{"id":5418,"date":"2017-05-25T12:38:22","date_gmt":"2017-05-25T02:38:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/?p=5418"},"modified":"2017-05-26T18:05:02","modified_gmt":"2017-05-26T08:05:02","slug":"the-glorious-feast-of-the-ascension","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/the-glorious-feast-of-the-ascension\/","title":{"rendered":"The Glorious Feast of the Ascension"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Glorious Feast of the Ascension\u00a0<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

By: Fr Matthew Attia<\/strong><\/p>\n

On Thursday,\u00a0 25 may the Church will celebrate the Feast of the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ into heaven, 40 days following His Glorious Resurrection.<\/p>\n

The Ascension = Confirms the Divinity of Christ<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Christ said, \u201cI came forth from the Father.\u00a0 Again, I leave the world and go to the Father.\u201d\u00a0 (John 16:28).\u00a0 Some 3000 years ago, Solomon the wise King asked, \u201cWho ascended to heaven and descended?\u201d (Proverbs 30:4).\u00a0 The only Person who could answer this puzzle was Jesus Christ, who said to Nicodemus, \u201cNo one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven.\u201d (John 3:13).\u00a0 Jesus, by His ascension, proved that He is heavenly and of heavenly origin and after He accomplished redemption, He went again to His royal and divine residence in heaven.\u00a0 At Pentecost, the Holy Spirit has come to reveal the hidden mystery of Christ and that He is equal to God the Father and without the Holy Spirit, no one can say that Jesus is Lord.\u201d (1 Corinthians 12:3).<\/p>\n

The Ascension = Prepares me to Receive the Holy Spirit<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Christ said, \u201cI will not leave you orphans, I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper that He may abide with you forever.\u00a0 He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.\u201d (John 16).\u00a0 Before the ascension, Jesus said, \u201cPeace I leave with you, My peace I give you.\u201d\u00a0 But the means of having this peace is through the Holy Spirit.\u00a0 This might be well explained by St. Cyril of Alexandria when he said, \u201cEverything is from the Father through the Son by the Holy Spirit.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Ascension = Prepares for me a Heavenly Place<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Christ said, \u201cLet not your hearts be troubled, you believe in God, believe also in Me.\u00a0 In My Father\u2019s house there are many mansions, if it were not so, I would have told you.\u00a0 I go to prepare a place for you.\u00a0 And if I go and prepare a place for you I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am there you will be also.\u201d (John 14:1-3).\u00a0 Moreover, Christ said, \u201cDo not fear little flock for it is your Father\u2019s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom.\u201d (Luke 12:32).\u00a0 St. Paul reminds us, \u201cFor our citizenship is in heaven.\u201d (Philippians 3:20).\u00a0 \u201cFor God has prepared a city for them.\u201d\u00a0 (Hebrews 11:16).\u00a0 Thus we labour and strive diligently in order to hear the words of Jesus, \u201cCome you that are blessed by My Father, come inherit the Kingdom.\u201d (Matthew 25:34).<\/p>\n

The Ascension = Directs my Heart, Mind and Life to Heaven<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cIf then you were raised with Christ,\u201d says St. Paul, \u201cseek those things which are above where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God.\u00a0 Set your mind on things above not on things on the earth.\u201d (Colossians 3:5).\u00a0 \u201cLay hold on to eternal life,\u201d writes St. Paul to Timothy, \u201cto which you were called.\u201d (1 Timothy 6:12).\u00a0 Let us therefore sow in the Spirit that we may reap eternal life.\u201d (Galatians 6:7-8).<\/p>\n

The Ascension = Reminds me of the Second Coming of Christ<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cThis same Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven.\u201d Said the angels to the disciples, \u201cwill so come in like manner as you saw Him go into heaven.\u201d (Acts 1:11).\u00a0 \u201cBehold I am coming quickly and My reward is with Me, to give to everyone according to his work.\u00a0 I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last.\u201d (Revelation 22:12-13).\u00a0 \u201cFor we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.\u201d (2 Corinthians 5:10).<\/p>\n

The Ascension = Restoration and Glorification<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Christ is preparing a heavenly place for us, and the Holy Spirit is preparing us to inherit that heavenly place with Christ.\u00a0 Therefore, as in marriage, the Holy Spirit is uniting the bride and the groom together, similarly in this eternal love relation, the Holy Spirit is uniting Christ and with the faithful soul that He loved and redeemed with His blood.\u201d (Revelation 1:5).\u00a0 The Ascension was the final act of the earthly mission of Christ.\u00a0 It represented the ultimate restoration and glorification of humanity; its being enthroned at the right hand of the Father in the realm of Divine existence known as heaven.\u00a0 Christ and all humanity in Him were accepted into the life of the Holy Trinity (Ephesians 1:20).<\/p>\n

The Ascension = My Spiritual Ascendency<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

The spiritual life, as Pope Shenouda reminds us, is a perpetual ascendancy towards God the Father.\u00a0 St. Peter urges us to, \u201cgrow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ,\u201d (2 Peter 3:18).\u00a0 He also says, \u201cAdd to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness and to brotherly kindness love.\u00a0 For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful.\u201d (2 Peter 1:5-8).<\/p>\n

Wishing you a blessed and joyous Feast of the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ into heaven, remembering the words of our Saviour, \u201cSeek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness.\u201d (Matthew 6:33).\u00a0 May you always feel and see \u201ca door standing open in heaven.\u201d (Revelation 4:1).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Glorious Feast of the Ascension\u00a0 By: Fr Matthew Attia On Thursday,\u00a0 25 may the Church will celebrate the Feast of the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ into heaven, 40 days following His Glorious Resurrection. The Ascension = Confirms the Divinity of Christ Christ said, \u201cI came forth from the Father.\u00a0 Again, I leave … Continue reading “The Glorious Feast of the Ascension”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":5422,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[46],"class_list":["post-5418","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","tag-ascension"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5418","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5418"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5418\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5420,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5418\/revisions\/5420"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5422"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5418"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5418"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5418"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}