Have you even stopped to ponder why there are 40 days between Jesus’ resurrection and his ascension into heaven? 

One might have expected Jesus to return to his Father almost immediately after his rising to new life. As a sort of affirmation that he truly was the Son of God, who now after his work on Earth was completed had nothing more to do except rejoin his Father. Jesus, however, as we know never did anything that was ‘expected’ of him. Nothing that we humans might think to be logical. Jesus does things in his ways and in his time.

In those 40 days of post-resurrection life Jesus continued to minister but most notably to his disciples and those closest to him. We have seen some of those encounters as we have journeyed through Eastertide. Think of; his appearing in the upper room, his journeying to Emmaus, his interaction with Thomas. All very important events because they taught the disciples more about Jesus, more than he could have taught or shown them before his resurrection. 

Through the post-resurrection events Jesus is showing them who is TRULY is - the Son of God. His resurrection was proof of his identity and was so necessary for the disciples to truly believe in it in a way that could not have done before his crucifixion. They might have thought they knew who he was but now they had the proof to who he actually was.

I feel that Jesus stayed with his followers for those post-resurrection 40 days in order to remove any doubt in the disciples minds that he was who he said he was. For if they had had lingering doubts they would not have been so extraordinarily effective at spreading the Good News. If you cannot commit 100% to something you never achieve what might be possible. You will easily give up at the first hurdle. By staying with his followers for those 40 days, Jesus helps them to relax in to their understanding and belief of who he is and what he came to do. He also begins to guide them in how they are to continue his ministry once he has ascended. One final push of inspiration to fuel the disciples to go and:

“… make disciples of all the world.”

as he commanded them to do at his ascension. When one realises what he was doing during the 40 days before his ascension one can understand more fully what he meant by that charge and how he had prepared them to undertake it. It probably didn’t come as a surprise that he told them to do that but more a final word on what he wanted them to do - and, do it they did. 

We can see how the disciples responded to Jesus’s last words as we journey through the Book of Acts and not only his immediate followers but those like Paul and Lydia who became followers after his ascension. So good were the original followers of Jesus at spreading the Good News that they led others to belief by what they said and did. We in our turn are the successors of those original converts and we like them will have enabled or brought others to Christ in our own way. 

We might not have had an experience like Paul or Lydia had but we will all have had an effect on someone else but we will probably never know how or why. It can be those; ‘When you said … you changed things for me’ moments. You probably won’t have any recollection of what you said but when God works through us we usually don’t realise that he is doing so. We are, however, still the inheritors of Christ’s teaching and commissioning of his followers in those 40 post-resurrection days and if we can relax into our faith we will fulfil the command he gave us at his ascension to:

“… go and make disciples of all the world.”