RESURRECTION - ASCENSION - PENTECOST

After the splendid victory on the Cross and His Resurrection on the third day, the Lord ascended to heaven bodily and sat at the right hand of the throne of God the Father (Ps. 110,1. Heb. 1,3). Our Lord was humbled, crucified and died; He tasted the bitter cup of death for every person. Now, after His holy Resurrection and His bodily divine Ascension, He is crowned with perfect "glory and honor" to guide many persons to eternal glory (cf. Heb. 2,9-10). The ascended Lord went up into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father; He entered His pre-existing glory and called the entire human race to be and remain with Him in heaven (cf. Eph. 2,4-6), there "at the right hand of God" the Father where He himself "sat" eternally! (Heb. 10,12).

Through the glorious and bodily Ascension of the Lord, man, who was the target of the devil, the originator of evil, is not simply honored; man also sits together and jointly reigns with God the Logos. This is why we sing on the day of the Ascension of our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ: "O God, the nature of Adam which descended to the lower regions of earth, after You renewed it (with your divine Incarnation, the blood of the Cross, the victory over corruption and the divine Resurrection), You also raised it up today above every rule and authority; for You loved it and accompanied it; You sympathized with it and united it to Yourself. Having united human nature to Yourself You suffered together with it; Being dispassionate, You, nevertheless, suffered with it and, consequently, glorified it with yourself".

Moreover, by virtue of the divine Ascension man has the possibility for personal deification, which is offered of course by grace from the victor of death and Hades. St. Basil says: Our Lord Jesus Christ did not only give us life, while we were dead, but He also granted us the gift of divinity and prepared eternal blessings whose magnitude of gladness the human mind cannot comprehend.

By virtue of the God-Ìan's Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension to heaven we put away the image of the earthly man and put on the image of the heavenly man. The period of our exile from Paradise has ended, for the portal is once again open to receive us. All these salutary deeds were done once and for all time, but also definitely. In Christ, death lost its power. Thus, it now is fearful only in name, but not in reality. For this reason there is "peace on earth", but also "peace in heaven and glory in the highest".

With these immeasurable and inconceivable gifts, the new creation in Christ is much higher than the first creation. For the Lord did not simply benefit us the degree that Adam's sin had hurt us, but much more. Our redemption, regeneration and return to God is complete and definite. Through the resurrected and ascended Christ humble and mortal human nature is honored so much that it exceeds all the degrees of created beings. This is why we sing in the Orthodox Church: Ï miracle new and marvellous, similar to no other in the world. This miracle is precisely that the nature of mortals, which was united with the divine nature of the almighty God the Logos, in an inexplicable manner, was raised to heaven and became a partaker of the blessed glory of the Trinity.

The marvelous thing is that man, by incorporating his nature in God the Logos, the Head of the Church, is placed not simply above but very much above the angelic powers and becomes a partaker of divine glory! For, as St. Chrysostom asks, to which nature did God say "sit at my right"? He said it to that human nature which had heard once in Paradise, "Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return!" Thus, man, who proved unworthy of the divine gifts, who became "a play thing of the demons" and captive of death, now overcomes death and is clothed in incorruption. And man who had fallen to such chaos that there was no "lower place to fall", was raised now to such height that there is no "higher place to rise". Man is now at the right hand of the throne of God, for "where the head is, the body is also; for by no means is the head separated from the body; for if it were indeed separated, there would not be a body and there would not be a head", as St. John Chrysostom observes. And in utter amazement he exclaims: "My God, look where He has raised the ecclesia (church)!" And elsewhere: "Truly these are awesome things!

This same truth is so beautifully expressed by St. Symeon the New Theologian.

"If the forefathers had repented then, when they were still in paradise they would have received only Paradise and nothing more, since they had been banished from Paradise for their lack of repentance. But later, they repented and wept much and suffered ñain and sweat and tïil and for this the Lord God of all willed to honor them and to glorify them and to make them forget all those evil things that they had suffered. And what did He do? Think of Çis great philanthropy. After descending to Hades and raising them, He did not place them again in that Paradise from which they were expelled, but rather he raised them to the heaven of heaven. And when our Lord Jesus Christ was seated at the right of God, his õnïriginate Father - consider this nïw - with what glory and honor did He glorify Adam (that is, the human nature, the human race), who was by nature Çis slave but who by grace served as Çis Father? Do you see to what sort of heights our Lord Christ raised him?" The philanthropic God, however, did not honor and glorify "ïnly Adam but also us his sons, that is, those who imitated his repentance and the tears and the lamentations(...). God continues to this day to glorify and to honor, as He did Adam, those who repent as they should and do the things which Adam did".

St. John Chrysostom compares what we lost through our transgression with what we gained through the God-Ìan, and states:

"In the beginning of creatiïn the Creator created man in the image of God, while nïw Çe has õnited man to God. Then he was given authority to rule over the fish and the animals. Íïw God has raised our new beginning above the heavens. Since the ascended Christ with Çis holy flesh has become, like the first fruits, the beginning of those who had fallen asleep, Çe has caused our entire human race to be blessed through that one flesh and beginning. Before, because of sin, nothing was more debased than man, while nïw nothing has become more honored than man. Through the resurrected and ascended Christ man conquers corruption and acquires incorruption. Ìan conquers death, because death has been entirely defeated and abolished and appears nowhere, while man acquires immortality and is deifed. Íïw, indeed, God and mankind have become one race".

These are the things which the pious hymnographer has in mind and this is why he writes in the magnificat of the Ninth Ode in the Canon for the Ascension: "The God and Logos of the Father who became man in a marvelous and magnificent manner, He who became poor and humble in the flesh, rose manifestly to heaven through the glorious Ascension and is much beyond the heavens. Our human nature, which had sinned and been banished from Paradise, deprived of divine glory and confidence, was through the Ascension of the Lord honored to sit with the Father. Let us, therefore, celebrate and exclaim all together the hymn of victory and let us clap our hands with spiritual joy and gladness".

But, for one to make the gifts of the Ascended Christ one's ïwn it is necessary together with Jesus to live His life as one's ïwn. Then, one can exclaim with St. Gregory the Theologian: "Yesterday I was crucified together with Christ, today I am glorified together with Çim; yesterday I was dying with Çim, today I am liíing with Çim; yesterday I was buried with Çim, today I am raised with Çim. Therefore, let us bear and offer appropriate fruit to Çim who died and rose for us". Thus, our participation in the blessings of the Ascended Christ makes Easter truly a holiday of "pass-over" by which we abandon "this dark and heavy Egypt of earthly life...", we triumph over corruption and death, and journey with gladness toward the promised land, the heavenly Jerusalem where eternal life and ceaseless joy reigns.

NIKOLAOS P. VASSILIADIS,
From his Book "THE MYSTERY OF DEATH"
Orthodox Brotherhood of Theologians "The Savior"