The one who had been crucified, God ‘made … both Lord and Christ’ (Acts 2:36).
The title ‘Lord’ (kurios), deployed more than one hundred times in the New Testament, asserts Jesus’ eternal deity — his nature and status as full and true God, co-equal with the Father.
Immediate and timely recognition of this absolute Divinity is seen in the disciples’ worshipping him once ‘he had departed from them and was carried up into heaven’ (Luke 24:51-52).
‘Yet King of kings and Lord of lords he is, and one day it will all be clear.’
Enthronement Finalised the Ascension
It was his ascension that signalled the crowning moment of Jesus’ kingship.
With its background in the Enthronement Psalms (2, 24, 68, 110), the ascension marked the beginning of his new phase of rule as King and Lord — confirming God the Son’s full installation by God the Father into the messianic office, occupying unqualified authority over God’s universal Kingdom of salvation and judgment.
The ascension is therefore God the Father’s own Divine act, whereby Jesus — having perfectly completed his God-given task — ‘was taken up into heaven’ (Mark 16:19; cf. Luke 24:51; Acts 1:2, 9, 11, 22; 1 Tim 3:16), admitted and welcomed into the Father’s immediate presence, taking up the chief position at the Father’s side.
‘Seated at the right hand of the power of God’ (Luke 22:69). ‘He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high’ (Heb 1:3). And he remains now ‘seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven, a minister in the holy places’ (Heb 8:1-2; cf. John 3:13; 6:62; 20:17; Eph 1:20; 4:8; Heb 10:12; 12:2).
To sit at the Father’s right hand is equivalent to calling Christ ‘the Father’s deputy, who has in his possession the whole power of God’s dominion.’1Calvin, Institutes, 2.15.5; Battles ed., 500.
Done To Him, and By Him
Yet it’s equally true that the ascension was not merely something done to Christ but by him.
As Bavinck explains:
‘The ascension was also his own deed. He had the right to it and the power to do it. He went up in his own strength (John 3:13; 20:17; Eph 4:8-10; 1 Pet 3:22). His ascension is a triumph in an even stronger sense than the resurrection. In it he triumphs over the whole earth, over all the laws of nature, over the gravity of matter. What is more, his ascension is a triumph over all the hostile diabolical and human forces which were robbed by God of their armor in the cross of Christ, were exhibited in their helplessness, and bound to Christ’s chariot of victory (Col 2:15). They are led away now as captives by Christ himself (Eph 4:8; cf. 1 Pet 3:19-22).’2Bavinck, Our Reasonable Faith, 373.
‘A triumph in an even stronger sense than the resurrection’ is a striking claim. In the resurrection he was raised. In the ascension, Bavinck says, he went up — under his own power, dragging the defeated behind him.
Total and Absolute
Both resurrection — the reversal and overthrow of death by new creation — and ascension are manifestations of God’s everlasting Kingdom.
The ascension of Jesus the Saviour is the revelation of his dominance. His kingly office is one of total and absolute omnipotence, entailing ‘rule and authority and power and dominion … not only in this age but also in the one to come’ (Eph 1:21).
‘Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end’ (Isa 9:7).
Christ Jesus, the Saviour of the world, is the Master of universal history. He governs all things, directing and ordering the entire cosmos for the saving reconciling welfare and benefit of his people, as well as the good of the whole creation.
Why History Makes Any Sense at All
This provides a much-needed clue to history.
The universe-embracing government of Jesus Christ ensures direction and meaning to the drama, conflicts and contradictions of history (Rev 5:1-5; 6:1-17).
Much of the process remains impenetrable to us, hidden in the present, to be fully clarified and revealed only at the last — yet the vision of Christ’s unchallenged eternal Kingdom as the overarching goal of all things gives sense and weight to the business of each moment.
For the time being, many — most — of the actual realities of his rule, though utterly real, are hidden from us. ‘Yet King of kings and Lord of lords he is, and one day it will all be clear.’3Seccombe, The Gospel of the Kingdom, 230.
That’s an honest formulation, and it’s worth not softening. Christians aren’t promised current visibility. They’re promised eventual clarity.
A King Who Was Crucified
The sovereignty and power of Jesus over all people and nations — in all times and places — is the sovereignty and power of a King who suffered and died, who was crucified for the everlasting good of those over whom and for whom he governs and reigns.
The endless expansion of Christ’s Kingdom proceeds through the communication, promotion and distribution of ‘the gospel of peace’ with God (Eph 6:15), ‘the gospel of the grace of God’ (Acts 20:24).
Guiding and driving forward the lives of individual persons and the course of world history toward its promised conclusion, the Kingdom of God over which Jesus reigns is a Kingdom marked and moved by unconditional generosity, provision, patience, mercy, care, goodness and welcome offered to all — just and unjust alike (Matt 5:45; cf. Acts 14:17; Rom 9:22-24; 13:1-7; 1 Tim 2:1-4).
Not that this love of God is accepted by all. Although God loves all people in some measure, many persist in rejection of it. Yet God’s love toward others — those whom, in love, he determined from before the foundation of the world to be his own, belonging to him (Eph 1:3-4; Rev 13:7-8) — is constantly extended and received in its fullness.
Authority Built on Service
Either way, the authority of Christ over the world is an authority built upon costly service, and grounded supremely upon his self-sacrificial death as ‘the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world’ (1 John 2:2).
Which is the thing that distinguishes this throne from every other. Power here was not seized, inherited or voted for. It was earned by dying for the people it governs.