LORD’S DAY 18
46. How do you understand the words, “He ascended into heaven?”That Christ, in sight of His disciples, was taken up from the earth into heaven;1 and that He is there for our benefit,2 until He shall come again to judge the living and the dead.3
1 Mk 16:19; Lk 24:50-51; Acts 1:9-11; 2 Rom 8:34; Heb 4:14, 7:23-25, 9:24; 3 Mt 24:30; Acts 1:11
47. Is Christ, then, not with us unto the end of the world, as He has promised?1
Christ is true man and true God: according to His human nature, He is now not on earth;2 but according to His divine nature, majesty, grace, and Spirit, He is never absent from us.3
1 Mt 28:20; 2 Mt 26:11; Jn 16:28, 17:11; Acts 3:19-21; Heb 8:4; 3 Mt 28:18-20; Jn 14:16-19, 16:13
48. But are not the two natures in Christ separated from one another if the human nature is not wherever the divine nature is?
By no means; for since the divine nature is incomprehensible and everywhere present,1 it must follow that it is indeed beyond the bounds of the human nature, which He has taken on, nevertheless it is within this human nature and remains personally united to it.2
1 Jer 23:23-24; Acts 7:48-49; 2 Jn 1:14, 3:13; Col 2:9
49. What benefit do we receive from Christ’s ascension “into heaven?”
First, He is our Advocate in the presence of His Father in heaven.1 Second, we have our flesh in heaven as a sure pledge, that He, our Head, will also take us, His members, up to Himself.2 Third, He sends us His Spirit, as a down payment,3 by whose power we seek those things which are above, where Christ sits on the right hand of God, and not things on the earth.4
1 Rom 8:34; 1 Jn 2:1; 2 Jn 14:2, 17:24; Eph 2:4-6; 3 Jn 14:16; Acts 2:33; 2 Cor 1:21-22, 5:5; 4 Col 3:1-4
