Reigning in Heaven Above

I'm a timeline kind of guy. I I like a a timeline to help

sort my thinking on things. When I first learned something

new, I found that I can categorize things well if I kind

of sorted into a timeline. And so timelines have helped me

very in various ways. When I first decided to get

serious about reading the Bible, one of the first things I did

was kind of put together a timeline in my mind.

So I know where Moses was and Elijah and Elijah and the

Babylonian captivity, King David, those kind of things.

I kind of sorted it out into a timeline that would kind of help

me to Orient myself. Now I realize that not everybody

is a timeline kind of a person or that operates with a timeline

possibility. So you're going to have to

suffer with me for a few seconds while I Orient those of us who

do. I want to give a quick timeline

of Jesus Christ, a quick timeline of Jesus Christ.

It begins way back at the garden than before with the promise of

the coming of the Savior. The promise of the Savior coming

from the very beginning, Genesis 315 and on forward Speaking of

the coming of Jesus Christ. And then that promise is

prophesied over and over again throughout the Old Testament,

that Old Testament section where we hear of the comings of of

Jesus Christ. And then of course you have the

birth of Christ, His life, the last three years of which were

spent in ministry, in public ministry with his disciples and

with the population as a whole. And then at the end of those

three-year period, of course, His arrest, His crucifixion, His

death, and then His resurrection.

Following the resurrection, there's a 40 year, sorry, a 40

day period during those 40 days where Jesus resurrected,

continued to minister to the population, continued to

minister to his disciples in particular.

Now 40 days is a either a real short period of time, if you

think of it that way, or it's a long period of time. 40 days ago

was somewhere a little bit after Thanksgiving.

So you can kind of think about that.

If you're like me, a whole lot has happened between now and

Thanksgiving, last Thanksgiving and and so you can sit there. 40

days is a long period of time. That 40 days ends with Jesus's

ascension into heaven. So you have the resurrection,

then you have 40 more days of ministry, then you have his

ascension into heaven. This is where Jesus is taken up

into heaven and then in heaven he rules during the next X

number of years. We are now in that period of

time where Christ is in heaven and he is reigning over this

world and he is reigning over this world until the 2nd coming.

You don't have the second coming of Jesus Christ, which is at the

end of time. You don't have the second coming

of Jesus Christ until you have him reigning in heaven, which

follows his ascension, which follows his 40 days of ministry,

which follows his resurrection, etcetera, etcetera.

That's a timeline in which we're operating with.

We're about to read a passage of scripture that focuses our

attention upon the ascension. The ascension of Jesus is

something that is kind of happens as a coda.

I think for most of our our thinking.

It's kind of an epilogue. You kind of throw it in.

You realize that something happened at the end of 40 days,

but it's crucial from a biblical standpoint and also from a

theological one. We don't get to the Second

Coming unless we have an ascension.

It's crucial, you know, we do not have Christ reigning now in

this world if we don't have an ascension.

It's crucial that we recognize the, the, the essential nature

of the ascension and how absolutely crucial it is for us

in life. This is not something that is

just thrown out there or A tag on one of the fears is that

you're left with the thought it without the ascension.

You're left with the thought that Jesus just kind of faded

out, or maybe he just disappeared at one point, or he

just wasn't present anymore. But the Scriptures want us to

recognize that that's not the case.

So it throws a lot of emphasis, a lot of weight on this

timeline, in this moment in the timeline, the ascension, where

Jesus goes from being with his disciples, physically manifested

with his disciples, to physically going up into heaven.

And we see that in Acts chapter 1, verses 9 through 11.

Acts 1:9–11

But we're going to start in verse 6.

And as always, I like it when my imagery here is the idea that

when God speaks to us, we snap to attention.

When God speaks to us, we pay attention.

And I like the imagery of that when we stand.

If you are able, please stand for the reading of God's Word.

Acts chapter 1, beginning in verse 6.

Acts 1 · chapter mention

So when the disciples had come together, they asked him, Lord,

will you at this time restore the Kingdom to Israel?

