The Ascension of Christ

Forty days after His Resurrection, Christ ascended bodily into heaven before His disciples, taking the human nature He assumed at the Nativity to sit, glorified, at the right hand of the Father.

For Inquirers

If the Resurrection answers the question "did death really lose?", the Ascension answers a quieter but equally important one: what happened to the body Christ rose in? He did not shed it once it had done its work, the way a diver might climb out of a wetsuit no longer needed. Forty days after rising, in front of a group of His own followers on a hillside, Christ's human body — the same one that had been born in a stable, that had walked dusty roads, that still bore the marks of the nails — was lifted up and taken from their sight into heaven.

This means something enormous that is easy to miss: a real, physical human nature is now, permanently, inside the life of God — an actual human body and soul, united forever to the eternal Son, seated in the place of highest honor. Christians are told that humanity itself, in Christ, has been carried into God's presence to stay — far more than a visit that ended.

This is also why the two men in white who appear to the bewildered disciples immediately turn their attention to the future: "this Jesus, who was received up from you into the sky, will come back in the same way as you saw him going into the sky." The Ascension is not Christ leaving for good. It is Christ going ahead, in the very nature He shares with everyone watching Him go, to prepare a place He fully intends to return from.

Overview

  • Forty days after His Resurrection, Christ led His disciples out toward Bethany and, while blessing them, "was carried up into heaven" (Luke 24.50-51; Acts 1.9).
  • He ascends bodily, not merely spiritually: the same glorified human nature He rose in is taken up, and two angels promise His return "in the same way" He departed (Acts 1.10-11).
  • The Ascension completes what began at the Nativity: having taken on human nature to be born, Christ now carries that same human nature into heaven itself, seated "at the right hand of God" (Mark 16.19).
  • The Church keeps the feast forty days after Pascha, understanding it as the necessary hinge between Christ's earthly ministry and Pentecost: Christ Himself says His going is what makes the Spirit's coming possible (John 16.7), and promises the disciples power for their mission once the Spirit arrives (Acts 1.8).

The bodily departure

Luke, who alone records both the Nativity and the Ascension in detail, closes his Gospel exactly where his second volume, Acts, will reopen: "he led them out as far as Bethany, and he lifted up his hands and blessed them. While he blessed them, he withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven" (Luke 24.50-51). Acts narrates the same moment with an added, striking detail: "when he had said these things, as they were looking, he was taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight" (Acts 1.9). The disciples do not merely hear that Christ has gone to the Father; they watch Him go, bodily, in broad daylight, until a cloud hides Him from view — the same cloud-imagery that had earlier overshadowed Christ and the disciples at the The Transfiguration, where a voice spoke from within it (Luke 9.34-35).

Why the body matters

The two angels who appear immediately afterward promise a bodily return to match the bodily departure: "you men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who was received up from you into the sky, will come back in the same way as you saw him going into the sky" (Acts 1.11). Whatever happened to that body at the Ascension, it is still a body — still, in some sense, coming back. St. Cyril of Jerusalem draws out the significance of exactly this point for new converts: "…He who was here crucified is in heaven above… He who was crucified on Golgotha here, has ascended into heaven from the Mount of Olives on the East. For after having gone down hence into Hades, and come up again to us, He ascended again from us into heaven, His Father addressing Him, and saying, Sit on My right hand, until I make Your enemies Your footstool."[^cyril-lect4] The same body that was crucified, that descended among the dead, and that rose is the body now seated at the Father's right hand — nothing about the journey from Bethlehem to Golgotha to heaven required Christ to set His humanity aside at any stage.

Elsewhere, reflecting on the geography of Christ's whole earthly course, Cyril draws the arc from one end to the other: "…from heaven He descended to Bethlehem, but to heaven He ascended from the Mount of Olives; at the former place beginning His conflicts among men, but in the latter, crowned after them."[^cyril-lect14] The Nativity and the Ascension are, on this reading, the two ends of a single movement: God takes on human nature to enter the world at Bethlehem, and forty days after His rising, that same human nature is carried into heaven to stay.

Sources

[^1]: Luke 24.50-51 (WEB) — the Ascension from Bethany, closing Luke's Gospel. [^2]: Acts 1.9-11 (WEB) — the cloud, the disciples watching, and the angels' promise of Christ's bodily return. [^3]: Mark 16.19 (WEB) — "received up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God.". [^4]: Luke 9.34-35 (WEB) — the overshadowing cloud and the Father's voice at The Transfiguration, the same cloud-imagery recurring at the Ascension. [^5]: John 16.7 (WEB) — Christ's own statement that His departure is what makes the Spirit's coming possible. [^6]: Acts 1.8 (WEB) — the promise of power once the Holy Spirit comes upon the disciples. [^cyril-lect4]: St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lecture 4, §13-14 — "He who was here crucified is in heaven above… He ascended into heaven from the Mount of Olives… after having gone down hence into Hades, and come up again to us, He ascended again from us into heaven.". [^cyril-lect14]: St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, Lecture 14, §23 — "from heaven He descended to Bethlehem, but to heaven He ascended from the Mount of Olives; at the former place beginning His conflicts among men, but in the latter, crowned after them.".