Christ is Risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia! Since we are still in the Easter season, it’s quite appropriate that we begin our message for today with that great news. Two weeks ago, you heard me share with you, through the eyes of Mary Magdalene, how difficult it could be to really believe that good news. In fact, at first, it didn’t seem like she believed it until Jesus appeared to her, spoke His Word to her, and then she believed. In last Sunday’s Gospel reading, you heard the story of “Doubting Thomas”, a man who heard the news that Christ was risen, but couldn’t quite believe it to be true until Christ appeared to Him and spoke to Him. Let me ask you this morning, would you have believed the news that Christ is risen if you had heard the Word? Or would you need someone to open your mind, clean out the junk that’s in there, so you could believe the Word? Our Gospel reading for this morning is going to teach us a bit about the Word of God, and about the truth of the Word. It is my prayer that as you hear the preaching of His Word, that our Lord will open your minds as He opened the mind of His disciples.
Two weeks ago, you heard about Mary Magdalene’s encounter with the news that Christ is risen! But, she was skeptical until she saw the risen Christ and heard Him speak His word to her. In the section before our Gospel reading for today, we have an appearance of Jesus to a couple of his lesser known followers. These two men are from the town of Emmaus. They had made the journey to Jerusalem for the Passover, and had followed the events of that week. So the evening of the Resurrection, they’re making the walk back to Emmaus, which is about 7 miles from Jerusalem. Their topic of conversation along the road is about the events of that past week. As they’re talking, Jesus came up and walked with them, and asked them what they were talking about. Hearing this, they think “What’s wrong with this guy? Has he been living in a cave the past week or something, how can you have been in Jerusalem and not know what happened this last week?” So they proceed to fill him in. They say “Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, a man who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him. But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things happened. Moreover, some women 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 the women had said, but him they did not see.” (Luke 24:19-24) Jesus responds “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 the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself. (v. 25-27) Once they get to their destination for the evening, they invite Jesus to stay with them, he sits at the table with them, breaks the bread, gives it to them, and we’re told “Their eyes were opened and they recognized Him, and He disappeared from their sight.” (v. 31) So they stop what they’re doing, and go back to find the disciples and tell them what they had just seen and heard from Jesus. What was the key here? Jesus taught them “from the Scriptures” why these things had happened to Him. He didn’t make this stuff up. He spoke to them God’s living, active Word. Keep that in mind, because I’m going to get back to that.
Now what’s my purpose in sharing this account with you? Look back at the text in Luke again. Remember with Mary Magdalane that Easter morning? Remember, she didn’t recognize Jesus right away. She had the physical evidence in front of her that Jesus had risen, she had heard His Word earlier, but her experience in this world led her to believe that this good news was false. It wasn’t until Jesus spoke His life-giving Word to her and through that Word opened her mind that she realized He had indeed risen!
Again, with these two men from Emmaus, we have the same thing happen. Jesus appears to them on the road, they don’t recognize Him, because they’re so wrapped up in the death. They had the Word of the women and the disciples that He had risen, but they couldn’t believe it. Again, their experience in this world prevented them from believing it, until Jesus speaks to them, starting with Moses and the Prophets, the Old Testament, and showing how they pointed to Him, and His death and resurrection for the forgiveness of their sins. It wasn’t until Jesus spoke His Word to them, that they believed that He had risen indeed.
Now, I bring you to our Gospel reading for today. The Emmaus disciples had returned, and caught up with the 11. They’re telling them “It’s true. Jesus really has risen! In fact, we’ve seen Him! We recognized Him in the breaking of the bread! He was present with us!” As they’re talking about this, there He is. Jesus, right there, in the presence of His disciples. He says “peace be with you.” He speaks, and they see Him. At first, they’re startled, acting as if they had just seen a ghost. You know that look, that look of fear when we jokingly may say to someone “you look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Except for the disciples, this isn’t Ghost, this is Jesus Christ, their rabbi, the One they followed for the last three years, the One they saw arrested, beaten, and crucified had risen! His Word confirms it: “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? 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.” Jesus then shows them His hands and side, Sure enough, there are the marks of the nails, the evidence that the same body that had been crucified on the cross and laid in tomb is alive and standing right there before them! Why, it’s almost too good to be true. In fact, the text says that the disciples still couldn’t believe, even though Jesus had given them the visible proof, they were so overjoyed, they just couldn’t believe it. So he asks for something to eat, they give him a piece of broiled fish, and he eats it. Now if Jesus was just a spirit, he wouldn’t be able to eat the fish. But there, right in front of their eyes, they saw the resurrected Jesus, body and all, do something that only a living, breathing human being can do.
