What happened on the road

Luke 24: 13-35, page 90
Now on that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, but their eyes were kept from recognizing him.
And he said to them, “What are you discussing with each other while you walk along.”
They stood still, looking sad.
Then one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?”
He asked them, “What things?”
They replied, “The things about Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be condemned to death and crucified him.
But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things took place. Moreover, some women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning, and when they did not find his body there, they came back and told us that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said; but they did not see him.”
Then he said to them, “Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?”
Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.
As they came near the village to which they were going, he walked ahead as if he were going on. But they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.”
So he went in to stay with them. When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight.
They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?”
That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together. They were saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!” Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.
Sermon
Chapter 17 of the Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain is the scene of Tom, Joe, and Huck’s funeral. It’s an iconic scene, and while in the book Tom, Joe, and Huck walk into the church near the end of their own funeral, I remember a TV version where the three boys fall through the ceiling into the church full of mourners while the preacher is preaching their eulogy.
It’s not common for anyone to see how their families and friends react to their passing. In the case of Tom, Joe, and Huck, the three boys find that they are beloved and valued by the entire town. Christ on the other hand, raised from the dead but appearing to these two men while hiding his identity from them, finds that his death has so disillusioned his followers that they no longer believe he is who he said he was.
On the road, two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, and on that road a stranger asks them what they are talking about as they walk along.
Like the congregation at the St. Petersburg church who doesn’t know that the boys they mourn are standing just outside the door, these two don’t know who it is they are walking alongside.
He was a “prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people,” they say, “But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.”
The stranger is frustrated by their lack of faith, and while they still don’t know that this stranger they are talking with is in fact Jesus he responds, “Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?”
He seems to think that his death is the obvious sign that he is in fact the Christ, but here I wonder if because he has conquered death himself he has forgotten how deeply death effects the rest of us, as though, even for Christ, the way your death will affect the ones you love is not something you can predict.
Some who think that “they’ll all be happy when I’m gone” find that they were so very wrong; others who think that “they’ll all be sorry when I’m not here anymore” find instead that everyone is too devastated to be sorry; and Christ, who assumes that his faithful will continue on being faithful even after the death that he warned them all was inevitable are so shocked by his crucifixion that his disciples lock themselves behind a closed door while these two leave Jerusalem disillusioned, seemingly giving up on the whole thing completely.
I don’t know what Osama Bin Laden thought would happen after he was gone, I do know that some hoped they would find closure in his death. And I pray that they have found it, but I am sure his death is not the end of terrorism because the meaning of death, anyone’s death, seems to never be what we hope or think it will be.
Here it seems clear that Jesus had hoped that his followers would have figured it out, but they didn’t. Death has a way of speaking so loudly it filters out all logic, all knowledge, all rational thought - everything – silencing hope, preventing loved ones from moving on, not giving disciples a deeper faith, and not ensuring that the living will have a greater thirst for life.
In our first scripture lesson for today we heard the stories of Simeon and Anna, a man and a woman who had spent their whole lives waiting to see the Messiah. Simeon went into the temple where Mary and Joseph had brought the baby Jesus and took him in his arms and praised God saying, “Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for the glory of your people Israel.”
That’s who they thought he was, they thought he was salvation. Simeon had been waiting his whole life to see him and when Christ died before salvation came we can be thankful that he wasn’t there to see it. His death comes as a complete surprise and to the tomb also go all their hopes for who he was and who he would be to them, sealed and buried, after being hung up on that cross, broken as his body was broken.
Two of them saw it happen – they thought they had found salvation – and instead they found death and the meaning of this death was not assurance that he was in fact the Christ but complete and utter disappointment.
So they left, towards Emmaus and back to life as it was before, though they knew that life would be just a little less sweet because they had hoped for something and seen that hope crucified.
That’s just what death does – it takes the sweetness out of things – and though we go on with our lives, things can’t be the same again because death crashed in and made everything different.
Life wouldn’t be the same for those two, and they knew it, but they had to go somewhere. So they started back towards Emmaus knowing that it wouldn’t ever be the same again, knowing that things would always be a little bit worse having hoped for something that didn’t come true.
That’s life, after all. You have to go on. Graduation still has to happen even though it can’t be quite as happy as it’s supposed to be because one who should be crossing the stage with everyone else will be painfully absent and no pomp and circumstance can replace her.
Death changes things. And maybe Christ realized how much it changed the faith of his believers as he walked on ahead of them as if he were going on, but for some reason they urged him strongly saying, “Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.”
It’s nothing really, just an invitation.
“Stay with us,” they said, but in those words was the beginning of something - a new faith, a stronger faith, the kind of faith that rises up out of the hopelessness of death.
The reality of things is that death, disappointment, failure, loss, are the inevitable hardships of life. As you high school seniors already know, even days as joyous as the last days of high school can be made somber; and as you already know, though you parents wish you didn’t, this isn’t the end of hardship either because living life means enduring loss from time to time.
But here is the truth – if you give up on things getting better, if you fail without picking yourself back up, if you lose hope so completely that your eyes are closed shut to the future and the chance that life does go on – then he will walk on because you will not have the words to stop him.
“Stay with us,” they said, and while he was at a table, not so different from this one, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him.
We all walk the road to Emmaus, away from how we had hoped life would be and towards accepting it as it is, but on the way there he stopped them and opened their eyes – and they began to hope for something again.
Come to this table now, as like the kitchen counter where your mother has told you that everything is going to be alright more times than you care to remember. At this table you will gain the strength to endure all that life throws at you and still go on believing that we have a reason to believe that our future is full of hope.
The Lord has risen indeed.
Thanks be to God.
Amen.