Easter concludes with Ascension. This festival has, unfortunately, lost much of its importance. However, it is a special event. At Ascension we observe that Jesus ascends into heaven to rule in the hearts of his believers and control world destiny for the good of his Church and the believers in that church. The Revelation of St. John paints a vivid and comforting portrait of our Lord ruling from heaven, but with each and every one of us each and every day working all things for our good with the ultimate goal of our eternal life in heaven.
The last great festival, Pentecost, shows the Holy Spirit, sent from the Father and the Son, creating and strengthening faith in the hearts of believers. Those eleven disciples, vacillating on Maundy Thursday, hiding fearfully behind locked doors on Easter Sunday, fighting for places of honor during Jesus' ministry are now bold witnesses of Christ's ministry, life, death, and resurrection. The Holy Spirit enables Peter to deliver his sermon and the Holy Spirit works faith in 5000 people. It was the Holy Spirit who worked faith in the Ethiopian eunuch and the Holy Spirit who led Philip to that Ethiopian to explain Isaiah's morbid, yet comforting, Gospel message of our Savior's death. It is that same Spirit who works and strengthens faith in each of us and continues to work faith in even the stoutest unbeliever.
As we progress through the many Sundays of Pentecost, we see an emphasis on Jesus' parables. In these parables we see the ideal lives God wishes his people to lead. Although we cannot attain that perfection, Jesus was perfect and his atoning sacrifice covers our sins and makes us perfect in God's eyes. It is the Holy Spirit that can lead us to strive for that perfection here on earth. Thus the Pentecost season, the non-festival half of the season, focuses on our lives in Christ.
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