Why Jesus Did Not Ascend into Heaven When Resurrected from the Dead? - Understanding the First 40 Days of the 50 Days of Paschaltide: The Professor Jesus’ “Salvific Missionary” Course and His Students’ Mastery

If someone asks you, “Why didn’t Jesus go straight to heaven when he resurrected from the dead? Why he made resurrection and ascension separate and spent 40 days on earth, rather than making resurrection and ascension into just one streamlined process?”,  how would you answer?

I asked this question when I was teaching about the Scripture readings for Ascension. I invited my audience to imagine Jesus as a mobile professor, who travels with his students. And, his disciples as students, who followed their professor, wherever he went. Just for the sake of figuring out the why of the question metaphorically, based on the canonical Gospel stories.

The canonical Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, provide stories about the professor Jesus and his students: how he recruited his students and started his teaching in Galilee and completed in Jerusalem before his death on the Cross and how he reappeared to them upon his resurrection.

All of these Gospels could have ended with the professor Jesus’ resurrection as it could be considered as his fulfillment of Isaiah’s Fourth Servant Song: 52:13-53:12. Then, the resurrection and the ascension would have been just one seamless process.

Imagine that all of his students gathered around the professor Jesus’ tomb, keeping vigil, on the third day from his death. They would have witnessed their professor Jesus actually coming out of his tomb and ascending from there. But, the question is why things did not go this way?

The students did not kept vigil by the tomb because they did not retain their professor’s important teaching: his repeated foretelling of his death and resurrection as the fulfillment of the Scriptures. Many of them scattered out upon the professor Jesus’ arrest, following his prayer in agony.

The Gospel readings from Paschal Vigil Mass, Resurrection Sunday Mass, Second Sunday of Paschaltide Sunday (Divine Sunday) Mass and Third Sunday of Paschaltide Sunday Mass, indicate that none of the professor Jesus’ students understood his resurrection because they did not remember his repeated foretelling of his death and resurrection.  Had they remembered and understood, they would have kept vigil by his tomb. As these Gospel readings remind, that is why they were afraid and confused with the professor’s empty tomb, while grieving for his death, on the day of his resurrection. It proves that his students did not understand a very important teaching of their professor, Jesus, though he had repeatedly foretold of his death and resurrection since Peter’s proclamation of professor Jesus as the Messiah, the living Son of God.

The students of the professor Jesus were not in the state of deserving a passing grade when Jesus fulfilled the Scriptures at the time of his resurrection. Imagine, what if he had ascended on the day of his resurrection… His students, the disciples, would not have been sent to all the ends of the earth as the apostles. Even the Holy Spirit had been poured out on them, they would not be so affected, because they had not matured in faith to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Then, giving the Holy Spirit to them would be like giving pearls to the swine. Then, Luke would not have had a reason to write the Acts of the Apostles and there would not been the Church.

Based on four Servant Songs in the Book of Isaiah (42:1–4; 49:1–6; 50:4–7; and 52:13–53:12 ), which the professor Jesus is the subject to fulfill, his mission could have completed with his resurrection. Thus, he could have ascended straight into heaven when he rose from the dead, in fulfilling the fourth (last) Servant Song (Isaiah 52:13-53:12). But, he did not go into heaven when he resurrected. Instead, he spent 40 days on earth, appearing to his students to teach about his Kingdom (Acts 1:3), though he had already taught about the Kingdom before his death. This reminds that the professor Jesus did not limit his mission to the minimum requirement by his Father: teaching the Good News of salvation, prophesized in the Old Testament, and making healing signs to affirm the validity of the Good News. And, he was not minimalist.  Thus, he wanted to make sure that his students are truly ready to deserve the Holy Spirit upon their completion of the course and to be sent out as his apostles.  So, finding that they were not ready because of their poor achievement, on the day of his resurrection, he had to stay and give them a remedial prep course.

Not all students pass. Some students drop out. Some fail the course. And, some receive an “incomplete” and need to do remedial works so that they will not fail but pass the course later.

The disciples were students. The word “disciple”(mathetes) means “learner” in the biblical Greek. And their professor was Jesus, whom they called “rabbi” or “maestro”. 


