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The Blessed Evangelist Saint Luke, ever the thorough reporter, gives us all the "facts" in the first chapter of Acts. He tells Theophilus, the Church, and you, that the Lord chose Apostles, to whom He presented Himself Resurrected and Alive -- AFTER HIS SUFFERING, AFTER THE CROSS AND TOMB. Luke tells us that the 12 saw and heard Jesus many times during the 40-day period after Easter. 40 days… the period of completion. 10 x 4. The number of years in the desert for the sinful Jews, the number of days on the mountain top for Moses in the delivering of the Law, the number of days of temptation in the wilderness for Jesus--to begin putting everything right again. And now, everything is Right Again! Jesus has now suffered, died, and rose again. Now what?

The Second Article of the Creed tells you that you have been redeemed from sin, death and hell by His innocent suffering and death; not with gold or silver but with His holy precious blood. Now what?

The Third Article of the Creed tells you that now you live under Him in His Kingdom and that you serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence and blessedness. Where is His Kingdom? Heaven? Yes, soon. But now His Kingdom is where Jesus is, for you. Now His kingdom is the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. Now His kingdom is where the Spirit gathers the flock together around the "marks" of the Church: the Word purely preached and taught, and the Blessed Sacraments administered according to Christ's Institution. Now His kingdom is found where He is bodily present through His Word. That's the "Right hand" of God; the "Right hand" of majesty!

Like the 12, it is not given to you to "know" when the "Kingdom of Israel" will be restored. That is, we don't know when the Lord will return at the end of time to usher us all in to eternity with glorified bodies. But we do know what we have right now. We know from St. Luke's record in Acts, that Jesus promised the 12 that He would send the Holy Ghost upon them before they would leave the city of Jerusalem. The Spirit would allow them to be His witnesses. How would they witness? By being witnesses, that is; martyrs. By going into all the world making disciples of all the gentiles they came into contact with. How so? By the Word, by Jesus. They were to Baptize all "nations" (not all nations 13 and older, but all peoples) in the Name of The Father and of The Son and of The Holy Ghost. They were to make followers by teaching all things concerning Christ. That means they were to take His words, His Word, the existing Old Testament Hebrew scriptures, as well as the Words which He had spoken and acted to them in His ministry. The evangelists (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John), along with Sts. Peter, Paul, Jude and James would record the New Testament and use these new "Spirit Breathed" Scriptures to teach and preach Jesus Christ and Him crucified for the Forgiveness of Sins. They would take His Words as He had told them and shown them, and attach them to simple water, to simple bread and wine, and feed His sheep; forgive His sheep, keep safe and strong His sheep.

Luke tells us all how the Ascension physically took place. When Jesus was done preaching His homily to His chosen pastors, He "was taken up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight." Up, because this time Jesus' vanishing from sight would be for the remainder of the New Testament period. He had appeared and disappeared other times during the 40 days of Easter joy. Now He would no longer "come back" visually. Now was the time of the WORD, of the Church, of the Acts of the Apostles and their successors. Up: for finality. Hidden by a cloud: for closure. Up, because this takes our eyes off of us and puts them on where Jesus is now to be found. Not in clouds or
outer-space, but in His Word. And not just where His word is sitting idly. Not in closed Bibles but in the Word preached and catechized. Not in the Jesus of Nature, but in the Sacraments, Jesus in, with, and under humble earthly elements.

Jesus could have stayed around talking with His own One voice to 12. A pastor can stand in the back of a church, in the narthex, talking with two or three people. That's not how the Word is to be preached to the New Testament saints. Jesus Ascended to the "right hand" of the Omnipresent Father, to the unity of the Trinity, so that He might fill all things and be with all believers in His Word. He Ascended into every pulpit where He has now placed one of His under-shepherds. He has Ascended into every font so that the waters of the new living Jordan, waters of life in His precious blood, may be poured over the heads of all baptized gentiles in "all nations." He has Ascended to the top of every altar so that His Body and Blood might be taken every Lord's Day, and every Church Feast Day for more forgiveness, more faith, more life.

Now you need not gaze into heaven, for heaven has come down to you in the Word of Christ.