Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.
It’s the third Sunday and third week in Easter, and this morning’s Gospel lesson records the third appearance of the resurrected Jesus on that very first Easter day. Now all four Gospels contain a record and a measure of Jesus’s resurrection. All four accounts also contain a rather subtle and often overlooked persistent theme as well. For example, in Matthew 28:4–6 we’re told that Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to the tomb, and the angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled away the stone and sat upon it. And the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he has risen, as he said.” Mark also adds an additional detail in his account, Mark 16, verse 7: “Go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.” In Luke’s resurrection account, he records the angel saying, “He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise.”
Each announcement, of course, has the obvious thing, the most attention-getting detail, which is: Jesus has risen from the dead. He’s not there. He’s no longer in the tomb. He was dead, but now he’s alive. But there’s a second detail that the angels reiterate each and every time the resurrection announcement is made. Each announcement makes it clear that the angel’s message of Jesus’s resurrection came with a reminder: namely, before his crucifixion, Jesus had regularly taught his disciples that he had to be rejected, he had to suffer, he had to die a crucified death, and then on the third day after his death, he would be raised back to life.
In this morning’s Gospel, two of the disciples were walking from Jerusalem to Emmaus. It was still Easter Sunday. On that very day, two of them were going to a village named Emmaus, which is about 60 stadia — that’s about seven to eight miles — from Jerusalem. And they were talking with each other about all these things which had taken place. And while they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself approached and began to travel with them, but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. The two disciples actually had set out probably mid-morning or so to walk the seven miles to Emmaus. They were talking about everything that had happened during Passover week and Passover weekend, when a stranger suddenly joined them — but they didn’t recognize who he was. We don’t know if Jesus hid his face partially from them, or simply his appearance was somewhat different, and they were in such sadness and disbelief they couldn’t see clearly. We don’t know exactly who these two disciples were. We have the name of one of them, but it doesn’t really tell us what kind of disciple he was. When they looked at Jesus, they only saw a fellow traveler who himself was coming from the direction of Jerusalem, so obviously he must have lived nearby or in Jerusalem, or had been a visitor.
Jesus, for his part, instead of saying, “Behold, it’s me, the great I AM,” and revealing himself to these two men, heeds the promise. He listens in on the conversation. He eventually asks, in what to us is kind of a complicated way, “What is this conversation that you are holding with each other as you walk?” The two travelers stopped and looked at Jesus. It was obvious from their appearance that they were deeply saddened, perhaps with tears welling up in their eyes. Their sadness over the death of their friend was notable. One of them, named Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?” Jerusalem was a big city, yet very few of the people there were eyewitnesses or involved in any of the events of Holy Week, especially of Good Friday and Easter morning. Yet Jesus was at the time the most well-known and celebrated man at the Feast of Passover that week. The news of his arrival on Palm Sunday, the conflicts that he had with the religious elite in the temple, his arrest, trial, suffering, and crucifixion had spread throughout all of Jerusalem. It would have been hard not to know at least a couple of basic details or rumors regarding Jesus the Nazarene. It was reasonable for the two disciples to assume that anybody who had been coming out of Jerusalem that week would have known at least a little about this fellow Jesus and his fate. But Jesus, for his part, asked, “What things?” And they said, “Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, a man who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him. But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.”
They went on to then summarize for the stranger the basic events of Easter morning, the events that the women who went to the tomb had reported to the various disciples that morning. They told the stranger that Jesus was the Redeemer. They acknowledged him to be the promised Messiah, at least to some degree. But like most everybody else, they misunderstood what the Redeemer of Israel meant and what the Redeemer of Israel had to do and endure. And look what Jesus does and does not do here. He doesn’t say at the end of their summary, “Surprise, it’s me!” He doesn’t show them his hands and his feet and his side, as he will do for Thomas, and as he has already done for the other disciples. Instead, he chided them for not believing what the prophets had spoken — that is, what the prophets had written in the Old Testament scrolls concerning the promised Messiah. And then he goes on to give them an Old Testament survey course, a Bible study in what the Old Testament is really fundamentally about. “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.
