The ascension of Jesus Christ is presented as a pivotal event, predicted in the Old Testament and confirmed by numerous proofs. The sermon details Old Testament predictions from Proverbs and Psalms, and symbolic pictures like the two birds in Leviticus and Elijah's ascension, illustrating Christ's return to God with the marks of his sacrifice. The proof of his ascension is established through the Word of God, the testimony of witnesses, the coming of the Holy Spirit, the observance of the Lord's Day, the existence of the Church, the unchanging nature of Christ's voice, his post-resurrection miracles, and his ongoing care for believers. The sermon concludes by emphasizing Christ's present power and authority at God's right hand, enabling him to save to the uttermost and intercede for humanity.
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So we turn to our text in Acts chapter one. Acts chapter one. And verse nine. And when he had spoken these things while they beheld, he was taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight. And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven, as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel.
We were speaking this morning at the worship meeting, a little about the holiness of God expressed in white. There you have two coming directly from the presence of God best in quite a power. Which also said, ye men of Galilee, Why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven. We want to speak this morning on the prediction of the ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ, and also the proof of it, and also the proclamation and power of that great event.
First of all, you have the prediction of it. There's an amazing verse over in the Old Testament. You'll find it in Proverbs thirty, and verse four, and I'm going to read it to you. Who has ascended up into heaven? And you'll remember the Lord Jesus quoted this in John chapter three. Who hath ascended up into heaven or descended? Who hath gathered the wind in his fists? Who hath hung the waters in his garments? And who hath established all the end of the earth?
Who is his name? What is his name? And what is his son's name if thou canst stand? Making it very plain that the one speaking here is God himself, way back in the Old Testament, and he said now, what's my son's name? Can you give it to me? Well, you find it, of course, when Christ was born, how the angels announced. what his name was to be, thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save us people from their sins. And Christ himself referred to this text when he said, Who hath ascended up to heaven?
Only he who came down from heaven, even the Son of Man which is in heaven, pointing out the fact that he not only came down, but he went back up. into the very presence of God. And so lovely verse at the close of Luke chapter twenty four, you may read it at your leisure, and verse fifty, and he led them out as far as to Bethany, and lifted up his hands and blessed them. They came to pass while he blessed them, he was parted from them, and carried up into heaven. And they worshipped him, and returned to Jerusalem, with great joy, and were continually in the temple praising and blessing God, Amen.
Now there you have those texts that we've read and the one in Acts showing the definite expression and pronouncement of the ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ. Furthermore, it's predicted in the Old Testament in Psalm twenty-four. Where you have the Lord Jesus ascending back into God's presence after his resurrection and forty days among his disciples. Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye, lift up ye everlasting doors, and let the King of Glory come in.
Who is this King of Glory? The Lord of hosts. He is the King of Glory. On there you have that text. in Psalm twenty four, announcing the celebration that Christ received when he went back to the Father. Also God said in Psalm one hundred and ten, when Christ ascended, set thou at my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footsteps. So you have these Old Testament predictions. Then you also have it pictured in the Old Testament, the ascension of Jesus Christ.
You remember in the fourteen chapter of Leviticus? Here is the leper. And of course he's outside the camp. But the time comes when he's in a condition, the leprosy has cleared up to the point where he can now come into the city and be returned to his family and attend the worship at the temple. And so the priest goes out to where the leopard is. And the priest takes two birds. These two birds are caught and one bird is killed. The priest rings the head off the one bird and, of course, the blood is caught.
And then he takes a little of that blood, and strangles it upon the leper, and pronounces them three. He then takes the living bird, and he dips the living bird in the blood of the bird that was slain, and he lets it go in the open heavens that it might go back to its native element, but with drops of blood upon its feathers. That living bird goes back into the air, the atmosphere, with the marks of death of Christ. These two birds give us a picture of Christ in his death, resurrection, and ascension to the cross.
Christ's blood was shed upon the cross, and when a poor sinner accepts Christ, then the Spirit of God makes good to that sinner, what Christ did for him at Calvary, and figuratively speaking, he is sprinkled with blood on the basis of the sacrifice of Christ that sinner's sins are forgiven, and he has peace with God. And then the bird that returned to the air with the blood upon its feather speaks of Christ, going back to the Father, his native host, going back to the presence of God with the marks of death upon.