Jesus said to them, It is not for you to know the times or the

seasons that the Father is fixed by His own authority.

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon

you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all

Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

And when he had said these things, as they were looking on,

he was lifted up, and a cloud took him from their sight.

And while they were gazing into heaven, as he went, behold, 2

men stood by them in white robes, and said, Men of Galilee,

why do you stand looking into heaven?

This Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven will come in the

same way as you saw him go into heaven.

And this is the word of the Lord.

Thanks be to God, the grass Withers and the flowers fade,

but the word of our Lord, it stands forever.

Amen. Please be seated.

If you would grab your Bibles, we're going to have the

Scripture in front of us as we walk through it on the screens.

But if you have your text with you, I think it's always helpful

in following along with the passage.

As we work our way through this. We are of course, focusing on

those verses, those 9/9 through 11 verses that talk about the

ascension, and we want to take a look at those.

So if you have your Scriptures in front of you or follow along

on the screens. Verse 9 And when they said these

things, when he had said these things, Jesus is speaking as

they were looking on the disciples.

He was lifted up and the cloud took him out of their sight.

This is a technical spot and I only tossed it out there For the

few of you that like to think about these kind of things.

Notice that this is passive voice.

Jesus was lifted up. Something happened to him.

This is not Jesus lifted himself up or Jesus decided to be lifted

up. This is something passive that

takes place. Jesus was lifted up.

And so of course, the question is by what power?

How did Jesus, how was Jesus's lifted up?

And this gets us into the interactions within the Godhead,

the Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and

the power by which the Holy Spirit comes upon Jesus Christ

through the Father and lifts him up into the into the heavens.

It's worth mentioning only for those of you who want to think

more deeply about the ascension and and what it actually entails

for a human being, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, to be

nevertheless lifted up. Something happening to him, it's

passive voice there. He was lifted up and a cloud

took him from their sights. So you got to kind of picture

there on the Mount of Olives, by the way, or somewhere nearby.

So they're a little to the east of Jerusalem.

They're outside of Jerusalem, the walls of Jerusalem.

And the Mount of Olives is a place where Jesus has met very

frequently with his disciples. It was important.

It was a meaningful spot for them.

So they all gather at the Mount of Olives and Jesus has been

with them for 40 days. And I'm sure the excitement, the

overwhelming character of the fact that someone has risen from

the dead and is present with them in all of his glory and

majesty and displaying his divinity consistently to the

people, I'm sure that's overwhelming them.

And then he has this conversation with them, and

while they are looking, while they're talking with him, he is

lifted up before them. This is where we get the term

ascension. He ascends, He is lifted up into

heaven. Now think about how different

this is than just blinking out of existence.

He doesn't blink out of sight of the disciples.

He doesn't disappear. Rather, he's taken up into

heaven. And I don't know how you've

envisioned this. Imagine him, him rising up

before them, and then there's this cloud, cumulus cloud, or

something along those lines that he lived.

When my kids were young, we built a model rocket.

Folks build model rockets. We built a model rocket.

We took the time to care for it. We painted it and we named it

and all this kind of stuff. We we were all excited about it.

We took it into a field and we set it off and it was slightly

overcast that day. Kel's laughing because she

remembers after all this time. We did this.

Then we fired off the rocket. It zooms up into the clouds and

never comes down. And there's the three of us, the

four of us standing there the whole time, staring into the

clouds. OK, if you have something like

that in your mind when we're talking about Jesus, get it out

of your mind. That's not correct.

When we're talking about a cloud enveloping Jesus, we are not

talking about a cumulus or an overcast night or a rainy cloud

or stormy cloud. Fluffy little white clouds.

This is the glory cloud of God. This is a Shekinah glory of

God's presence, that physical manifestation that has been

present throughout the Scriptures of demonstrating the

reality of God's glory there before God's people.

When the Shekinah glory of God shows up, he shows up for

whatever reason, for their good reasons back in the in the Old

Testament in particular, to demonstrate that there's a

cloud, this pillar of cloud, this pillar of fire.

