The Road to Emmaus - An Easter Sermon

Today, all across the world, Christians have faithfully proclaimed, “Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!”  This has been proclaimed confidently, with faith, with a firm conviction that Jesus indeed lives.  Yet two thousand years ago the two companions on the road the Emmaus did not proclaim “Jesus is risen”.  They had heard reports that Jesus was alive again but didn’t believe those reports.

A few years ago a ferry called ‘The River Dance’ ran aground on the beach in Cleveleys during strong winter storms.  I saw the BBC television news report about it the following morning, but somehow it didn’t seem quite real.  I read the report in the local newspaper, ‘The Gazette’, and saw the photograph, but still it didn’t seem quite real.  Only when I went down to Cleveleys on the following Sunday afternoon and saw the forlorn sight of that beached ship with my own eyes did it seem real.

Similarly when a local landmark in Blackpool, Yates Wine Lodge, was torn apart by fire, I first heard about it from somebody in the street and didn’t entirely believe them.  Then I saw the photos and report in ‘The Gazette’ and I believed it had happened, but it didn’t seem quite real.  It was only when I drove past a few days later and saw the remains that it became real for me.

I’m sure that most of us can think of times in our lives when we’ve heard or read about things, but they only became real when we saw them for ourselves.

The two travellers on the road to Emmaus, Cleopas and an unnamed companion, had heard about something they couldn’t quite believe in.  They’d heard that some women had been to Jesus tomb and found it empty.  Those women were claiming that they’d seen a vision of angels who said Jesus was alive.  Some others had been to the tomb and confirmed it, but as far as they knew nobody had seen Jesus alive.  Cleopas and his companion had heard that Jesus was alive, but they couldn’t believe it; it didn’t seem real to them.

The companions are joined by Jesus, but they don’t recognise him.   The New International Version says that this was because, “they were kept from recognising him.”  The Revised English Bible has “something prevented them from recognising him.”  In ‘The Message’ Eugene Peterson translates this passage as “they were not able to recognise who he was.”

No translation gives us any real clue as to why they couldn’t recognise Jesus and I’m told the original Greek is just as ambiguous.  Why couldn’t these two travellers recognise Jesus?    The clues are in the rest of the passage.

The unrecognised Jesus joins them on their walk and asks them, “What are you discussing together as you walk along?”

They begin to talk about Jesus and about who they thought he was.  “He was a prophet.”  That is how the two viewed Jesus.  They had recognised that he was somebody sent by God but they saw him as somebody like Isaiah, Jeremiah or John the Baptiser; a prophet and not the Messiah.  They said that they had hoped that Jesus would be the Messiah, “the one who was going to redeem Israel” but their hopes had been dashed by Jesus death.  They’d heard the reports that Jesus had been raised from the dead but obviously didn’t believe them.

There are a lot of people in the twenty first century who have a similar view of Jesus, both outside and inside the church.  Even those who follow other faiths recognise Jesus as a prophet, as a great teacher sent by God, perhaps the greatest ever religious teacher; but they will not or cannot see him as Messiah or Son of God.  Because they have this view of Jesus, that he was a great religious leader but nothing more, they cannot believe that he was raised from the dead.

Cleopas and his companion were Jews who had almost certainly known Jesus for a while and heard him teach.  They were not among the twelve, but might have been among the seventy two Jesus sent out with his message.  As Jews they would have known their scriptures far better than most Christians know their Bibles today.  They knew the scriptures that said what would happen to the Messiah, they had almost certainly heard Jesus himself preach and yet they just saw him as another failed prophet; not the Messiah who would bring salvation to God’s people.  People today, too, can read the Old Testament, they can read the New Testament as well and still not believe that Jesus was and is the Son of God who rose from the dead on that first Easter Day.

So we have Jesus, Cleopas and his companion walking towards the village of Emmaus.  The two travellers tell Jesus about their feelings, about their disappointment that the man they thought was the Messiah who would save Israel was now dead and their confusion over reports that he had been raised from the dead.

Jesus’ response is to take them through the scriptures that they knew well, to help them perhaps to see those scriptures in a new way.  We don’t know exactly which texts Jesus used, but clearly the passages he chose and the way he explained their meaning made a difference.  As they were later to say, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the scriptures to us.”

