Today the church celebrates one of our calendar-contingent feast days: The Feast of the Ascension.

Or, in German, Himmelfahrt (which is much more fun to say).

In Norwegian it’s Himmelfartsdag (even more fun to say).

But, I digress…

The Feast of the Ascension follows the Biblical pattern of 40, and finds itself a square 40 days after Easter. That Biblical pattern of 40 is meant to be a touchstone for those who pay attention.

40 days and 40 nights of the floating ark.
40 years of wandering for Israel.
40 days of temptation in the desert for Jesus.

This is not coincidence, Beloved, but rather a repeating tracer by Biblical writers to say, in a concise way, that 40 is “when you’re at your wit’s end” and you can’t take anymore.

When it comes to the Ascension, though, it’s flipped. The Biblical account notes that Jesus appeared to the disciples, and a few random folx, for 40 days and then exited stage left. It’s kind of like the Divine has “had enough.”

Why?

Because if Jesus had stuck around, the disciples never would have. We love to get attached to things and then depend on them for the hard lifting, right?

If Jesus had stuck around, the church would never learn to lean on one another (I mean…they’re still struggling to do that 2000 years later, right?).

Just like birds are kicking the chicks out of the nest in these May days, saying, “You’re made for this!” the Ascension is a way to explain that Jesus isn’t showing up in the same way anymore.

So you, Beloved, have to.

In fact: you’re made for this.

-art by Bagong Kussudiardja (Indonesian, 1928–2004), Ascension, 1983

Today the church remembers an unusual 13th Century Saint of the church, Saint Juniper, Fool and Friend.

Juniper was a companion of St. Francis of Assisi, but may have been even more extreme than him when it came to eccentricities. Juniper was known as a “fool for Christ,” and, like your aunt with an unending purse in church, was known for continually giving away all of his possessions and living in such a publicly exuberant way that he was constantly in trouble with authorities.

Eventually his monastic superiors ordered him to no longer give away his outer robe to beggars, which he had a habit of doing. Moments after the directive, he encountered a beggar and is supposed to have said, “I have been told not to give you my clothing, but if you decide to take it off of my back, I will not put up a fight.”

Juniper is a winsome saint who reminds the church, and all of us, that everything we have is always on loan, and in living that way we learn to better enjoy not only what we have, but also the moment we give it away.