You know, he teaches them once again that the Old Testament scrolls are ultimately about him. They prophesy him. They provide the details of the suffering servant. They forgot their basic understanding of what the Old Testament Scriptures are for. Jesus gave the two disciples the survey course. He showed them that the Christ is in the books of Moses. He showed them that Christ is in every single one of the prophets. He showed them that what was going to happen had to happen in order for the Christ — and all Christians — to ultimately enter into glory. Jesus taught the new disciples what so many Christians today have not yet learned, and seem quite resistant to learn: namely, the entire Old Testament points to and is about the Christ — his suffering, death, resurrection, and ascension. That all had to be in order for him to save sinners, to redeem them. Jesus teaches them the lesson he learned as a child, as he grew up studying in the Old Testament schools: that the Word of God, given through Moses and the prophets, is trustworthy and true. It is a testament, a testimony, to what God is doing in the promised Messiah, and what he will do in the promised Messiah, in the person and in the work of Jesus who is the Christ. Jesus used the Old Testament the way the Old Testament was given, and the way in which it was meant to be understood and explained. It’s not a political saga, although that is the backdrop. It is about God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit keeping God’s promise — the Lord God’s promise to the world and to the children of Israel that a Messiah would come and save them from their sin, and ultimately undo what Satan had done in the Garden of Eden. He showed them from the Old Testament that the purpose for which Christ came into the world was in fact to be rejected, delivered up by the chief priests, the scribes, the Pharisees, and the religious rulers, in order to be condemned to death on a cross for the sins of the world.
Jesus was teaching them both how and what they would ultimately do — that is, teach others in the right understanding of the Scriptures. Last week in John’s Gospel, Jesus appeared in a locked room. Thomas wasn’t there. And we’re a week away from when Thomas would himself put his hands in his side and touch the scars of Jesus’s hands and become believing Thomas. Then he would say, “My Lord and my God!” And Jesus replied to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” Here Jesus is teaching the disciples on the road to Emmaus — and every other Christian — the exact same lesson. They are prevented from recognizing Jesus so that they believe by virtue of hearing the Word of God rightly preached, taught, interpreted, and applied. Even though they had not yet been given to see who the stranger was, they came to believe what the stranger taught, and that he had taught them from Holy Scripture itself. “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?” They admit that they became believing as they were being taught correctly from the Bible. They came to believe without seeing. They came to believe because the Word of God was being rightly preached and taught to them.
When Jesus first joined the two, they had the facts right. They had the basic facts. But the facts were very depressing. All they saw was the facts of suffering and death and loss and fear of the future. That’s all they could see. That depressed them. And they were depressed because they didn’t interpret those facts in light of the Word of God and the promises given in the pages of the Old Testament. They did not understand how rejection, suffering, and death fit into God’s plan of salvation — for either the promised Messiah or for themselves. They had hoped Jesus would be the one to redeem Israel, but they didn’t understand that the crucifixion was the way in which he’d go about redeeming Israel. It’s only because Jesus opened their minds to Scripture that they began to understand that in the crucifixion, Jesus was at work redeeming the whole world. We have the same trouble, you know. We know the facts of our own life. We see facts all the time. Sometimes they’re quite brutal. We experience the facts of our lives throughout our lives as we travel down the road of our own life. We see the facts, and very often those facts are heartbreaking, and they’re depressing, and they raise fears and concerns about our future, and whether or not we’re going to be taken care of, or whether or not we can handle this or that. We don’t see those facts in light of the Gospel or in light of the teaching of the Word of God. And that’s why we fundamentally sometimes fear the future, worry over things that we have no control over. Because we don’t look upon these things through the eyes of the biblical text. We don’t see them in light of God’s promises to us. When life dishes out facts that make things hard and costly, we get angry, we get fearful, we get depressed, we get sad — as if those facts are the final word, and as if Christ isn’t busy redeeming those facts of our life. We forget what the prophets and the apostles were given to write to us on God’s behalf. We forget Romans 8:28: “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” Or consider Jesus in Luke 12:27–28: “Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass, which is alive in the field today, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, how much more will he clothe you, O you of little faith!”
