We have just begun a new sermon series in the book of Acts, and so our scripture reading today is in Acts chapter 1, which is on page 1080, if you're using the black Bibles that are provided for you. And so I invite you to stand with me, if you're able, for the reading of God's Word. Your bulletin says verse 9, but we'll back up just a little bit into verse 6 to just pick up this whole paragraph here. So when they had come together, they asked him, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? He said to them, it is not for you to know times or seasons that the father has fixed by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and to the end of the earth. And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes and said, Men of Galilee, Why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven. The grass withers, the flowers fade, and yet the word of the Lord remains forever. You may be seated. So right in the middle of springtime, we have times of services, and we've even had a particular friend of mine who fills the pulpit occasionally remind you that every Sunday we ought to open every service in the same way that we do those particular Sundays in April, when we say, He is risen, and you respond? He is risen indeed. Yeah, hallelujah. Probably a lesser known greeting among us is, He is ascended. Yeah, see, you're confused, aren't you? The Ascension of Jesus Christ. It's not very celebrated in the church. You know, pragmatically, that's because Ascension Day is always a Thursday. And who goes to church on Thursday? And so it's 40 days after the resurrection. We know the resurrection was on a Sunday, the first day of the week. So you can do the math in case you don't trust me. Forty days from that Sunday is always a Thursday. And so Ascension Day, even for those who follow church calendars, not a big church-going day. But maybe also, It just feels a little bit sort of like a... well, yeah. Like, it's a little anticlimactic to say that Jesus has ascended. I mean, what else was he going to do? Is the ascension of Jesus just sort of the natural necessity? I mean, he's not going to... he said he was leaving, and so he left. And he said it was good for us and better for us even if he left, because then the Holy Spirit would come. Is that all the Ascension is, is just to make sure that the Holy Spirit gets his turn? It's sort of a tag-team effort in our salvation? Even when you look at the Gospels, only Mark and Luke mention the Ascension. So Matthew and John do not. But Luke doesn't just mention the ascension at the end of Luke, he considers the ascension of Jesus Christ sort of the linchpin that holds Luke and Acts together. It's important enough to Luke to mention twice. both at the end of the gospel and at the beginning of Acts. And so it must be, at least in Luke's mind, important. And I know that many of you feel like I am prone to hyperbole. And let me just say, that's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. I do not mean this in a hyperbolic way when I say that the ascension of Jesus Christ is as critical for your salvation as the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ. that the ascension of Jesus Christ, maybe one reason we don't focus much on it is, it seems like more of a, that's good for Jesus that he's ascended, and we don't really recognize why it's so crucial for our own salvation. It's easy to look at the cross and see the cross, Jesus, even in, you know, let's back up even farther, to look at the incarnation, God becomes a man, he takes on flesh. The Word became flesh and tabernacled among us, moved into our neighborhood, dwelt with us, faced the troubles and trials and brokenness of this world with us, yet without sin. We understand how the Incarnation, God the Son, embraced that on our behalf and for us. We understand that the crucifixion is for us. Jesus should not have died. As far as His own need was concerned, He died for us. We recognize the resurrection is for us. It's God stating that Jesus' perfection, His perfect obedience has been justified. And we point to the empty tomb, that Jesus did not die for His own sins, but for our sins. But the ascension feels more like it's a promotion for Jesus and not so much a good for you and me." And I think without the ascension of Jesus, the incarnation is just sort of an odd thing that happened. I think without the ascension of Jesus, His miracles are just kind of cool to talk about. Without the ascension of Jesus, His death and resurrection don't mean anything. After all, lots of people die, and a few people have been raised from the dead. Even Jesus' friend Lazarus was raised from the dead. But the trouble with every person that was raised from the dead, even going back into the Old Testament with the miracles that Elijah and then Elisha performed, do you know every one of them was raised to life and got to die again? Which kind of makes you wonder, I'll bet Lazarus was really quiet after his resurrection. He was like, could you imagine? I mean, you get, you