The Ascension is often referred to in our Reformed tradition as part of the exaltation of our Lord Jesus. You see, Reformed theology identifies two states or two conditions in the mediatorial work of our Lord. In Jesus' saving work to redeem his people, he endured a state of humiliation and then was rewarded with a state or condition of exaltation. I hope I'm bringing back to the memory of some of you your catechism. I don't know if the present-day lessons are rather specific about these issues. But our Reformed theology speaks of a state or condition of our Lord which was humbling, humiliating, and it has four stages. And a state of our Redeemer Lord which was exalting, and there are four stages. Let me just review them briefly for you. The first stage of our Lord's humiliation was his humble birth. We'll never be able to imagine how humiliating it was for the Lord of glory to be born in human fashion, in extremely humble circumstances, as a helpless baby. The Creator became a creature. He, before whom the angels sang unending hallelujahs, was born in an animal's feeding trough. Humiliation. The second stage of Jesus' humiliation was his life of suffering. Throughout his whole life he suffered. He came to his own. The Bible says they rejected him. People of his hometown in Nazareth tried to push him off a cliff. Jesus was rejected by the very people he came to tell about the kingdom of heaven. He was ridiculed. The clergy called him a demon-possessed man. Isaiah was right. Despised and rejected of men. A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, humiliating. The third stage and the deepest depth of his suffering of Jesus' humiliation was the crucifixion, excruciating physical pain. But no movie director or company of actors and actresses could possibly portray the depths of the agony of our Lord Jesus because not only did he physically suffer, but he had to cry out, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me in order that you and I might never be forsaken of him? And then the final state of his humiliation was his burial. Imagine the Son of God entombed in a grave site. A humiliation that none of us will ever be able to comprehend. But then begins the stages of the state of exaltation. And you know it begins with His glorious resurrection. Because up from the grave He arose, a conqueror o'er His foes. Death could not hold its prey. You know the wages of sin is death. And the last enemy is death. And Jesus defeated both. Exaltation arose from the grave. And then the ascension, and that's the one we're commemorating tonight, isn't it? Can you imagine the reception Jesus received in heaven when He ascended to glory? Those same angels that had to see the Lord of glory reduced to a helpless infant and suffering the abuse of men was now triumphantly returning and they could sing Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive glory and power, wisdom and strength forever. It must have been quite a reception when the very angels that had gone announcing His birth 33 years before now could celebrate His return to glory. And so they sang the song of Revelation, Thou art worthy, O Lord, for you have redeemed us to God by your blood, but of every tribe and people and tongue and nation. The third stage of his exaltation is the one in which Jesus now rests. He is seated at the right hand of the heavenly majesty. And you know, we're going to recount, we've recounted some from the Old Testament, we'll recount a few from the New Testament, references to Jesus' actual ascension. But every reference to his presence at the right hand of the heavenly majesty is a reminder of how He got there by His glorious ascension. That's the present stage. And there's one left. He's going to come back. One day, pray that it may be soon. The heavens above us are going to split open. And the sight of His glory will make the mountain shake. And then, every knee will bow, without exception, willingly or unwillingly. And every tongue confess that He is Lord to the glory of God the Father. The ascension is part of the exaltation of our Jesus and reminds us to lift up our heads for our redemption is drawing near. You know, our Reformed theology is a precious heritage and we do a great disservice to our emerging generation unless we share these great truths that are so identified because they emerge from the Word of God itself. And now let's turn our attention to those two brief references in the New Testament to Jesus' actual ascension. Actually, I'm only going to read the one because we've already read Acts chapter 1, The event on Bethany's hillside where the disciples saw Jesus literally disappear behind a cloud. And I believe he was immediately at the Father's right hand. Jesus was not a rocket ship that had to travel at a certain speed, the speed of light or whatever. But he was received out of their sight and immediately translated into glory. The other one is in Luke chapter 24. Luke happens to be the author also of Acts. So the only two records of the actual event of the Ascension are from Luke. And they're very simple. Luke chapter 24 verse 50. When he had led them out to the vicinity of Bethany, he lifted up his hands and blessed them. While he was blessing them, he left them and was taken up into heaven. Then they worshipped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and they stayed continually at the temple praising God. And now the third reference to the ascension of Jesus is in our scripture reading in anticipation of the evening message. In the book of Revelation, chapter 12. And I hope you're not surprised tonight to discover that there's a reference to the ascension of Jesus. A rather clear reference to the ascension of Jesus in Revelation, chapter 12. This is God's Word. A great and wondrous sign appeared in heaven. A woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and a crown of twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. Then another sign appeared in heaven, an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on his head. His tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth so that he might devour her child the moment it was born. She gave birth to a son, a male child, who will rule all nations with an iron scepter. And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. The woman fled into the desert to a place prepared for her by God where she might be taken care of for 1,260 days. And there was war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. But he was not strong enough, And they lost their place in heaven. The great dragon was hurled down that ancient serpent called the devil or Satan who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth and his angels with him. Then I heard a loud voice in heaven saying, Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ. For the accuser of our brothers, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of his testimony. They did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death. Therefore, rejoice, you heavens, and you who dwell in them. But woe to the earth and the sea, because the devil has gone down to you. He is filled with fury because he knows that his time is short. When the dragon saw that he had been hurled to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child. The woman was given the two wings of a great eagle so that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the desert where she would be taken care of for a time, times, and a half time. out of the serpent's reach. Then from his mouth the serpent spewed water like a river to overtake the woman and sweep her away with the torrent. But the earth helped the woman by opening its mouth and swallowing the river that the dragon had spewed out of his mouth. Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to make war against the rest of her offspring, those who obey God's commandments and hold to the testimony of Jesus. Here ends the reading of God's word. May his Holy Spirit help us understand and respond in faith to this word of life. Dear friends in Christ, there are three realities that we have to address, that we have to recognize whenever we look in the book of Revelation. And the first of those realities is that it is a vision. You know, we have various types of literature in the Bible. We have history books. We have poetry, the Psalms, Proverbs, and the like. We have prophecy. We have gospel. But we also have visions. A book like Ezekiel has repeated visions. Zechariah, eight consecutive visions. And we have to interpret visions according to the kind of literature they represent. A vision, you see, is something like a trance that was used on several occasions by our God to reveal his truth. The Lord used very many techniques, of course. He revealed His will in dreams, sometimes in direct communication, like the Ten Commandments given directly to Moses. Some of the very meetings that Abraham had with the angel of the Lord and Manoah, Samson's father, direct communication from a messenger of the Lord. Dreams, direct communications, visions. Sometimes it just says, the word of the Lord came unto so-and-so, and we don't even know how it was received. But one of the prominent ways was through the means of visions. And the whole book of Revelation is one of these. This is a vision John had on the Isle of Patmos of heaven. A trance in which the Lord opened up some of the truths in heaven. And we're going to understand that chapter 12 is also part of that vision. The second thing we have to remember when we look at the book of Revelation is that, like all visions, it has symbolic language. Many of these terms are simply symbols, metaphors, words that aren't to be taken literally, but in the light of the rest of the Bible, to be understood as conveying literal truth from our God. And so we have to interpret these. We need some understanding. And we always have to do it in the light of the Scripture, because the Bible is its own best interpreter. And we're going to look at that. We have the symbols of a woman, a pregnant woman at that, and a great red dragon, and so forth. We're going to look at these rather carefully. It's symbolic language, so stay with me. The word of the Lord will become very clear to you very soon. And then finally, it's always good to be reminded that there's a special reward promised to those who study the book of Revelation. It's in the first chapter, the 10th verse, where we read, Blessed are those who read the prophecy contained in this book. There's an offer of a special blessing to those who look into the book of Revelation. We pray that that blessing may be ours also tonight. So let's look at this passage, especially verse 5, because I'm sure you were able to identify verse 5 as a reference to the ascension of Jesus. We read it again. She gave birth to a son, Bethlehem, Christmas. A male child, sort of emphasizing this is the promised son, who will rule all the nations with an iron scepter. Psalm 2 had prophesied a thousand years before that the Messiah would rule all nations with a strong arm. And he does rule at the Father's right hand. In principle, he is already the ruler of the nations. In reality, he will be forever at his second coming. And then we read, and her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. The Ascension. Well, let's look at these. This verse particularly, but some of the others, to understand the message in its totality, under the theme, the triumph of our ascended Lord. I want you to notice, first of all, there are Old Testament anticipations. We made some reference to that before, and now we're going to see it more clearly from the first four verses of Revelation chapter 12. We said that a vision has much symbolic language, so let's draw our attention to that. Let me lead you through an understanding of some of these symbols before us. To begin with, it says, a great and wondrous sign appeared in heaven. A sign is something that points away from itself to something greater. Find a road sign up I-15, it says, Escondido, so many miles ahead. Well, you don't stand around the sign and look at Escondido. No, the sign points away from itself and it informs you that Escondido is ahead. Well, here we have a sign appearing in heaven, a woman. In the light of the Bible, that's not a very difficult problem to understand that sign. Throughout the scripture, not just the Old Testament, but the entire Bible, believers, the covenant community, the fellowship of the faith is most frequently referred to in a feminine form. Listen to Genesis 3.15. You know that one. The seed of the woman will crush the head of the serpent. The first promise, the first hint at God's design to save a lost world, someone born of a woman, seed of a woman, would crush the head of the serpent and destroy the works of darkness, the seed of the woman. And forever after throughout the Old Testament particularly, The seed of the woman is the believing community of the faith, the covenant household of fellowship of believers. And, of course, the seed of Satan represents unbelievers. So you have at the very beginning the feminine reference to the community, the potential community of faith. Some of the prophets make it even clearer. Listen to this prophecy from Isaiah chapter 52, the second verse, shake off your dust, rise up, sit enthroned, O Jerusalem, free yourself from the chains on your neck, O captive daughter of Zion. So Isaiah is addressing the covenant community and calls them daughters. The feminine. He makes it still clear in Isaiah chapter 54. We read in verse 5 and 6. For your maker is your husband. The Lord Almighty is his name. The Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer. He is called the God of all the earth. The Lord will call you back as if you were a wife. deserted and distressed in spirit. A wife who married young only to be rejected. That's Isaiah speaking. Many of the prophets refer to unfaithful Israel as a company of adulteresses, an unfaithful wife of the heavenly husband. And so many of the references are to be understood in that covenantal relationship of the heavenly husband with his earthly wife, his earthly partner in covenant unity. Ezekiel chapter 9 verse 1 says, What a lioness, that's a woman lion, isn't it? What a lioness was your mother among the lions. She lay down among the young lions and reared her cubs. The nations heard about him, and he was trapped in their pit. And they led him with hooks to the land of Egypt. So here Ezekiel is referring to unfaithful Israel when they were oppressed in the land of Egypt. And he says, your mother was a lioness, But she was caught and distressed by the enemies. In the same chapter he says in verse 10, Your mother is like a vine in your vineyard planted by the water. It was fruitful and full of branches because of abundant water. Its branches were strong, fit for a ruler's scepter. It towered high above the thick foliage, conspicuous for the height of its branches. But that mother vine was uprooted in fury and thrown to the ground. So Ezekiel laments that this woman figure, the bride of the heavenly husband, was unfaithful. Without prolonging this much longer, because we could go with this till midnight, these figures of the covenant partner of God's people, we turn just to Hosea 2, verse 14. Therefore, I am now going to allure you. See, Hosea also says that Israel had gone astray. But God, through the prophet Hosea, says, I'm going to win you back. I'm going to allure you to myself. I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her. I will give her back her vineyards and make the valley of