Jesus opened the Old Testament to these two New Testament disciples. The Holy Spirit and the Word created faith in them, even though they had not yet seen and realized who the traveler was who walked with them. They became examples of those who had not seen but yet believed. You see, Thomas wasn’t alone. There’s a doubting Thomas in all of us, and there’s a doubting pair walking to Emmaus on that very first Easter day. Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world, is the heart and the center of the Old and New Testaments. He is the true key to understanding the biblical text. He used the biblical themes of Law and Gospel as his primary biblical interpretation, as he explained the Law and the Gospel, beginning all the way back there in Genesis 1, 2, and 3. He taught the travelers what it means to see the cross, to believe because of the Word.
Now it was the custom of the day that as travelers went together in groups, not necessarily to the same destination, then toward the end of the day, if a set of travelers was reaching their final destination for that day, the other travelers who had a longer path to walk, further to go, they would stop to say goodbye and pretend as if they were going to go on further. It was impolite then, as it is now, to take hospitality for granted. So those who had to go further would pretend like they were going to go further, in order to see if the ones who would reach their final destination were going to issue an invitation. And 99 percent of the time, that’s exactly what happened. And that’s what Jesus does here. As they approached the village where they were going, Jesus gave the impression that he was going farther. And so they strongly urged him, saying, “Stay with us, for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent.” So he went in to stay with them. And they issued the customary hospitable invitation to spend the night there in safety and rest, and began to prepare a meal. Once the meal is prepared, they recline at the table, and the host blesses the food and offers the prayer. But Jesus turned the tables here. He’s been invited into their house. The meal has now been prepared. But Jesus is the one who hosts the meal and now serves them. “When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed and broke it and gave it to them. And their eyes were opened, and they recognized him. And he vanished from their sight.”
This pattern of eating is common in the Bible. The Gospels record many meals between Jesus and his hosts. Sometimes those hosts are scribes and Pharisees and religious leaders; those meals weren’t very pleasant. Other times those meals consist of sinners, tax collectors, prostitutes, poor people, the outcasts. And in every account, there was a period of teaching before eating. A doctrine lesson would be held first, and then there would be the meal. It kind of sounds familiar, doesn’t it? It’s called catechesis. It’s also called the Service of the Word and the Service of the Sacrament. This meal in Emmaus had some differences, though. A meal was taking place after Jesus rose from the dead. He was their rabbi on the road, even though he prevented them from recognizing him. He began serving the meal as their host, but he himself did not partake of it, because he said he would not eat of this meal again until he ate with them in heaven. But he blessed the bread and broke it and gave it, and then vanished before their very eyes. The pattern of hearing God’s Word, then eating the meal, has made itself into the liturgy of the church. We follow the same pattern: we have the Service of Confession and Absolution, the Service of the Word, and the Service of the Sacrament — all predicated on the idea that you’re supposed to learn something from God’s Word that enables you to participate in the Lord’s Supper, as a contrite sinner receiving the absolution of all your sins.
Even though we cannot see Jesus, he has promised to be with us throughout our entire journey as we travel through this life. “Behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). And Deuteronomy 31 of the Old Testament: the Lord promised to be with you as well. “The Lord your God is with you. He will not leave you or forsake you.” Or from our epistle lesson this morning: “the word of the Lord remains forever.” And he is the Word. Even though you may not see Jesus in your circumstance, let there be no mistake: he is with you in your circumstance. He is with you in a particularly special way in the church, in the Word and Sacrament ministry. He is with you as you travel this road from your birth to your grave. He’s not dead. He’s here. Christ is with you, my fellow traveler. His body didn’t stay in the tomb. He rose, just as he said he would. And you will rise, just as he’s promised you will. In good times and in bad, he is here with you — hidden in those circumstances, but working all things to the good for them that love the Lord. In the Word and sacrament ministry, he’s forgiving your sins each and every day. He provides for your daily bread. He is working all things for your good, even though many times we don’t think so. He is our Savior. And we see him not in his physical form, but one day we will stand before him face to face, and will be whole. No more place to travel to. Amen.
May the peace that surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.