Who also said, You men of Galilee, why stand you gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, who is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as you have seen him go into heaven.
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Bede
AD 735
The angels appeared to them for two reasons, namely to console them in their sorrow at His ascension by reminding them of His return, and to show that He had truly gone to Heaven, not merely apparently so, as in the case of Elijah (2Kings 2:11).
So shall he come, as you have seen him going. This word going, says St. Chrysostom, sufficiently intimates, that he ascended by his own power: for so will he come by his own power to judge the world. (Witham)
Jesus Christ shall come on the last day, in the same body, in the same majesty, to judge the living and the dead. This he had likewise promised, in more than one place of the gospel, speaking of the vengeance, which he will exercise on the city of Jerusalem. St. Jerome, St. Hilary, and many other ancients, have believed that the Son of God will appear again on Mount Olivet, and that all people shall be assembled to judgment. (St. Jerome, super Joel iii. 2.; St. Hilary, super Matthew xxiv. 32.)
And that same body, which thus ascended to heaven, and which will thus descend, is given us in the blessed Sacrament. "O miracle! exclaims St. Chrysostom, He that sitteth with his Father above, is at the same time handled by men below. Jesus Christ ascending to heaven, both hath his flesh ...
One as magnanimous, but the other as timid; lastly, one as suffering death, the other as risen again, by means of which event they maintain a resurrection of their own also, only in another flesh. Happily, however, He who suffered "will come again from heaven".
Who has yet beheld Jesus descending from heaven in like manner as the apostles saw Him ascend, according to the appointment of the two angels?.
He will come again on the clouds of heaven, just as He appeared when He ascended into heaven.
Now He ascended into heaven from Mount Olivet which overlooks the valley of Josaphat. Therefore He will come to judge in the neighborhood of that place.
