On the Way to Emmaus...

Oh Lord God, we do bow before You, we do recognize your glory

and Your majesty and it is a joy for us to be here.

Remind us again of your blessings as we praise you this

day. We ask in your sons name, Amen.

Please be seated and if you would, grab your Bibles and turn

to Luke chapter 24. Luke chapter 24.

Luke 24 · chapter mention Luke 24 · chapter mention

Before we get started today, I want to make a comment just to

express how encouraged I was over this past week in the

aftermath of the storm at how I saw many opportunities and many

people taking the opportunity to express themselves as part of

the community of God. It was wonderful to experience

that. Now I realize that we could do

better. There are perhaps people here

that did not feel touched necessarily by God's people

during that time during the struggles that followed the

storm that blew through here. But I know that so many people

have, and it's been a great blessing to be a part of a

community that has sought to draw one another together.

There is something unique about the church.

We're going to look at this in times to come.

The church is a community of grace.

Now, there's lots of communities in this world.

There's lots of neighborhoods. There's lots of reasons why

people are stuck together, but only the church is a community

of grace. Other places can be communities

of kindness and of gentleness, etcetera, etcetera.

But grace is that gift that comes from the Lord.

Grace is that which is connected to the God Himself and only this

body can be the community of grace.

And it's been a joy for me over the past week to see that

community of grace fulfilling its calling to be gracious

towards one another. I hope that you experienced

that. I hope that you had people

praying for you or that you were able to offer that assistance to

help other people during this time.

It's been a joy again to be a part of this community and see

that. I've been very grateful for

that. We are moving into a series now

on the post resurrection appearances of Jesus Christ.

Now the reason why we do that is that we have spent lots of time

and we appropriately spend lots of time talking about the life

and the teachings of Jesus. How can we possibly be a

community of of God and not speak about the teachings in the

life of Jesus? And we, very appropriately, as

the Scriptures itself do, focus a lot of our attention upon the

cross of Jesus Christ, upon his sacrifice and death there, as we

should. And of course, the story is not

complete until we talk about the resurrection.

And so we focus upon the resurrection.

That's not the end of the story, the story continues.

Jesus appearing over a period of 40 days to his disciples and

communicating some incredibly important things, basically

taking the lessons of his life, his death and his resurrection

and applying them into their lives in a really powerful and

meaningful way. What we're going to be doing is

we're going to over the next couple weeks, we're looking

specifically at those resurrect post resurrection appearances.

How did Christ appear to his disciples following the

resurrection? What did he communicate and how

does that shape and guide our faith?

Today's text out of Luke chapter 24 is perhaps one of the most

Luke 24 · chapter mention

prominent or popular of those passages.

The how Jesus appears to the disciples on the road to Emmaus.

We're going to look through that today and we're going to

basically be answering the question that I think is posed

by the by the text a numerous different times.

And we're going to try to answer that question that I think is

also relevant to every person in this room.

And that's the question of how, how do we recognize Jesus?

How do we see Jesus as he truly is?

Not as we want to imagine him not, not as it's easy to

envision, not in the manner in which we imagine Jesus

comforting us or or the the nature of Jesus in our minds,

But rather, how do we see Jesus as he truly is?

How do we recognize him as he appears?

Now, if you've been a part of this fellowship for some time,

you hear us talk about things like loving Jesus, being

intimate with Jesus, walking with Jesus, drawing near to

Jesus. Now obviously these words are

metaphorical in some cases, or the imagery trying to capture is

somewhat metaphorical, but it's also real.

No less real for being metaphorical, but what does it

mean? How do we do those kind of

things? I remember very much so.

This was even before I was a Christian being very jealous for

the people who lived during Jesus's time, like why did they

get the chance to see him really and be able to tangibly touch

him and all those kind of things.

And I thought about following him around and the disciples

that would hear him speak and those kind of things and and was

jealous of them without realizing that they Jesus that

they were experiencing pre resurrection is not the Jesus

that we experienced today post resurrection.

We experienced the Lord post resurrection and a great passage

to see how this is played out and to challenge our own

understanding, to challenge our own abilities to be able to

answer that question. Do we recognize Jesus as He

really is? Do I see him as I really is, as

he really is? Or do we just worship an idea in

our own minds? We want to see the Lord as He

truly is. How can we do so?

The text begins in Luke chapter 24, verses 13 through 35.

Luke 24:13–35

There are 32 and we're going to look, work our way through this

text here together. Hear the word of the Lord for us

this morning in Luke chapter 24 that very day.