anchor a door of hope. There she will sing as in the days of her youth. In that day, declares the Lord, you will call me my husband. You will no longer call me my master. There are a few exceptions to a reference to the covenant community in the feminine. But they are only places where the covenant nation is a communal whole, a communal entity where God refers to Israel as his son. Hosea says, out of Egypt have I called my son, anticipating, of course, the Christ, who is also the true son of God, called out of the land of Egypt. But most frequently, the woman figure represents the believing community. So here in this vision, John sees this woman, which you know in the New Testament, is the bride of Christ. And a bride is a young woman. And of course, the Bible ends with a story in the book of Revelation of the marriage supper of the Lamb. Yes, eventually we're going to a wedding reception when the church, the covenant community of faith will be eternally pledged with the heavenly bridegroom, the Lord Jesus Christ. But we must go on now because John in this vision sees more about this woman. It says a woman clothed with the sun. That suggests radiance. There's something radiant about God's people. Oh, they're imperfect, but by grace, they have a radiance about them. One of my own seminary professors, his name was Professor R.B. Rinkby Kuyper, president of Westminster Seminary in Philadelphia for 25 years, and professor of practical theology, wrote a book after his retirement, and he entitled the book, it's a book about the church, The Glorious Body of Christ. Yes, there's something radiant about the church of Christ because it is the object of the grace of God. And that church has authority. The moon under her feet, whenever you have something below someone's feet, a figure frequent in the book of Psalms, it suggests authority over something else. And 12 stars on her head, which is, of course, authority also. So below and above, authority, this woman, this wife of the heavenly husband. And now verse 2 tells us something strange. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. Do you know that verse encapsulates the entire Old Testament? Another of my professors was Hendrickson, William Hendrickson. my first New Testament professor. And he has written a commentary on the book of Revelation. And he frequently cites the gospel in a nutshell, as he calls them. Very brief references that seem to cover the entire panorama of the history of redemption. Well, this one verse describes the entire history of the Old Testament from Genesis to Malachi. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. You see, the Messianic community of the Old Testament existed to await the coming of the promised Messiah. Await the birth of the promised Savior. Thousands of years they waited expectantly. Waiting for God's promise to be fulfilled. And so the woman of the Old Testament, which is a believing messianic community of faith, is here described as an expectant mother awaiting the coming of the Savior of the world. It simply describes the Old Testament, doesn't it? And verse 3 does too. We're moving along a little better now, aren't we? Then another sign appeared in heaven. Another sign. Another indicator. Another sign that teaches and points away from itself to something else. An enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on his head. That's an easy one, isn't it? Because right in this chapter it tells us who that dragon represents. Not a literal dragon, no, but a symbol for the devil. Because verse 13 says, when the dragon saw that he had been hurled to earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child. And again, the passage refers to the devil as the deceiver, the one who leads people astray. Verse 9, the great dragon was hurled down, that ancient serpent called the devil or Satan, who leads the whole earth astray. So that's an easy one, isn't it? The dragon is the devil. And he has seven heads. Heads represent wisdom, and seven is perfect wisdom. But it's perfectly evil in his plan, in his wise wisdom and plans. Ten horns. Horns represent power in the Scripture. But this is evil power. And seven crowns represents authority again. But this is evil authority. Surely the devil has some authority. He even told Jesus when he tempted him that he could give Jesus authority because he had been given authority. But, of course, he was given authority only for a while because, as the scripture says, he knows his time is short. Well, you have here, then, these two communities, a community of faith and the devil. And this devil, with all his authority and power, tries to frustrate God's plan, which brings us to verse 4. His tail swept a third of the stars of heaven out of the sky and flung them to the earth. That has reference to the fallen angels. It's clarified for us in the book of Jude where it specifically says that there was a rebellion against God in heaven and a minority, but a rather large minority, this says a third, that's a minority, but it's still a good group, was literally hurled from heaven and they are, of course, the evil spirits now that harass us today. as the devil does. So you see, the devil has his kingdom messengers. That's what these angels, these stars in the heaven represent. And then we have this very sober statement in verse 4. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth so that she might devour her child the moment it was born. Now you have another statement describing the entire Old Testament's reference to Satan's intent to prevent the coming of the Savior. He stands before the woman, the believing community, the messianic community, covenant community of faith, to devour her child the moment it was born. This describes the whole Old Testament's battle that is waged between the powers of darkness and the powers of the Lord. The devil's intent from the beginning was to prevent the coming of Jesus, prevent the coming of the promised Messiah. Have you ever wondered why there's so much war and so much immorality and so much idolatry and so many stories of massacres. There's some almost pornographic literature in the Old Testament. Why? Well, now you know the answer. Because the Bible is describing for us the seriousness of the devil's intent to break down the faith of the community, the covenant community, so that God's promise of a Savior would never be realized through them. We noticed earlier in the sermon that there was a mother promise of Genesis 3.15. But no sooner did God say that a seed, someone born of a woman, would crush the head of the serpent than Abel is born. And the devil thinks, oh, maybe the promise will come through Abel. So he has Abel killed by Cain. That was the devil's attempt at the very beginning to devour that child before it was born. But God provided Seth. But in chapter 6 of the book of Genesis, we have a description of great wickedness in the earth. So early in the Bible, the degeneration took place so that in just these seven or eight generations, the Bible recounts, we have great wickedness. So great that God had intervened with a flood. And the devil came within one family, Noah's family, and they weren't very perfect. The devil came within one family of devouring that child, preventing the coming of the Messiah. Then there was a tower of Babel where people rose up in united opposition against heaven. And God had to come and confuse their language, lest the totality of the human race would be corrupt and no Savior would be born. And then in Genesis chapter 12, Abraham is called, From pagan darkness, such a lonely figure. And God gives a promise that in his seed, his descendants, all families of the earth would be blessed. But if by the time Abraham has grandchildren, Jacob, and his great Jacob's children, they're all but dead from starvation in Palestine. The devil almost succeeded to wipe him out once more. But God had made a provision for Joseph to be in Egypt, by now the secretary of agriculture. And he made provision to preserve that small company of 75 souls so that the devil would not be successful in preventing the birth of a savior. A few hundred years later, this small community was persecuted severely by evil pharaohs. And one of them finally said that all baby boys born to the Hebrew people, all these babies must be thrown into the Nile River. And what a plan that was for the devil's strategy. Because how long would it take for a nation to lose its identity if all baby boys were simply destroyed? Because the girls would have to grow up and marry Egyptians and the unity of the covenant community would be lost. But my God, in his marvelous grace, has Pharaoh's own daughter preserve his people and raise Moses to be of the people of Israel, to lead the people of Israel through the wilderness into the promised land. And in the wilderness, the devil almost succeeded. The people rebelled against God. There was not much fodder even for their goats and sheep, but God provided manna. And we could go on and on, couldn't we? But we must. You get the point, don't you? All these times when kings led the people of Israel astray in the Old Testament and the prophets spoke out against them, It was the devil's attempt to corrupt a nation so that God's strategy of salvation would not succeed. The Babylonian captivity seemed to signal the end of this special community of faith. This woman through whom the Savior of the world would come, but God restored them once again. In fact, the devil came within one little seven-year-old boy of cutting the golden thread that led from the promise of Genesis to the Savior. Little Joash, the only surviving descendant of King David, was hidden in the temple by Jehoiada, the high priest. And when he was 15, he was brought out and said, here is your king. And the devil was again frustrated. Finally, the Savior was born. A man-child, destined to rule all nations with a rod of iron. But the devil wasn't through, because he moved the heart of evil King Herod to decree that all the baby boys in and around Bethlehem would simply be executed to get this one child that the devil wanted to be rid of. But God, through an angel, sent Joseph and Mary to Egypt until the wicked King Herod died. And finally, this last effort, frustrated by the devil, God's plan triumphed, Which brings us finally and almost concludingly to verse 5. The woman, she gave birth to a son. Despite all the