This Isn't Goodbye

May 20, Ascension Sunday, is the day on which many Christians observe Christ’s ascension into heaven following His death, burial, and resurrection.

What must the disciples have thought? One moment Jesus was speaking to them, and the next He was being taken up into heaven, enveloped by a cloud, and gone from their view. While the men struggled to process what was happening, two angels appeared beside them, asking, “Why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11 NIV).

Ah, yes. “I go to prepare a place for you... I will come back and take you to be where I am...”

So it’s not over.
This isn’t goodbye.
And the best is yet to come.

I think it must have gone a little like Sheldon Vanauken recorded in A Severe Mercy, of meeting with C.S. Lewis:

“On that last day I met C.S. Lewis at the Eastgate for lunch. We talked, I recall, about death or, rather, awakening after death... I said it would be a sort of coming home, and he agreed. Lewis said that he hoped Davy and I would be coming back to England soon, for we mustn’t get out of touch. ‘At all events,’ he said with a cheerful grin, “We’ll certainly meet again, here – or there.’ Then it was time to go...

When we emerged onto the busy High with the traffic streaming past, we shook hands, and he said, ‘I shan’t say goodbye. We’ll meet again.’ Then he plunged into the traffic. I stood there watching him. When he reached the pavement on the other side, he turned round as though he knew somehow that I would still be there in front of the Eastgate. Then he raised his voice in a great roar that easily overcame the noise of the cars and buses. Heads turned and at least one car swerved. ‘Besides,’ he bellowed with a great grin, ‘Christians NEVER say goodbye!’

I like to remember that on Ascension Sunday. Jesus never said a last goodbye – because He’s coming back! Meanwhile, His Spirit waits with us for that awesome day when the shout goes out:

Behold, He comes!
Riding on the clouds,
Shining like the sun,
At the trumpet call;
Lift your voice,
It’s the Year of Jubilee,
And out of Zion’s Hill
Salvation comes!