Luke 24 · chapter mention

Now this is Sunday morning here. This is Sunday afternoon, I

guess. And so that very day here, this

references, if you have your Bibles, you can see the

immediate story before this details of resurrection.

The Sunday morning of seeing the tomb is empty.

So that very day we're shifted now a couple of hours into the

early afternoon that very day, two of them, the two of them

being the disciple, 2 disciples. They're not named here.

A little bit later on when you realize the name of one of them

is Cleopas, the other disciple is not never named, which is LED

rise given rise to the speculation that perhaps this is

Cleopas's wife that is with him. I'm somewhat sympathetic to that

perspective or speculation. But in any case, you've got 2

disciples and they're so identified earlier in the text

as followers of Jesus Christ. So we have to think of them as

those two people who have walked with Jesus Christ, who have

heard him speaking, have witnessed the sacrifice and the

death upon the cross. Two of them, we're going to a

village named Emmaus, about 7 miles from Jerusalem.

There's a number of different villages that kind of fit this

bill. They're not sure exactly which

one Jesus would have been or the text here is referencing.

But so the picture is you got 2 disciples.

This is Sunday morning. So during the Sabbath they were

not able or they were not moving around.

But now these two disciples have some business or something that

they have to get to a nearby community for.

And so they're on the road to Emmaus.

If they're moving fast, they're looking at about a two hour

walk. If you're not moving fast, they

could drag out to 3 or 4 hours, something along those lines,

kind of a trip. So they're on the way to Emmaus,

about 7 miles from Jerusalem, verse 14.

And they were talking with each other about all these things

that had happened. While they were talking and

discussing them, Jesus himself drew near and went with them,

but their eyes were kept from recognizing Him.

All right, so picture this for a second.

You've got 2 disciples that are very focused on what just took

place. That's the attention that is

upon them. They are obsessed with what has

just taken place. Their Lord and Savior remember

all the anticipation that they built up about Jesus and they

were expectant to follow Him all the way to His throne.

And so along the way, they are walking along with Jesus, or

they're walking along and Jesus comes and walks along beside

them. And the text here says that they

were kept from recognizing him. They were kept from recognizing

him. Now, what kept them or who kept

them from recognizing him? Now immediately some options

bubble into your mind. The first option being, of

course, the Satan kept them from recognizing him, as we know that

it was part of Satan's understanding of his function

and role in this world is to keep us, to prevent us from

coming to know the Lord and coming to see the Lord.

And so very clearly, it's possible that Satan is the one

that kept the disciples here from recognizing the Lord.

That's possible theoretically, etcetera.

But the text doesn't lead necessarily to understand that.

Most of the time when it's phrased along this line, this is

a passive voice. When it's phrased like this,

it's usually not Satan. And when Satan is active in the

scriptures, it you always identifies him as the source of

action. So if not Satan, what's the

other alternative? Well, God himself kept the

disciples from recognizing Jesus for God's purposes, for the

revelatory nature of what takes place later in the text.

If you know, with the storyline where we're headed, you can kind

of anticipate this. Perhaps it was God himself that

kept the disciples from recognizing him.

That's possible. I think it's also possible that

it's simply their own sin. All of us know what it's like to

be so jaded and so distorted in our vision and our hearts that

we can't see things correctly. Now.

It's hard to imagine that they are walking alongside their Lord

after walking with Him for three years or more and seeing Him

crucified, etcetera, that they can't recognize Him.

But that's the power of our unbelief.

That's the power of sin in our lives to actually do something

along those lines. So I think one of the latter 2

illustrations, either God himself, which I suspect is

probably more the way to understand it, or their own sin

has prevented them from recognizing Him.

Verse 17. And Jesus said to them, what is

this conversation that you were holding with each other as you

walk? And they stood still looking

sad. Then one of them named Cleopas

answered him and said, are you the only visitor to Jerusalem

who does not know the things that have happened here these

days? It's interesting that Cleopas,

the irony here of this is that Cleopas is the one whose eyes

are blind and yet he's accusing Jesus.

He says, do you not know what's going on here?

Can't you tell what's happening here?

And so notice what's happening. You got a picture this.

So the two disciples are talking about with each other.

They're concerned about everything that is taking place.

This third guy kind of joins them, and after a few steps, the

third guy kind of says, hey, what?

What are you guys talking about? And the two disciples, notice

what it says here in verse 17. Verse.

Is that something? Yeah, the end of verse 17.

And they stood still looking sad.

Their eyes were downcast is the way that it's articulated.