And this is a fulfillment of Jesus prayer to the Father just

days earlier where he prayed Father, the end is near.

Glorify me with the glory that I had with you before the world

began before the world began. The Father and the Son and the

Holy Spirit together in this massive beauty of glory.

And here it is Jesus Christ who is now ascended, who, sorry, who

was resurrected from the dead, displaying divinity in every

way, yet nevertheless at this spot now being surrounded by the

glory cloud of the God the Father as he ascends into

heaven, surrounded by the glory. Now, what does that mean?

That helps us to understand what's happening between the

ascension that we just read about and the second coming that

is yet to come of Jesus Christ. We have the period in which we

are living in now. What is happening during that

time? Where is Jesus, what's he doing?

Hey, he's had a hard life. Let's face it, He was crucified

for my sin. That on its own takes plenty of

effort on on his part. And not just that, but he was

crucified for your sin, for the sin of the entire world.

He has taken upon himself. He gets to heaven and he kicks

back. Give me a lazy chair, boy and a

clicker and then you know this is what I'm doing in heaven.

That's not at all the picture. The picture here is that he's

swallowed up in the glory cloud of the Father, the glory that he

had before the beginning of the world.

The rest of the Scriptures portray for us as picture that

the Lord is reigning in heaven. They describe that as sitting at

the right hand of God the Father Almighty, sitting at the right

hand. Now.

Now the right hand is the hand of power.

It's it's the hand of of authority.

It's the hand of blessing and glory.

And so when Jesus is sitting at the right hand of God the

Father, when the scriptures articulated like that, they're

trying to give you the picture that he is in authority up in

heaven. Now, what does authority mean

for those of us? It means that every minute that

you live your life between the ascension and his second coming,

again, every minute in that time is covered by the authority of

Jesus Christ, dominated by his authority.

Now it's easy for us. We often talk about God having

God being sovereign, God being all powerful and all this kind

of stuff. And OK, we can appreciate that,

but that's God. Here we have Jesus Christ, the

Son of God, God himself, who we have spent weeks reading about

in the Scriptures. The disciples spent years

walking with him daily. We get every minute of our lives

spent engaged with Jesus Christ who has revealed himself to us

through the gospel message, who has revealed the Father through

the gospel message. That's the one who is reigning

in heaven for you. That's the one who is exercising

authority over your daily life right now.

Who can imagine a life that is free of difficulties and and

struggles? None of us have that life.

And yet in every minute, the joys of your life, all the

blessings, everything good and glorious, our God reigns and

rules over all of that. Our Christ is authoritative in

every one of those moments and equally in every moment of your

suffering, in every spot where you're sitting there saying,

God, where the heck are you? He is reigning and rolling in

heaven for you. That's the God, the God who has

ascended into heaven. But the Scriptures always talk

about authority in ways that we don't.

When we think of authority, we think of power.

We think of might. We think of ability to

accomplish things and certainly that's true.

That is the authority that God, that God has it Christ exercises

in heaven. But authority also biblically

means care, nurture, responsibility.

If you have authority over somebody, it is your

responsibility for their for them to have care, nurture,

love, goodness, kindness. All of the qualities that we see

in Jesus Christ are not the qualities that he somehow leaves

behind when he ascends into heaven.

But when he ascends into heaven and claims the authority that

God has in store for that the Father has in store for him.

That authority then is exercised in the way in which he

communicates himself to us, the way in which he expresses his

authority in our lives. It is a care, it is a nurture,

it is a love. It's one of the reasons why the

scriptures talk about Jesus is interceding with the Father.

Imagine the fact that there is not a concern in your life.

There's not a a hope and a prayer that you ever experienced

that the Father is not consistently being whispered

into his ear by the Son. Christ is sitting at the right

hand, nurturing, caring, compassionate, kindness,

goodness for you, and He does so in part by interceding on your

behalf, by giving of himself on your behalf into the Father's

ear. This is the kind of imagery that

is built into the idea of him being taken up in a cloud and

sitting at the right hand of God the Father.

