Easter 3

May my words and my thoughts be acceptable to you, O Lord, my refuge and my redeemer. (Psalm 19:14)

SEASON: Easter 3
PROPER: A
PLACE: St. John's Parish, Kingsville
DATE: April 14,2002

TEXT: Luke 24:13-35 – “When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and give 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?”

ISSUE: This story reveals the great disappointment of two disciples leaving Jerusalem on the road to Emmaus. All they had hoped for was over, and peasants of the time were probably used to having their hopes dashed. The expectant redeemer is crucified. Yet the stranger reveals to them much from the scriptures that told of suffering and yet God’s forever renewing hope to redeem and deliver his people. Finally, they see in the stranger the risen Christ who teaches and abides with them and becomes revealed through the supper, bringing back memories of the last supper and the great feeding miracles. They are fed again with hope.
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Luke’s gospel gives another fascinating resurrection story. It is the story of Cleopas, a disciple, and a mysterious unnamed disciple. They have both been in Jerusalem and were apparent witnesses to the crucifixion of Jesus. We would gather that they were a part of the peasant class of Jesus’ followers. These disciples become disappointed when there are reports that Jesus had risen, but others had gone to the tomb and did not see him.
We can well imagine that for peasants of this period, disappointment and discouragement was a significant part of their lives. Little ever changed, and their status in life was pretty much set. Occasionally there were good days and hopeful things that happened, but for the most part life could be fairly dismal. As Cleopas and the other disciple continue on this road to Emmaus discussing the tragedy that had experience in the last several days. A stranger encounters them and inquires about what it is they are talking about, and why they are so sad.. They treat the stranger as if he were some kind of idiot: “Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days . . . . . The things about Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet might 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.”
The stranger replies, also in a somewhat demeaning way, “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?” The stranger begins to do some teaching as the group moves along the road, starting with the story of Moses. We really do not know what Jesus taught. It is something of a mystery as well. We can only ourselves be familiar with the scriptures and make thoughtful educated guesses as to what the stranger taught or revealed to these disciples. He may well have explained how Moses was the servant of God, and how through his faithful devotion a people in oppression and slavery were led to receive the civilizing commandments of God, manna in the wilderness, water from a rock, and eventually were led to a new homeland. While Moses may not have suffered like Jesus had suffered, Moses took on many years of dealing with a cantankerous people, who often fought him much of the way. But Moses faithfully committed himself to the deliverance of God’s people, when he himself never got to enter the promised land.
The stranger may have taught how the Judges struggled with Israel, and how David, himself only a shepherd boy, becomes a charismatic King and fought off enemies and brought his people to a time of faithfulness and grandeur. He was indeed an imperfect but a faithful messianic hope in his time. Repeatedly the prophets Jeremiah, Isaiah, Ezekiel, and the minor prophets wrestle with the sins of the nation Israel, suffer at the hands of their hard heartedness, all in the effort to restore the nation when it is down, and to bring hope and restoration to some very dismal situations. Even old Jonah in the belly of the big fish is raised up to do what God wants him to do. Isaiah also had an image of a Suffering Servant that would humbly, mercifully, without violence would bring hope to the world, and bear the sins of many, that restoration and hope would come again.
Maybe in the teaching of the stranger, he is saying that Jesus, who these disciples had depended upon, was in fact another prophet and a son of the Father who was willing to teach, heal, restore the alienated, suffer, and in great and profound love lays down his life for his friends. There is no greater love. And as surely as God enters into human history in an effort to give and hope and restore his own, will not the Lord Jesus himself be raised up and his way of love and intent suffering for his friends become a living vitally important way of life and of God in the history of humanity? Maybe the stranger addressing the disciples was saying something to that effect.
For these disciples it seems to make some sense. It is not just blind faith in resurrection but a revelation of the trend and understanding of God in human history that God constantly attends to the needs of his people and calls them into service with him.