Without the living Jesus to help us understand, the scriptures can seem confusing, contradictory even, hard to understand.  When the living Jesus speaks to us, maybe through the words of ministers and preachers or in our minds and hearts as we meditate, the scriptures come alive in a new way.

As Methodists we are very familiar with the account of John Wesley’s conversion.  Reflecting on the experience later, Wesley wrote, “I went very unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate Street, where one was reading Luther’s preface to the Epistle to The Romans.  About a quarter before nine, while he was describing the change God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed.  I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.”  No doubt Wesley had read Paul’s Epistle to The Romans many times, he may even have read Luther’s preface to Romans many times, yet something that night was different.  Through William Holland’s reading of Luther’s commentary John Wesley heard the voice of the living Lord Jesus and found in it salvation.

As Jesus finished explaining the scriptures they reach Emmaus.  They still hadn’t recognised him, they still hadn’t realised their travelling friend was Jesus, but they invited him in for the night.  After Jesus exposition of scripture they were very close, but hadn’t quite got there.

There are many people in our churches today who are very close, but haven’t quite got there.  John Wesley called them ‘Almost Christians’.  Wesley described an ‘Almost Christian’ in the most glowing terms, as somebody who is of good honest character, a charitable person who is outwardly religious, a devout person who prays and goes to church and is attentive throughout the service.  An ‘Almost Christian’, says Wesley, is sincere, they really intend to serve God and do his will, for His sake and not their own.  They sincerely desire to please God in every way, yet they are only almost Christians.  Wesley confesses that, before his conversion on Aldersgate Street, he himself was only an ‘Almost Christian’. 

So what changed for Wesley?  How did he go from being what he called an ‘Almost Christian’ to being what he called an ‘Altogether Christian’?  What is the difference?  The difference is love for God, a love for God that fills heart, mind and spirit; and faith in Jesus, faith that he is the way, the truth and the life; faith that Jesus died on the cross for the forgiveness of sins and that he rose from the dead bringing us the assurance of eternal life.  As John Wesley himself wrote, “an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.”

Jesus sits down to supper with Cleopas and his companion and breaks the bread.  As he does this, Cleopas and his companion suddenly realise who Jesus is, and as they realise he vanishes from their sight.  On the brink of understanding, it is the breaking of bread by Jesus that brings the final certainty of faith; they know that Jesus is their travelling companion and that he has indeed been raised from the dead, just as they had been told.

It is hard to accept, this idea of Jesus rising from the dead.  All kinds of theories have been suggested as to what happened on that first Easter Day.  The traditional Christian view is that Jesus’ physical body was literally brought back to life.  In Luke 24:39 Jesus himself says, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your mind?  Look at my hands and my feet.  It is I myself.  Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones; as you see I have!”   That physical body was changed in some way.  The risen Jesus could still eat food, as he demonstrated on more than one occasion; he could be touched and could cook fish.  On the other hand he could enter a locked room without opening the door; he seemed to be able to move from one place to another very quickly and even to vanish into thin air.  There was something essentially different about Jesus’ resurrection body.

My firm conviction is that Jesus’ resurrection was a physical one; that he did physically rise from the dead, however incredible it seems to us in the modern world.

Some Christians doubt a literal physical resurrection.  They would say that the resurrection of Jesus was a spiritual resurrection and that the meetings the disciples and others had with the risen Jesus were essentially inner spiritual experiences.  I have no doubt whatsoever that meeting Jesus was an intensely spiritual experience, as the account of the travellers on the Road to Emmaus proves.  They didn’t recognise Jesus for who he was until their spiritual eyes were opened.

The significance of Jesus’ resurrection is a spiritual one, because it is through spiritual experience that we meet the risen Jesus today.  I have spoken before of my own coming to faith, of the years of reading the Bible and hearing sermons, of my years as an ‘Almost Christian’ and then that moment when the gospel message came into my heart as well as my mind, when the risen Jesus spoke to me through the voice of another and I believed!  Ever since then I have wanted others to know that spiritual encounter with the risen Jesus for themselves, to share in that faith in Christ Jesus and love of God.

Our passage from Luke ends with Cleopas and his companion sharing that intense desire to make known the reality of an encounter with the risen Jesus.  Despite the fact that it is evening, that it is going dark and that they risked attack from robbers on the road between Emmaus and Jerusalem, the two companions set of straight away to Jerusalem to tell then eleven remaining disciples that they had seen Jesus.