There are the scars and his hands and in his feet, and if he brushed aside his garment, you'd see the scar on his side made by the Roman sphere. Christ to this day wears those scar scars in the globe. And so he went back to heaven with a mark of death upon us. And the book of Revelation speaks of Christ being seen as a lamb freshly slaved. Nineteen centuries in heaven hasn't caused those wounds to become stale. He has a lamb freshly slaved.
There's nothing aging. There's nothing decayed. There's nothing stale. about the Lord Jesus Christ. He's forever friend. He's a sacrifice. He's as though he died yesterday. But there are the scars. The lamb best slayed slaves. And so you have these pictures in the Old Testament of the ascension of the Lord Jesus going back to the Father's right hand with the marks, the scars of death upon him. You also have another incident when the angel appeared to Manoa's wife and told her about the fact that she was going to have a son.
And the same name of that son was Sampson. And when Manoa also got the information from the angel of the Lord, he made a sacrifice upon a rock. And as the flame of the sacrifice ascended toward heaven, the angel of the Lord ascended in the flame and vanished out of sight. In other words, the angel of the Lord ascended on the basis of the sacrifice that was offered upon that altar. The Lord Jesus Christ went back to heaven on the basis And in the fragrance of, for his old work upon the cross, Christ went back to heaven, and you know I to be saved.
Had he not sacrificed himself, shed his blood upon the cross, and received by the Father his work was done, he ascended in all the fullness and fragrance of his own finished work into the presence of God. Then you have another case. You remember how Elijah and Elijah crossed over Jordan. And Elijah, the elder prophet, he took his mantle, and he smoked the waters of Jordan, and they parted, and they went over. The young prophet undoubtedly admired the age prophet Elijah, and he said, I want to have your mantle.
I want that power you've got. All right, said Elijah. If you see me go, you may have it. In other words, you keep your eye on me. For if I should go, and you not see me, you can't have it. But as it happened, Elijah did see Elijah go. As the chariot came down, and caught away Elijah. Elisha had his eyes fixed and focused upon the old prophet. From the moment he told them, If you see me, go, you may have my mantle.
And so he saw him go. And the mantle was left for the younger prophet Elisha. He took it out. He smote the waters of the river Jordan. and he had Elijah's power because the waters parted, and he went over. There could be no power for you or me in service, as Christians, until the Lord Jesus went to heaven. Then he left us the mantle in the person and work of the Holy Spirit. Elijah had the same power as Elijah.
And I want to say this revelingly, we have the very same power that Jesus Christ had, the power of the Spirit of God. There is only one evangelist. There is only one Bible teacher. There is only one soul in earth. That's the Lord Jesus Christ, and he's working through you and through me. We can only preach, we can only teach, we can only win souls in the measure the Spirit of God is working through us. And so it's Christ working through the members of his body as people that enables others to be blessed.
And the Spirit of God would not have come on the day of Antioch had Jesus Christ not arisen. How wonderful that is. And the Lord Jesus Christ himself three times in the Gospel of John says, What and if I ascend back to where I was before? Here he is referring to his return to the Father, his ascension. did he not say to Mary Magdalene, go tell my disciples I ascend to my Father, to your Father, to my God, and to your God.
Yes, Mary, I am going back. Possibly next Sunday without something to say about that lovely little town of Bethany, where is the Mount of Olives from whence the Savior departed this earth to go back to be with the Father. And so we have these evidences of the resurrection and the ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ. Predictions in the Old Testament and pictured also in the Old Testament and promised by Christ himself. Now the proof of his ascension. Last week we mentioned fifteen infallible proofs of the resurrection and ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ.
For the sake of those who are not here and others who may want their mind refreshed, here they are. We mention the fact of the Word of God, the Old and the New Testament. That's one proof we have that if the Bible tells me that Jesus Christ, my goes again, he has sent it back to heaven, I need no other proof. That is one imperable proof that Jesus Christ is right where he is. The Word of God cannot be wrong, and God cannot lie.
