Sermon Excerpt:
With Open Minds
Luke 24:44-53, Acts 1:1-11
Rev. Randy Quinn
According to Luke, Jesus
made several appearances after Easter before ascending into heaven 40
days later (Acts 1:3). We’re celebrating Ascension Sunday because
it’s been 40 days since Easter. (For those who do the math, Ascension
Day was actually on Thursday of this week.) And next week is
Pentecost, when we will mark the 50th Day since Easter –
the end of a “week of weeks,” or as the Hebrew holiday is often
called, the Festival of Weeks.
But Luke chooses to both
close his Gospel and to open his sequel with the story of the
Ascension. And that has been puzzling me all week. Why this story?
Why end the Gospel here? And why repeat the story in the opening
chapter of his next book?
So I went back to
re-read the beginning of Luke. And I found it curious that the first
story he tells is the story of Zechariah entering the temple to pray (Lk.
1:5-13). You remember that story, right? – an angel visits him and
tells him that he will have a son and he is to name him John, the man
we know as John the Baptist.
That means Luke ends the story
where it began – in the temple . . . Subscribers:
