Last week I preached about the two men who encountered Jesus as a stranger on the road to Emmaus, and how we too can encounter Him in the most unexpected place and at the most unexpected time.
It seems to me though that something else unexpected also happened that day.
The two men, both disciples of Jesus, were broken. Their hopes had been dashed. Their Lord and Master had been killed and now they were directionless and hopeless.
They were not even at the point of starting to think what they would do next.
They had no plan, and no direction, except to leave Jerusalem and walk towards Emmaus.
On the road they encounter a stranger who walks a way with them and asks them what they are talking about.
Why are they so down hearted?
Cleopas is amazed that the stranger has not heard about the apparent life changing events that occurred in Jerusalem, three days previously.
After all, an innocent man was executed, after a sham trial, and as a result the sky darkened, high winds blew and the curtain in the temple was torn.
The victim, His name was Jesus, was a man who spoke about eternity as someone who had a personal experience of it. He healed the sick and even raised the dead. He did no one any harm. He was famous.
How could the stranger not have heard about these things?
To the two disciples these were earth shattering events, but to the rest of the world it was just another dark and stormy day with high winds.
The only people who actually knew what had happened were those who had witnessed it with their own own eyes, and those who would have heard the news as far as it could have reached, by the morning of the third day.
You see in the Roman world people were executed every day.
Life was hard in a subjugated nation where the slightest disobedience, the slightest disorder in the public order, could result in the swiftest and harshest punishments.
Death, in their society, and in their land, was an everyday occurrence and not something to make you look up for.
On the road to Emmaus though, two unusual things happen. Firstly the two men, unknowingly, meet the risen Christ in the most unexpected place and at the most unexpected time.
The second unexpected thing to happen is that Cleopas preaches The Gospel of Jesus Christ for the very first time.
He says, “Are you the only one visiting Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?” “About Jesus of Nazareth, He was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people. The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place. In addition, some of our women amazed us. They went to the tomb early this morning but didn’t find his body. They came and told us that they had seen a vision of angels, who said he was alive. Then some of our companions went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but they did not see Jesus.”
In just a few concise sentences Cleopas nails the Gospel. He speaks it out for the very first time, except he proclaims it from the perspective of negativity.
In his version of the gospel there is no joy and all hope is lost.
From his perspective something really bad has happened but from our perspective, with the benefit of history, hindsight, and scripture, we can see that actually something good happened and a great victory was won.
Because of his grief, because of the place and because of the time, Cleopas fails to notice the significance of what he is saying. “Jesus, the Nazarene, a prophet, who was powerful in word and deed, before God and all the people”, is a wonderful confirmation and proclamation of The Promises of God.
Every Jew would know that ‘The Word’ spoken about by Cleopas was The Word Of God, that which spoke creation into existence.
The Word! The Power behind the throne, and no one in history, except Jesus, possessed such a power.
Many prophets before Him, and even kings, had been able to pray to God, to speak to God, and ask Him to do things, and many times God did them. But no one in history, before Jesus, could actually speak out The Word and change things, instantly!
And He was the one in whom they had put their hope. Their hope of redemption for all Israel.
But from their limited perspective ‘Redemption’ only involved throwing off the yoke of oppression from Rome and the Restoration of Israel as The People Of God.
Many times Israel had abused their relationship with God. Many times their land and their society had strayed from that which God and Moses had laid down for them, and many times God had to correct their thinking, and even to punish them.
Now their best hope was lost. Or certainly it appeared that way.
Of course their minds are dimmed by grief and they are unable to think clearly about all the things that He, Jesus, had taught and shown them.
They missed the fact that prophets had foretold His death, even the manner of it, and His resurrection, and that Jesus had clearly told them that He would be killed and that He would defeat death, and rise again.
Even though they reported the eyewitness testimonies from the two Mary’s, and Peter and John, they still couldn’t see it.
So there we have it. His life, His Power, His Death, His Resurrection. The Gospel, Good news, up to a point! All that is missing is the promise of eternal life with God for those who believe. That's what He has been trying to tell them all along.
And they cannot see what comes next because of their grief, because it is too soon, and so they don’t recognise Him until He sits down to eat with them and breaks the bread and offers it to them.
The Bread! “This is my body broken for you, do this in remembrance of me!”
And they took the bread, and they recognised Him, and instantly their whole perspective on life was changed because suddenly they had hope.
The promises were true.
Their eyes were opened and they went from despair to hope in the time it takes to blink an eye.
Jesus is alive! He really is. Not just alive again 2000 years ago but He is alive today, in heaven, with the Father, and He is also here, in spirit.
But these are things for other sermons on other days.
Today, as we experience the end of the seventh week of enforced lockdown in our country, and around the world, we need to know that Jesus is alive, that He is as real today as He was 2000 years ago, and even right back at the beginning of time.
Why do we need to know this? Because in Jesus there is hope. In fact He is the only real hope.
In Him is the hope of eternal life, because He lives we can know tomorrow.
Because He lives we are saved from the eternal consequences of our sin.
Many of the early disciples, like Cleopas and his companion, would have viewed Jesus from the limited perspective of a Jew under the yoke of Roman Oppression and the corruption of their own leaders, but we now know that they were mistaken.
We must not make the same mistake of just just viewing Christ as the solution to our problems in this world. He is, but He more than that, much more, because He is also the solution to our eternal issues, which are;
Being by nature sinners.
Being, by our sinful nature, unworthy to enter into the presence of The Eternally Perfect God.
Being, by nature, weak and susceptible to the influences of the evil one.
Christ is the solution.
By His wounds we are healed!
By His death we are saved from our sins, we are forgiven! We are redeemed from him who previously thought he owned our souls.
By His resurrection we are saved from the ultimate human fear. Which is the fear of death, because He proves that death is not final, it never was!
And by The Power of His Holy Spirit we can resist the temptations of the evil one, and do things that we never thought we could do!
Jesus connects the Old Testaments prophecies and promises of God about the Messiah who is to come, The place where He was born, the parents to whom He is born, the nature of His life and the circumstances of His death and resurrection.
Later, when He appeared in the room with them, through the locked door, He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.”
How else would they have come to believe that He was of God, that He is God.
They didn’t have our scripture, and their eyewitness testimony’s had not yet been spoken out, or written about and so;
‘He opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures.”
He told them, “This is what is written: The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. 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.”
While we are locked down it seems to me that there are many opportunities to not only tell others about The Gospel Of Jesus Christ but also to live The Gospel Of Jesus so that others will encounter it at the most unexpected time and in the most unexpected place.
When Cleopas and his companion encountered Jesus on the road to Emmaus it changed their lives in the blink of an eye.
In Jesus name, amen.