Then we notice the witnesses, five hundred and twenty-five witnesses, or twenty-four, I think it was, as in First Corinthians fifteen, that saw the Lord Jesus after he rose from the dead until the time he was taken from them back into heaven. Then we mention the Spirit of God. The very fact that the Spirit of God came down is proof positive that Jesus Christ had gone up. Then you have the proof of the Lord's day. The people would still be keeping the old Jewish Sabbath, which was yesterday, Saturday, if Christ had not ascended.
The very fact that Jesus Christ ascended gives us the Lord's day, for he arose on the first day of the week, and he went back to heaven, and the Lord's day is what we keep now. This is the Lord's Day. The very fact we keep the first day of the week. The Lord's Day, not the old Sabbath which was yesterday, is another evidence of the presence of glory by Christ at God's right hand. Then we were speaking of the church. There could be no church on earth which is his body without a head in heaven.
you had a body and the head was taken off. Happily, you wouldn't live. In order for a body to function, it must have a head. And in order for a church, an organism, to function here on earth, there must be a living head. That's the Lord Jesus Christ. And the fact that a living organism, known as the church, has functioned for nineteen hundred years It's another proof and evidence, unmistakable, that there's a living man at God's right hand, the head of that body.
And then again, you have the fact of his voice. His voice didn't change. The resonance of that voice didn't change. You remember after he rose from the dead... Mary thought through the morning this and her tears, surely this is the gardener. She sensed the presence of her personality, and she, supposing him to be the gardener, said, Will you tell me where you've laid him, that I may go and take him away? He said, Mary. Little Bonai, Master, she detected that voice.
the experience of death hadn't changed his tone. And those of us who have heard his voice speaking through his words in this day of grace will detect that voice on the resurrection morning. We'll know that voice. We've heard it through his words. We'll hear it on the resurrection morning when he shall come and all the redeemed. shall rise out of their grave, and they which are alive remain, shall be tossed up with them beneath the Lord in the air. Then you have the scars in his hand, another proof, another evidence that Jesus Christ is alive and in God's presence.
Then you have his works. Do you remember how the Lord Jesus told his disciples to launch out into the deep? in Luke chapter five. That incident took place early in his public ministry. But after he rose from the dead, what was the one thing that he did as a repetition of what he did in Luke five? He did it in John chapter twenty-one. He told his disciples, but they tore it all night and caught nothing. Let your net down on the right side.
Now here he's talking to seven experienced fishermen. They could have started in the argument right away. They didn't know who that person was on the bank that had told them to let your net down on the right side. They could have said what difference the eight or ten feet had out here in the lake. And that's no easy task to pull your nets up from the left side and let them down on the right side. But there was authority in that voice. Let your nets down on the right side, and you shall find. And they enclosed a great multitude of fishes.
John says, that's him. John identified him immediately. That's the law. Because Christ had repeated a miracle that he performed early in his ministry, he repeated it after he rose from the bed. And John says, that's the Lord. Soon as another group, the big is the risen Christ. And also he talked with them. He ate with them. He just gave me a piece of a honeycomb. and they gave to him, and he ate, just to satisfy their unbelief.
And again, his care over his own, that's another evidence. And think of how the Lord has cared for his own down these nineteen hundred years. I have no other explanation for my life than a living Christ at God's right hand. He's cared for me. all these years. He's met my every need. As I've said many times in this platform, I've never taken a salary. I've never lived in a collection. I never asked for a dime. People have asked me if I needed money.
I said I wouldn't tell you if I did. There's only one I talk to about those matters. And I've never been in debt in forty years previously. And I've had all the clothes I wanted to wear. You're going to see me with a new one on one of these days. I don't know whether I want to wear it or not. A millionaire died up in Atlanta a couple of months ago, and his wife left me free of his best suits. Now, I'll be wearing one of them, a dead man's suit. But the Lord has many ways of caring for his people.
Yes, that's an evidence of a living Christ. And think of the souls that get saved. Every time a precious soul comes to know Christ the Savior, that's a proof that someone in heaven doing this because Christ only can say so. Salvation is the law, old preachers by pressure and sob stories and so on. and put on a bribe and get church members that I'm talking about, members that only God can add to the church. God added to the church daily such I should be saved, and when a person is genuinely born again, that's the work of the Spirit of God through our listening prayer.
So here are these many infallible truths. that Jesus Christ is alive. He was taken up. The Bible says he was carried up. He was received up. He was passed through the heavens. He entered heaven itself. And Peter says he's sitting on the right hand of the majesty of God. All these expressions giving us all the evidence we need that Jesus Christ is like this man, a living man in heaven. You know Solomon is a lovely type of Christ. David was a man of war. David wanted to build the Lord a temple. God said, no, David, you're a man of war.
And you shed too much blood. You can't build me a temple because the temple is going to be built. It will be figurative of the temple that will be erected in the millennium. When my son shall reign from sea to sea, from pole to pole, there will be peace over all the earth. But Solomon, your son, shall make thee a temple. Your man of war, he's a man of peace. And Solomon built that wonderful temple after his name. There were six steps to Solomon's temple, and there was a golden lion on the end of each step, making twelve golden lions, full size.
but only six steps going up to Solomon's temple. Six is the number of man. How did you get that? Man was created on the sixth day. Six is the number of man. Seven is the number of perfection. And so here is man. He comes short of perfection. And even Solomon, in all his gloated wisdom, his reign over the earth, his wealth, and his wisdom, and his kingdom comes short of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ.
He's the perfect man, and he'll have a perfect administration where he reigns over the earth in a day to come. And he had seven steps to his throne. The first step was Bethlehem, his incarnation. The second step was his consecration when he was baptized in Jordan. And his third step was Gethsemane, or his resignation, when he said not my will, but thine be done. His fourth step was Gavatha, or the place of judgment.
Before Pilate, his humiliation. Before Pilate, over to Herod and back to Pilate again. That was the fourth step. Then Golgotha, that's the fifth step. That's his crucifixion. Then you have the grave, his burial. Yes, and his resurrection. That's the sixth step. The seventh step. his honor, his ascension back to the Father's right hand. And so you have his incarnation, his consecration, his resignation, his humiliation, his crucifixion, his resurrection, and his ascension.
Seven steps back to the Father's right hand. The disciples saw him go. We notice that in reading our text. They saw him go. Why, what a wonderful scene it is. I've been turning it over on mine the last week. We have more to say about it. Lord willing, next Sunday morning. Here he takes his little band out as far as to death in him. On there on the little mount of olives. Not all of them. The Lord Jesus Christ leaves his disciples.
On that he goes. And there they stand watching their ascended Lord. What must the feelings of their hearts be as he finally vanished into the cloud the chariot of heaven and took a lot of sight? And then the two angels, the two men appeared to give them a mission. and to tell them the comforting story that this same Jesus which is taken from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as he has seen him go into heaven.
So the disciples saw him go. You know what then the angels, they also announced the fact that he had gone but he would return. And you notice there are two angels or two men you've heard from them. That's what is significant. You remember when Christ was crucified. And you see at the Mount of Transfiguration Moses and Elias and the Bible tells us they speak of his decease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem. Moses and Elias were talking about the death of Christ.
That was their conversation. Here are two men associated with this crucifixion. Then when Christ was buried on that resurrection morning, two men, angelic beings, one at the head, the other at the feet, were the body of Jesus at length. Now in his ascension, two men. announcing the fact that the same Jesus which is taken from you to heaven shall so come in like manner as you have seen and brought. The Bible says to his testimony. In the mouth of two or three witnesses, let every word be established.
Now I wouldn't take the word of a dozen men for taking to earthly things. That is, certain kinds of men. I would rather believe one angel from heaven than a million men. But here are two men, two angelic beings, and they have confirmed the fact, they have witnessed the fact that Jesus Christ has taken us into heaven and is so done in like manner as you see them go. Two men at his crucifixion, two men at his resurrection, two men connect with his ascension.
