On the Road with Jesus

Reading Luke 24:13-35

Preached by Joshua 26/04/2020

“Nothing behind me, everything ahead of me, as is ever so on the road.” This line comes from Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road”, a novel that captures the rise of the road trip, the restlessness of youth, and the journey to find oneself out on the road.

We don’t have many rites of passage any more in 21st century New Zealand, but one of the major ones is the moment of getting your driver’s licence.

There is a newfound freedom in being able to hit the road. The road trip is one of the most joyful expressions of this freedom.

Speaking of road trips, the Christian philosopher, James Smith says this:

We leave because we’re looking. For something. For someone. We leave because we long for something else, something more. We leave to look for some piece of us that’s missing. Or we hit the road to leave ourselves behind and refashion who we are. We hit the road in the hope of finding what we’re looking for...[1]

And so, in the modern mind the road is so often a metaphor for a place of self-discovery.

This fondness for the road is nothing new.

Throughout history, pilgrimage has played a huge role in our search for meaning and purpose.

The Jewish people would ascend to Jerusalem for festivals singing Psalms on the way.

In the late middle ages, many pilgrims trekked the Camino de Santiago to visit the site where it is thought that St James is buried.

Pilgrimages, road-trips, and journeys have always been important to us. There is something about them that captures our imagination and hearts.

How about you at home? You probably have a favourite journey.

Lately on lock down we haven’t been able to go anywhere. We have been limited to being pilgrims of our local neighbourhoods.

So, what is the most fascinating thing you have seen on your daily covid-pilgrimages around the neighbourhood?

In today’s Gospel we encounter a road trip although it’s by foot.  We encounter two disciples on the road to Emmaus. They are also on the road looking for something. They are trying to make sense of the events of Easter, working out just what on earth has happened.

They carry with them their dreams and hopes, their longings and disappointments.

So, let’s take a journey with these disciples on the road:

First, we might consider why would Luke include this story in his biography of Jesus?

Luke’s telling of this story seeks to do a couple of things at the end of his Gospel:

1)   It seeks to emphasize the reality of Jesus’ resurrection, it does so by offering yet another witness to what happened.

2)   It names the journey of two disciples who offer a model of the Christian life and journey. We see in them a reorientation of their hearts and lives around a revelation of who Jesus is and the presence of Jesus with them.

(13-14) In verses 13 and 14 we are introduced to two disciples of Jesus, only one of them named for us. There are lots of debates about who they are. They are not part of the central crew of the 11 disciples whom they visit at the end of the story, but they were clearly familiar with Jesus.

They are on the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus, a seven mile journey according to Luke. They are walking and talking, and the language is clear that they are vigorously discussing, arguing even, fact checking and espousing opinions, wondering what on earth has just happened. How can they explain these strange Easter events that people are talking about.

(15-16) Then Jesus shows up in their midst, but we hear this mysterious phrase “their eyes were kept from recognizing him.” Most commentators agree that this is some kind of concealment on God’s part. Jesus remains fully hidden from view in terms of his identity, yet he walks right there with them and talks with them.

This theme of “seeing”, of vision and blindness is used throughout Luke’s writing.

We might think of Simeon who in Luke 2 sings “my eyes have seen your salvation.” We might think of Luke’s account of the Apostle Paul being blinded on the road to Damascus and then having his sight restored both literally but also metaphorically in terms of knowing who Jesus really is.

And so just like Paul before his conversion experience these two disciples on the road don’t recognize Jesus for who he is.

(17-27) Jesus enters into a conversation with these disciples on the road. He asks them what they are chatting about.

This stops them in their tracks. They are so mournful and stunned by grief they can’t stroll and chat. There is a dramatic pause in the journey and the disciples share what’s troubling them.

They say they are talking about:

“Jesus of Nazareth, a man who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, 20 and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him. 21 But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.”

The disciples name very accurately much about Jesus and his role as mighty prophet, but they stop short of the full story.

When they imagined that Jesus would save Israel, they likely imagined that Jesus would deliver them from their Roman enemies, liberating them from domination. In fact, it appears as if the very opposite has happened.

Jesus was crucified by their enemies.

The disciples also mention the news they have heard of Jesus’ resurrection, yet they can’t quite believe it. 

They say: “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.” (24)

There is a huge irony in them sharing this with Jesus. They are basically saying “We really wanted to see what happened, we’re not quite sure if we can believe until we do”…and there is Jesus right in front of them. They are in the midst of what they desire but they just can’t quite see it.

Jesus then rebukes them.

He says: “Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! 26 Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?” 27 Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.

Jesus doesn’t hold back. He calls them foolish and slow of heart. It’s not just about understanding and the intellect, its’ about their inner commitments and their attitudes. They are in Jesus’ view reading all of these events the wrong way.

Jesus points them toward the necessity of His suffering.

The pattern of the prophets in Scripture was rejection, suffering, and death. Jesus fulfills this pattern, he comes as more than just a prophet, he comes as God incarnate to take upon himself the suffering of the world, bearing its weight on the cross and by rising again bringing hope and new life.

Tom Wright puts it this way:

“They, like everybody else in Israel, had been reading the Bible through the wrong end of the telescope. They had been seeing it as the long story of how God would redeem Israel from suffering, but it was instead the story of how God would redeem Israel through suffering; through, in particular, the suffering which would be taken on himself by Israel’s representative, the Messiah.”[2]

So, Jesus shows them that they have been viewing the story of the Bible through the wrong lens.

