God cannot come uninvited... Ascension B

Today Jesus ascended into heaven.  To ascend means to go up and indeed that was what the disciples saw – Jesus went up to the heavens.    This is a way of expressing that belief that Jesus, after his mission here on earth, went back to his Father, he now goes back from where he came from and he now sits at the right hand of his Father.  Jesus has to go.  He has to leave behind his disciples.  He himself said so.  Unless I go, he said, the Spirit cannot come.

There are two things I would like us all to reflect on the ascension of the Lord.

First, absence and presence are intimately connected.  We can truly see the value and importance of each others presence when that presence is taken away, when that presence is withdrawn from us. 

My mother died more than a year ago now and yet every time I go home, every time I sit at our dining table alone, I would find myself staring at the empty chair in front of me.  Something is missing, something is absent, life it feels has become incomplete.  I didn’t feel that way when she was still around but when she was gone I begun to feel lacking.  When we miss somebody, when we feel the need for them, when we long for their presence, something is missing, something is lacking, like a hole in one’s heart that needs to be filled in.

We have to have an absence in order to desire a presence.  Absence is needed otherwise there is no emptiness, there is no incompleteness, there is no longing, there is no yearning in love that will welcome with joy the presence. 

And I believe this is what Jesus is showing us.  Many times just like the disciples we feel the absence of Jesus in our lives, we feel the absence of God in our world – a world without love, a world without God.  Jesus left us.  There are times when we feel that he is not around when we needed him the most; he is not around when we long for him the most; he is nowhere to be found when we desire his assuring presence the most.  And yet if you notice, the emptiness that is carved out in our hearts by his absence, create in us a longing, a need, a desire for God.  That absence is needed. 

God has to create in us a longing, for God cannot come uninvited.  God has to create in us an emptiness he alone can fill for God cannot come when he is unneeded.  God has to create a feeling of absence because he cannot come when his presence is not desired.

Absence is necessary so that we can yearn for his presence.

Second, the ascension of Jesus also reminds us that we cannot limit God.  God was made flesh in Jesus.  In his incarnation he was born to a particular country, he lived among a particular people, at a particular time. 

In the ascension however, Jesus did not remain limited and confined to these.  He is no longer tied up to only one country – Israel.  He is no longer identified only to one people - the Jewish people.  And he is no longer limited in time to just one era - the Roman Era.  By his ascension Jesus becomes Lord of all, he has dominion over all and he lives forever.

The ascension of Jesus reminds us that we cannot limit God, we cannot localize God; we cannot bound God’s love to just one type of people; we cannot confine God’s action to just one specific place.  God is free.  We just have to allow God to be God.

God’s sacredness cannot be limited to a particular space like a church, a shrine or an altar.  The whole world is sacred, the whole world is a shrine, even our places of work are sacred, our homes are sacred, our environment is sacred.  There is danger when we confine God and the sacred only in church, for then we allow sin to flourish in the other areas of our lives, we allow greed and selfishness to thrive in our businesses; we permit corruption to run our politics. 

God’s love cannot be confined to a particular people only.  All is loved by God, saints and sinners are loved by God, even those who do not believe are loved by God.  Problems come when we claim God’s love only for ourselves. Then we become bigots, we become extremists, and we become self-righteous.  God is free to love whom he wants and he loves all.

God’s ways and actions cannot be confined only to rituals.  Prayer is not only about kneeling or lighting candles.  It is not only saying the rosary or the Our Father and theHhail Mary.  We encounter God even in the daily events of our lives.  God speaks to us not just in the bible but even in the persons we meet.  God challenges us in the problems we face.  God is in our recreation, in our triumphs, in our joys as much as we encounter him in our discouragements and defeats, even in our sufferings and trials.

In the ascension Jesus has become free, God is free.  Let us allow God to be God.