(Note: Suggestion for reading the lessons on Ascension Sunday: In order to get the proper historical flow you may want to read Acts 1:1-11 after reading the Gospel, Luke 24:44-53.)

When you love someone, you try to fulfill their final deathbed directions. If your loved one has a last will and testament, you try to carry out the final instructions contained therein. In Acts 1:1-11 we have Jesus' last will and testament, his final teaching about the kingdom of God and his final instructions to the apostles and to us to serve as his witnesses both close to home and throughout the world.

Just before he ascended into heaven, Jesus met with his apostles and reviewed with them the essentials of his teaching about the kingdom of God. Luke puts it this way: "After suffering he presented himself a…