Page:The New Church - What, How, Why .djvu/27

Rh appeared to His disciples, and when He had blessed them, He was seen to ascend until the clouds enveloped Him. While they stood gazing steadfastly into the sky where He seemed to disappear, an angel stood by and said that as they had seen Him ascend, so He would descend. From this some have thought that the Lord would come again in the material clouds and in a material way. To know how He was to come we must know how He ascended.

The Lord after His crucifixion appeared not by assuming a material body, but by opening the vision to see Him in the spiritual world, for God is a Spirit.

No angel or spirit can be seen by the natural eyes. Since the Lord appeared by opening the inner vision, He disappeared by closing it. His apparent ascension into the sky was an appearance from the gradual closing of the spiritual sight. When that was entirely closed, He disappeared. We may know this if we stop to think, for