Their eyes are downcast. Once again, this imagery of what

their eyes, what your eyes are seeing.

Their eyes are downcast. They can't even look at the

third person, but they stand still when they do this.

And then Cleopas then says, are you the only guy that doesn't

know what's going on? Are you really this blind to

you? Can you not tell what's

happening here? And then Cleopas, Jesus says to

them in verse 19 what things and they said to him concerning

Jesus of Nazareth. Now, I want you to listen to

this. This is the gospel according to

Cleopas. And the gospel according to

Cleopas is a great gospel. It's a gospel message that my

guests will resonate with many people in this room.

It's a gospel message that I think a lot of people outside

this room throughout our world would recognize as the gospel,

the good news of Cleopas. What's the good news of Cleopas?

Listen carefully to it, but remember this, his eyes are

downcast, he's sad. He's got this gospel message

that he's about to proclaim and yet he's sad.

Gospel message according to Cleopas from verse 19 and

following concerning Jesus of Nazareth, a man who was a

prophet, mighty and deed and word before God and all the

people, and how our chief priests and rollers delivered

him up to be condemned to death and crucified him.

But we had hoped that he was the one who would redeem Israel.

Yes. And besides all this, it is now

the third day since these things happened.

Moreover, some of the women of our of our company amazed us.

They were at the tomb early in the morning and when they did

not find his body, they came back saying that they had even

seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive.

Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it,

just as a woman said had said, but him they did not see.

Do you hear the gospel there? Do you hear the good news?

Maybe not. What do you hear verse 19

concerning Jesus of Nazareth? The focus of Cleopas's gospel is

upon Jesus of Nazareth. What focus?

The focus that he was a prophet. Indeed.

He came from God. He is mighty indeed.

Mighty indeed is code in biblical language for the

miracles and for the life in which he lived.

He lived this great miracle life.

He was mighty and word of God before the Lord.

He was mighty before all the people.

In other words, this is the man that is well respected.

He is in awe there. There's great reason to respect

him and to look up to him, to appreciate his teachings, to

appreciate his lifestyle, even to appreciate his his miracles

that he took place, to acknowledge these kind of

things, to realize that this was a man of God.

This is Cleopus's gospel. Not only that, but he also

recognized, recognizes the oppression that took that Jesus

suffered through the opposition that he had and the fact that he

was speaking to power and how power came and crashed down upon

him, even leading to his own death.

Plus they recognize that his body is missing.

Clipa says, look, the women went to the term tomb.

They couldn't find his body. It was missing.

The tomb is not filled right now.

There's this, there's this gap that we don't know what took

place to Jesus and this gospel message talking about this

wonderful teaching, this wonderful, glorious, amazing man

that did all these glorious and wonderful things, this honorable

person that everybody would respect, nevertheless leaves

Cleopas and his partner downcast and crushed.

That's not good news at all. What are they missing?

Clearly I've set it up hopefully enough that you know the answer

to that question. Clearly, there's no faith in the

resurrection. There's no faith in the

resurrection. Cleopas understands that this is

a good man, understands that this is a good teacher,

understand that this is somebody special from God and understands

all the marvelous things, even the suffering that he went

through, the sacrifice of his own life.

He understands all of those. But separated from the

resurrection, you get a gospel that is no gospel at all.

It is not good news. It leaves you downcast.

Why? Because it leaves you in your

sin. What the resurrection is is that

vindication of the sacrifice of our Lord, that God has accepted

from Christ the punishment for our sins so that we are not to

be held accountable for our sin. But rather than that, guilt has

been transferred onto Jesus Christ.

Apart from the resurrection, there's no assurance of that.

There's no comfort of that. There's no nothing for us.

And so you have a world out here and we have many people in here

that are comfortable thinking of Jesus as a good teacher, as a

wonderful life that I want to emulate, as a model that I want

to follow. They're they're happy with all

of that. But the resurrection is just one

miracle too far because we've never seen such a thing.

And consequently we have a gospel that in the end is no

gospel at all. Separate the gospel from Jesus

Christ and Cleopas's gospel is simply not good news.

Mark continues, then says this. Then Jesus says to them in verse

25, 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 of the prophets, he interpreted

to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself,

Jesus says to the disciples. So they're walking along.

This third guy suddenly says, You foolish ones.

Now there's some question in scholars minds about how harsh

of a rebuke this is. Is this a you foolish ones?

If I call you foolish, the chances are I'm rebuking you

pretty strongly. OK, Even if I like you, I

probably am not going to call you a fool unless I really mean

it that way. And indeed, in Jesus time, to be

a fool was not to be intellectually deficient.