You notice a connection with Christ's proclamation, the proclamation of his ascension. You have heaven's response. I mentioned that a while ago, a connection was sound pretty poor. Heaven's proclamation Here comes the conqueror. Here is the victor for his foe. Lift up your heads all ye gates, and be it that thou be everlasting for. What a day of celebration that was when Jesus Christ went back to the Father after being thirty-three and a half years on earth.
What a celebration. I think of men like MacArthur, He came back from the far east, a wonderful general. I don't think we'd have the mess today. We've got in that part of the world that General MacArthur could have lived and handled. But that man came back and what a celebration he had in Washington and all over the world for this great soldier. When Eisenhower came back from the Europe, He too had a great celebration. When the astronauts came back, more celebration.
Here are these heroes. These men have come back from doing a great work. They came back, and oh, what celebration. Well, friend, that's minor, incomparable to the celebration that went on in heaven. when the real hero, when the real covenant went back to heaven after accomplishing a work that saves men from hell, saves them unto eternal life, and glorifies God forever, and makes possible a new heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth eternal righteousness.
Who has the imagination or the vocabulary? tell you the celebration that went on that day when Jesus Christ went back to heaven. In contrast to a celebration, you have demonstration. I thought of this last night. We're living in a day of demonstration, demonstrating against the establishment, be it political or ecclesiastical, Oh, what a difference between celebrating and demonstrating.
There are those who would demonstrate against these men, I've mentioned, radicals. Are they demonstrating against the message of the Ascended Lord today? Yes. Atheists, radicals, ridiculed, even demonstrate against them. fact that Jesus Christ is in heaven, that give us Christianity, they don't believe him. There are those who are devil worship. I haven't read that recently. Devil worshipers, groups all over the country are employed. Another indication of the last days of the satanic influence of the world.
And these groups demonstrate against truth of a risen Christ, they are worshipping the dead. And if there's anything the devil wants the world to believe, is that Jesus Christ is not alive. But you know, in that mob of demonstrators against the fact that we have a living Christ at God's right hand, his resurrection in the sense of, there are those Yes, those who vocally oppose and vocally demonstrate. There are those who violently oppose and violently demonstrate against the fact of what is in Christ.
For there are those who just go wrong with the crowd and don't open their mouth just curious. For when you see among a crowd of fifty thousand demonstrated, I wouldn't want to be found there. You would have to give a lot of explaining. Are you sympathetic to this demonstration? If you are, you shouldn't be here. And I know Christians who are in organizations that are demonstrating against our religion. You always try to.
Modernism. organizing, demonstrating against the installation of the Bible, demonstrating against the virginity, demonstrating against his atonement of the cross, his resurrection, his ascension is coming at it. Some of God's people are drifting with the tide. They're with the demonstrators against it. Lord, let me remind you. Are we celebrating today? Are we with a group that celebrates the ascended Lord? Or are we with those who are demonstrating against these divine, these wonderful truths?
So you have heaven's celebration. You have the celebration of the angels. In the fiftieth of Luke, There's joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repented. And I'm confident that if there's joy among the angels over a repented sinner or a sinner coming to Christ, there must have been a wonderful celebration when the Savior, sinners went there. When Jesus Christ went to the Lord. Oh yes, heaven celebrated. And angels joined in that celebration too. You find that in your Bible, in Revelation, four and five.
Here you find them singing in the celebration of a living Christ. Then there's the church on earth, and the Spirit of God through the church celebrates. Fact of a living Christ, not demonstrating against it. We celebrate the Spirit of God through us as just through the church, the true church, celebrates the fact of a risen, glorified Christ at God's right hand, this same Jesus. You have the privilege of doing that in the meeting prior to this one, celebrating his death, his resurrection, and his coming again, but he says, do this until I come again.
Then you have Peter. What does Peter say? Peter says he's on the right hand and the Majesty and High. Here's Peter's declaration. Here is Peter's proclamation. And Stephen, that we'll be speaking of when we get to chapter seven. Stephen is being stoned to death, and as those stones fell thick and fast, Almost knocking him unconscious and eventually gave him. Stephen, looking upward toward heaven, he saw the Son of Man standing on the right hand of the Majesty on high.
