Seeing Jesus

Would you open your Bible with me to Luke chapter 24, beginning with verse 13.

Picture the scene. It is the afternoon of the day of Jesus’ resurrection. Two disciples are walking the eight miles from Jerusalem to Emmaus. One is named Cleopas. The other is left unnamed, and maybe this morning you can quietly insert your own name there.

They are trudging home after the worst weekend of their lives. Every hope they cherished about Jesus being the Messiah has been shattered. They had believed He was the Promised One. They had traveled to Jerusalem for the Passover with joy and anticipation. Instead they watched in horror as Jesus was beaten and crucified like a criminal and buried in a borrowed tomb.

It is now the third day. Rumors swirl—some women say His body is gone, that angels announced He is alive. Others ran to the tomb and found nothing. So they walk and talk, their voices low, trying to make sense of it all.

One remembers, “Did you see how they beat Him until His back was bloodied?” Another adds, “I can still hear the hammer strike those nails… again and again.

Did you hear His cry, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’” And then the most painful thought slips out: “Maybe… maybe He wasn’t the Chosen One after all.”

As they speak, a Stranger draws near and falls in step. He asks simply, “What are you talking about?” They stop, faces downcast. “Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who doesn’t know the things that have happened?” one of them blurts out. Everyone in the city has been talking about it. “What things?” the Stranger asks.

They pour out the story—how Jesus of Nazareth was a prophet mighty in word and deed, how their leaders handed Him over to death, how their own hopes were crushed. They even repeat the strange reports of an empty tomb and angelic visions.

And still they do not know that it is Jesus Himself who walks beside them. Verse 16 gives us the quiet secret: “their eyes were kept from recognizing Him.” They knew Jesus the man. They could quote His words. But they had not yet known Him as the risen Lord.

How many of us live the same way—seeing Jesus as a figure of the past, a great teacher from long ago, but not a present Savior? When you think of Him mainly in the past tense, it is hard to see Him standing alive at your side.

Listen now to the Stranger’s response: “How foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Did not the Christ have to suffer these things and then enter His glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets He patiently explains how the Scriptures all pointed to Him.

What a Bible study that must have been! The disciples’ hearts begin to warm though they cannot yet explain why. The road is long, the sun sets. As they near their village Jesus makes as if to go farther. They cannot bear to let Him go. “Stay with us,” they urge, “for it is toward evening and the day is far spent.” Only when they press the invitation does He come in. Christ never forces Himself on anyone. He waits to be wanted.

A simple evening meal is set. Jesus takes the place of the host. He blesses the bread, breaks it, and gives it to them. And in that moment their eyes are opened. They see the nail scars. They know. “It is the Lord!” they cry—and He vanishes from their sight.

But now their hearts are burning. Weariness forgotten, hunger forgotten, they hurry back through the dark to Jerusalem to tell the others: “The Lord is risen indeed!” They carry the greatest news the world has ever heard.

Back in the upper room they find the disciples gathered in fear behind locked doors. Everyone is talking at once. Some believe; some cannot. And suddenly Jesus is there—no knock, no sound of footsteps—simply standing among them. “Peace be unto you,” He says. No rebuke for their failures. No lecture about their fear. Just peace.

He shows them His hands and side. The wounds speak louder than any words: I survived the cross. God has provided salvation. You are accepted. Peace be unto you. Then He breathes on them and says, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”

Friend, He still comes through our locked doors. We know what it is to hide in fear—fear for our children, for our health, for our future. We shut ourselves in, but Jesus walks through the walls and says the same thing: “Peace be unto you.”

As we come to the communion table, remember that promise: “Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst.” He comes to sit with us, to bless the bread and the cup, to make Himself known in the breaking of the bread. He waits for you to invite Him to stay, to open the door of your heart and let Him abide.