Call to worship – Psalm 100

Sermon: Beginning with Moses and all the Prophets

Reading: Luke 24: 13- 35

Jesus seeking you. Jesus walking beside you. Jesus revealing Himself to you. Your response. Please hold these four thoughts in your mind as we meet this morning. My heart leapt when I saw that the lectionary reading for this morning was the passage where Luke describes the two on the road to Emmaus. It is a passage that has been important to me and one that is rich in teaching. Many of you will be familiar with the passage, but I want us to look at what is described. It is the morning of the resurrection when the woman who had taken spices they had prepared went to the tomb which they found to be empty. Two men appeared to the woman and say, “He is not here; He has risen!” The women are reminded that Jesus had said that he would be delivered into the hands of sinful men, be crucified, but on the third day would be raised again. And we read then that the women told these things to the Eleven and to all the others. After this, Cleopas and another left and were walking to the village called Emmaus. This was about 11 km from Jerusalem. We read that they were talking about everything that had happened when Jesus himself came up and walked with them. We read that they were kept from recognising him. Jesus then asks them, “What are you discussing together as you walk along?” They actually stop walking and Cleopas asks, “Are you only a visitor to Jerusalem and do not know the things that have happened there in these days?” Jesus answers, “What things?”. They tell the stranger of Jesus of Nazareth, a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people. They tell how the chief priests and the rulers handed him over, sentenced him to death and crucified him. They recount then, how on this third day some of the women had been to the tomb but did not find his body. The women had stated that they’d seen a vision of angels who had said that Jesus was alive. Others had then gone to the tomb, found it empty, but did not see him. All this time, they are unaware of who is walking and talking with them. Jesus says to them, “How foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Did not Christ have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?”. And then we read that “beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.” The reference here to “Moses and all the Prophets” is a reference to the whole of the Old Testament Scriptures. In my mind. This may have included references to passages such as these: Genesis 3:15 “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” Isaiah 7:14 “14 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.” 1

Isaiah 9:6 “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” Isaiah 11:1-2 “A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit. 2 The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him—the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of might, the Spirit of the knowledge and fear of the Lord—” Isaiah 52: 13 “13 See, my servant will act wisely; he will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted.” Isaiah 53:11 “11 After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied.” Psalm 22:16-18 “Dogs surround me, a pack of villains encircles me; they pierce my hands and my feet. 17 All my bones are on display; people stare and gloat over me. 18 They divide my clothes among them and cast lots for my garment.” Zechariah 12:10 “10 “And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son.” Jesus takes them through God’s revealed word about his coming to earth, his crucifixion, and his resurrection but they still do not recognise him. As they approach the village Jesus makes as if he was going further. However, they urge him to stay for the evening as the day was nearly over. They then sit at the table with Jesus, who takes bread, gives thanks, breaks it and begins to give it to them. It is at this point that we read that their eyes were opened and they recognised him. As this happened he disappeared from their sight. It’s then that we read that they ask each other “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?” It is as if for the first time they recognise the life, death and resurrection of Jesus in the prophecies revealed in the Scriptures. They had been with Jesus and they had grown up with the Scriptures. But only at that point do they bring the two together. “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us and opened the Scriptures to us?” And then we are told how they respond. It would have been night time by now. Remember that they had invited Jesus in to have supper with them. But they got up, and returned to Jerusalem. I believe that when they walked to Emmaus they would not have hurried. They were pondering all that had happened. They were disheartened and disoriented. Now I imagine them making their way as quickly as they could. This would have taken at least two hours. We read that when they got to Jerusalem, they found the 11 and those with them assembled together. The two were told, “It is true! The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon.” “Then the two told what had happened on the way, and how Jesus was recognised by them when he broke the bread.” Four points are important here for us. Firstly, I believe it is important that Jesus sought the two as they walked to Emmaus. They did not invite him. He found them. Secondly, that Jesus was walking with them, right beside them. Step-by-step, not unreachable or far away. He was talking to them and listening to them. He was real and present.

