O kings and kingdoms of the earth, in joyful song adore him. Praise him who rides the ancient sky, who thunders forth his battle cry. Let all bow down to him. All claim His power and surrender His reign. For great in Israel is His name. His might is in the heavens. O awesome God, you've come, you're the home. With power and glory pass your own. People of God, we now come to the reading of our text for this evening. Acts chapter 1. We'll read 1 to 11. We'll be focused particularly upon 6 to 11. Acts chapter 1. Let us hear the Word of God. In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day when he was taken up, after he had given commands through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen, he presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God. And while staying with them, he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which he said, You heard from me, for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now. 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 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 has taken up from you into heaven will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven. The grass withers, the flower fades, the word of our Lord endures forever. Dear congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ, there are many events in the life of a person upon this earth which we might call framework events, events which we use to measure time, measure seasons of life. There is perhaps graduation. We just made it through graduation season, did we not? A graduation from high school, a graduation from college. It marks a new season. It's the beginning of a new frame, or it's the first frame of a new season. We might think of moving. Perhaps you've moved in your life. And so you look back and you say, well, this was when I lived in that house, or this is when I lived on that street. Beyond these personal frameworks, there are things that we might call national frameworks. We might think of a date such as 9-11 in this country. And so events could be called pre-9-11 or post-9-11. It's a marker. It's a frame of reference, a frame of time. The ages of archaeology, such as the Iron Age, they all mark various types of frameworks, variously understood. And we can think, again, of birthdays. We can think of the birthday of a person. We can go back to the personal. We can think of a birthday of a nation, July 4th, Cinco de Mayo. These are all different ways. There are all kinds of ways in which we think of the times in which we live, in which we think of the place in which we live. the age in which we live. What are the most important age markers? What are the most important frames of our very age, of our very time? Well, broadly speaking, the most important ones are creation, fall, redemption. God created, there was a fall. We live in a fallen world and we wait for redemption. These are the three major acts. The first two happen without much time lapsing between them. And now we wait for the final one. But in between fall and redemption, there are other major markers. There are other major frame points. The ascension is certainly one. It is a very marker of our age. There's one more major marker, that is the day of Pentecost, which we'll celebrate in a particular way not too long from now. But basically speaking, we live in an age which is framed by the ascension of Jesus Christ with the ending frame being the second coming when he will come back down. This is how we define the time in which we live. And so we'll consider that with three points as we look at this text. There's final directions and then there's that visible going. Visible going recorded for us by Luke and then also some reference to that ultimate coming. the frames which define our age. So what are the final directions, the last conversation between Jesus and his disciples, the last loving rebuke of Jesus to his apostles? They've been with him for years. We considered not too long ago even some of the particular calling. He called them fishermen. He called them tax collectors. We'll look at this Sunday as we work through Mark. These are men who have walked with Jesus. These are his disciples. And so he hears them say one more thing that they have misunderstood. Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? Verse six. Two misunderstandings we have here. First, they misunderstand the timing, and they also misunderstand the scope of the kingdom. And so Jesus, when the disciples say, at this time, Jesus responds, it is not for you to know the times or the seasons that the Father's appointed by his own authority. Now, it's a loving rebuke. Notice that he says, the Father. Even here, he's reminding them, this is not simply my Father, this is the Father. This is the one that we can call Father. You might say, in that sense, it's a gentle rebuke. But it's a rebuke. It even puts the same words back on them. They ask what time. And Jesus says, it's not for you to know the time. This is for the Father. So no, it is not at this time. We do not know what the time is. The Father alone knows, and you should not even be concerned about the time. Well, here we have application, both direct and indirect, do we not? Directly, we have application to the end of this earth. When is the end of this earth? We do not know, nor are we to look into it too particularly. This is for God alone to know. There are things such as the signs of the times. There are some things which revelation reveals to us, which we can study to one degree or another. There are then things we might say which are vaguely known, but we're to be content with this. Matters regarding the very end of the earth, which are not known, they are for the Father. They're not