It was not to be immature. To be a fool was to be was to

embrace unbelief. To embrace unbelief, that's what

it means to be a fool. And that's exactly what Jesus is

accusing these two disciples of doing.

They're embracing unbelief. You can see it laid out very

clearly in the very next or in the end of that verse.

Oh, foolish ones, slow of heart. Look at verse 25.

Slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken.

Slow of heart to believe what? Not to believe in the

resurrection. That's not what he accuses of

them. He doesn't accuse them of being

slow of heart to believe the words of Jesus.

What does he say? Slow of heart to believe the

Word of God Scripture. That's what Jesus is frustrated

with their foolishness for disregarding the scriptures, not

for being overcome by the nature of the resurrection or anything

like that, but simply by virtue of the fact that they did not

understand the scriptures. What did they not understand

about the scriptures? How do we now who here says that

we can understand the scriptures?

I mean, the Scriptures are tough.

Well, listen to how Jesus describes it, verse 26.

Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these

things and enter into his glory? That's Jesus's shorthand for the

Scripture. All the Old Testament, all the

New Testament is summarized in that statement.

It's necessary for Christ to suffer and to enter into His

glory. And if you read the Scriptures

and understand the Scriptures that way, then you've ceased to

be foolish. You are a man or woman of

belief. That's what Jesus is

articulating here. And then beginning with Moses

and all of the prophets, Jesus interpreted to them all the

scriptures, the things concerning himself.

Can you imagine this Bible study?

This is a great Kelly mocks me occasionally because when I get

home from driving around, I listen to lectures or books or

something like that in my car. And so I sit in the garage for,

you know, short periods of time and listen to the end of a

lecture. I just sit in the car and listen

to the lecture go. I never want I don't want it to

end. This Bible study.

Can you imagine? Looking through all of the

scriptures and seeing how it all concerns himself.

The heel that stomped on Satan's head, that was Jesus's.

The lamb that is caught in the thicket, that is Jesus.

The ark that save Noah and the family, that is Jesus.

The priests who offer the sacrifices, that is Jesus.

The great high priest that stands and offers himself, that

is Jesus. The prophet that is coming, that

is Jesus. The suffering servant in Isaiah,

that is Jesus. The wisdom of God, that is

Jesus. The kings who roll over

Jerusalem, that is Jesus. The sacrifice of their own life,

or the offer of sacrifice from Moses and of David and of

Deborah and the other leaders of Israel, that is the conquering

of Jerusalem and the conquering of Canaan land as a whole, that

is Jesus. The whole Scriptures all point

to one thing, Jesus Christ. And what about him that he would

suffer and that he would be raised into glory.

This is the scriptures. Can you imagine this Bible study

that that the that these two disciples are getting along

their way in verse 18, Sorry, verse 28, verse 28.

And so they drew near to the village where they were going.

And again, I can just imagine them really we're getting close

and this Bible study is so great.

Let's walk a little slower here, you know, as a because they

don't want it to end. They never want it to end here.

They're getting the greatest insight in which they can possum

when they drew near to the Jesus acted as if he was going

further. Jesus acted like he was going to

continue on. Now why is that?

Nobody's really quite sure why Jesus did this.

I tend to think it was so that he could provide the disciples

with an opportunity to act in faith, step out and do something

in faith because of all this and what you've been hearing.

They urged him strongly. The words are that, you know,

they laid hands on him almost just short of that.

You know, they urged him strongly, urged him strongly,

saying stay with us, for it is towards the evening and the day

is now spent. So Jesus went in to stay with

them. So Jesus, you know that they

like, please don't stop talking. Come in with us, sit with us.

You don't want to continue on in your wherever you're going, stay

here with us. So they stay there with us.

Verse 30, when Jesus was at the table with them.

Jesus is the guest. It is highly rude for the guest.

OK, here's the thing. I'm a preacher.

And so at every meal, guess who prays?

You know, I, I, I pray. But you know what?

When I go to your house, when you invite me to your house, go

ahead and do that someday and provide a meal for me.

Go ahead and do that someday. And I am not going to say, hey,

I'm going to go ahead and pray. Now.

I'm never going to do that. You know what I'm going to wait

for? I'm going to wait for you to

pray, which means we're going to wait a long time.

Or rather, what I'm going to wait for is for you to say to

me, Henry, would you pray? OK, Because why?

