For on Ascension Day he returned to that supernatural life of God which forms the background not only of our human life but of the Universe itself.  And 10 days later, at Pentecost (Whitsunday), with the coming of the Holy Spirit, the Ascended Christ came to his own to be not only with them but within them.  And life for them was now transformed.

When the Apostles were flogged by the same powerful and ruthless men who had crucified their Lord and could crucify them too, they now went out rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonour for his Name, and they boldly proceeded to defy their enemies by continuing to teach and preach in their midst in the very Temple itself.  As St Paul was to say later, “I live, yet not I but Christ lives in me” and “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me” (Galatians 2:20; Philippians 4:13).

We can understand, therefore, why on Ascension Day they returned to Jerusalem with great joy.  Not only had their Master, despised and rejected by men, been highly exalted by God, but they knew that from now on he and they would go forward into the future together, never again to be separated from one another.