AFTER the resurrection Jesus appeared to His disciples at different times and places. They were thus strengthened for the work that was before them.
At His last visit, forty days after the resurrection, He walked with them from Jerusalem to the Mount of Olives. Here He gave the blessed promise, so dear to every child of God, "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." Matthew 28:20.
And then, with hands raised in blessing, He rose from among them. As they gazed upward, "a cloud [of heavenly angels] received Him out of their sight."
Had they lost their Saviour forever? Oh, no! Two shining angels had been sent to comfort them, and said, "Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into Heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into Heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into Heaven." Acts 1:9-11.
Jesus Himself has said, "I will come again, and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also." John 14:1-3.
The angels told the disciples that He would "so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into Heaven." He ascended bodily, in plain sight of the disciples. When He returns, "every eye shall see Him." Revelation 1:7.
The Ascension.
Paul, in describing Christ's second coming, says, "For the Lord Himself shall descend from Heaven with a shout, with the voice of the Archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord." 1 Thessalonians 4:16, 17.
Paul calls the Christian's hope "that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ." Titus 2:13.