devil's designs over all the history of Old Testament revelation, she gave birth to a son, a man-child, who will rill all nations with a rod of iron. And her child was snatched up to God, ascended to the heavenlies and to his throne. Well, I hope you understand now why our Reformed forefathers established this tradition. You know, some traditions are good. We shouldn't be traditionalists. Worship tradition. They establish this tradition to meet in the house of the Lord, to celebrate and to recollect the ascension, the triumph of our Lord Jesus Christ. Heaven itself rejoices at the ascension, and shouldn't we? Because verse 10 says, Now have come salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ, for the accuser of our brothers, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. They have overcame Him by the blood of the Lamb. This is worth recalling. It's a tragedy that the Ascension is considered the forgotten event in the life of our Lord. We were visiting children in Wisconsin, and it was Ascension Day. So we went to church with them on that Thursday evening, some six years ago. And I counted the people present. There were 28. My children's family numbered six and Doris and I numbered two. We were eight of the 28, and I counted the preacher and the organist. And we were told that the church can hardly hold its congregation on Sunday morning. And about an hour and a half ago, I got a call from a 12-year-old granddaughter asking if I would sponsor her in some fundraising event. You grandparents and parents know all about that. They had walkathons for this and telethons for that, you know. And they were going to raise money for the Christian school. And I told her I would, of course, promised, you can be assured, very generous and all. But I said, how did the service go tonight? Because it was 8.30 there, and they have 5 o'clock service. And she said, what service? And I said, well, this is Ascension Day. And she said, I didn't know it. She wasn't even told in the Christian school today, she goes to the Christian school in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, that it's Ascension Day. And, of course, they don't have a service. So I said, why don't you ask your daddy and mommy why you're not in church on Ascension Day? Well, I'm thankful for your presence here tonight. And I think this is a tradition that we shouldn't lose. You see, we are still the bride of Christ, aren't we? We are still the woman figure. As a matter of fact, verse 6 tells us that. I'll close with this. The woman fled into the desert. You see, the Lord of glory has ascended to heaven, but the woman is still here. His family of faith is still here. So verse 6 tells us about the New Testament church. You and me. The woman fled into the desert. The desert always has that faint recollection to the wilderness. The desert where the children of Israel came from Egypt through the desert to the promised land. And they survived only by the grace of God. And so we survive spiritually in this world only by the grace of God. The woman fled into the desert to a place prepared for her by God. Where she might be taken care of for 1,260 days. And that in itself is a marvelous figure. That represents the entire period of time from the first coming to the second coming of Christ. But we'll reserve that for a later time. But we'll close with this reminder that the devil is still busy. He knows his time is short. He knows he's on the losing side now. He never prevented the coming of the Savior, but he's still leading the world astray. Verse 9b tells us that so very, very clearly when he says the great dragon was hurled down, that serpent, the devil, who leads the whole world astray. He's still harassing the church. Verse 13, when the dragon saw that he had been hurled to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child. So the believing community has given birth to the mule child and he keeps pursuing her children. But God protects the church. Verse 14. The woman was given the two wings of a great eagle so that she might fly to a place prepared for her in the desert where she would be taken care of for a time, times and a half time out of the serpent's reach. But the devil continues, doesn't he? Verse 15. He tries to start another flood of evil to destroy the church. But the dragon was unsuccessful. So, dear friends, remember, the forces of evil are still strong. There is unbelief. There is a compromising tendency with the policies and actions and habits and patterns of the worldly society around us. There's always this temptation for living for that which money can buy and rust will destroy. And so we conclude with just these two brief admonitions. Be vigilantly aware of the devil's strategy against the church and in your own life. And secondly, live in the triumphant awareness that our Jesus has been highly exalted and given a name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow eventually. But we will do so now. Please pray with me. Thank you, Father, for the glorious ascension of our great Savior, signaling the perfect and fulfilled work of salvation which He earned for all those who trust in Him. Blessed be Your name forever and ever. Amen.