Sermon Text: Ephesians 1:15-23
Date: May 17, 2026
Event: The Ascension of Our Lord (Observed), Year A

Ephesians 1:15-23 (EHV)

This is why, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, 16I never stop giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. 17I keep praying that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, will give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in knowing Christ fully. 18I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you may know the hope to which he has called you, just how rich his glorious inheritance among the saints is, 19and just how surpassingly great his power is for us who believe. 20It is as great as the working of his mighty strength, which God worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, 21far above all rule, authority, power, and dominion, and above every name that is given, not only in this age but also in the one to come. 22God also placed all things under his feet and made him head over everything for the church. 23The church is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.

Jesus Ascended for You

Have you ever had to do something for someone who didn’t understand why you were doing it? The clearest example I can think of occurs around animals. If you have a pet—especially one that exhibits some sort of separation anxiety—they might not understand why you need to leave them to go someplace like work or the store. If you could reason with them and explain how the economy works, you might be able to explain that you need money to purchase food so they can eat. But, since you can’t, what are they often left seeing? You left them alone while they wanted you to stay.

If we take that picture and apply it to our spiritual lives, we are the pet, and Jesus is the owner. We wish we could see Jesus, be with Jesus, have him right here in front of us all the time, but that’s because we often have as good a grasp of what we really need as a sad dog has of exchanging money for food. It’s why we need to always pray, “Your will be done,” because we know that God’s will is better than ours, his understanding is more complete than ours, and we know his promises that he’s going to work all things out for our eternal good, whether we “get it” or not.

Sometimes we are left just having to trust that God knows what he’s doing, while other times, through his Word, God does reveal why he’s doing what he’s doing. And we have that before us in our Second Reading this morning as God speaks through the apostle Paul to explain why Jesus ascended and what he’s doing now.

Paul’s relationship with the Christians in the city of Ephesus was very special. Ephesus was one of the places where Paul spent the most time during his ministry—years rather than weeks or months. If you look at his farewell to the leaders of the Ephesian church in Acts chapter 20, you see the immense love as their final departure brings with it intense emotions of thankfulness and sadness at Paul’s goodbye. These Ephesians are fellow believers whom Paul dearly and clearly loves. And so very early in his letter to them, he lets them know that he’s praying for them and then is specific about what he is praying: I never stop giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep praying that… (Perhaps there is a lesson here in making it so that telling someone, “I’m praying for you,” is not just an empty platitude. Be specific with them! What is it that you are praying? Even if you don’t know what exactly to pray about, but you’re entrusting them to God’s care, what a comfort it is to hear that as the person being prayed for!)

But on this observation of Jesus’ ascension, let’s focus in on what specifically Paul is praying about. He is pleading with God to give the Ephesians the Spirit of wisdom and revelation [to know] Christ fully. In other words, Paul is praying for God to increase and strengthen their faith. “Lord, let them know who you are, let them know what you’ve done, let them know why you’re doing what you’re doing so that they are confident of your unending grace.” I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you may know the hope to which he has called you, just how rich his glorious inheritance among the saints is, and just how surpassingly great his power is for us who believe. Notice how so much of what Paul is praying for is that they may be able to see what they cannot actually see, that they may be able to see how things actually are, not as they appear.

And that is the “trouble” with Jesus’ ascension. He’s gone. Well, not gone-gone, but we can’t see him anymore. The disciples stared up into the sky until the angels asked them what they were doing. “He’ll be back,” they assured the group; they promised that he would return exactly the same way that he left, with the clouds. But until then? They couldn’t see him. We can’t see him. The ones who had traveled the dusty roads of Judea, Samaria, and Galilee with Jesus would now walk alone. And so would those who believed through their message—like the Christians in Ephesus, like you and me.

We look around us, and we wonder where Jesus is. Perhaps we’re not staring into the sky waiting for him to appear, but we probably look around and wonder just what his plan is. Look at what’s going on in the world. Look at what’s going on in our country. Look at what’s going on in your city, your neighborhood. My goodness, look at what’s going on in your home among your closest family. If you spend enough time thinking about it, it’s enough to make you want to cry, or give up, or just scream at the top of your lungs. But where, in all of this chaos, hardship, suffering, and pain, is Jesus?

