Sermon 263A

SERMON 263/A

ABOUT THE ASCENSION OF THE LORD

And we are already in heaven with Christ.

Today our Lord Jesus Christ ascended into heaven; may our heart ascend with Him. Let us hear the Apostle saying: If you have risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God; seek the things that are above, not what is upon the earth. For just as He ascended and did not depart from us, so too we are already with Him there, although it has not yet been fulfilled in our bodies what has been promised to us. He has already been exalted above the heavens; yet on earth He suffers whatever labors we, as His members, endure. He testified to this from above, crying: Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? And: I was hungry, and you gave me food. Why do we not also labor on earth in such a way that through faith, hope, and love, by which we are united to Him, we may already rest with Him in the heavens? He, while there, is also with us; and we, while here, are also with Him. He accomplishes that both by divinity, power, and love; but we achieve this not by divinity as He does, yet by love, but directed towards Him. He did not leave heaven when He descended to us; nor did He depart from us when He ascended again into heaven. For since He was there while He was here, He thus testifies: No one, He says, has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven. He did not say: the Son of Man who will be in heaven, but: the Son of Man who is in heaven.

Christ is our head and we are His body.

But indeed he is with us even when he is there, for before he ascended, he promised this, saying: "Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age." We are also there by name, for he said: "Rejoice, because your names are written in heaven"; although we wear out the earth with our bodies and labors, and the earth wears us out. But when we begin to be in his glory after the resurrection of the body, neither will this mortal body inhabit us, nor will our affection incline to these things; he gathers all from here, who holds the first fruits of our spirit. For neither should we despair concerning the perfect and angelic heavenly habitation, because he said: "No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven"; he seems to have said this concerning himself alone, as if none of us could attain this; but it was said because of the unity, since he is our head, and we are his body. Therefore no one except him, because he is also ourselves according to that which he, the Son of Man, is for us, and we are the sons of God for him. The Apostle says thus: "For as the body is one and has many members; but all the members of that body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ." He did not say: "so is Christ"; but said: "so also is Christ." Christ therefore many members, one body. So he descended from heaven by mercy, and none ascended except himself, when we also in him by grace. And because of this, none except Christ descended, nor except Christ ascended; not that the dignity of the head is confused in the body, but that the unity of the body is not separated from the head. For he does not say of seeds as in many, but as in one, "in your seed which is Christ." Therefore, he calls Christ the seed of Abraham; and yet the same Apostle says: "Therefore you are Abraham's seed." If therefore not in seeds as in many, but as in one: and this seed of Abraham, which is Christ: and this seed of Abraham, which we are; when he ascended into heaven, we are not separated from him. He who descended from heaven does not begrudge us heaven, but in some way cries: "Be my members, if you wish to ascend into heaven." And by this we are currently strengthened, in this we burn with all desires; we meditate on this on earth, that we are considered in heavens. Then we will put off the flesh of mortality, now let us put off the oldness of spirit: the body will be easily lifted up to the heights of heavens, if the burdens of sins do not weigh down the spirit.

Christ ascended with the body.

For even that which some heretics criticize moves them, namely, how the Lord could descend without a body, when He ascended with a body; as if it were contrary to those words where He says: "No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven." Therefore, they say, how could a body which did not descend from heaven ascend into heaven? As if He had said: Nothing ascends into heaven except what descended from heaven; but He said: No one ascends, except he who descends. For this refers to the person, not to the condition of the person. He descended without the clothing of a body, He ascended with the clothing of a body; nevertheless, no one ascends except he who descends. For if He has fitted us to Himself as His members, in such a way that with us joined to Him, He is the same entity; how much more can that body, which He assumed from the Virgin, not have a different person in Him? For who says that not only he who descended ascends, whether it be a mountain, or a wall, or any higher place, if he should ascend clothed when he had descended unclothed; or ascend armed when he had descended unarmed? Therefore, as it is said of this: No one ascends except he who descends, although he ascended with that with which he did not descend; so no one ascends into heaven except Christ, because no one descends from heaven except Christ, although He descended without a body, ascended with a body, and we will ascend, not by our own power, but by our unity with Him and our own unity. For there are two in one flesh: this is a great mystery in Christ and in the Church; hence He Himself says: They are no longer two, but one flesh.

Christ fasted and spent the same number of days with his disciples after the resurrection.

And thus He fasted when He was tempted, still in need of food before death; but He ate and drank when He was glorified, after the resurrection no longer in need of food. There He was showing in Himself our struggle, here in us His consolation, defining both in forty days. For He fasted forty days when He was tempted in the wilderness, as it is written in the Gospel, before the death of His flesh; and again, He was with the disciples for forty days, as Peter speaks in the Acts of the Apostles, coming in and going out, eating and drinking after the resurrection of His flesh. The number forty seems to signify the passage of this world for those who are called to grace, through Him who did not come to destroy the law but to fulfill it. For there are ten commandments of the law, already the grace of Christ spread throughout the world; and the world is divided into four parts, and ten multiplied by four makes forty; because those redeemed by the Lord, He gathered them from the regions, from the East and West, and North and Sea. Thus fasting for forty days before the death of the flesh, it was as if He was crying out: Abstain from the desires of this world; but eating and drinking for forty days after the resurrection of the flesh, it was as if He was crying out: Behold, I am with you until the consummation of the world. Fasting indeed is in the tribulation of struggle; for he who contends in the struggle abstains from all things; but food is in the hope of peace, which will not be perfect until our body, whose redemption we await, puts on immortality; which we do not yet possess in glory, but are already fed by hope. The Apostle shows us to do both simultaneously, saying: Rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation; as if to say it was in food, this in fasting. For as we tread the way of the Lord, let us both fast from the vanity of the present world and be refreshed by the promise of the future: here not setting our heart, there nourishing it upward.