The Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Love of God, and the Fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.
Luke 24:36 “While they were telling these things, He Himself stood in their midst and said to them, ‘Peace be to you.’ 37 But they were startled and frightened and thought that they were seeing a spirit. 38 And He said to them, ‘Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? 39 See My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself; touch Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.’ 40 And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and His feet. 41 While they still could not believe it because of their joy and amazement, He said to them, ‘Have you anything here to eat?’ 42 They gave Him a piece of a broiled fish; 43 and He took it and ate it before them. 44 Now He said to them, ‘These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.’ 45 Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, 46 and He said to them, ‘Thus it is written, that the Christ would suffer and rise again from the dead the third day, 47 and that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. 48 You are witnesses of these things. 49 And behold, I am sending forth the promise of My Father upon you; but you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.’” (NASB)
Thomas Paine said of closed minded people; “To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason, and whose philosophy consists in holding humanity in contempt, is like administering medicine to the dead.” Closed minded people are like dead people. We have a more polite way of describing such people. We say of them “It’s like talking to a wall.” The question becomes who are the closed minded people.
Today is the third Sunday of Easter and we are reading yet another Easter Sunday account of the resurrection of Jesus. On Easter morning we heard the angelic message “He is not here, He has risen as He said.” Last Sunday we read St. John’s account of Jesus’ resurrection appearances on Easter Sunday. We also heard how He breathed on the disciples and gave them authority to administer the forgiveness of sins. Then we heard He appeared eight days later for Thomas’s sake to offer to Thomas what all the others had finally come to see and believe for themselves.
This morning we are back on East Sunday and in that room behind closed doors with those skeptical disciples this time by way of the Gospel of St. Luke.
In Luke 24:13-35 St. Luke tells us about Jesus’ appearance on the road to Emmaus, about their conversation about all that had happened in Jerusalem, and about who Jesus revealed Himself in the breaking of the bread.
Now as Clopas, Jesus, and the other disciple were walking toward Emmaus and before Jesus revealed Himself to the two disciples, Jesus does something fundamental, something necessary for the life of the church. Without this fundamental action, there would be no true church. There would be no dispensary of the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation.
Luke 24:26-27 (a much over looked text during this time of year). Jesus says to the two confused and unbelieving disciples, “‘O foolish men and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things and to enter into His glory?’ Then beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, He explained to them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures.”
Take note was well how the two disciples characterized what had happened. After Jesus had vanished from their midst they (32) “said to one another, ‘Were not our hearts burning within us while He was speaking to us on the road, while He was explaining the Scriptures to us?’”
It’s about seven miles between Jerusalem and Emmaus. For people like us that seems an unreasonable distance to cover in a short period of time. But the two disciples immediately scamper back to Jerusalem to tell all the other disciples that they had just spent considerable time with the resurrected Jesus.
By the time the two disciples get back from Emmaus, the disciples had heard a couple of reports of the resurrection and had had time to discuss the matter. But they were still confused and skeptical.
What kind of resurrection was it? Did Jesus’ spirit come back from the grave to haunt them in some way? Was the resurrection just a vision, or an hallucination, or maybe an extreme case of wishful thinking.
Suddenly, as the two disciples from Emmaus were telling the rest what had happened, “[Jesus] Himself stood in their midst and said to them, ‘Peace be to you.’ 37 But they were startled and frightened and thought that they were seeing a spirit. 38 And He said to them, ‘Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? 39 See My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself; touch Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.’ 40 And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and His feet.”
The first order of business was to show the disciples what sort of resurrection this was. It was a complete resurrection of body and soul. But still they couldn’t get their minds around the fact that Jesus the dead One, that is Jesus whose body died and was verified dead on the cross was now alive in every sense of the word. Luke writes they “still could not believe it because of their joy and amazement.”
Jesus had shown them His hands and side. He had breathed on them. But still that was not enough. So He takes an additional step to show them what kind of resurrection they are witnessing. 41 . . . He said to them, ‘Have you anything here to eat?’ 42 They gave Him a piece of a broiled fish; 43 and He took it and ate it before them.”
Having established the reality and physical nature of His resurrection, Jesus turns His and their attention to the basis of true Christian faith. You see on that first Easter Sunday there were two things that were opened. Two things that were once closed, but Jesus opens them with His Word. The first was Jesus’ tomb and the second was the disciples’ minds. The Gospel of Luke repeatedly tells us that Jesus opened their minds to understand the Scriptures. Jesus did that with Clopas and the other disciples on the way to Emmaus.
