Encountering Jesus - the Emmaus Road

Luke 24: 13-35

Philip Jones

We need to go back in time.  We need to remove the past two weeks from our memories, we need to set aside our own responses of joy and celebration that Jesus the Lord has risen, and return to the fear, grief and confusion of that first Easter Day as the disciples saw it.

If we were disciples at the time of today's gospel story about the encounter on the Emmaus Road, today would be the day of resurrection.  It would only have been two days ago that we saw our teacher and friend hoisted on a cross by the Roman authorities and allowed to die a painful and horrible death.  We are feeling grief over his death. We are angered and humiliated by the injustice of it all; and we are at risk ourselves of being arrested as collaborators - in fact Peter nearly was, but he managed to lie his way out of danger.

And then only this morning, some of the women in our group went up to the tomb and discovered that Jesus's body has gone. They came back to the group with some strange story about a couple of angels and a message about not looking for the living among the dead! But we didn't really believe them - they've been beside themselves with grief; it's not surprising that they're seeing things. Peter dashed off to the tomb to check it out, then went home looking a bit shell-shocked.

It's been an awful three days. We're all confused; we have no idea what will happen next or what we're supposed to do. We had such high hopes, he made such big promises, we all adored him so much - and now he's gone.

So, amid all that turmoil, Cleopas, and another disciple whose name we don't know, decide to leave Jerusalem where all the horror took place and set out on the road to Emmaus, a seven-mile walk through the hills to the north west.   It seems very likely Cleopas and friend may have lived in Emmaus because later in this story they invite a friendly stranger to spend the night in their company. There's no mention of an inn, so the obvious assumption from the text is that Emmaus was their home and they were happy to offer hospitality in their house to a traveller.

As they are walking along, talking over everything that's been going on since the day before yesterday, and probably talking themselves into deeper and deeper despair, a stranger falls in with them and walks alongside, and asks them what they're talking about to make them look so sad. And Cleopas lets it all out - all the events of the past three days come flooding out, all the hurt and the fear and confusion.

But when the two disciples have finished their story, the stranger slowly and methodically takes all the broken pieces of the last three days and makes sense of them. He assembles them into a pattern which shows that the death and rising to new life of Jesus were foretold by the prophets, that there was no confusion about what was happening, and that it was all part of God's plan for humanity.
 
This was a critical moment for Cleopas and his friend: they say afterwards that their hearts burned within them when the stranger explained these things to them. In fact they are so drawn to him that they ask him to spend the rest of the night with them as that first resurrection day draws into evening.

As they prepare to eat their supper, it would have been the custom for the guest - the stranger - to say the blessing over the food. And as the stranger takes the bread, blesses, breaks and gives it out, the disciples recognise at last that their companion is none other than Jesus himself. But with that recognition, they no longer see him: he has disappeared from their sight.

The stopover in Emmaus is cancelled and Cleopas and friend immediately return to Jerusalem to share their story with the rest of the group. When they arrive they discover that Jesus has also appeared to Simon Peter, and while they are still sharing their experiences with one another, Jesus appears again to all of them, reaffirms the truth of his resurrection, and tells them to stay in the city until they are clothed with power from on high.  Luke's gospel leaves the group of disciples and other companions in Jerusalem, waiting. And this has all happened during the early morning, daytime, evening and night-time of that first Easter Sunday.

The pace of events, the sheer energy of bouncing from one occurrence to another, have left those disciples shaken and emotionally shattered. But one crucial change has occurred: the despair and confusion have lifted. There is suddenly something to work for and to live for; the community of Jesus's followers now has a mission and will soon receive the power to achieve that mission. And the foundation stone of that mission is faith in the power of God through the living, resurrected Jesus.

The essence of the story of Cleopas and his friend on the Emmaus Road is still a living experience for the community of Jesus's disciples today. It highlights two deeply significant ways in which the power of Jesus can be recognised and applied in our lives.  Those early disciples allowed their faith in Jesus to open their minds to the message of Jesus supported by scriptures which spoke of him; and they opened their hearts to the revelation of his continuing presence with them at the breaking of the bread.  These two great fundamentals of Christian faith - the good news of Jesus interpreted through the scriptures, and the presence of Jesus represented through the breaking of the bread in the Eucharist - have been at the heart of the Christian tradition since the earliest days. They form the broad outline of this service today, as they do in almost every Christian denomination.

They are strengthened by the fact that, on many occasions in his ministry, Jesus interpreted the scriptures as a pathway to a greater understanding of God's will for our world. He never lessened their importance, although he certainly challenged us sometimes to look hard at how we interpret and apply their message.  Equally, on the night before he died, Jesus himself created for his followers an act of remembrance which involves breaking bread and sharing wine as signs of his continued presence among them.  When these two - the message of the gospel, and the breaking of bread - came together on the journey to Emmaus, the effect was overwhelming for Cleopas and his friend.

Perhaps it's no longer as dramatic for us today. We don't easily experience the emotions of that first Easter Sunday when we come here 2000 years later. Much time has passed; it's not easy to cross the cultural divide between 1st century Palestine and 21st century Britain. And yet, as a Christian community trying to follow our Lord's teachings, we've found no better way to allow Jesus to come to us, speak to us, and take priority in our lives than by engaging with the message of Jesus in the scriptures, and by receiving the gift of Jesus in the Eucharist.

We are doubly blessed if our hearts burn within us when we hear and understand Jesus's call in our lives; or if we somehow glimpse the risen Jesus present with us at the breaking of the bread.  We can probably each recall those rare and special transcendent moments when we seem to have drawn close to God, or when have experienced a particularly truthful insight during our faith journey which has changed us. Those are surely the times when our hearts burn deep within us as we hear his voice.   Those are the revelations to our deepest selves that the living Jesus has been alongside us and is present with us.  And our continued journeying with Jesus suggests that there are more of those experiences to come – that's why our Christianity is a journey towards the banquet of life and never a completed assignment.

The experience of the two disciples on the Emmaus road, being lifted out of despair and confusion into a place of joy, confidence, wholeness and understanding through their encounter with the living Jesus, shows that these indeed are channels by which God's grace, and the love and companionship of the risen Jesus, come into our lives.  The Emmaus revelation is one of the most intimate ways of experiencing the resurrection – a journey, a conversation, a sharing of fears and doubts, a sharing of wisdom and discernment, and a simple supper.  And, in so many respects, we still walk that Emmaus Road with Jesus as our companion, because those are the intimacies which Jesus shares with us here today and every day.

Amen.

(Philip Jones)