win, you're done, you're fine. You get to the gates and you're like, oh, I get to rest. And the angel's there and he's like, yeah. I mean, yes, have a seat. No, you don't get to move into your mansion just yet. But just sit here for about four days. And guess what? The next time you die, then you get to come back, and then we'll keep you. But Jesus, without the ascension, it simply means that somewhere along the way, He had to have died again. And so the ascension is crucial for you and me. And so, clearly, You're looking at these few verses and wondering, and how are you going to get all that out of this narrative that he did ascend? Where do you get the why it was so important? And I get it from our call to worship. And that's part of the reason why I use the entire psalm in our call to worship, so that you can have it in front of you. Psalm 110. Because if you and I were going to inspire the New Testament and we were going to say, OK, but the New Testament has to have ties and connections to the Old Testament. So maybe if there was one verse. Let's pick one verse in the Old Testament that we quote more than any other verse to point to the centrality of the deity of Jesus Christ and his sacrifice of atonement that satisfied the wrath of God. Like, what's one verse we could use? And maybe we'd say, oh, well, let's go to, you know, Isaiah 9. Let's quote a bunch of, let's quote those. I mean, you know, eventually Handel's going to write beautiful music about it, so let's fill the New Testament with verses from Isaiah chapter 9. And then maybe someone would say, yeah, that's nice, but that's really about his...it kind of jumps from childhood to reigning, and you kind of miss the middle. So let's use Isaiah 53. You know, the suffering servant, you know, the man of sorrows acquainted with grief who takes the wrath of God on himself and is rejected by God and stricken, smitten, and afflicted by God himself. And that would be the verse. And so it's interesting to realize that the Most frequently quoted Psalm in the entire New Testament is Psalm 110. The most frequently quoted verse in the entire New Testament is verse 1. The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand. So we're gonna spend some time in Psalm 110. I looked up the page number in the Black Bible. and then ADD kicked in and I forgot it three seconds after I looked it up. So it's around 602 maybe, but for some reason that number sticks in my head. But anyway, that's why it's in your bulletin. And every section is a verse. So you can just, if I say verse three, you can go one, two, three, and then you'll be in verse three in the call to worship if you wanna just look at that. The right hand of God. The right hand of God is a theme throughout both the Old and New Testament. Just a few things about the right hand of God. It is a place in Exodus 15 where God's power comes from his right hand. In Deuteronomy, he has a flaming fire at his right hand. The Psalms constantly talk about the right hand of God. There are pleasures forever at God's right hand. There is refuge from adversaries at God's right hand. There is support that comes from God's right hand. There is a saving might in God's right hand, and it goes on and on, and you can look these things up and do a quick search in a computer and just type in right hand or God's right hand. And so now see I, Amy recognizes the importance of being at someone's right hand because whenever we have company over and there's too many people at our table, not too many, the right amount of people at our table, I didn't say too many, and Amy and I have to sit at an end together, we usually use a bench, and Amy always sits at my right hand because she also agrees that at my right hand there are pleasures forevermore. No. For Amy, it's more practical. I'm left-handed. It's smart for her to sit at my right hand because she will never be bumped when she sits at my right hand and I eat with my left hand. And so, with God constantly emphasizing his right hand, it's a little, you know, left-hand triggering, but at least I know that my left hand is in God's right hand if we walk side by side. So, nana, nana, nana to the rest of you. But there's so much in the Bible about God's right hand. The prophets tell us that God's righteous right hand upholds us, that it's by God's right hand that he created everything. But here at Psalm 110, we're told that the right hand of God is reserved. There is a reserved seat at God's right hand for one called the Lord. Adonai, Master. It's this interesting verse where the Lord is speaking. The Lord, the covenantal God, Yahweh, the God of the universe, is speaking to one that he calls Lord. So the Lord says to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool. So whoever he's talking to has a lot of, like, authority. He's called Adonai. Do you know that I said that this verse is quoted more than any other verse from the Old Testament by the New Testament. 