The outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost was implemented by the ascended Christ (Mt. “Let all the house of Israel therefore know assuredly, that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified” (Acts 2:36).Įspecially note the “therefore” connective. On Pentecost, after arguing for the resurrection and ascension, Peter contended: The ascension of the Savior is an integral part of the proposition that Christ is the “Lord,” who has the right to exercise “all authority” (Mt. There are several significant doctrinal points connected with the ascension of Christ. The Abiding Significance of Christ’s Ascension It also that the ascension was never a point of controversy among the early disciples, thus requiring elaborate argumentation. This brevity demonstrates the restraining influence of the Holy Spirit strictly human journalistic impulses would have expanded the narrative considerably. It is significant that Luke’s account of the ascension episode (Acts 1:9-11), consumes only 63 words in the Greek Testament. At the time of his martyrdom, Stephen was permitted to actually see the ascended Christ and petition him (Acts 7:55-60). The event was taken for granted in the balance of the New Testament (Acts 2:33 Eph. Mark, who wrote under the tutelage of Peter (Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, 2.15), also took note of the ascension (Mk. 1:3 24:51), not to mention his guidance by the Spirit. Luke’s record of this event was under-girded by his careful research (Lk. The apostles themselves witnessed the Savior’s ascension (Acts 1:9-11). That lack of evidence indirectly supports the record of the ascension there was no earthly corpse. Those efforts, however, if they occurred, were in vain. With such a trophy, Christianity could have been crushed in its infancy. If Jesus was not raised from the dead or if he somehow survived the ordeal of Calvary and died later (as Hugh Schonfield speculated in his infamous book, The Passover Plot), surely the Lord’s enemies would have vigorously sought to reclaim his body, thus nullifying the resurrection story. The ascension of Christ presents a problem for the opponents of Christianity. Thus, in this instance, indicating that the taking up was empowered from above, namely by God. Each time the verb is in the passive voice, he “was taken up.” The passive voice represents the subject of the verb as being acted upon. Effected by Godįive times New Testament writers employ the Greek term analambano (to take up) of the Lord’s ascension (Mk. His ascension was one of the tests of Christ’s prophetic credibility. And, while on trial before the Jewish Sanhedrin, Jesus announced to the high priest that presently he would be “sitting at the right hand of Power” (Mt. Though the disciples struggled with the concept of Jesus’ death, he told them plainly that he was going back to the Father (Jn. No other psalm is so frequently quoted in the New Testament - an indication of the importance of the event. Prophetically AnnouncedĪ thousand years before the Savior’s birth, David prophesied the ascension of Jesus when he announced the Lord’s enthronement at the Father’s right hand (Psa. But the ascension event is of equal significance, and careful attention should be given to it. For that reason, occasionally the resurrection narrative has overshadowed the ascension record. The resurrection of Jesus from the dead is the foundation truth of the gospel (1 Cor.
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