In a couple of months we're going to talk about the stoning

of Steven, the first Christian martyr.

And I'm going to let the cat out of the bag now because none of

you will remember a couple of months from now, but you've got

a great picture. While Stephen is being stoned,

the heavens open up before him and he's able to see the

heavenly throne. Do you remember this?

Some of you were picture this. And he sees the Father sitting

on the throne and at his right hand, Jesus Christ not sitting.

It's the only time in Scripture where Jesus is sitting is at the

right hand of God the Father. Not sitting, but standing at the

right hand of God the Father. I got to tell you, for me, this

gives me goosebumps because it's one thing to think of Jesus

sitting that's passive at the right hand of God the Father.

He's powerful, he's active, he's going to control, he's reigning

and all that kind of stuff. That's true, but he's sitting.

That's the way it's usually described for me in with the

with the martyrdom of Stephen. You see him, he's not sitting.

He's he's arisen, he stood up, he's standing actively working

on behalf of Stephen. And that's the way I love the

picture of what Jesus is doing with each of us.

He is at the Father's right hand actively pursuing our good and

our kindness back to the text. And a cloud took him out of

their sight. And while they were gazing into

heaven as he went, behold, 2 men stood behind him with two white

robes. These guys were coming back from

laundry, so they want. That was funny.

You know, it's really not good if I have to cue you two things.

No, no. OK, Two men in white robes

coming in our present. This Harkins easily back to the

resurrection scenes where again we're told that two men show up

in white robes. We have the picture.

These are angels. And so angels, God's messengers

come, and they speak to the people and they say, men of

Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven?

This Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven will come in the

same way as you saw him go into heaven because of the ascension.

In the same way he will come again.

Now what does that mean? In the same way, how, how, how

are we supposed to anticipate the coming, the second coming of

Jesus Christ In the same manner, in the same fashion, in the same

way that the ascension took place.

How did the ascension take place?

Here's the key. Look at the beginning of that

sentence. This Jesus who was taken up from

you, this Jesus, it's not the Jesus of our minds.

It's not the Jesus of some spiritual entity.

It's not the Jesus that might exist 20 centuries from now when

Christ comes again or whatever. It's this Jesus, the one that we

saw going into heaven, the one that we worked with and walked

with, the one that we talked with and heard from, the one who

we cared for and cared for us, this Jesus.

Here, what we see is the understanding that right now

reigning in heaven is not OK. Two ideas here.

First is theological. The theological idea reigning in

heaven right now is not the mystical essence of Jesus or the

spiritual form. It is the physical form, the

human being, Jesus Christ, yes, the Son of Man, Son of God, yes,

indeed. All of the second person of the

Trinity, God himself fully and divine that Jesus Christ, but

also the fully human Jesus Christ with a physical body,

with a physical presence in God's presence right now, in the

Father's presence right now. Which is the promise of course

for us that we too will be able to dwell in God's presence in

physical form. We too will be able to

experience his love and his care.

Why? Because we've experienced,

because Jesus himself has experienced that.

Jesus himself has known that. So firstly, in the same way that

he went up with a physical form as a human being, so in that

same way as a human being, he will return to earth.

It is not a feeling of goodness or, you know, we're all kind of

reflecting Jesus's goodness while we live in this world and

stuff like that. No, what we are anticipating is

the physical return of the human being, the Son of God, Jesus

Christ himself. That's what was going to return

to us. That's the theological, the

discipleship picture here is the way the angels say this Jesus.

This is the Jesus that is reigning.

This is the one who you come to in heaven when we come in

prayer. This is the one that we come to

when we come to the Lord with our needs and with our desires

and with our yearnings and with our hopes and our expectations.

