{"id":6150,"date":"2022-06-01T04:47:21","date_gmt":"2022-06-01T04:47:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/?p=6150"},"modified":"2022-06-14T11:40:36","modified_gmt":"2022-06-14T11:40:36","slug":"the-ascension-of-lord-jesus-christ","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/the-ascension-of-lord-jesus-christ\/","title":{"rendered":"The Ascension of Lord Jesus Christ"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Ascension of Lord Jesus Christ<\/strong><\/p>\n

Pope Shenouda III<\/strong>
\n June 1, 2022<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Feast of the Ascension of our Lord into Heaven, after He spent forty days with His disciples is celebrated in Holy Church on June 2.<\/p>\n

By the Ascension of the Lord, we mean His bodily Ascension.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In His divinity, He is everywhere; He does not ascend nor descend. Therefore, in the Liturgy of Saint Gregory we say \u201cAnd You ascended into the heavens in the body\u2026\u201d This ascension is evidence that His Glorified Body is not subject to the earth\u2019s gravitational laws and also of His Divinity. He ascended before His disciples as they were watching. This scene strengthened their faith because the Lord not only resurrected using His Divine power, but He also ascended into heaven in front of them.<\/p>\n

In His ascension to Heaven, He did not leave His Church on Earth.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Before His ascension He told the Apostles, \u201cI am with you always, even to the end of the age.\u201d (Matthew 28:20). Lord Jesus Christ stayed with the church and they did not feel His material presence only, but also His spiritual presence\u2026He appeared to Saint Paul the Apostle more than once. He also appeared to Saint John the disciple on the Island of Patmos and gave him letters to the Seven Churches.<\/p>\n

By His ascension, He sat on the right hand of His Father.<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is according to what was said in Saint Mark\u2019s Gospel \u201cSo then, after the Lord had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God.\u201d (Mark 16:19). Sitting on the right hand of God fulfilled God\u2019s promised Him in the Old Testament saying, \u201cThe Lord said to my Lord, \u2018Sit at My right hand, Till I make Your enemies Your footstool.\u2019\u201d (Psalm 110:1). This event was witnessed by Saint Stephen the Archdeacon during the time of his martyrdom (Act 7:56). Saint Paul the Apostle also spoke about this in his epistle to Hebrews (1:20; 8:1; 12:2). And His ascension to Heaven, and sitting on the right hand of the Father, all that means the end of the statement \u201cmade Himself of no reputation.\u201d (Philippians 2:7)<\/p>\n

The statement, \u201con the right hand of the Father\u201d means in the power and holiness of the Father. God who fills all does not have a right and a left side like limited beings. However, the right means the power and holiness (Psalm 118:16). So, sitting on the right hand of the Father means ending making Himself of no reputation, and going back to the form of power that He gave up in His Incarnation. The statement \u201csat\u201d means settled, meaning that He will not go back to being of no reputation again. Therefore, in His second coming He will come in power and great glory (Matthew 25:31).<\/p>\n

Moreover, the ascension of the Lord Christ to Heaven makes us direct our sights to Heaven where He is and where He was before His incarnation.<\/p>\n

The statement \u201cto Heaven\u201d means to the highest, and so our sights rise up there when we pray. And so do the church towers and aim for the Heaven.<\/p>\n

The Lord\u2019s ascension is also a guarantee of our ascension.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not now, but when He comes in His second coming and \u201cwe shall always be with the Lord\u201d (1 Thessalonian. 4:17). When He \u201cwill transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body.\u201d (Philippians 3:21). But not now as many think that we are now in Heaven on the right hand of the Father!
\nHappy Feast to you all, Amen!<\/p>\n

Source: The book \u201cThe Holy Feast of Ascension\u201d by H.H. Pope Shenouda III<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In His divinity, He is everywhere; He does not ascend nor descend. In the Liturgy of Saint Gregory we say \u201cAnd You ascended into the heavens in the body.\u201d This ascension is evidence that His Glorified Body is not subject to the earth\u2019s gravitational laws and also of His Divinity. He ascended before His disciples as they were watching. This scene strengthened their faith because the Lord not only resurrected using His Divine power, but He also ascended into heaven in front of them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6183,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-feasts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6150"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6150"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6150\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6184,"href":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6150\/revisions\/6184"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eotcmk.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}