As Christians we should have a burning desire to tell others about Jesus; about how he died for them on the cross to bring forgiveness of sin and then rose from the dead bringing us assurance of eternal life.  We can be used by Jesus to assure them that through faith in him, even though our bodies may fail and die, we can be sure that we will live on forever.

Jesus himself told us to pass on the good news of liberation from sin and the promise of everlasting spiritual life.  The final words of the risen Jesus, as reported in Matthew’s gospel are, “go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.”

In the passage in Luke that follows on from the account of the encounter on the road to Emmaus Jesus says, “The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.  You are witnesses of these things.”

In the Acts of the Apostles, just before his ascension, Jesus says, “You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

Jesus does not call us all to be evangelists, any more than he calls us all to be ordained ministers, local preachers, church stewards or whatever.  But we can all be witnesses for the risen Jesus in the way we live our lives, in the love we show to others and by having the courage, if the opportunity presents itself, to be open and honest about our faith.  We never know, the risen Jesus could use us to bring that person to faith.

Like Cleopas and his companion we too may have, or have had, doubts about Jesus being the Son of God and rising from the dead.   Like Cleopas and his companion the risen Jesus comes to us and leads us gently to the truth of who he is; and like Cleopas and his companion we must be fired with enthusiasm to tell others about Jesus.  May the risen Jesus meet us and meet us again and bring us these blessings.

The Reality of the Resurrection - A Sermon for Easter Day

Preachers do all sorts of odd things on Easter Day.

I have heard of several Ministers and Local Preachers who have eaten daffodils on Easter Day.  Well, I won’t be walking over to our cross this morning and eating one of the daffodils.  For a start off I have no idea what a daffodil tastes like and for another they may be high in calories, which won’t help with the weight loss!  The point was that if the congregation went home and told people their Minister had eaten a daffodil, nobody would believe them.

I know another Minister who planned a very special Easter sermon.  As he began to preach a circus performer came tumbling down the church, interrupting his preaching.  After a brief conversation he resumed the sermon.  Then the Christmas fairy appeared, skipping down the aisle and interrupting the sermon.  Again there was a brief conversation and the sermon resumed.  Finally, just as the Minister was getting going again, I entered the church, dressed as Elvis Presley and belted out Suspicious Minds to a by now intrigued congregation.  The Minister then suggested that if people told family and friends that in church, on Sunday, the service had been interrupted by a circus acrobat, the Christmas fairy and Elvis Presley, nobody would believe them.

I tried to think of something I could do in an Easter Day service that nobody would believe; like coming in wearing a Hawaiian shirt or wearing a Superman costume, but then I decided that if people have even the vaguest knowledge of me, nothing I could do would be unbelievable.

The point of all these unbelievable acts perpetrated by Ministers and Preachers is, of course, to point out that the resurrection of Jesus is, for many, simply unbelievable and yet it happened.  I say that with absolute conviction!  I believe very firmly that in first century Judea God raised Jesus Christ physically from the dead to glorious and eternal resurrection life.

Many people do indeed doubt that Jesus physically rose from the dead.  They dismiss whole thing saying that we know dead bodies do not come back to life, it is simply impossible.  Some inside church have the same view.  They say that what the early Christians meant by resurrection wasn’t that Jesus physically came back to life, but that in the days and weeks following his death they could still feel his presence and therefore began to claim that he was still alive.  The idea that he physically rose from the dead came when later generations misunderstood what the very first Christians meant by resurrection.

 

Our gospel account this morning makes it clear we are talking about more than a spiritual experience, though it was certainly that as well.  Mary Magdalene saw somebody who she thought was the gardener, though he was, of course, Jesus.  This obviously very solid flesh and blood person asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?  Who is it that you are looking for?”

Mary replied to this unrecognised though very real physically present person, “If you took him away, sir, tell me where you have put him, and I will go and get him.”

Let’s pause and reflect here.  For Mary, at this point, there is no suggestion at all that this is anything other than an ordinary conversation between a man and a woman, not suggestion of anything spiritual going on and no suggestion that she thought anything had happened to Jesus other than his body being moved by somebody.

