April 13, 1997
Psalm 4
Luke 24:13-35

Let's take a moment to place this text and this period of time within the context of the Christian calendar.

With the story of the resurrection of Jesus as told to us by Mark two weeks ago on Easter Sunday, we now enter into that time--pre-Pentecost, called Eastertide. It is the 50 days in the church year before the celebration of Pentecost. In Eastertide, the post-resurrection stories are read and told, so that Christians might rejoice in the presence of Christ going before us in the world.

This Sunday, the third Sunday of Easter, is known as Jubilate Sunday--the Sunday of joy. It is interesting that our story begins with its opposite. For weeks we have been walking toward Jerusalem in our lectionary texts; today we head straight out of town to Emmaus.

The story of the appearance of Jesus on the road to Emmaus takes place on Easter afternoon and evening and is told only in the Gospel of Luke. Its opening theme is disbelief and depression, which again make the disciples almost miss the meaning of the resurrection in their lives.

Cleopas and another unnamed disciple have left Jerusalem. They have had enough of the bad news there--the betrayals, the denials, the distortions, their dreams dashed. They felt like suckers to have even dared to hope for so much.

On the flight-or-fight scale of human response to crisis, they, like the women at the tomb, take to flight. They would just as soon get out of town. They've had their fight, and now they pull their collars up and head out of Jerusalem to the quiet village of Emmaus, about seven miles out of town and away from all this despair and bewilderment.

Incidentally, Emmaus means "warm springs." Maybe they were heading to Emmaus to sit in some hot water and try to rejuvenate their dried-out spirits. As Californians, we know how good a hot tub or a mud bath can feel after a difficult or trying time!

It is while they are walking and talking together, debriefing all that has happened, so the story goes, that the resurrected Jesus "came up and walked with them." So depressed are they, however, that they don't even recognize him. Various translations try to deal with the moment. "They stood still, their faces downcast." "They stood still, their faces full of sadness." "They stopped, their faces drawn in misery."

It's easy to see why they are so depressed.

Everything, EVERYTHING has gone wrong.

Jesus is dead.

The movement is ended.

Their dreams are buried.

Their hopes are grounded.

The first and maybe only person they have ever met who could be called the Child of God has been betrayed and beaten, cursed, stripped, mocked, and killed. As Jim Gilliom writes, "The flesh of love has been punched through and hung up by nails on a cross."

No wonder they are bummed out. No wonder their faces are drawn in misery as they trudge the seven lonely miles to Emmaus. Times couldn't get much worse than this.

You've been there. You've been on the road to Emmaus. Some of us are even walking on that very road this morning.

It's the road of hopelessness and despair. It's the road which suddenly appears before us when someone we love dies. It's the road which rises up to meet us when we have been betrayed--in a marriage, a friendship, a partnership, or a good job opportunity suddenly gone awry. It's the road we walk when we find ourselves dealing with loneliness, depression, alienation, grief, or suffering.

In terms of the general human condition, the Bible calls it the reality of sin in the world. Another way to put it is this: You have to expect that some awful things will happen to you on your life journey. No one is exempt from the awful rigors and tragedies of this life. One of the chief lessons on the Emmaus raod story is that we all live in a grief-tainted, anxious, and difficult world, where no one--not even Christ--escapes its tragic touch.

Now comes the Easter Gospel: This is not all. There is more to the Christian life than walking bewildered down a long road of despair and grief.

The story says that the resurrected Christ joins the two disciples on the road and walks with them. Of course, they don't recognize him at first. In other words, on their depressing, fear-filled road, they do not walk alone. The Divine Spirit of the Risen One walks side by side, step by step with them.

"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadows, I shall fear no evil; for thou art with me."

It's a great Gospel story. Luke makes a fine point, you say, but how does the resurrected Christ walk with me? I haven't seen him on any of my Emmaus roads.

Remember that the two did not recognize Christ either. All they saw was a stranger, a comforting friend who walked along with them and tried both to comfort their hearts and to open their tired minds.

The second point of understanding this Gospel lesson is one of friendship. Christ may appear to us in a friend who will simply walk with us and share our heart's pain. This is the longing of the heart for supportive human companionship, of which Albert Camus wrote:

Don't walk in front of me; I may not follow.

Don't walk behind me; I may not lead.

Walk beside me and be my friend.

My Uncle Jimmy was not my real uncle. He was the uncle of one of my dear friends. When I moved to Des Moines, on the advice of his niece, he visited the Urbandale Church where I was minister. By sheer grace and my good fortune, Uncle Jim decided to adopt me as his honorary niece, pastor, and good friend.