It's this Jesus, the one who raised that will they saw go up

into heaven and who is now reigning in eternity until the

2nd coming again. That's the Jesus, and you can

know Him, and you can have a relationship with him, and you

can love him, and you can walk with him and serve him and be

beloved by him. All of all of the pictures that

we see from Jesus. This is why we spend so much

time focusing upon Jesus Christ in the Gospels.

It's why the Scriptures provide us four different accounts of

Jesus's life and teachings. So we get to know this Jesus

because it's this Jesus who is reigning in heaven.

And when you say to yourself, I don't know what to say to this,

to Jesus, I can't imagine talking to the one who was

rolling in all of heaven and controlling all the world.

It is the one. He has revealed himself

consistently in scriptures that we are to come to him and to

give ourselves to him and to abide by him.

This is the Jesus they who is up in heaven right now reigning on

your behalf. Take a look back at the text

again for us, verse 11, men of Galilee, why do you stand

looking into heaven? And I sit there and think, how

can you really ask that question?

OK, Does it strike anybody else as a bit of a rebuke as a mild

rebuke here? Strikes me as a mild rebuke that

the angels are kind of saying Now, I suppose there's different

tones you could read this in, but I kind of read it like, hey,

guys, why are you staring up into heaven?

Why are you being a stargazer? Now this is a challenge to all

of us who are stargazers. Kell and I went to Steeler game

a little bit ago. Somebody gifted us with tickets

really down near down low was beautiful.

We got to see a lot of happening.

The game wasn't that exciting. And so I very quickly got caught

in watching other things take place.

One of the things that I saw was the broadcast team that was

running back and forth and the and the and the reporters that

were around. I watched the coaches as they

milled around, around the medical staff.

I kind of got distracted by everything else that was

happening and I was engaged in that.

But I really got caught in the security personnel.

There was a security guard that stood with her back to the game

and staring up at the stands the entire game and never flinched.

The crowd would go wild and she was staring at the stands.

The crowd would Boo. She was staring at the stands.

People would come and jostle her.

The the reporters would walk by the broadcast teams, everything.

She stared at the stands. This is the kind of commitment

and the dedication that the angels are saying to the fair,

to the to the disciples. What are you doing?

Why are you staring into the sky?

Take a look back in verse 9 for me with with me, if you would.

And when Jesus had said these things, when he had said these

things, what things did he say? The stuff where he said

beforehand, where he identified the power of the Spirit, the

calling of the church to witness to him, and the role of that we

are to play in this world as a whole.

The power of the Spirit, the role of the church and the needs

of the community of the world as a whole.

Last week we read this passage in verse 8.

And you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon

you. You will be my witnesses in

Jerusalem, in Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

By the way, I if you were here with me last week, we, I

challenge you to think in terms of 321.

Remember that if you were here with ME3.

If you have 3 individuals near and dear to your family, be

praying for them every single day. 2 institutions that are

functioning here within the Pittsburgh community or the OR

the country as a whole. 2 institutions that are bringing

forth the gospel message, the Kingdom of God in in God's

service. Pray for them.

One nation somewhere around the world, somewhere around the

world, one nation around the world.

OK, here you go. I'm not going to be offended,

but if you did this, look at your neighbor.

Look to your neighbor and stick your thumb up.

Go ahead, look to your neighbor. If you did this, stick your

thumb up. If you did, OK, now stop.

OK, put your thumbs down. Some of you are doing terrible

things. Put your thumbs down.

OK, Encourage your neighbor after this.

If you got a thumb up, encourage them by going to them and

saying, hey, what country? Don't ask after the three

people. That might be too personal.

Don't ask after the the two institutions, but ask after the

nation. Hey, what?

What place in this world are you praying for?

I talked about last year my 40 year prayers for Afghanistan and

I've recommitted myself to doing that. 25 years ago, Kelly began

praying for North Korea. Now, if you know anything about

the church in North Korea, you know that it is devastated.

There's a, there's a group absence of witness there.

