The safe side. A theistic refutation of the divintiy of Christ by Mitchell Richard M

Author:Mitchell, Richard M
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ
Publisher: Chicago, Ills., R.M. Mitchell
Published: 1886-12-31T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter XII. Paul and the Ascension

Paul knew nothing of the ascension, it had not been thought of in his time. He often spoke of the resurrection, and always had reference to it only, when alluding to Jesus having arisen.

The story of the ascension grew in a natural manner, and was probably not inserted in the New Testament until after the promulgation of the canonical gospels, as the only clear account of it is in the first chapter of Acts. It was an outgrowth of the unsupernatural presence of Jesus upon the earth. His ideas were simple. His second coming was to be soon—in the lifetime of his disciples—and no coming would be satisfactory unless he was seen coming "Among the clouds with the angels, armed with great power." And while his coming was intended to be understood as desirable for the world, the description of what it was to be is one of terror.

His predictions related mostly to Jerusalem and the temple, the destruction of the latter being magnified into a most important event. His field of operation and ideas of time and events were narrow. John the Baptist proclaimed the coming of the Messiah, and if Jesus was that Messiah, his presence filled John's predictions and the prophesies of the Jews also, and now to still preach of another coming of Christ while he was yet here was equivalent to an admission that this first appearance was a disappointment and failure. It was. He did not fill their expectations, because he had been born like other people, and had not come in the clouds, according to their ideas of a God.

This was the greatest difficulty Christ and his disciples had to overcome. People could not believe in the divinity of a man whose life they all knew to have been so commonplace. They said (Matt. 13:55-56):

"Is not this the carpenter's son? is not his mother called Mary? and his brethren, James, and Joses, and Simon, and Judas? And his sisters, are they not all with us? Whence then hath this man all these things?"

This was a natural criticism of one who made such pretenses. They recognized the fact that one claiming to be a God should have supernatural powers in coming to or leaving the earth, and several of the representations of Jesus evidently had their origin in efforts to overcome this difficulty. The doctrine of the immaculate conception, for instance, was an indispensable necessity on the part of those claiming that a man born like other people was, nevertheless, the Son of God.

The second coming of Christ was simply a promise to do in the future what he should have been able to have done then. He had not come in the clouds, displaying great power and glory at that time, but would do so upon another occasion, in sight of his disciples. But when long afterwards that promise still remained unfulfilled, the then powerful church incorporated into the New Testament the story of the ascension. Christ had

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