That's the only time in your New Testament you find the Son of God standing. For when he went up, he sat down. at God's right hand. God says, Sit thou at my right hand until I make thy enemies. I whisper. But when the first martyr laid down his life for a living Christ, Jesus Christ stood up and received what he said, Stephen, Lord Jesus, received from his Spirit, laying up his sin to their charge. How like his Lord he was when Christ from the cross says, Father, we pray.
They know not what they do. And Stephen says, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And he tells us this. His body is straightened, displayed in the presence of a living Christ. Jesus Christ stood up to receive the first martyr of the church. There you have Paul on the Damascus Road, this persecutor of the people of God, and he stricken God, a light from heaven blinded. Paul, who spoke, listened to the voice that spoke of him, Lord, what will thou have me to do?
He recognized this glow that fell, this light that shone, this voice that he heard, with the voice of a risen glorified Christ, Lord, what do you have with me? Here is the Apostle Paul giving evidence to the fact, and he laid down his life and his labor. For years he preached this risen Christ, and was willing to suffer for him, and died for him. Now, wouldn't he be fooled to suffer like he did if no such a person lived?
Why would these martyrs die if they had the consciousness and the assurance that the one who were dying for was alive at God's right hand? And the reason the martyrs have died down the centuries is because they've known person of the living Christ, the peace, his peace in their hearts. That's why they suffered for me. We're willing to come. And then the last one, the seventh one, testimony, the John, he says in the Revelation, I saw the land sitting upon his throne.
So you have heaven, you have the angels, you have the spirit in the church, You have Peter, you have Stephen, you have Paul, and you have finally John. He says, I saw the land. Ninety-two-year-old John in the Isle of Patten. He saw the land sitting upon a bull. What a glorious picture it was. And John fell at his feet at one day. Yes, Jesus Christ did the same. He is right now with God's right hand. And another proof of his presence is his power.
For this we conclude. He has power to do what? One of our brethren read this passage in the meeting this morning, referred to it. He's able, first of all, to do exceedingly upon the behalf of all that he has to do. He is able, here is his power, his authority. He is able to do what? What he has promised? He is able also to perform. He has the power, not only to promise, but to fulfill that promise. And he is able to save to the uttermost all that come unto God and the Father's life.
He is able to save from the gutter most of the uttermost, from those in the gutter unto the glory. He's able to do it. What says he's able to keep you, he is able to keep you from falling and prevent you from falling for the presence of his glory with exceeding joy. Right, will I quote the last verse? He is able, not only to do this, not only to fulfill his promise, but not only to save all who have crossed them and save them unto the head, but is able to destroy both soul and body of the unclean brother, but is able to destroy them in caring for us.
O the power resident in the man of God's right hand, See, now he ever lived to make intercession for us. He ever lived to save unto the end. Not unto the end, but unto the end. All that come to God and the Father by him through him is living Christ. And so we've noticed these things. The prediction of his ascension. And then the proofs of His ascension.
And then the proclamation of His ascension on the power of it. And I trust if you haven't known the power of His saving grace in your life, except this morning, come as a lost, guilty, sinner, and receive. And after you're saved, you can depend on and experience that power from day to day. in your life and like Frankie we were hearing about in that nursing home and after I read that letter and the next time I visited my sister I looked at a face the face of about seventy-five people there wasn't a smile on one but Frankie could smile In the midst of all of the warm peace of humanity, he is enjoying the power and the presence of the living, glorified Lord.
Shall we pray? Our Father in heaven, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, we come into thy presence. We ask thy blessing upon thy word, save us souls today, and, O God, Thy beloved people need a closer walk with thee. They need to know more of thy presence and power. May thy word contribute to this end, we ask, in our Lord Jesus' precious name. Amen. Shall we sing? Two hundred and forty-three. Softly and tenderly, Jesus called him.
calling for you and for me. See on the apostles he's waiting and watching, watching for you. And for this living, loving, long-suffering, Lord Jesus Christ is ready, waiting to receive the four lost fifty sinners who are from just as you are. Right now, maybe you've done it during the meeting, you'd like to tell us, or maybe you'd like to do it on the horizon and coming, I'll be singing with you.