Enrolling the grand course of salvific mission, taught by Jesus, by his invitation, the disciples spent nearly 3 years with their professor, Jesus. Sometime, the class room was in a synagogue in Galilee. Sometimes, it was in the Temple in Jerusalem. It was also on the mount. It was also in someone’s house. He even taught on a fishing boat. And, like a science course, he did a lot of “lab” teaching.  Actually, not confined in a kind of laboratory you may think, but his lab was anywhere in the world. Whenever he made signs, these were his lab demonstration teachings.

Then, on the night before his death, Jesus the professor, gave rather a lengthy lecture to his students, the disciples. The lecture and how the students responded are written in John 14, 15, 16. And, he concluded his lecture with an extensive prayer, known as High Priestly Prayer, written in John 17.

After this, the professor was arrested by the forces tipped by the betrayer, and thus he entered into his Passion and died on the Cross.

As he had foretold more than once, the professor resurrected from the dead on the third day and made his tomb empty. Some students came to the empty tomb of his. But, they had no idea what had happened to the corpse of their professor – except for Mary Magdalene, as she met the risen professor as she stayed by the tomb crying, while others left wondering. Mary later told them about her encounter with the risen professor. But, they did not believe it.

Then, the risen professor appeared to the two disciples walking to Emmaus. They thought this guy was a stranger, who knew nothing about their professor and what happened to him, because the way he asked them what they were talking about sounded as if he did not know. So, they told him everything about what happened to their professor – unbeknownst that they were talking to the risen professor.

Then, the risen professor told them, “Oh, how foolish you are! How slow of heart to believe all that the prophets spoke! Wasn’t it necessary that your professor should suffer these things and enter into his glory?!”(Luke 24:25-26)

Men! Who is this guy? I bet these two disciples thought of the guy who joined them in conversation and journey.

So, the risen professor, whom they still did not really recognize, took the upper hand from this point on and gave then a crush review course on the Scriptures, what he had taught as the Good News. Though these two students did not recognize that one who was teaching the Scriptures was the risen professor Jesus, their hearts frozen with grief were being warmed enough. Then, when he broke the bread for dinner, later in Emmaus, their hearts were on burning fire, as they recognized that their professor had risen from the dead. Upon that moment, the risen professor disappeared but these two students ran back to the rest of the students to tell to their experience with the risen professor.

The risen professor Jesus appeared to their students repeatedly and continued with the post-resurrection prep course to his students for 40 days until his ascension, as described in the post-resurrection narratives of the canonical Gospels and Acts 1:1-9.

Professor Jesus was finally able to ascend to be seated at the right hand of the Father in heaven, because his students had achieved the passing level to deserve receiving the Holy Spirit on Pentecost for their new endeavors as his apostles.

The day of Ascension is the day that the professor Jesus’ students successfully finished their final exams and defended their theses. And, the day of Pentecost is the day of their commencement. Their confirmed “degree” is the Holy Spirit. On this commencement day, Pentecost, they graduated from the discipleship and commenced their missions with the apostleship.

As Bl. Fulton Sheen has said, the first public word of Jesus is “Come!” and the last word is “Go!”. Professor Jesus invited a group of fishermen to enroll his course on becoming salvific apostles in Capernaum, by saying, “Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men!” (Matthew 4:19). And, when they successfully passed this course, he commanded them to “Go! Make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age!” (Matthew 20:19-20).

On the night before his death, the professor Jesus promised the “degree” for them, upon their completion of the course, and it is the Holy Spirit, whom the professor explained as another Parakletos, who will be with them always as the Spirit of Truth (John 14:16), who will guide through his teaching (John 14:26), just as he had taught them. It was because in essence, this Holy Spirit, whom the professor called another Parakletos is essentially himself, as he is, indeed, the Parakletos (1 John 2:1).

The professor Jesus is the Parakoletos in human flesh, which came from his mother, Mary the Immaculate. Upon his resurrection, while he retains the flesh, the professor Jesus has become more spiritual. So, he became physically omnipresent because of his supernatural spiritual nature and was able to ascend into heaven, when he has no reason to worry about his students to be led by another professor, who is completely in spirit, upon their commencement.