Because I'm your guest, and as the guest, I'm waiting for you

to take the initiative. And if you ask me to pray, I'll

do that. But I'm just as happy because

I'm the guest. I'm not the host here.

What does Jesus do in verse 30? When he came to the table with

them, Jesus took the bread. Jesus broke it, blessed it and

broke it, and he gave it to them.

And everybody's mind is ringing, of course, because this is

exactly what Cleopas and his partner experienced at the Last

Supper. Jesus is modeling the very Last

Supper for us. Now, what I want you to do is to

take an imaginary loaf of bread in your hands.

And I can see if you're doing this or not.

So take imaginary loaf of bread in your hands.

Thank you. OK, now break it.

Some of you still aren't doing it.

Break it and give it to the person next to you.

Give it to the person next to you.

Look at the person next to you. What?

What do you see when you look at the person next to you?

OK, stop playing now. OK, just look at me.

All right. Now if I break the bread and I

give it to you, what are you looking at?

What do you see when you take the bread?

You see the hands, you see the wrists, What do you see?

You see the crucified body of Jesus Christ.

What did the disciples see when Jesus broke the bread and he

gave it to them? They see the crucified Lord

standing before them. And So what are we told?

Verse 31? Then their eyes were opened and

they recognized Him. Their eyes were opened and they

recognized Him, and then he vanished from their sight.

And they said to each other, Did not our hearts burn within us?

While he talked to us on the road?

While he opened to us the Scriptures, did our hearts not

burn within us? How do you see Jesus as He truly

is? How do you recognize Him for who

He really is? Not your figment of your own

imagination, not your wish fulfillment, but for Jesus as He

truly is. There are two things that the

Lord has granted to us that are played out right here that need

to dominate your life. The Word and sacrament.

The Word and sacrament. While they're walking along the

road, Jesus is portraying the Word, showing how everything

points to Him, and they are swept up in it.

Their hearts are burning. How?

Have you ever been in a Bible study?

Have you ever listened to somebody else's sermons and felt

that burning in your heart about what's going on here?

That's what happens when you open yourself to the Word now,

not to memorize facts or to but to see Christ crucified and to

see him glorified. That's the point of Scripture.

That's what he says about it, that it all focuses upon Him to

see his glory and his suffering. That's the text.

That's the point of the text. The Word burns within us.

And the sacrament. What is the sacrament?

OK, the word supper. We're about to experience it

here in a few seconds, but it is a physical, tangible way of

experiencing the grace of God. A physical, tangible way of

experiencing the grace of God. In other words, it is not just

the Word of God. It is the Word of God and the

love of God that come together in your life to come together in

your witness to everybody else that come together as we express

the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.

It is the Scriptures. It is God's love and it is not

sufficient to give one without the other.

It is not sufficient to give one without the other.

There are some of you that are desperately trying to win your

family members or your neighbors to Christ by loving them.

Please. You can't do it without that,

but you can't do it without the word of God.

There's a great story of a missionary.

Do I have time for this? No, but I'm going to anyway.

There's a great story of a missionary who worked in a tribe

that was that. That was vegans.

They were all vegans. What's the word vegetarian?

Thank you. They were all vegetarians.

And he says, I am not going to share.

I am not going to verbalize the gospel until somebody asked me

about it. I'm going to love these people

into the Lord. I'm going to love them so much

that they're all going to come to me and say, why do you love

us so much? And I'm going to be able to

share the Jesus Christ with them.

Seven years later, nobody has ever come to him.

Finally somebody comes to him and says, I've really got a

question for you about your life.

And he thinks to himself, finally, years of loving these

people, I'm going to be able to share the gospel message.

And they say to him, are you a vegan?

You vegetarian? Because they've misunderstood

the love that they've poured out because it has not been tied to

the scriptures. But you just can't give them the

Scriptures. The scriptures need the tangible

expression of the Word of God. Their hearts were burning within

them and they still didn't recognize them.

Their hearts were burning within them until they see the nail

hands, the nail holes in the hands, until they see the love

of God that is tangibly expressed to them.

This is what God does for everyone of you every day.

He expresses. He gives you that opportunity to

have your heartburn within you because you're reading the

scriptures well and He has placed you within a community

and He's placed you in a world where you have the opportunities

to demonstrate and to receive the love of God so you see Him

so that your eyes may be opened. Lord, may our eyes be opened.

May we see you as you truly are. May our hearts burn within us

when we are exposed to the Scriptures.

May we experience your presence at the sacrament.

May we be taken by the love that you demonstrate for us each and

every day. Through Jesus Christ our Lord,

we pray. Amen.