Why did she not recognise Jesus?  Perhaps, as I was once told in Sunday School, it was because her vision was blurred by her tears.  Maybe Jesus simply has his back to her or was partially turned away, as the film ‘The Greatest Story Ever Told’ suggested.  Perhaps Jesus was some distance away.  Maybe it was because Mary knew Jesus was dead and didn’t even consider the possibility that the man she was talking to could be Jesus.  Why did Mary not recognise Jesus?  I’ll return to this question later.

Jesus speaks just one word, ‘Mary’ and she realises who he is; her ‘Teacher’ risen from the dead.  He is still the same solid physically real person she has been talking to, but now the experience of encountering the person Mary now knows to be the resurrected Jesus takes on an added spiritual dimension as well.  Mary’s encounter with the risen Jesus was both a physical and a spiritual experience.

Jesus physically rose from the dead on Easter Day.  Since the earliest days of Christianity the constant claim about Jesus was that on the cross he defeated death and that by rising to life he proved death a defeated enemy.  If Jesus did not rise physically from the dead then how is death defeated?

If Jesus did not physically rise from the dead, then where did the idea come from?  In the pagan Roman world the idea of physical resurrection seemed as ridiculous as it does to many people today.  Even in Israel there was no concept of individual resurrection.  Many Jews believed that all the dead would rise when God brought in his worldwide kingdom, but not that anybody would rise before that day.

Jesus physically rose from the dead on Easter Day.  As Paul wrote, in his first letter to the Corinthians, “if Christ has not been raised from death then we have nothing to preach and you have nothing to believe.  If Christ has not been raised then your faith is a delusion and you are still lost in your sins.  It would also mean that believers in Christ who have died are lost.  If our hope in Christ is good for this life only then we deserve more pity than anyone else in all the world.  But the truth is that Christ has been raised from death as the guarantee that those who sleep in death will also rise.”

Jesus physically rose from the dead on Easter Day.  It was not just a spiritual experience who appeared to Mary Magdalene outside tomb but a real solid person.  It was not just a spiritual experience who walked with the two on the road to Emmaus and broke bread before them but a real living person.  It was not just a spiritual experience who cooked fish on the shore of the Sea of Galilee but a real living person.  It was not just a spiritual experience who appeared before Thomas and the other apostles but a real living person.  Only a physically resurrected Jesus could have convinced Doubting Thomas that Jesus lived again.

Jesus physically rose from the dead on Easter Day and yet Mary did not recognise him.  Why?  Why do so many people today, even in church, not recognise our risen Jesus?

I think it was because Mary was searching for a dead body rather than a living Lord.  She couldn’t find Jesus because he was alive, not dead.  Many people today make the same mistake.  The Jesus they know lived almost two thousand years ago.  The accounts of his miracles and teaching impress them.  But they have no experience of the risen Jesus who walks with us day by day.  “Christ is risen” doesn’t just mean he came back to life in first century Judea: it means that he is alive today, right here, right now!  Christ is alive!

Mary was searching for a dead Jesus, but she found a living Lord because Jesus found her and came to her.  That is usually the way it is.  Jesus parable of the Lost Sheep tells us that even before we know we are lost, Jesus is looking for us.  On the road to Damascus Paul was not looking for Jesus, yet Jesus came to him in a vision of glory and Paul found the Saviour he didn’t even know he was looking for.  If you feel that you have lost your faith or Jesus seems far away know that he is already coming towards you and is just waiting for you to recognise him once again as your Saviour and Lord.

Mary was searching for Jesus but did not recognise him when she found him.  Sadly that is true for so many people.  Jesus comes to us in the hungry, in the thirsty, in the lonely and in the persecuted.  He comes to us in the needy person and we do not recognise him.

Francis of Assisi was terrified of leprosy.  One day, whilst walking down a narrow path, he saw a leper coming towards him.  Instinctively his heart shrank back, recoiling from contamination by that horrible disease.  But then, ashamed of himself, he ran and put his arms around the leper’s neck and kissed him before passing on.  Only a moment later he looked back and the road was empty with nobody in sight.  For the rest of his life Francis was convinced that it wasn’t an ordinary leper he had met, but Jesus himself.

We should always be ready to help those in need because, if we don’t we may miss out on a meeting with our Lord Jesus himself.

Jesus physically rose from the dead on Easter Day.  Jesus Christ is risen indeed!  Our living Lord Jesus comes to us each and every day:  let us welcome him daily into our lives and into our hearts and live as people who serve a living Lord.