I met him on his 70th birthday, and we became instant good friends. He was a retired doctor and former chief of staff at Iowa Methodist Hospital. One of the things I liked most about my friendship with Uncle Jim was that he insisted on personally reading every X-ray and hospital test I took the entire time I was in Des Moines! He took doctoring seriously and made it a conscious part of our friendship.

He was invaluable to my family and me in the long journeys of my cousin's death from lung cancer and then my mother's death from a series of brain strokes. He helped us read and interpret the signs of life and the journey to death, and he gave us the strength to be compassionate and caring while attending to dying in both of these deaths which were so difficult for my family. I called him when I needed to--day or night--for advice, counsel, wisdom.

A more committed and compassionate friend I have not known. He walked beside me in times of anxiety, despair, and sorrow. I will be forever grateful.

Uncle Jimmy died in a terrible automobile accident almost two years ago today. I suppose it is fitting, but slightly ironic, that the family called me home to Des Moines to give the eulogy at Uncle Jim's memorial service.

The Emmaus story describes that kind of healing through friendship. It's a story about the kind of comfort and care that friends can provide in those horrible life moments, when there seems to be no way out.

There is a great deal of "friendship on the Emmaus road" which takes place in this congregation. I will not forget a big pot of red tulips on my doorstep when I returned home from the death of my mother. Casseroles, flowers, notes, phone calls, prayers, hands holding other hands in prayer--it all shows up miraculously on the doorsteps and at the homes of those who walk the Emmaus road. Pastoral caregivers, parish callers, intercessory prayer, Laikos, care and fellowship; it's all part of the way of life of this community and of any community which seeks to walk hand in hand with the Risen One.

But is it enough? And is it the whole of the meaning of the Emmaus story?

The fullness of joy is to come. The three of them now arrive at Emmaus at the end of the seven-mile walk. As it is evening, they eat together. It is when Jesus says the blessing and breaks open the bread, Luke says, "that their eyes were opened and they recognized him."

With that, Jesus disappears. And the disciples say to each other, "Did not our hearts burn within us when we met him on the road?"

Without a moment's delay, says Luke, "they set out and returned to Jerusalem." That's another seven miles, this time in the dark, but in the light of some newly learned truth, the truth contained in a burning heart. And finding the rest of the disciples, they tell them what has happened, and everyone exclaims, "The Lord is risen, indeed."

It's a great story, written for those early Christians who were trying to find their new way in an awful world. For the early church was soon persecuted. Stephen would be stoned to death. Peter would be crucified in a most gruesome manner. Jerusalem would be destroyed. It's a story written so that new believers could hold on, hold on, even though being a Christian was a dangerous road to walk in those days.

This story is also written for us.

"And they rose that hour and returned to Jerusalem." There is a kind of acceleration in the movement from depression to relief to joy.

The two are excited and the adrenaline is rushing; how else would they have been able to fly through the night to the room where their friends were gathered? But they enter the room to discover that the disciples have already heard the same story from Peter, who had seen Jesus out fishing that night.

Affirmations and gladness abound! And the post-resurrection appearances begin to gather momentum--"I saw him outside the tomb; he called my name!" All the disciples except Thomas gathered, hiding in a locked house; and there he is, in the midst of them, and then coming back again, just to show Thomas. Peter taking his boat after a night at sea and standing on the shore, and a familiar figure asking, "Have you any fish? I'm hungry, let's have some breakfast." The two at Emmaus, breaking bread.

All this points to community and mission. The friends who were able to talk to each other with burning hearts were entering a new relationship with each other, a relationship based on new community.

The good news contained in the post-resurrection stories is that despair is not the chief end of life. Neither are friendship and caring the sole answer to our sin and misery. The whole meaning of Easter is that our joy cannot be contained and doesn't belong only to us.

The life of Easter people is a life of mission. We live in a world groaning under its losses--wars destroy people and whole countries; hunger and starvation decimate whole populations; crime and violence hold millions of women and children in the constant clutches of fear; cancer, AIDS, cholera, and other diseases devastate the bodies of countless people; floods, earthquakes, disasters fill our TV screens. It's a world of losses and misery. Resurrection people cannot stop at Emmaus. People who believe cannot hoard the secret or live chiefly unto themselves. We go forth into God's world with burning hearts and open eyes.

We have got to live as those who have witnessed the Risen One; who know the circle of love; who continue to seek the truth without reservation; who have chosen gratitude instead of resentment, hope instead of despair.

We are called to walk along the road to Emmaus . . . and beyond, into the rest of the world.

More importantly, we are called to live with wide-open eyes and burning hearts, so that we too may run and tell others about the hope we know, the joy we experience, and the love which never dies. Amen.