Now in this morning’s Gospel lesson, Jesus “said to them, ‘These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.’ 45 Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, 46 and He said to them, ‘Thus it is written, that the Christ would suffer and rise again from the dead the third day, 47 and that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem.”
If the church is going to be the church, she must have pastors, teachers, and faithful members whose minds are open to the doctrines and truths of Scripture. Thus Jesus “opened their minds to understand the Scriptures.”
The fact is, sinful human nature does not and cannot properly interpret, understand, and believe the Word of God. Time and time again the Scripture teaches that the natural mind corrupted by sin is closed to God and held captive to the principles of this world, that is to the old sinful nature and its desires. It is hostile to God and to His Word. Romans 8:7 is one example. “The mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so.”
Now if you listen to most folks today they’d say that the Bible is an open book. We have been taught to believe that just anyone can pick up a Bible, read it, and get value out of it. “What does it mean to me?” “What does it mean to you?” Those two don’t have to match. Each decides for him/herself what Christian doctrine is. What Christian worship is. What is right and wrong for them.
The idea that a person need to be taught that there is a right and wrong ways to read the Bible seems contrary to 500 years of translating the Bible into the common language. It especially seems counter to the modern idea that religion, religious doctrines, religious ethics, worship services, sacred traditions, and especially Bible passages themselves can be interpreted and applied in anyway any person deems acceptable and helpful.
We often hear people giving other people the advice to go out there and find what fits you. Go find what’s comfortable for you. Go listen to those things that make you feel better about yourself and your life.
This is the culture and environment in which we live. The Holy Spirit had St. Paul write the following to Timothy. [2 Timothy 4:3-4] “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths.” That passage fits our day and age like a finely tailored suit.
This folks is the very definition of what means to be closed minded. To be truly closed minded is to ignore or disregard the clear teachings of God’s Word in search of something that fits what I think I need to hear and experience. A person who is closed minded does not learn from true Christian teachers how to read the Bible and think theologically about worship, or the Christian faith, or the Christian life. The closed minded just go looking for teachers and so called “churches” that affirm them in their basic ignorance.
A noble minded person says what the Ethiopian eunuch said when Philip asked him, “‘Do you understand what you are reading?’ And he said, ‘Well, how could I, unless someone guides me?’” (Acts 8:30-31) Listen to what Philip does. “Then Philip opened his mouth, and beginning from this Scripture he preached Jesus to him.” Beginning in Isaiah, Philip teaches the Eunuch that the “Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms” are about Jesus and he even includes the doctrine of Holy Baptism in his teaching of Isaiah. How many think of that?
Jesus called those who do not know how to read and teach and preach the Scripture blind guides and those who follow after them the blind. (Matthew 15:14) “They are blind guides of the blind. And if a blind man guides a blind man, both will fall into a pit.”
There’s a Greek word used to describe how Scripture is to be interpreted. Exegesis – it means to draw out from the text the meaning. Jesus teaches us here and elsewhere that the job of the Christian teacher and preacher is to drawn Him out of the text and teach Him to the others.
Today people engage in the opposite. It has a name too. It’s called eisegesis – which means to read a meaning into the text–to me Bible studies. Jesus taught the disciples to do proper exegesis – to draw out Christ from the Old Testament texts. “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.”
Jesus fulfilled the mission of the Christ. He lived a perfect sinless life. He suffered and died on the cross, then as we read in today’s Gospel, He rose from the dead and set into place the foundation for the preaching, teaching, and worship life of His church– namely exegesis.
He taught them and subsequently those of us whose minds have been opened to the Scriptures how we are to understand the Word of God, Christian worship, and Christian life. Jesus showed His disciples how to interpret everything from Genesis through the end of Malachi and therein find Christ on every page. The key to the right understanding is the Law and Gospel, God’s demands and the Person and Work of Jesus Christ. No other preaching except that which comes directly and rightly drawn from Holy Scripture is Christian preaching. No other doctrine will do.
Jesus taught Peter how to understand Scripture and what to preach and so he did. 3:18 “But the things which God announced beforehand by the mouth of all the prophets, that His Christ would suffer, He has thus fulfilled. 19 Therefore repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away….” No other kind of preaching accomplishes the purpose for which Christ came into the world. No other preaching makes you a child of God. 1 John 3:1 “See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God; and such we are.”
When it comes to the Word of God, to true religion, you are the “open minded” whose sins have been forgiven.
AMEN
May the Peace that surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.