also end up
walking into controversy, into opposition, in some cases perhaps even onto a
picket line or into a police barricade or a jail cell. It happens.
Just as the slave girl owners had Paul and Silas arrested when they
interfered with their money-making scheme by breaking the chains that had bound
the slave girl, Christians today still get in trouble when they go up against
of entrenched power, entrenched corruption, entrenched oppression.
This is not something to be attempted alone – none of us has
the strength to deal with this on our own.
And this is why Jesus prayed that his disciples would be one, as Jesus
and the Father are one. Here in
Bridesburg especially, we may have some glimpse of what this looks like, as our
neighborhood has a strong ethic of sticking together. As followers of Jesus, we need one another. We need to stick together. Even pastors are constantly being encouraged and
reminded by Conference Ministers and such to stay connected, to meet and talk
with other pastors, to encourage one another and hold one another accountable,
because pastoring can be a lonely undertaking.
And it’s the same for all of us – we need each other, to encourage one
another and to hold one another accountable if someone’s going off course.
Jesus prayed for his disciples, “I ask that they may be one,
as we are one.” “You will receive power
when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem,
in Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. May our life together at Emanuel Church be an
answer to Jesus’ prayer, and may the Holy Spirit grant us power to witness to
God’s love by serving God and neighbor in Jesus’ name. Amen.
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