Kindred in Christ,

This coming Sunday is an important day in the church calendar—Ascension Sunday! Yet, unlike other holy days such as Easter or Christmas, Ascension Day is not accompanied by a wealth of traditions. I do not know about you, but I did not grow up celebrating Ascension Day dinners with my family, nor have I ever given out Ascension Day cards to my friends. Perhaps it is because the story of Jesus’ Ascension is not exactly a happy story. For in a sense, the disciples experience God leaving them. In Acts 1:1-11, Jesus had only been back from the dead for a short while when he decides to leave the disciples and ascend to heaven. This must have been very frustrating to Jesus’ followers, who wished that Jesus would just settle down and for things to go back to how they used to be before the crucifixion. Yet Jesus does not reveal to us a God that settles down, but rather a God who leaves in order for us to follow after God into something new and more grace-filled than we could have imagined.

Join us this Sunday as we reflect further upon the story of the Jesus’ Ascension and continue in our series Lessons from the Wilderness. Hope to see you on Facebook Live!

Alongside you,

-Rev. Paul Ortiz