Today is Ascension Day, the day we remember when Jesus ascended to heaven following his death and resurrection. It’s a good occasion to receive afresh our baptismal identity “in Christ” as children of God. Baptismal death and being “born from above” position us for God to “make us alive” and to “raise us up and seat us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus (Eph 2:5-6). From this vantage point we are invited to see and act in alignment with Jesus and the Kingdom of God.
These truths became visible in Lesotho, Africa back in March as Gracie and I taught on identity and authority during our Certificate in Holistic Liberation.
Forty pastors and ministry workers met in a cinder block, tin-roofed church on the edge of a road. After some lively a cappella singing, we settled in, with a volunteer reading John 1:1-5 and 9-13 in the native language Sotho.
Together we looked at how John introduces the Word as existing with God in the beginning, and being God– through whom all things were created—without even mentioning Jesus by name. Such a humble introduction, which presents the Word as giving life!
“Do any of you feel you need to hear from God? Do you need wisdom for a difficult decision, direction for your life, or revelation regarding a pressing question?” I asked.
People were nodding and some were saying “Amen.” We stopped and prayed, asking for these things.
We read together John’s powerful words: “In him was life, and the life was the light of men and women. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it” (Jn 1:4-5).
We notice together that when this true light comes into the world to enlighten every person, the world doesn’t recognize him and his own [people] don’t receive him” (Jn 1:9) (back then and still now).
What humility! This God does not impose, but comes under the radar— incognito, a hidden light, and completely rejectable.
What an indictment on humanity. That we can be so blind and ignorant, and reject God’s saving, enlightening Word– Jesus, who is life and light! Yet John writes on, inviting us to resist the status quo of blindness, ignorance and rejection. An alternative response is possible that leads to receiving our truest identity:
“But as many as receive him, who believe in his name, to them he gave the right [literally “the authority (exousia in Greek)] to become children of God” (Jn 1:12).
Receiving this humble Word, Jesus, brings us into a new identity, when we are “born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of people, but of God” (Jn 1:13).
As we were reading and discussing these verses we noticed a growing desire to know and more deeply receive this humble God. Then we transitioned into the next and final part of our teaching on identity and authority.
In nearly every one of our teaching session we use Bibliodramas to illustrate and experience the teachings. After reading Ephesians 2:5-6 I invited a volunteer to play God, and a pastor stepped forward to take on the role. I placed a plastic chair on the raised stage and invited him to take a seat.
“Imagine this being God, seated in the heavenly realm,” I said.
Then I invited someone to play Jesus. Surprisingly, a woman pastor stepped forward (pictured below with Gracie). Gracie and I wondered whether anyone in this group would have trouble with this, but they didn’t seem to. I placed a second plastic chair next to ‘God the Father’, and motioned for ‘Jesus’ to take a seat beside him.
I then asked for a volunteer to play a disciple. The soft-spoken older pastor of that church stood up and came forward. I placed a third chair beside ‘Jesus,’ and then summarized the new-birth baptismal identity of a disciple. I asked the pastor if I could pretend to baptize him and he agreed. I put my right arm around his back and pretended to dunk him, speaking out “I baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
I then explained that in baptism we symbolically die and are raised to new life. Also because of Jesus’ ascension, we are raised and seated at the right hand of the Father in Christ, (summarizing Ephesians 2:5-6).
Next I invited the pastor to take a seat beside ‘Jesus’, explaining that this is our spiritual position which Jesus brings us into as sons and daughters of the Father– since Jesus has ascended and is seated in the heavenly realm. I emphasize that we simultaneously remain alive and active here on earth amidst our families, communities and nations.
“We are connected to Jesus and the Father,” seated in Christ at the right hand of God,” I said, “though nobody can physically see this spiritual dimension. I gently placed the right hand of the man playing God on the shoulder of the woman playing Jesus; and the woman’s hand on the shoulder of the pastor playing a disciple.
I asked Gracie to loan me her scarf, which I placed over the heads of the man and woman playing the Father and Jesus. Only the pastor playing the disciple was now visible.
“Here we are now in our new, spiritual identity as children of God,” I stated, pointing to the pastor seated before us.
I then asked if anyone was suffering from back pain. Five or so people raised their hands. I invited the first woman who raised her hand to come forward, and held the hand of the pastor playing the disciple, asking him to pray for the woman, empowered by his attachment to Jesus and the Father.
The pastor tentatively extended his hand towards the woman’s back and looked at me nervously, not sure what to do next. He needed a little coaching, so I suggested he trying speaking out a simple phrase:
“Be healed from your back pain in Jesus name!” I said to him, and the translator repeated my words to him in Sotho– which he repeated in a soft voice that only the woman and I could hear.
Immediately a look of shock came over the woman’s face. She exclaimed before the group that the pain was gone now! A second woman approached the pastor with excitement, and he spoke as softly and tentatively for her as well. She too said that the pain had completely left!
At this point I removed the covering from the heads of the man and woman playing God and Jesus. I immediately noticed that the woman playing Jesus was crying. Tears streamed down her face.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I feel the touch of the Spirit,” she said as she sobbed, her face strangely radiant.
I was deeply impacted by the move of the Holy Spirit visible on this woman. So I asked if she’d be willing to pray for the whole group from the front. The woman agreed, standing and extending her hands towards, praying for the Holy Spirit to be poured out on us all. Immediately after praying she fell over her chair and landed on the stage, laughing and crying simultaneously.
At the same time our translator fell to the ground in front of the stage and began crying, telling us she’d been instantly healed of chronic back pain, which had started years before, after the birth of her teenage son. Others were crying and praying as the Spirit seemed to have fallen on the whole group.
We had never seen a manifestation of the Spirit quite like this, which resulted in five people being healed of back problems, and a man who had limped for seven years after a motorcycle accident being healed so he no longer limped.
There in Lesotho on this first day of training the Spirit walked into the room, confirming the Word of Jesus’ humble divinity and our ascension to the right hand of God in Christ, with the signs following (Mk 16:20).
Consider helping fund our next Certificate training in Benin, Africa August 24-29 through giving to The People’s Seminary here or by sending a check to Tierra Nueva, PO Box 410, Burlington, WA 98233.
Consider reading or listening to Daniel Bourguet’s two volume The Humble Divinity of Jesus in Mark’s Gospel, available as paperback or ebook volume one or two, or in audiobook volume one or two.
Check out my recent podcast “Disciple: Word, Spirit, Justice, Witness” on Apple or Spotify.