From Sight to Faith: Reflections on the Ascension

For forty days, our eyes have been fixed on a single point of light. Since the Great Vigil of Easter, when the first spark was struck in the darkness and the shout of “The Light of Christ” rang out, this Easter candle has been our steady companion reminding us that the Light of Christ is with us after the gloom and grief of Good Friday.

It has stood in our sanctuary like a pillar of fire in the wilderness, a silent, glowing witness to the fact that the tomb is empty and death has been defeated. We have become comfortable in its glow. It has made the Resurrection feel tangible, visible, and present.

But today, we reach a turning point that feels, at first glance, like a loss. In many of our older traditions—the "old-school" way that many of us still hold dear—we do something jarring during the service of the Ascension. After the Gospel is read, an altar server swiftly snuffs out that flame.

The smoke rises, curls for a moment in the air, and then vanishes. The tall pillar of wax remains, but the fire is gone.

To many people today, this feels like a mistake. We live in an age that hates endings. We want the celebration to stay at a fever pitch; we want the lights to stay on. Common Worship suggests keeping the candle lit until Pentecost to show that Easter is one long, unbroken fifty-day feast. And while that has its own beauty, I believe we lose something profound when we skip the act of putting it out. By extinguishing the candle today, we are participating in one of the most honest and necessary mysteries of our faith.

The reasoning behind this old tradition is rooted in the literal history of the Forty Days. We are told in the Book of Acts that Jesus stayed with his followers for exactly forty days after he rose from the dead. This wasn't a random number. It was a period of intense training. The disciples had to learn that the Jesus they knew—the one they could touch and eat with—was now the Lord of Heaven and Earth. But on the fortieth day, that period of physical, face-to-face instruction came to an end.

When we blow out that candle today, we are acting out what we might call a "Holy Absence." We are marking the moment when a cloud took him from their sight. As that smoke rises, it is a sharp reminder that Jesus has physically left the room. He is no longer walking the dusty roads beside us; he has gone up to the Father.

Why should we favour this stark, old-school way of doing things? Because it forces us to face the "gap."

By putting the candle out today, ten days before Pentecost, we create a space in our worship that feels just a little bit emptier. We enter a period of waiting. We are like the Apostles in the Upper Room—huddled together, perhaps a little nervous, staring at an unlit candle and wondering what comes next. This gap is essential for our spiritual growth. It teaches us desire. It teaches us to long for the Holy Spirit.

If we were never hungry, we would never seek the Bread of Life. If the visible light never went out, we might forget to kindle the invisible fire of love within ourselves.

This tradition is a form of "tough love." It tells us that the honeymoon phase of the Resurrection is over. The era of walking by sight has ended, and the era of walking by faith has begun.

Saint Augustine once said that Christ did not leave heaven when he came down to us, nor did he withdraw from us when he went up again. This is the mystery of the Ascension. If Jesus had stayed on earth in his physical body, he would be limited by space and time. If he were in Jerusalem, he could not be with you in your kitchen or at your bedside here today. By "going away," he stops being merely beside us and starts being inside us. He withdrew from our eyes so that we might find him in our hearts

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The extinguishing of the candle doesn't mean the Light of Christ has gone out; it means the Light has shifted its location. It has moved from the sanctuary of the stone church into the sanctuary of our hearts. The candle goes out so that we can catch fire.

There is a famous moment after Jesus disappears into the clouds where the disciples are just standing there, necks craned, staring at the sky. They look like people who have lost everything. But the angels appear and essentially tell them: "Move it along. Why are you staring at the sky? There is work to do."

That is the message of the smoke rising from the wick today. The physical appearances are over. The "proofs" are finished. Now, the responsibility passes to us. We cannot just be consumers of Jesus’ presence; we have to be carriers of it. We understand that we are the Body of Christ on earth. If the Head has gone into glory, the Body must continue his work on the ground.

When that candle is eventually moved to the font where we baptise, it will be used to light the small candles given to new Christians. That is where the light goes! It doesn't disappear; it multiplies. Every time you perform an act of mercy, every time you stand up for the truth, every kindness to another person, or sacrificial act, every time you pray in the silence of your heart, you are proving that the Ascension was not a departure, but an expansion.

So, as we watch the flame die out today, let us not be afraid of the shadow. The cloud that hid him was not a cloud of darkness, but a cloud of God’s glory. He has gone to prepare a place for us, so that where he is, we may also be.

Let us pray during these coming nine days for a fresh outpouring of the Spirit. May the absence of the flame on this candle ignite a greater flame in our lives—a fire of mission, a fire of holiness, and a fire of love that the world cannot extinguish.

The light is out. The doors are open. Now, let’s go be the light.

Amen.