When I was a kid I had a book of those “magic eye paintings”, those 3D pictures where you had to look at them cross eyed at a certain distance for images to pop out.

I remember staring at it for what felt like hours until suddenly there came a moment where the picture popped and I could do it.

As soon as I saw it, I could see the rest of the paintings in a new light, every page made sense.

I think it’s like that with Jesus and the Bible too.

It turns out that Jesus is the interpretive key to the Scriptures. It is a book with Jesus at its heart. We can’t understand the full story without Jesus, and we can’t understand Jesus without the story. Here Jesus points out that He is the fulfilment of all of their hopes, he is what they have been looking for all along.

Jesus is beginning to reveal himself to them through the words of the Bible, yet their eyes have not quite opened yet.

(28-29) It starts to get late and so the travellers on the road invite Jesus to stay with them.  

(30-31) In what happens next we see the aha moment.

30 When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. 31 Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him…

Here in the breaking of bread Jesus reveals himself to them fully.

Their eyes are opened.

In the very first meal of the Bible Eve and Adam take the fruit of the tree and eat from it. When they do their “eyes are opened.” In this moment creation was marred by rebellion and sin.

Now in Luke 24 Jesus celebrates another meal. He takes the bread and when he gives it to the disciples their eyes are opened, they recognize him.

Here is a picture of new creation.

Jesus reveals himself to them. He is suddenly present with them.

Jesus does this through the action of breaking bread with them.

Our attention can’t help but be drawn to the celebration of the Lord’s Supper, the meal that Christians have shared for centuries. A meal in which we know Jesus’ presence with us.

This passage is a rich source of reflection and meditation for the Christian life. There is so much we could dig into.

There are however two major invitations that struck me as I read it afresh this week.

1)   We are invited like the disciples on the road to see who Jesus really is, to know his presence with us, and to worship Him.

2)   We are invited to a new and hopeful way of seeing the world through the lens of Jesus’ resurrection.

1 - An invitation to see Jesus for who He really is, to know his presence with us…

After encountering Jesus, the disciples on the road go out to share the news with burning hearts, they have had a deep and real encounter with Jesus, both through the Scriptures and his presence with them at the table.

Ever since Christians have celebrated word and sacrament, we have come to the Scriptures to meet Jesus and come to the table to celebrate his presence with bread and wine.

The story of the Emmaus road journey is representative of the Christian journey in so many ways. It tells a story of coming to know Jesus in the midst of our lives, walking with us and revealing Himself to us.

Before we ever go on a journey Jesus takes the ultimate journey toward us.

St Augustine in his “Confessions” put it this way:

 “For he did not delay, but ran through the world, crying out by words, deeds, death, life, descent, ascension – crying aloud to us to return to him. And he departed from our sight that we might return to our hearts and find him there.”[3] (65)

Jesus takes the initiative in the story of the Emmaus road. He chooses to walk with the disciples, he reveals himself through his teaching and breaking of the bread as the one who by his death and resurrection has come to rescue them and give them new hope

How might Jesus want to reveal himself to us afresh today?

2 - The lens of resurrection - A new way of seeing the world.

The disciples eyes are opened at the end of the Emmaus road story and they are invited to see everything in a new light because of what Jesus has done.

How might we in this time be invited to see our world through a lens of resurrection hope?

Murray Rae (Theology Dept Otago University) in his Otago Daily Times article this week said this about the travellers on the Emmaus road:

They were confronted by a reality that simply couldn’t be accommodated within their prior estimations of what is and is not possible in this world. It took time for their blindness to be overcome. It took time for the disciples to discover that the world had changed and that the forces of death that nailed Jesus to the cross no longer had the last word.

I wonder whether our current struggle against Covid-19 might help us to see reality in a new light, to imagine a different way of ordering our world?”[4]

Last week Edmund spoke of how we find ourselves in an opportunity to consider a “reset.” So much of our daily reality has been put on hold or changed.

Sometimes it takes arresting and sudden change for us to realize the lenses through which we have been viewing the world.

Perhaps now more than ever there is an opportunity for our lives to be shaped by the hope Jesus offers.

Murray Rae goes on to say:

“Ever since that first Easter encounter, Jesus has been inviting us to share in a new reality, a new way of being human. In this new reality the poor hear good news, the blind see, and sinners are forgiven…Is it too good to be true? Our inclination to think so is not a sign of the impossibility of such a world but rather of our lack of imagination and of faith.”

I found those words suitably challenging.

Today’s story is an invitation to let our imaginations and our faith be shaped by the resurrection of Jesus.

The most important journey we will ever take is the journey we take with Jesus. This passage invites us to consider how Jesus might reveal himself to us today, through the Bible and through the course of our daily lives. It also invites us to consider what difference it makes for Jesus to be on the road with us. How might the revelation of who Jesus is and the presence of Jesus with us shape the course of our journeys?

My experience is that Jesus being on the road with us makes all the difference in the world…

Let’s pray…

[1] Smith, James K. A.. On the Road with Saint Augustine (p. 4). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

[2] Tom Wright, Luke for Everyone.

[3] St Augustine, Confessions (Hendrickson Classics), 65

[4] https://www.odt.co.nz/opinion/how-do-we-want-order-our-new-world