At this point, Jesus says to them “This is what I told you when I was still with you. Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms” That’s what we today call the Old Testament. At this point, our text tells us Jesus “opened their minds so they could understand the scriptures.” Remember, during his ministry, Jesus had told His disciples on more than one occasion that he would suffer many things, be crucified, die, and rise again on the third day as the Scriptures had said. And do you remember what their reaction was? When Peter first heard Jesus say this a few days before the Transfiguration, he said “Never Lord, this shall never happen to you” (Matt. 16:22) Another time when Jesus was telling them all of this was going to happen to Him, right afterward, James and John want Jesus to do whatever it is they ask of him, and they ask for seats at his right and his left in His kingdom, thinking of a kingdom of worldly power. Up to this point, they never understood why Jesus said all of these things. But now, now that it had all happened according to the Scriptures, Jesus opens their minds so that they finally understand it. These very disciples who didn’t get it at first, now understand, by the power of Jesus’ words. God’s Word was true, all of this Had to happen so that “repentance and forgiveness of sins would be preached in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem”
But, there was one last thing Jesus would tell the Disciples. This message, this message of Christ crucified and risen for the forgiveness of the sins of the world, would be preached by them. Jesus was sending them out. “You are witnesses of these things. I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.” The disciples would be sent out in the world, by the power of the Holy Spirit, and proclaim the very message that Jesus had given them in His Word. Nothing more, nothing less, so that through the message of Christ’s Word, minds would be opened, and believers would repent of their sins, and have their sins forgiven.
So what you may ask? What does that have to do with you and me, the people of God at Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church in Audubon, Iowa on Sunday, April 26th, 2009? As disciples of our Lord Jesus Christ, as members of the one, holy, Christian and apostolic church, we are called to follow in the teachings of our Lord Jesus, and bring His Word to the nations yet today. For the past 100 years, this congregation has been called to bring that Word to Audubon, Iowa.
The message we are to proclaim, as we heard in both last Sunday’s gospel reading from John 20, and this morning, is to proclaim “repentance and forgiveness of sins in the name of Christ.” That means we have a two-fold message, one of Law and of Gospel.
First, we have been called to point people to God’s Word of Law. That means we are to tell them exactly what God’s Word has to say about our condition. And this is where a lot of problems have crept into the church in the last few decades. In order to lead someone to true repentance, that means we have to proclaim the law. It means we have to point out the sins of other people. And we live in a society that tells us you do your thing, I do my thing, and we’ll just leave it at that. Often, if you tell someone that a certain behavior or practice is sinful and against God’s Word, you’ll hear the question “Who are you to judge me? What gives you the right to say that?” Our society is becoming more and more tolerant of sin as time passes. And there’s tremendous pressure on Pastors like myself to keep quiet about it in the pulpit. Why? Because it might scare some folks off we’re told. Or the argument goes “since our society is different, that means God’s expectations have changed. All that stuff you read about in the Bible regarding marriage, or homosexual activity, or telling the little white lie, our about issues regarding human life, well, we live in different times, and that only pertained to that time and place 2000 years ago. This is the stuff of what’s often called a higher-critical method of scriptural interpretation. It has torn Lutheranism in this country apart for the past 30 or 40 years now. It’s one of the reasons that the largest Lutheran church body in this county is in such peril right now. It takes God’s Word to us, and assumes that man is the master over God’s Word. The eventual result is that we are no longer declaring what Christ has commanded His church to declare. It no longer is a message of “repentance and forgiveness of sins”, but a feel good message to give you a boost for the week. It’s popular stuff, in some cases, it packs the pews on Sunday, giving it the outward appearance of success, compared with churches that wish to remain faithful to Christ and His Word. But, it doesn’t save anyone from judgment and hell. If you are one of those who thinks that God doesn’t care about proclaiming His word of law, you better think again, because Jesus makes it clear to His church today in our Gospel reading that we are to proclaim it today!
So, the first part of our message is proclaiming the law of God. But we don’t do it simply to point fingers and say “we’re better than you because we’re not doing that!” The purpose of proclaiming God’s law is to show us how we fall short of what God expects of us, and what our sinfulness has rightly earned us. But it also prepares us to hear the 2nd part of that message, the part about forgiveness. That’s when we hear about what Jesus Christ did for us. We hear about how He, the sinless Son of God, took our place by suffering and dying, and then rising again to defeat the power of sin, death, and the devil, so that we will be raised up to new life with Him. We realize that there is no sin too great that can’t be forgiven.
And that’s the two fold message we as a congregation have been called to proclaim to our community these past 100 years, and for the next 100. Yes folks, we are called to point people to God’s law, and call them to repentance, but we also are here to proclaim to repentant sinners the sweet news that their sins have been forgiven on account of Christ. Are you sitting there in the pew this morning, wondering if there’s any way that God could love someone like you, especially after what you’ve done? Then it’s my joy to proclaim to you that Christ has died for the likes of you. Your sins are forgiven, they are as far as the east is from the west. Christ has set you free from that sin, so you can be God’s beloved child. You are justified, “Just as if you’d never sinned.”
This morning, through His Word, Christ has opened your minds, just as He opened the minds of the Disciples through the preaching of His Word. With the eyes of faith, you have seen the nail scared hands and feet, the would in His side, and you’ve seen the great price that was paid so that you can be forgiven of your sins. You have also heard your Lord give us, His church, our marching orders. He never said it would be easy. He never said it would be popular. But, it’s the only message He has given us to preach. “Repentance and forgiveness of sins.” Law and Gospel. Let us continue to faithfully proclaim that message to all who will hear so that minds are opened, and by the power of the Holy Spirit, others hear the wonderful news that they are forgiven of all of their sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. The proof is in the words of Easter that we see through the eyes of faith, with minds opened by the Word of Christ: Christ is Risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia! Amen.
