Thursday • 5/18/2023 •
Day of Ascension
This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 8; Psalm 47; Ezekiel 1:1–28; Hebrews 2:5–18; Matthew 28:16–20
This morning’s Canticles are: before the Psalm reading, Pascha Nostrum (“Christ Our Passover,” BCP, p. 83); following the OT reading, Canticle 8 (“The Song of Moss,” Exodus 15, BCP, p. 85); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 19 (“The Song of the Redeemed,” Revelation 15:3–4, BCP, p. 94)
Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we consider some aspect of that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I am grateful to be with you.
Today is the Day of Ascension, and it seems an especially appropriate time, here in Year 1 of the Daily Lectionary to begin reading the Book of Ezekiel. The vision that first appears to Ezekiel is loaded with symbolic freight for an ascension-imagination, one shaped by the wonder of the fact that Jesus Christ now reigns from heaven and at the same time dwells within his church on earth.
Anticipation of incarnation. At the end of the vision that launches Ezekiel’s prophetic ministry, God appears to him in bodily form: Ezekiel sees a figure enthroned in God’s battle chariot that looks like a man who has an amber torso, gleaming and fiery, and who has lower parts that look like a burning flame, shining with splendor (Ezekiel 1:26–27). This “figure whose appearance resembles a man” strikes Ezekiel as “the appearance of the likeness of the glory of Yahweh” (Ezekiel 1:26,28).
Fra Angelico , Mystic Wheel: The Vision of Ezekiel, Basilica di San Marco, Florence. Public domain
From a Jewish perspective, the vision is at least borderline scandalous, if not altogether blasphemous. From a Christian perspective, however, the vision is a peek into the day when the glorious Son of God would walk the earth in sandaled feet, and then ascend to heaven to re-take possession of his pre-existent glory. John narrates, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father.” And Jesus prays, “So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed” (John 1:14; 17:5).
Intimation of gospel revelation. Yahweh’s battle chariot displays the faces of four creatures: a human, a lion, an ox, and an eagle (Ezekiel 1:10). Features of these creatures appear also on Babylonian religious statues. Their appearance on Ezekiel’s battle chariot signals that the true Lord and Master of all living things is Yahweh: creatures of the air (eagle), of wild beasts of the wilderness (lion), of domestic livestock (ox), and of humans themselves (man).
These same creatures appear in a similar vision in the throne room vision in the Book of Revelation (Revelation 4:6–7). Early church tradition associates each creature with a particular Gospel:
• the man with Matthew, whose gospel begins with genealogies stressing Jesus’s human lineage;
• the lion with Mark, whose gospel begins with John the Baptist’s voice in the wilderness, the domain of the lion;
• the ox with Luke, whose gospel begins with Zechariah the future father of John the Baptist carrying out his sacrificial duties in the temple, where on the Day of Atonement an ox would be sacrificed for the sins of the people; and
• the eagle with John, whose gospel begins with the elevated, “high flying” perspective of Jesus, the Logos of God, being both “with God and God.”
Doré - Bible Ezechielovo vidění. Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld , Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Of course, there’s not a straight line from Ezekiel to this Christian application of his imagery. But the hints of God’s embodiment and the theme of God’s ability to be present to his people wherever they are (next point) make it easy to see how the imagination of early Christians would have adopted these symbols. Jesus, now ascended to the right hand of the Father, ministers his presence to us, in part, through the Gospels that are associated with these figures.
Lack of geographical limitation to God’s presence. The creatures on the chariot of Ezekiel’s vision have wings that touch one another. In Ezekiel 10, we find that the creatures of Ezekiel’s vision are cherubim. Just like the cherubim atop the ark of the covenant in the Jerusalem temple, their wings touch (Ezekiel 1:9; 2 Chronicles 3:11). The wings give Ezekiel’s chariot-ark mobility, and so do its wheels: “As I looked at the living creatures, I saw a wheel on the earth beside the living creatures, one for each of the four of them … When they moved, they moved in any of the four directions without veering as they moved. … When the living creatures moved, the wheels moved beside them; and when the living creatures rose from the earth, the wheels rose. Wherever the spirit would go, they went, and the wheels rose along with them; for the spirit of the living creatures was in the wheels” (Ezekiel 1:15,17,19,20). The image inspired the spiritual “Ezekiel Saw the Wheel”:
Ezekiel saw the wheel;
Way up in the middle of the air.
And the big wheel run by Faith, good Lord;
And the little wheel run by the Grace of God;
And a wheel in a wheel good Lord;
Way in the middle of the air.
It is a powerful symbol for every generation of believers who know they are strangers and aliens—from the Babylonian Captivity through the African dispersion, and beyond—that, unlike all the other gods, the God of the Bible is everywhere and anywhere. The absolutely majestic truth of the Ascension of Jesus Christ is that he now has the ability to be here, there, and everywhere. There’s not a moment he is not with us, nor a moment in which he is not superintending all things, “in heaven and on earth and under the earth” (Matthew 28:18; Philippians 2:10).
Collect of the Day: Ascension Day. Almighty God, whose blessed Son our Savior Jesus Christ ascended far above all heavens that he might fill all things: Mercifully give us faith to perceive that, according to his promise, he abides with his Church on earth, even to the end of the ages; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, in glory everlasting. Amen.
Be blessed this day,
Reggie Kidd+