Sin darkens our ability to see the true joy in Jesus’ ascension. We can’t see him physically because his earthly work is done. And yes, it’s done despite the sorrows and suffering of this life because Jesus never came to solve that—at least, not now. Jesus’ goal was, is, and always will be eternity; he wants to rescue us from the here and now and bring us to that place of never-ending peace with him.

That’s what his work was all about. His perfect life was lived not as an example for us, but to substitute for our lives that are caked in sin. His death was not an illustration of patience under trial and suffering, but the actual payment for your sins and mine, the sins of the entire world. His resurrection from the dead was proof that death had no hold on him (because he had no sin) and that his work was complete—finished. As we’ve seen over and over again throughout this Easter season, his empty tomb means that our tombs will also be empty. He will raise us from the dead just as the Father raised him. And Jesus’ ascension is the cherry-on-top of this salvation sundae. Because at this point, his work is truly complete. He had made clear over the past 40 days that he had, in fact, been raised from the dead. The disciples knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that this Jesus, who had died, was in fact alive. And the Holy Spirit would bring them extra clarity in just a few days so that they could begin their work as his witnesses to the world.

Which brings us back to Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians. If any of the members of this congregation in what is now far-western Turkey had actually seen Jesus with their physical eyes, they would have been in the vast minority. No, for most, if not for all, Jesus was not someone they met, but someone they learned about. They found him in the promises God had made in the Hebrew Scriptures and in the testimony of those who, like Paul, went out to share the good news of sins forgiven in Jesus.

That means that you and I have a lot in common with these first-century Christians. Because we, too, have not seen Jesus in the flesh, yet we know him, love him, and believe in him as our Savior. Why? Because just as God answered Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians, he has answered that very prayer for us as well. We have had our eyes opened as God has created faith in us. So amazing is that faith that trusts Jesus as our Savior that Paul says that the same power that created this faith is the power that raised [Jesus] from the dead. And it would have to be because it’s a miracle no less amazing to raise the Messiah from the dead than it is to raise us from the spiritual death of unbelief to the spiritual life of faith; faith so powerful that it, as the writer to the Hebrews describes it, makes us sure about what we hope for… convinced about things we do not see (Hebrews 11:1).

And yet, while we don’t see him, he is not far from us. He is not some distant, absentee God and Savior. No, Jesus promised to be with us to the end of this age, throughout this life (Matthew 28:20), and so he is. What is he doing? Working everything out for your eternal good. Paul said that God also placed all things under his feet and made him head over everything for the church. Jesus rules everything for us. That means those horrible things going on in global events are, in some way, being worked out for the good of those who believe in him. That heartache and frustration that you feel is in service of the end-goal of eternal life in heaven with your Savior.

And Paul underscores that by describing us as members of Jesus’ body. His love for us is so great that the one who is the fullness of him who fills everything in every way made himself incomplete without us. It’s very much like his own observation at creation before he made Eve, “It is not good for the man to be alone” (Genesis 2:18). Jesus himself says, “It’s not good for me to be alone, it’s not good for me to not have my people, my loved ones, my family with me.” And that explains all of his work for us. Why would the divine set aside that glory and power to take on our human nature? Why would God suffer and die for the sins that people, that you and I, committed against him? It was not a requirement. He could have been God and remained God, perfectly just, without ever doing any of that, all the while rightly condemning each of us to hell. No, it wasn’t need that drove him, it was love. His love decided that he was incomplete without us, so he created us. His love decided that he was incomplete without us, so he saved us when we sinned. His love decided that he was incomplete without us, so he now prepares a place for us to spend eternity with him face-to-face.

So we are not far removed from Jesus—quite the opposite! We are members of his body, the finger on his hand, the toe on his foot, the rib in his side. We are so close to him that we are one with him by grace through faith. His blood that purifies you from every sin unites you to him. His love that sacrificed everything for you rules the universe for your eternal good —all things are under his feet! And his strength for you is so great that he will return in the same way we’ve seen him go—with the clouds—to pluck us out of this world of misery, sin, and death and bring us to the eternal safety of his visible presence forever. There we will find a clear reunion with the rest of our body—his body—all of our fellow believers.

Until that day, my dear brothers and sisters, try to see the trouble in your life like the pet owner going to work. Even if you don’t understand why God is allowing this or that, trust that the one who loves you has only love behind it, that he’s going to work all things out for your good, that your Savior is literally ruling the universe to make sure that you are safe with him in eternity.

Christ is risen! He has gone up with a shout! Alleluia! Amen.

Soli Deo Gloria