100% of the times that this verse is quoted, it is intentionally and directly tied to Jesus. Every single time this verse is quoted, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand, Whoever is quoting it, without any mistakes or without any caveats, says this verse is about Jesus. In fact, the first person to do it? Jesus. Jesus quotes this verse. And he doesn't do it with his disciples, his 12 closest disciples. He doesn't do it with his 72 disciples who are following him. He does it surrounded by priests and Pharisees who despise him. And it's quoted in Matthew and Mark and Luke. He says, how is it that David writes In Psalm 110, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand. Now how is the Messiah a son of David, and yet David calls him Lord? And we're told that they didn't miss it. Like the next paragraph says, and so they decided to have Jesus killed because he was making himself equal to God. And so already we know that even as far back as in Jesus's day, when you read Psalm 110, you knew it was about the Messiah. You knew it was about someone who is equal to God. The ascension of Jesus Christ is proof that he is God. And we look at this psalm, the Lord, Adonai, is ascended, first of all, to rule. So he's ascended, it's this ascension of a king. So again, you know, where would we be without the Lord of the Rings? You know, the stewards never dared sit on the throne. Even when they were hating that there might be a return of the blood of Isildur or the line of Isildur, they would never dare sit on the throne. They sat down on the step in front of the throne. And here is this one coming to the throne room of Yahweh. and invited, come sit at my right hand. Come sit here on the throne. Jesus has ascended as king. And what do we see about him being king in Psalm 110? Well, he has a throne. We just saw that. Sit at my right hand. Sit on the throne next to me. He has a throne. But he also has a footstool. And this is an interesting footstool. You know that a king is powerful when he uses his enemies as home decoration. You know, if we go to Bob's house, and we're sitting around in his living room, and Bob puts his feet up on his ottoman, and you say, hey, Bob, that's a nice ottoman you have there. Is that leather? If he responds, no, it's my enemies, you should be like, oh, oh, I like you, Bob. I hope you like me. God says, sit at my right hand till I make your enemies a footstool. So he's got a throne, he's got a footstool, he's got a scepter. And we're gonna see that his scepter is made of iron. He's garbed in holy garments, he's ready for battle. But it's not even a battle that he has to fight. The Lord is saying, I will make your enemies a footstool. You sit until I make your enemies a footstool. Jesus sits and reigns. There's this great passage in Revelation 19. You know, we're told here in this passage that we'll be clothed. Your people will offer themselves freely on the day of your power in holy garments. And so what are the garments that God's people are going to be coming to this king wearing? And in Revelation 19, we learn what the garments are of these people who are come ready to do battle on behalf of the king or with the king or for the king. We know that while we're here on earth, the garments that we have are like armor. You know, Paul tells us that here while you're on earth, you know, you need a helmet, you need a breastplate, you need, you know, shin protection, you need to gird your loins, you know, there's a battle that's going on and raging and you have to be ready for it. And so you might expect that, well, when the final battle comes, we'll need all that and more. Maybe they'll finally find the Greek word for Teflon or Kevlar and then we'll really be ready for battle. And so it's interesting in Revelation 19 to read about this final battle. We're told, then I saw in heaven opened in verse, this is Revelation 19, 11 to 16, if you want to write this down or flip over to it, Revelation is the last book in the Bible if you're looking for it. So then I saw heaven opened and behold a white horse, the one sitting on it was called Faithful and True. In righteousness he judges and makes war. His eyes are like flames of fire on his head. There are many diadems and he has a name written that no one knows but himself. He's clothed in a robe dipped in blood. Hey, by the way, decorating your home with your enemies, another sign that you're a mighty warrior is if you use blood as an accessory to your clothing. He has a robe dipped in blood as he enters into this final battle. The name of him is called the Word of God, this one who's on the horse. And then we're told, and the armies of the Lord are arrayed in fine linen, white and pure, and they're following on a horse. From his mouth comes a sharp sword which strikes down the nations. He will rule them with a rod of iron. So the scepter isn't a rod of gold or of silver. It's not just decorative, but it's an actual, useful, functional scepter. He rules with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh he has the name written, King of Kings and