even for us to look into. To look into it too specifically would be to go against specific directions, the very final directions of Jesus Christ. This is a direct application. Do not be overly caught up with the end of this earth and the exact timing of it in particular. What about an indirect application? You might say that's the direct, cosmic, universal, worldwide. What about personally? Don't we all have some longing to know the future? What does the future hold? Where will I be six months from now? Where will I be one year from now? Will things that seem to be going against me be corrected? Will they be worse? Will situations I'm not satisfied with, will they be reversed? Will the blessings which I have right now continue to be poured out and multiplied? What's going to happen one year, two years, ten years down the road? Well, it is the Father alone who knows the end of all things. It's the Father alone who knows the future of your life as well. It's not that it's wrong to plan. It's not that it's wrong to make a certain kind of investment. These things can be appropriate. But the specific details of our lives are in God's hand. They'll be determined by His authority. So even as we leave the end of the earth itself in His hand, leave the end of your own life in His hand as well. It's not only the timing which the apostles, the disciples have misunderstood, they've also failed to understand the scope. The scope and the power of the kingdom. So now they've misused the word time and now they use wrongly the word kingdom and the word Israel. For they're using the word kingdom and and the context and in light of things that they've said in the Gospels, we might say they're still focusing on this kind of earthly kingdom idea. They're still thinking of the kingdom of Israel, the United Kingdom, we might even say more particularly. Saul, David, Solomon, the kingdom was beautiful, rich. Is this going to be restored? That common misunderstanding of the Pharisees and the disciples themselves. They return again to it here. Now will you restore the kingdom of Israel? Well, now Jesus says, you will receive power, verse eight, when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. God wants them to not think about the power or the pomp or the beauty of an earthly kingdom. God wants them to think upon the Holy Spirit who will be poured out upon them soon. He's spoken of this. He wants them to look for Pentecost, though they didn't call it that yet. He wants them to think spiritually. And what about that word Israel? Well, it not only has that kind of kingdom of Israel earthly focus, it has a very particular focus, isn't it? Even at the might of the United Kingdom, it's still only stretched through portions of Palestine. And what is the geography that Jesus puts back to them? Not Israel, but Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the end of the earth. That's the geography which Jesus puts back. You're thinking about Israel. He says, think beyond Judea, Samaria, think to the ends of the earth. This is your calling. It is true. They begin. in Jerusalem it is true there to stay in Jerusalem until the Holy Spirit is poured out so they're waiting for that it is true that Israel can be spoken of as the firstborn son of God that is that is what God told Pharaoh or God told Moses to tell Pharaoh Exodus chapter 4 God even as he was concerned that Abraham would be a blessing to the nations, now makes it clear. Think beyond Israel. My gospel must go forth beyond Samaria, those neighbors that you don't like very much, and then beyond to the end of the earth. In short, The rebuke is something like this, go labor on in light of what I have done. The task of the Old Testament prophets included the central tasks of preaching repentance and preaching a looking forward to the Anointed One, the Messiah. And now the task of the apostles is this, Jesus is on the mountain about to ascend and their task will be preach repentance and look back upon what I have done. Go be witnesses to this, go be witnesses to me. So, final directions, loving rebuke of Christ. We can have some sympathy for the apostles though, can we not? We could stand here and say, oh look, they've been with Jesus for three years, they still just don't understand, they just don't get it at all. Well, it does say something of the stubbornness of man. These would have been false ideas that they heard from their youth, that they're kind of returning to. But at the same time, we do want Jesus to reign even physically here upon earth, do we not? We do want the Lord to come quickly. We do want that full and final victory. But there's labor yet to do. Go and be my witnesses. That's why Jesus didn't restore the kingdom right then and there. He just didn't restore the kingdom right at that moment because the gospel needed to go forth. Because you still needed to hear it and I still needed to hear it. This is why Jesus is not back yet. Who else still needs to hear it? Maybe you sit and you think, Lord, come quickly. We don't know the season or the time. Maybe it's tonight while I'm sleeping. Maybe it's tomorrow. Is there any particular moment? We can't look into the seasons or the times. We can cautiously say one thing, though. If there is any time in your life which is slightly, slightly more likely time when Jesus is going to come. It's when the gospel is being preached to someone who does not yet fully believe. Because when will Jesus come? Jesus will come when all of his people have heard the good news and believed. When all of God's people have been converted truly to be called His own. We don't know the time or the season, but is Jesus slightly more likely, very slightly, because there's a lot of people on