Can you imagine how glorious it'll be if somewhere yet in

Kelly's lifetime, God breaks through into North Korea and

brings a gospel in that place? And Kel can say for 25 years,

for 30 years, for 40 years, I have been praying faithfully for

that. People pray faithfully for that

nation. This is in part how we fulfill

the calling that God has given in verse 8, that we will be

witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria and to the ends of

the earth. But back to verse 9, when he had

said these things. Now, it's possible that this is

simply chronological. It is possible that this is

simply a chronological statement.

First he did this, He said these things, and then he did.

Then he went ahead and ascended into heaven.

It's possible it's chronological, but I don't think

so. I think it's thematic.

It's after he has said these things, once he has commissioned

us, once he has said, hey, be on the watch for the power of the

Spirit. Form yourselves into the Church

to be my witnesses and minister in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and

to the ends of the earth. Once he has said these things,

once he has given this charge to the church, then he was free to

what? To ascend into heaven, into a

position of authority and power so he can oversee, so we can

watch, so we can guide and direct the church in the

fulfillment of its task. Once he's done the thing, then

he's in a position to ascend into heaven and fulfill that

task that God has given to him. Notice the looking nature of

this and when they looked at they were looking on they lifted

him up out of sight in verse 9 and then in 10 while they were

gazing into heaven and then in verse 11 he says why are you

staring into heaven? What we have here are disciples

understandably taking an awe hello, we just saw a guy fly and

then get wrapped up in the glory cloud of God.

I'm going to stand there with my mouth open staring into heaven.

It's understand the rebuke from the angels to me seems a little

tough, but they've got a point. Jesus has said go, go, wait for

this power of the Spirit and then go and be my witnesses and

go here, here, here. You've got all this territory to

cover. Don't stare at the stars.

Don't be gazing at the stars. Don't be get distracted.

Be like that, that security guard who knows her task and who

is focused on her task and is locked in that that's what she

is supposed to do. So the so the angels here are

saying to each of us, you've got a task.

God has called you into a thing and now he has put himself in a

position to enable you to freely and completely accomplish it.

He is reigning in heaven in the glory of the Father.

He is reigning in power and He has blessed you with the gift of

the Holy Spirit. He has called you to be the

church and witness together and He has sent you into this world.

Don't get distracted. Don't get distracted unless you

are Superman, Superwoman, like that security guard.

If you're anything like me, you're going to get distracted.

You're going to spend a whole lot of life being distracted.

Built into the idea of the ascension is Jesus ascended into

heaven to enable us to be faithful to the calling.

So we need not be distracted and we can't afford to be distracted

because he's reigning in this world.

I don't know your distraction, but my guess is family is part

of it. I don't know your distraction,

but I bet job money is part of it.

I don't know your distraction, but if it's mine, it's comfort

and calm and peace and can everybody get away from me for a

little bit? Not to speak person, never mind,

I don't know your distraction, but the Lord is saying to you,

why are you gazing into heaven? He is ruling, He will come

again. He is ruling.

Now let's go about the task of being my witnesses in the power

of the Holy Spirit, to be the church witnesses of Jesus Christ

in 321, in your family and community, in the surrounding

areas and to the whole world. Let's pray together.

Gracious Lord Jesus, we thank You that you did not just wink

out of existence or that you didn't just pass away without

telling us, but rather You gave us the blessing of witnesses of

the disciples to see you ascend into heaven and to claim that

glory that the Father has blessed you with before the

creation of the world. Lord, we are grateful that You

have called us also to the task of witnessing to this world and

the opportunities that we have to be filled with Your Spirit,

empowered by your Spirit serving you as the Church, ministering

this world. Help us, Lord Jesus, to do that.

We are dependent, needy, needing you to do that, trusting You,

the reigning in heaven that you hear our prayers.

And so, Lord, we pray that you would hear us as we pray the way

you taught us to pray. Our Father who aren't in heaven,

hallowed be Thy name, Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done

on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day Our Daily

Bread, and forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors, and

lead us not in temptation, but deliver us from evil.

For thine is the Kingdom, and the power and the glory forever.

Amen.