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Sermon for the Ascension of our Lord – June 1, 2025
Acts 1:1-11, Ephesians 1:15-23, Luke 24:44-53
Dear friends, grace to you and peace from God our Father and our risen and ascended Lord Jesus Christ.
On this last day of the Easter season, we hear how the risen Jesus was carried up into heaven to take his place at the right hand of the Father. We also hear that before Jesus was taken up into the clouds, he gave his disciples a mission. And to help them carry out this mission he also gave them a blessing.
The mission Jesus gave the disciples was to proclaim repentance and the forgiveness of sin in his name. They were to be witnesses to all that he had accomplished by his death and resurrection. They were charged with carrying the Good News of Christ’s saving work into the world, beginning from Jerusalem, on to Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.
This continues to be the mission of the church. The church Jesus founded has been called to proclaim repentance and announce forgiveness, to proclaim both law and gospel, God’s commands and God’s promises. The church’s mission is to bear witness to the Good News that by his death and resurrection Jesus Christ has reconciled a sinful humanity to a holy God, so that we can live a new life with him that begins now and continues forever. This is all a gift of grace, received through faith. Proclaiming this, bearing witness to it, is the mission of the church – then and now.
The devil fights against this mission tooth and nail. The world doesn’t necessarily want us to be engaged in it either. Heck, sometimes the church itself seems to be more interested in other things, forgetting the primary mission given to us by our Lord! We always seem to be getting side-tracked and distracted.
Don’t get me wrong – the church may well get involved in any number of worthy projects as we live out our faith by serving our neighbors, but the primary and most urgent mission we have as the church, according to Jesus’ own last words before he ascended, is to proclaim repentance and the forgiveness of sin. It is to bear witness to the Good News of what Christ has done for us.
After giving the disciples this mission, Jesus gave them his blessing. Jesus lifted up his hands and blessed them. He blessed the disciples, and he blessed the mission he gave them. By lifting up his hands to give this blessing Jesus was using the same physical gesture the priests in the temple used to put God’s blessing on the people at the end of worship. This was the posture used to put God’s love, God’s grace, God’s power, God’s blessing on them. Jesus used this very same gesture. He lifted up his hands to put his blessing on them, showing them that his support was covering them, that his love was over them.
As many of you know, our oldest son got married last month. Back in the fall, he had some time alone with the father of his now-wife. As the two sat together in a deer stand, our son conjured up the courage to ask him if he could marry his daughter. He wasn’t simply asking for his permission. He was asking whether he would support it, whether he would get behind it, whether he would be pleased with it. He was asking for his blessing, which he gave.
And then last month when they exchanged their vows, all four of us parents lifted up our hands and laid them on the couple’s shoulders, praying for God’s blessing and giving them ours. We assured them that we would support them, that we were behind them, that we were pleased with what they were doing. We blessed them. That’s what a blessing is!
In the same way, our Lord Jesus puts his blessing on his disciples. In the same way, he puts his blessing on his church today. He puts his blessing on us and on the mission he has given us. This blessing is not only an authorization. It is not only permission. It is a promise to support us in this mission. It is a promise to be behind us, to be there for us through the various challenges and difficulties we encounter. It is an assurance that he is pleased with us as we carry out the mission he has given us.
This blessing is vitally important, because there are times when this mission is hard. There are times when it leads to hostility and to heartache. There are times when it feels like we are losing ground. There are times when it feels like everything is aligned against us, from the culture to demographics to struggles within the church. There are times when we get discouraged or frustrated or just tired.
The church has always faced this threefold attack from the world, the devil, and our sinful selves. But the church has also always had the hands of Jesus lifted up over it. The church has also always had Jesus’ blessing over us. That is to say, we have his support, his backing, his love and grace carrying us on.
You have been so kind to make such a big deal today about the 25th anniversary of my ordination. When I look back on a quarter of a century as a pastor, I know there is no way I would still be doing this if it weren’t for those hands of Jesus lifted over me, over us, over the mission we share. It has been said that to be a pastor you need the mind of a scholar, the heart of a child, and the skin of a rhinoceros. There are parts of this job that are very difficult. There are parts of it that do not get easier with time. I know there is no way I would still be doing this if it weren’t for this blessing from Jesus, the blessing of his support, his strength, his steadfast love.
This blessing came through the laying on of hands at my ordination. This blessing continues to come through Word and Sacrament, which I need each week as much as you do. This blessing comes embodied through people. It comes through colleagues. It comes through my family, and especially my wife – who knows what kind of day I’ve had just by looking at my face when I walk through the door. This blessing comes through you. It comes through the members of the congregations I’ve served, particularly here at Oak Harbor Lutheran Church. There’s a reason I’ve spent nearly 15 of those 25 years here! (And counting!) Thank you for so beautifully embodying this blessing of Jesus through your support, your encouragement, your love.
There is great joy in ministry too. So much joy. Such deep joy. Our gospel reading tells us the disciples were filled with joy as they returned to the temple after Jesus’ ascension. I get it! And I hope you do too! This joy comes through the ever-present hands of our Lord Jesus lifted over us. This joy comes through his blessing. This joy comes to us as our Lord continues to support us and strengthen us through his Word and his Supper and through each other, through the fellowship we share.
This blessing is over you too. As you participate in the life of the church, enduring its challenges and its frustrations and its disappointments, the blessing of Jesus is upon you. As you carry out your own holy callings in life, your vocations – your role in the family, your work in the world, your ministry here at church – as you carry out these callings, Christ’s blessing is upon you. As you experience hardship and heartache, his hands are over you, supporting you and strengthening you. He is behind you with his steadfast love every step of the way. As we carry out these callings together, he takes great pleasure in our faithfulness.
Our Lord Jesus conquered sin and death for us by enduring the cross, dying, and rising again. After forty days of resurrection appearances, Jesus was carried up into heaven. He was taken up into the clouds. As St. Paul tells us in our reading from Ephesians for today, his ascension was his enthronement as he took his place at the right hand of God, where he is head over all things for the church.
He has given us a mission to proclaim repentance and the forgiveness of sins. He has given us the mission of being witnesses to the Good News of what he has done for us through his death and resurrection, so that others might hear and believe and follow him into a new and renewed life, a life steeped in the grace and love of God, a life lived in joyful obedience to his Word and his will, a life which begins now and continues forever.
As we carry out the mission he has given us, the mighty hands of our ascended Lord remain over us. He gives us the blessing we need so that we can continue to carry it out with great joy.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Rev. Jeffrey R. Spencer
Oak Harbor Lutheran Church