Читать книгу The Acts of the Apostles - William Barclay - Страница 14

THE GLORY OF DEPARTURE AND THE GLORY OF RETURN

Acts 1:9–11

When he had said these things, while they were watching, he was taken up and a cloud received him and he passed from their sight. While they were gazing into heaven, as he went upon his way, behold, two men in white garments stood beside them; and they said to them: ‘Men of Galilee, why are you standing looking up into heaven? This Jesus who has been taken up into heaven from you will come again in the same way as you have seen him go to heaven.’

THIS short passage leaves us face to face with two of the most difficult ideas in the New Testament.

First, it tells of the ascension. Only Luke tells this story; and he has already given an account of it in his gospel (Luke 24:50–3). For two reasons, the ascension was an absolute necessity. One was that there had to be a final moment when Jesus went back to the glory which was his. The forty days of the resurrection appearances had passed. Clearly, that was a time which was unique and could not go on forever. Equally clearly, the end to that period had to be definite. There would have been something quite wrong if the resurrection appearances had just simply petered out.

For the second reason, we must transport ourselves in imagination back to the time when this happened. Nowadays, we do not regard heaven as some place located beyond the sky; we regard it as a state of blessedness when we will be with God for all time. But in those days everyone, even the wisest, thought of the earth as flat and of heaven as a place above the sky. Therefore, if Jesus was to give his followers undeniable proof that he had returned to his glory, the ascension was absolutely necessary. But we must note this. When Luke tells of this in his gospel, he says: ‘they . . . returned to Jerusalem with great joy’ (Luke 24:52). In spite of the ascension, or maybe because of it, the disciples were quite sure that Jesus had not gone from them but that he was with them forever.

Second, this passage brings us face to face with the second coming. We must remember two things about the second coming. First, to speculate when and how it will happen is both foolish and useless, as Jesus said that not even he knew the day and the hour when the Son of Man would come (Mark 13:32). There is something almost blasphemous in speculating about something which was hidden from even Christ himself. Second, the essential teaching of Christianity is that God has a plan for us and the world. We are bound to believe that history is not a haphazard conglomeration of chance events which are going nowhere. We are bound to believe that there is some divine far-off event to which the whole creation moves and that, when that final fulfilment comes, Jesus Christ will be Judge and Lord of all. The second coming is not a matter for speculation and for a curiosity that is quite out of place; it is a summons to make ourselves ready for that day when it comes.