Tag: Isaiah

By Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892)

A reflection for Ascension Day 2016:

While he blessed them, he parted from them and was carried up into heaven. — Luke 24.51

Jesus will come again. Our Lord is doing the best thing for his kingdom in going away. It is clear that he has not quit the fight, nor deserted the field of battle. It was in the highest degree expedient that he should go, and that we should each one receive the Spirit. He has not taken his heart from us, nor his care from us, nor his interest from us: he is bound up heart and soul with his people.

The scriptures tell us—and this is a reason why we should get to our work—that he is coming in the same manner as he departed: “This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.” [What does this mean?]

Do not let anybody spiritualize away all this from you. Jesus is coming as a matter of fact, therefore go down to your sphere of service. Give of your wealth and don’t talk about it. Consecrate your daily life to the glory of God. Live wholly for your Redeemer.

Jesus is not coming in a sort of mythical, misty, hazy way, he is literally and actually coming, and he will literally and actually call upon you to give an account of your stewardship. Therefore, now, today, literally not symbolically, personally and not by proxy, go out through that portion of the world which you can reach, and preach the gospel to every creature according as you have opportunity.

Be ready to meet your coming Lord. What is the way to be ready to meet Jesus? If it is the same Jesus that went away from us who is coming, then let us be doing what he was doing before he went away.

Don’t stand gazing up into heaven, but wait upon the Lord in prayer, and you will receive the Spirit of God, and you will proclaim, “Believe and live.” Then when he comes he will say to you, “Well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of the Lord.” So may his grace enable us to do. Amen.

*Abridged and language updated from Spurgeon’s sermon The Ascension and the Second Advent Practically Considered.

Today’s Reading
Isaiah 2 (Listen – 3:00)
Hebrews 10 (Listen – 5:33)

 

But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come… he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption. — Hebrews 9.11–12

Tomorrow Christians around the world will celebrate the Day of Ascension. “While he blessed them,” records the gospel of Luke, “he parted from them and was carried up into heaven.” The Greek word translated carried up is the same word used throughout the New Testament for offering. In other words, Christ was offered up to Heaven—the spiritual posture of the savior became physical reality in his final moments on earth.

The language of offering ties directly into the symbolism presented by the author of Hebrews. Christ is the fulfillment of the old system. Yet if he brought that system to its end, what can we learn from the New Testament’s continual use the language of high priest, temple, and law? N.T. Wright explains:

This puzzle, very close to Paul’s frequent question as to why God gave the Law, is often answered in terms of religious development: people in earlier days thought they needed animal sacrifices, but we’ve grown out of such things. That’s not the New Testament answer.

The Temple was given as a true signpost; there was nothing wrong with it. But the signpost isn’t the reality, and if people are mistaking the one for the other the time may come to chop the signpost down.

A person draws near to Christ, Dr. Wright explains, “Not because you’re climbing a ladder of spiritual advancement, but because you’ve grasped the truth at the heart of Jesus’ ministry: Jesus has come to offer, and accomplish, the reality to which the Temple points but which it cannot ultimately deliver.”

Hebrews teaches that Christ is seated at the right hand of God—he offered himself to the father to bless his Church by interceding on their behalf. The only way we can reject this blessing, N.T. Wright concludes, is by trying to create our own sacrifice, temple, and high priest:

We don’t go in for killing bulls and goats, but do we show evidence of the reality to which their blood was supposed to point? Or have we substituted a new regime of ‘dead works’ which impede, rather than facilitate, our worship of the living God?

Today’s Reading
Isaiah 1 (Listen – 4:36)
Hebrews 9 (Listen – 4:40)