this earth, to come if you're speaking the gospel for the first time, as someone who's never really heard it. I mean, we live in a country where most people have heard of who God is, but they also, at this point, usually haven't really heard who God is. Well, if you're proclaiming the gospel, this might be a moment when God takes one of his own to be his. When Jesus is heard and believed, at that moment when someone believes, that is the moment. And Jesus comes, well, because he comes when all of his people have heard. Go, labor on. And this was a visible going. Jesus gives these final directions, our second point now. He makes a visible ascent. You might say it was visible until he reached the clouds or that he actually went up on a cloud. But the point is that the disciples could see him going. This was visible. It was a leaving of this earth. Seen by only a few, but seen. Others have been taken up. Enoch, Elijah, not with this kind of victory. So then there are only a dim parallels. But Jesus goes up in that way. He leaves this earth. physically, visibly. At one point the Apostle Paul refers to heaven when he talks about his vision in 2 Corinthians as the third heavens. So then Brockle Speaking of the Ascension, he says Jesus went up through the atmosphere, through the universe, through that first and second heaven into the third heaven. He visibly left and he's physically somewhere else. He went from one real place to another real place. Not a place that we could get to, apart from the spiritual power of God, apart from from death, then we could say, but he went from one real place to another. This happened at a real time. Verse 3, 40 days after his resurrection. This happened at a real place. Verse 12, the Mount of Olives. And they really saw Jesus going up. What does this mean? Well, it has a number of applications for the Lord's Supper. We're not actually eating the physical body of Christ when we partake. The physical body of Christ is in another place. We then might think also about those who might desire to see Jesus. Well, there is some seeing of Jesus in this time of the foundation setting of the church. We see it in the book of Acts twice. But even the scene of Jesus in Acts is a particular kind of scene of Jesus. Turn to Acts chapter 7 with me, not too many pages down. Acts chapter 7 verse 55. The only other appearing of Jesus spoken of is Acts 9 and then the various other places that that the Apostle Paul talks about and that that was kind of is a little bit different, you know, he's kind of struck blind. There's a light from heaven, you know, what does he see he speaks one time about Jesus appeared to me, but is he talking about that or the time when he was caught up into the third heaven there and then then there's something else related to that of but this is the only clear case where it's described someone it's described someone seeing Jesus acts chapter 7 verses 55 and 56 and he Stephen full of the Holy Spirit gays and heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God and he said behold I see the heavens open and the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of God now if someone comes to you and says I saw Jesus I mean, there's a lot of reasons to be skeptical, but first of all, if they say, I saw Jesus on earth, then you really got reasons to be skeptical. He's not physically here. The one time we have it described that someone clearly saw Jesus, it was heaven opened and they saw him sitting at the right hand of God in the heavens, not upon this earth. Jesus is physically somewhere else. Now, didn't Jesus say, Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age? Yes, He did. Is there a spiritual, divine presence of Jesus, especially through His Holy Spirit? Yes, there is. But the physical, bodily presence of Jesus Christ is somewhere else. It's in heaven, at the right hand of the Father. So this has implications not only for how we think about the Lord's Supper, this has implications for expecting to see Jesus. We're not to expect to see Jesus on this earth. We're not to expect to see the angel of the Lord as some of the Old Testament saints did. And there are other great realities assured to us by this truth as well. Hebrews speaks about the necessity of our priest being in heaven and speaks about sureness and steadfastness that we have with knowing our eternal priest, Jesus Christ, is there interceding on our behalf. Those are separate sermons really, but it's a reminder that this physical ascent of the resurrected body of Jesus Christ is from one place to another, and it has real impact on how we think of the Lord's Supper, how we think about seeing Jesus, and how we think of our eternal High Priest. Hebrews 8, Hebrews 6, other chapters in Hebrews. And so it was a visible ascent. But this brings us to our final point. Because Jesus is not only priest who goes up into the Holy of Holies as Hebrews describes it, he's also king. He ascends as king and he will come back as king. Our third point, there is an ultimate coming in Jesus Christ. The disciples are looking, they're gazing into heaven, but they would not remain there motionless. God sends two of His angels, two of His ministering spirits. It doesn't use the word angel here, but we can be confident they're angels for a number of reasons. First of all, they appear suddenly. Second of all, they They know things about these men. They know what they just saw. They speak about the ascent of Jesus. They know that they're from Galilee. They say, O men of Galilee. And their clothing also, they're wearing white robes. And so two angels appear, stood by them in white robes, the end of verse 10. Then, verse 11, they say, Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven will come back in the same way as you saw him go into heaven. He'll come back on a cloud. The Son of Man comes on a cloud, Daniel 7. That is what is the same. There is something that's different. There's something that's different also. Only a few saw Jesus go up. When Jesus comes back, all will see. We read in Philippians 2 that the final exaltation of Christ is that every knee will bow, every tongue confess. How about Matthew 24 verse 30? 