The Heavenly Ministry of Christ

What has Jesus been doing since His ascension into heaven? And what is He doing right now? Today, Sinclair Ferguson considers the ongoing prophetic ministry of Christ as His Word is read and preached.

This week on Things Unseen, we’re reflecting on the fact that tomorrow in the Christian calendar is actually Ascension Day, the day when some churches celebrate the ascension of the Lord Jesus, an event that in some ways was mysterious—Jesus going back to heaven and the cloud of God’s glory—but also important. And it raises a practical question for us: What has Jesus been doing since His ascension, and what is He doing now?

Sometimes we talk about the work of Christ in terms of His threefold office. Remember we’ve talked before about the fact that Adam was created to be the prophet and priest and king of creation, but he failed in that ministry so that when Jesus undertook our salvation and restoration, He fulfilled these three roles in a new and redeeming and restoring way. And He did it through His incarnation, His life, His death, His resurrection, His ascension, and now His heavenly session and reign. He’s done everything needed to accomplish our redemption.

But there’s more. There’s even more to the good news than the fact that Christ has accomplished our redemption. He’s now ascended and gone to heaven to apply that redemption to us. And one of the ways He does this is by continuing His ministry as Prophet and Priest and King.

So, how does Jesus continue to be a prophet? Well, He did it first of all by giving us His Word in the pages of the New Testament. Remember how He told the Apostles in the upper room that when the Holy Spirit came to them—and He was speaking particularly and uniquely to them—they would be able to give the New Testament to the church? The Spirit would remind them of everything Jesus said (John 14:26), and we find that in the Gospels. He would lead them into an understanding of the truth about Him (John 16:13), which we find in the Gospels and in the Epistles. And He’d show them things to come (John 16:13), which we find, for example, in the book of Revelation, as well as elsewhere. These words are as good a summary of what’s in the New Testament as you’ll find anywhere. That’s the work of Jesus as the ongoing Prophet of the church.

But He continues to exercise this prophetic ministry in the exposition of the Scriptures He’s given to us. I wonder if you’ve ever thought about Paul’s words in Ephesians 2:17. He says to the Ephesians, “Christ came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near.” But when did Christ do that? Did He visit Ephesus during His ministry or between His resurrection and His ascension? No, Paul is speaking here about what happened when Paul himself and his companions came to Ephesus. Paul preached, and through Paul’s preaching of the gospel, Christ’s voice was heard as he preached peace and salvation.

I think the Ephesians could have sung Horatius Bonar’s hymn actually. Do you remember it?

I heard the voice of Jesus say, “Come unto me and rest; Lay down, thou weary one, lay down Thy head upon my breast.” I came to Jesus as I was, Weary and worn and sad, I found in him a resting place, And he has made me glad.

Isn’t this exactly the experience we all have under a living ministry of the Word of God? And it makes us say to one another, “The Lord was speaking to us today.” It isn’t that we hear sounds other than the words that are spoken, but by the Holy Spirit, within and beyond the preacher’s accent, we recognize the accent of the Lord Jesus. And there are many times, I suspect, when we scarcely notice that our own preachers have an accent at all. When that happens, we realize that through His Word, it’s the Lord Jesus detecting, analyzing, reaching and healing the sicknesses of our souls, and getting to places that no human being could possibly know even exist.

Now, there are two important implications of this present ministry of Jesus as Prophet. The first is that actually we have a primary need and responsibility, wherever and whenever possible, to place our own lives under a living ministry of God’s Word. When we do that, we’ll begin to be delivered from the all-too-common idea that sermons explain what God has done and then preachers tell us what we are supposed to do. We’ll discover that because Christ speaks in God’s Word when it’s preached in the power of God’s Spirit, God’s Word begins to do its own work in us, shaping and reshaping our thinking, transforming our affections, melting our wills, and renewing our minds.

The second implication of this, well, it’s very simple. It’s that we need really to pray for such ministries to be raised up in our own time and to be sustained. Incidentally, I wonder if you do pray for the preaching of the Word in your own congregation. And I wonder, have you ever actually encouraged your pastor and preacher?