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Thirdly, that Jesus revealed who he was. Everything had already been revealed in the Scriptures to show them who Jesus was but the two on the road to Emmaus did not appreciate this. They did not recognise who was walking with them. They knew Jesus and they knew the Scriptures. However, they could only bring these two together after it was revealed to them that God’s Word was not only a matter of history but was the living person of Jesus. God’s Word was not only a matter of history but was the living person of Jesus. When their eyes were opened and they recognised him, this was more than just a recognition of who the person was who was walking beside them. It was as Jesus takes bread, gives thanks and breaks it, as he had done on the evening before he was crucified, that their eyes were opened. They saw then that the Scriptures recording that Jesus would be “lifted up” were true, the reality of the resurrection was brought home to them. As I considered this passage it struck me that the walk of the two to Emmaus is very like my own journey of faith. I grew up attending church with my parents. I attended Sunday school and was taught about the Bible, the characters and stories recorded in the Bible. This seemed to me to be interesting history of events from long ago. Even as I was growing up I understood that we attended church in order to hear sermons, teaching us about God and about God’s love. I found this interesting, but somewhat removed from what I needed to face from Monday to Saturday. If I look back I believe that it was really after Sue and I joined Trinity that I began to experience God’s love as reality rather than as an intellectual exercise. This happened as I interacted with Trinity members who not only knew God’s Word, but lived it. In my case, I know that this experience was intensified when we started a fellowship group. A fellowship group meant that we gathered less formally than on a Sunday morning and were able to discuss questions, challenges, highs and lows in a circle of trust. This reality came to me not only in the course of our fellowship group meetings, but also in interactions with you, my brothers and sisters, one-on-one, participating in acts of service and receiving teaching like the Bethel Bible course. God of the history book became God with us. God with me. Can you relate to this? Your experience may well have been very different. But let us look at what happened on the road to Emmaus so that we may learn from, and experience the reality of, God’s Word. This passage shows that Jesus sought out the two as they journeyed home, shattered and confused by the events they had experienced. “We had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel” and now they did not know. Jesus seeks them. “For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”1 “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.”2 And Jesus walks with them even though they were not aware that this was Him the resurrected Jesus. And Jesus walks beside us now. He is available for a personal relationship with each one of us. Remember that he told his disciples, that although he was going away He would send another: “… but if I go, I will send Him (the Holy Spirit) to you [to be in close fellowship with you].”3

1 Luke 19:10. See also Isaiah 65:1 ““I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me; I was found by those who did not seek me. To a nation that did not call on my name, I said, ‘Here am I, here am I.’” 2 Revelation 3:20 3 From the Amplified Bible. 3

Jesus opens their eyes so that they see him. In Ephesians4 Paul wrote: “17 I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. 18 I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you,” “Open the hearts of our eyes that we may be enlightened”. How this happens needs to be unpacked in a separate sermon. This is what happened to the two on the road to Emmaus. The living meaning of the Scriptures was revealed to them. When camping in wilderness areas we have always tried to avoid setting up camp after nightfall But on occasions we have had to do so. We had no idea of what our existing surroundings even looked like. It was only as the sun rose in the morning and the light pushed back darkness that we could see what had been around us all the time. John Piper writes this5: “No one merely decides to experience the Christian Scriptures as the all-compelling, all- satisfying truth of one’s life. Seeing is a gift. And so, the free embrace of God’s word is a gift. God’s Spirit opens the eyes of our heart, and what was once boring, or absurd, or foolish, or mythical is now self-evidently real.” The fourth point is the response of the two. Once their eyes have been opened to the reality of the resurrection there is a new priority. They no longer pause over dinner or decide they will do something in the morning. They need to share what has been revealed to them and to do it right away. They hurry back to Jerusalem to share what has been revealed to them. Do you see as well that this walk reflects the gospel message? Jesus coming to be with us, walking beside us, revealing God’s Word to us, being lifted up and leaving us to respond. Do you see that. You may want to read through the passage slowly and consider this. What are we to do in response to this message? I believe that it is this. We are to listen to and read the Scriptures not only as a record of history. But as the living, revealed word of God. We need to pray that our eyes would be opened to see the Scriptures in a new way. Pray to understand that as we go through each day that Jesus walks beside us. God with us. When he was here on earth. And God with us as the Holy Spirit is with us. With us to give us wisdom, to strengthen us, to guide us and to encourage us. That we are not on our own no matter what the challenges are that we face now in this Lockdown time or in the future. Pray for an understanding as to how we are to respond. This is difficult in this lockdown period. We are removed from being in physical community, which is so important for us and for keeping and growing our faith. But we are to use this time to determine how we can respond even in these restricted times. We can use this time to determine how we will respond once the lockdown restrictions are lifted. We are to pray that the eyes of our hearts will be opened to see the Scriptures in a new and living way. Gordon Hay Trinity, Lynnwood 19th April 2020

4 Ephesians 1:17-18. Read this with Romans 1:21 and Romans 2:14-15 5 An article on How God Opens the Eyes of the Heart: https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/how-god-opens-the-eyes-of-the-heart 4