24, we'll begin at verse 29. Immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then will appear in heaven the sign of the Son of Man, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and glory. The angels didn't lie, certainly. There's something that's exactly the same. He went up in the clouds, He'll come back in the clouds. There's something that's different. He went up before a few, He will come back before every tribe, before every nation. See, we live, this is the framework of our age, but it would be denied, right? Only a few saw Him go up, and then some don't believe. what is recorded plainly for us in the Word of God by Luke and by others. So it might be denied that He's coming back. He did go up and He will come back. And when He comes back, there will no longer be any way to doubt. Everyone will see. Stephen saw him in heaven. When Jesus is next seen physically on earth, everyone will see him. Read in Zephaniah that some will try to hide. There is no hiding, everyone will see. So it is the ultimate. The angels, they come in white. They don't tell the disciples to be sad. Revelation chapter 3, if you would turn there with me, we'll read backwards. We'll read verse 21 first and then we'll go back to verse 10. Revelation chapter 3. Why is this not a reason to be sad? Well, we said when we read Philippians, right, that exaltation, it follows, it follows the humility to the death on the cross. The ascent of Jesus Christ is not a point of humility, it's a point of exaltation. And somewhere like Revelation 3 would make this clear. In Revelation 3, verse 21, This speaks about that Jesus is on the throne already and then we'll go backwards and read about the ultimate ruling. Revelation 3 verse 21, the one who conquers I will grant him to sit with me on my throne as I also conquered and sat down with my father on his throne. So in the letter to the churches here, what is being spoken of? It's speaking of that session, Jesus ascended and then the session is that he sits down at the hand of God. It's speaking about that he ascended and he's now sitting on his throne. He is the king, he is sitting on his throne. This is not a reason to be sad. The angels don't come and say, they don't come and say cry, they come and they say, he is gone, he'll come back. And now go and depart. And then we would turn to Luke 24 and we would read that they did go. When they went down, they went down rejoicing. Not a reason to be sad. But it is true that the final, ultimate, complete victory has not yet come. Verse 10, because you have kept my word about patient endurance, I will keep you from the hour of trial that is coming on the whole world to try those who dwell on the earth. I am coming soon. Hold fast what you have so that no one may seize your crown. The one who conquers, I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God. shall he go out of it, and I will write on him the name of my God and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which comes down from my God out of heaven and out of the new name. He who has an ear to hear, let him hear." In other words, Jesus is on the crown, on the throne already, verse 21, but that final victory both for his people and that final visible coming has not yet come. This is a reason to be joyful. This is a reason to go labor on. Go spread the news. Many, many generations of Christians have thought that their generation was the last generation. Because there's always wars and rumors of war, There's always the poor, there's always the effects of evil. Will we be another generation that future generations look back on and say, they said, surely this, he'll come now. All the evil in the world. Will we be that generation or will we be the generation when he comes? Will He come before our lifetime is over? We return to the fact that we do not know, but that our task either way is not to look up to heaven. Our task is to go forth and to speak of what will come. Go labor on. tell others what the framework of this world is, that I came down in humility, that I was raised up in exaltation, and that I'll come down again in judgment for those who do not believe. We labor in light of what He has done. We take comfort in where He is. The psalmist says, be of good courage. We have even more reason to be of good courage. He has left us, but it was part of God's plan. And at the same time, we do wait eagerly. We do say, Lord, come quickly. We do want the full, ultimate kingdom of God to be seen. But not before all who must hear have heard. Not before that witness, that labor is complete. Speak quickly, dear Christians. Come quickly, Lord Jesus. Let us pray. Father Almighty, our holy God, make us to know the very definition of the time in which we live. May this bring us through everything which must be endured in this in-between time, when we at once have an exalted Lord and still live on a fallen and cursed earth. And make us then to witness who you are and what you have done and what you will do. This we pray in the name of Jesus, our Ascended King. Amen. People of God, our song of application 373 will stand to sing, number 373. After that is our offering for Pablo Landisuri and the Ecuador Missions, but first let us stand to sing number 373. I'm on my mountain triumph