And He led them out as far as Bethany, and lifting up His hands, He blessed them. And it happened that while He was blessing them, He parted from them and was carried up into heaven. And they, after worshiping Him, returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were continually in the temple blessing God.
Luke 24:50-53
Introduction
The very end of the gospel according to Luke. Here we see the summary of what is expanded on a bit in the first chapter of Acts as Jesus blesses the disciples and ascends into heaven. There are a couple things to consider in this passage that make it stand out, though.
The first is that the blessing Jesus gave the disciples is both finished (He blessed them) and ongoing (while He was blessing). It can often be difficult to discern what words Jesus meant for the apostles only and what He meant for all of us. What is reassuring in this passage is that He gives a blessing in two distinct parts.
The second is that the disciples were worshiping Him as He ascended. Worship is an act that is exclusively reserved for God. This is a very important passage to remember when considering the nature of Jesus Christ. Yes, He is fully man. Without His humanity, He could never represent the rest of us before God. But He is also fully God. Without His divinity, He could never accomplish what He accomplished.
And they, after worshiping Him
Starting with the second major observation, we need to be reminded that the nature of Jesus Christ is vitally important to the integrity of the gospel. His being man is not largely disputed these days among people who claim to be Christians. In the early Church, Gnosticism was a large enough problem that volumes upon volumes were written on the subject.
The Gnostics claimed a lot of things, but one of the core principles they generally held to was that Jesus was not a man, but a spirit only. That is because of their misguided conviction that the material world was inherently evil by the very fact that it was material. These days not many would claim that. So-called “Christian Science” teaches the material world is an illusion, and so tacitly denies this truth about Christ’s incarnation, but apart from them there are not many.
On the opposite end of that continuum, however, are those who would claim Jesus is not divine. Or at least that He is only partially divine. Or that He is some other kind of divine. In this camp we see groups today like Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses. You can know they are wrong about this conviction regarding Jesus’ divinity though by this passage alone (though there are many more that corroborate it). If Jesus was not God, the apostles would have been committing idolatry by worshiping Him. And we received the entire New Testament of scripture through the apostles. If they believed Jesus was worthy of worship, so ought we.
Be blessed
What really caught my eye about this passage was that Jesus not only blessed His disciples, but was taken up into heaven “while He was blessing them.”
A lot of people find a grammatical analysis of scripture intimidating. And that mostly comes from the fact that in order to truly analyze the grammar, one must understand the original language. Now the barrier of entry went from “know grammar” to “know Ancient Greek grammar” and things became a lot more complicated. But one of the blessings we have as English speakers is an abundance of translations available to us.
The same cannot be said for most other languages, having a handful of translations at most. Because we have so many English translations, we are able to compare between them. And where there is overwhelming consensus, we can reasonably conclude things that are true about the foundational Greek (or Hebrew) text. And what you will find about this text is that regardless of whether the translators used “while” or “as,” the implication presented is that He was taken into Heaven before His blessing was concluded.
The blessing Jesus was giving to His disciples can be found in Matthew 28 when He gives the disciples a command to, “make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,” telling them to go out for this purpose and to teach their disciples all He commanded. But the blessing He gives is, “behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” And this blessing is for all Christians. He does not abandon us simply because the days of the apostles have ended. He is with His Church and will remain with her as history culminates in the grand marriage of the two (Revelation 19:7-8). Take comfort in knowing He will never abandon us, but will remain with us through all trials until His coming in glory.
May the Lord bless you and conform you into the image of His Son.
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