After the discussion, Cleopas and the other disciple (incidentally possibly likely that it was a woman, and may have been the wife of Cleopas) invite the stranger to supper. Of course, at this time eating together meant these people were equals and that they had become intimate. Notice the transition from their earlier almost hostility toward one another and the transition into friendship in the dialogue that has taken place. Talking with one another and keeping open conversation and communication can be very hopeful and healing for relationships. The stranger takes the lead:
“He took the bread . . . blessed the bread . . . and broke it . . . and gave it to them.”
“Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him.”
The great “Aha!” has happened.
In the familiarity of the meal of eating with him, accepting him, understanding him, remembering the Feeding of the Five Thousand: “He took the bread, blessed the bread, broke the bread and distributed it.” It was reminiscent of the Last Supper: “He took the bread, blessed the bread, broke the bread, and distributed to his disciples saying, ‘This is my Body.’” In this wonderful event Cleopas and the other disciple becomes aware this is the Lord. He is with us. God has done it again. God continues to feed and nourish, and we with Christ are the living body in the world. The eyes of faithfulness are not blind, but they see God’s presence and hear the calling to be the body of Jesus Christ in the world and to join faithfully that servant ministry.
We are living in a world right now of many tragic disappointments. It is so disappointing and depressing to see the problems that some of the great religions of the world have created. In an article which appeared in The New York Times, April 7, 2002 on the Web by Maureen Dowd it was reported that someone scribbled on a wall in Washington D.C. after Sept. 11, the following prayer: “Dear God, save us from the people who believe in you.” Tragically extremists of the Islamic Faith and of the Jewish Faith have been unable to find the way of peace in the name of God, through their relationship with God, but have turned their scriptures in to a force for hate. And this hatred has effected the entire world, not the Middle East alone. So called Christian militants have smeared the name of Christianity at the bombing in Oklahoma, in murdering gays, blacks, and bombing abortion clinics. We’ve experienced the sad messes created by the evangelists, Jim Baker, Jimmy Swaggart, and Jim Jones in Guyanna. Even Billy Graham is supposed to have made some anti-Semitic remarks on the famous Nixon Tapes. The recent sexual scandals in The Anglican Church in Canada and in the Roman Catholic Church (and some here in our own diocese) have all given Christianity a very black eye at a time when our religion is so desperately needed.
All around us there is a lot disappointment and sadness. We see marriages breaking up. We see the tragic influential effects of alcohol that destroy lives in our young people in high schools and colleges, in older adults, and I would suspect that the high divorce rate is also a result of the excessive use, or should I say ‘abuse” of alcoholic consumption.
In recent years, all clergy of the Episcopal Church are required to have training in the prevention of Child Sexual Abuse and Adult Misconduct, or resign from their parishes, along with other church employees. Now all of our clergy are required to have training in the handling of Violent Physical Abuse in Families, relating to children and spouses. These are the tragic issues of our time that demand our attention and our redemption.
For the longest time in the telling of the story of the Good Samaritan, we have been inclined to put ourselves in the place of the Good Samaritan. We’re the good guys in the white hats. But now we have come to realize that we are not the Good Samaritans, we are more likely the indifferent priests that pass by or are more likely those in the ditch so desperately ourselves in need of a redeemer and of a Good Samaritan that we feel stuck and hopeless, discourage and sad. At a time when we are so desperately in need of a faith and hope in times of our troubles, national, religious, and personal, it seems that there is no hope, no peace, no reconciliation.
They were walking along the road to Emmaus. “What are you worrying about and saying? Why so sad, so disheartened so discouraged?” the strangers voice asks.
Are you so dumb you don’t know how disappoint our lives have become, how fearful we are, how hopeless the world seems. Look at it; it’s a mess!” we reply.
“Don’t you know the story,” the stranger replies, “The story of how God has always been present, trying to redeem and lead the way. How prophets and servants have suffered but remained faithful living in hope that God would renew and raise up the fallen.”
Who is the stranger who seems so calm and reassuring? Who is this one who takes the bread, blesses the bread, breaks the bread, and gives it to us? Who suffers and dies for us, and with us, who reaches out to us and says take eat? This (You are) is my body? Who is the strange foreigner in our midst who comes to us in the ditch? It is God in Christ come again to feed, nourish, renew us in faith, and to lift us up into a new community with the Lord.