Lord of Lords." So, most of you recognize that we live outside of the gates of Quantico Marine Base. And when you see the Marines ready for battle or ready for even just practice battle, they will often be in their camouflage, I guess you don't call them outfits, do you? I know they're called cammies. So they're utes, they're utilities. So I like outfit. I'm going to start calling them outfits. Anyway, so they wear cammies, which is also short for camisole, and they blouse their pants. So I just, I don't know. So anyway, but. Always very rugged clothing. It's intended to hide them. It's intended so that they blend in. It's intended to disguise them. You know, of all of the options for the Marines of the clothing that they wear, white linen robes is not one of them. Especially as battle garb. White linen robes, like women in here, you, like men don't know what I'm talking about, and I shouldn't know what I'm talking about, but you know that you wear a linen skirt or a linen pants, if you think about sitting down, they wrinkle and are useless, and you have to re-iron them and start all over. Linen, like it shows everything, and white linen, super absorbent, Do you know why you wear white linen robes to a battle? It's not just because you know you're going to win. It's because you know you aren't going to have to fight at all. The armies of the Lord will follow him into the final battle dressed in white linen robes because the battle is fought and won. What a beautiful picture. This is the one who sits on the throne right now. He is the king. And you have to notice that it's a frightening thing if you are not following this king, because while he reigns on behalf of his own children, he also rules over those who refuse to follow, who refuse to bend the knee. This whole passage speaks of the very ends. The Lord is at your right hand. He will shatter kings on the day of his wrath. He will execute judgment among the nations. He will fill them with corpses. He will shatter chiefs over the wide earth. Chiefs is the same word in Hebrew for heads so you can read that verse saying he will shatter heads over the whole wide earth he will drink from the brook by the way therefore he will lift up his head or it might even say he will lift up the head there is an important warning to those who do not bow to Jesus as king That God's wrath, though he poured out onto his son for those who would repent and would submit to Jesus as king, that wrath is still reserved for those who will not. Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool. There's a great warning in this passage that Jesus is ascended as king and as ruler, and that that means good for his own, but it's a warning for those who are not. But he's not only ascended as ruler, he's ascended to God's right hand. Why? Why is it important that Jesus, the Son of God, is at God the Father's right hand? It's a place not only of ruling and reigning, but it's a place of access. Jesus sits at the right hand of the Father and has constant access to his Father. Why is that important for you and me? because the Lord has sworn and will not change his mind and says, you are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek, which is the most random thing perhaps you could ever hear about. So is that good? Should I be pleased? What is this? Who is this Melchizedek? And he's only mentioned once. Other than this, he's only mentioned, like he shows up in Genesis 14. But then he's mentioned here in this psalm, and then there's whole sections of Hebrews explaining who he is. In the New Testament, there's large sections. And in fact, it's interesting, in Hebrews, it starts talking about Psalm 110. It's one of the places that this psalm is quoted. And the writer of Hebrews gets partway into explaining it and then says, you know what? You're not ready for this. You're still immature. You still don't understand these things. And it's so important that you understand the basics. And then he comes back and he starts explaining it again. But who is this Melchizedek? He shows up in Abraham. He blesses Abraham. He's this priest. He's called the King of Salem. in Genesis 14, that's what he's called, that's his title. And King of Salem, in Hebrew, could be translated King of Peace, Salem, or Shalom. He's the King of Peace, is his title. His name, Melchizedek, or Melech Zodak, a Melech king, Zodak, righteousness. So his title is King of Peace, and his name is King of Righteousness. That's just a coincidence. Anyway, let's move on from that. But we don't really learn anything. He just sort of shows up and then he disappears. So we don't really learn anything about where he came from or where he went. He shows up with bread and wine and blesses Abraham. And the writer of Hebrews says, it's a better priesthood than the Aaronic priesthood, the priesthood of the Levites. He's basically saying like, look, the law, the priesthood of the law is not going to save you. That priesthood even points back to the priesthood of Melchizedek and forward to the priesthood of Christ. That priesthood itself tells you we're going to need a different priest. We're going to need a better priest. We're going to need a priest probably from someplace outside of the Levites. And here comes this priest from the tribe of Judah, and he is a priest in the order of Melchizedek. What does a priest do? A priest is a mediator. A priest intercedes on behalf of his people. A priest goes to God and asks God to forgive the sins of his people. A priest brings the sacrifices and only the priest brings the sacrifices and asks God to forgive his people. Jesus sits at God's right hand. The writer of Hebrews says he sits in order to, he ever intercedes. He sits at God's right hand in order to constantly intercede on your and my behalf, because he has made the final sacrifice. He has made the only sacrifice that could atone for and appease the wrath of God on our behalf. And he sits at God's right hand as a redeemer, as a priest, reminding the Father of what the Father delights to remember. that we are forgiven in the work and in the name of Jesus Christ alone. He is at God's right hand as king on the throne. He is at God's right hand as priest interceding for you. And it's interesting, I forgot to mention this in my intro, But we're in Sunday school, we're talking about the Apostles' Creed, and just working through phrase by phrase with that. Now at communion we use the Nicene Creed, and we talked a little bit about that at first week of Sunday school, why we use the Nicene Creed instead of the Apostles' Creed. But whether you're looking at the Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed, or even the Athanasian Creed, and you're like, the who, what? It's really long and strangely redundant. It goes over, anyway. Look it up. It's fun. And you'll see, oh, that's why we don't say that one. But all three of these find it important to say, I believe that Jesus Christ not only rose from the dead, but ascended to the right hand of God the Father. When we are talking about creedal basics that, like, you must get this, or maybe you're not even a Christian, the ascension of Jesus Christ is in that creedal statement. Also they all three say, and he sits and he sat down at the right hand of God the Father. So Jesus ascended to rule and he ascended to the right hand of God as your priest and he ascended to sit down. And why does that matter? And isn't it just kind of poetic language? Well, even if it is poetic language, what is it trying to imply? Well, when do you sit down? You sit down when you're done. You sit down when you have finished your work. So at a time, you know, there was a time when they used to say that like 97% of the workforce at some point worked for McDonald's. Anyone ever hear that statistic? It's not true anymore. But I was a part of that 97%. When I was a sophomore in high school, I worked for McDonald's. And, you know, there's a few things you pick up from that that you, like, put away immediately. And then there's other things that stick with you forever. And one of those was, if you have time to lean, you have time to clean. Anyone else? See? It's McDonald's, man. They put an excellent work ethic into all of us, at least those of us who had the privilege. But, if you have time to lean, you have time to clean. Why? Because leaning implies your work is done. Sitting implies your work is done. Jesus has ascended to the right hand of God and sat down. Because his work is actually done. He has already done the work of your salvation and your redemption. That final battle is Jesus getting up from the completed work to just put a final exclamation point on it. Satan is defeated. Death has lost. Jesus is seated at the right hand of God the Father because He has finished the work that His Father gave Him to do in the saving of His children. Which means, by the way, that when we get to Acts chapter 7, Six is this, seven, eight. Seven or eight. And the first martyr after Jesus, Stephen, and he's being stoned to death. And this is a really interesting passage where he says, in some of his last words, he looks up to heaven, he says, behold, I see the Son of God, the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God. And so while Jesus sits at God's right hand, do you know that sometimes when you and I are facing the worst, apparently He stands up. He stands at God's right hand too. He says, this one is yours. care for her, protect him. And Stephen still died, but his death was not his end. Jesus is at God's right hand ruling and reigning. He is at God's right hand interceding for you. He is at God's right hand because he has finished the battle against all that despises God and therefore despises you. And while he sits at God's right hand, sometimes he stands at God's right hand for you. This is for you, the ascension of Jesus Christ is for you. So today, I want to hear all of you, you know, mingling around the potluck and at the tables, just saying to each other, He is ascended. He is ascended indeed. Hallelujah. Let's pray.