TELL THE STORY – BREAK THE BREAD
Luke 24: 13-35
Rev. Gary Paterson
April 6, 2008
Well, here we are at the third Sunday of the Easter season, and once again, our Scripture reading for the day offers us yet another resurrection appearance. Two weeks ago we the heard Matthew present the witness of the women who encountered angels at an empty tomb; last week, in John’s gospel, we took a spin on the dance floor with Doubting Thomas; and this week, Luke is inviting us to go for a walk on the road to Emmaus.
All of these different stories, each gospel writer trying to offer a sense of what it was like to experience the risen Christ, wanting to provide later Christians, the ones who weren’t there, way back when, in those first few weeks, with a glimpse of resurrection, a taste. So you weren’t there? Well, join the crowd. What’s important, though, is to figure out how we might encounter the presence of the risen Christ in our times, our own lives. What might it look like? How will we know it when or if it happens? Is it real?
So Luke sets down this story about two disciples traveling the road to Emmaus… he’s the only gospel writer to do so. This story… which just happens to be the longest account of the risen Christ appearing to his followers – it’s unique to Luke. Which makes you wonder, just a bit. Like… we don’t actually know where Emmaus was. Sure, says Luke, it was about seven miles from Jerusalem – but who knows in what direction, because it doesn’t seem to be marked on any ancient maps. And what about that disciple Cleopas? You never hear tell of him anywhere else in the Bible, before or after this occasion, his fifteen minutes of fame. You’d think if you were going to present a key resurrection appearance, you’d make sure it happened to a recognized disciple, an “important” one… maybe Matthew or Phillip or.… And that second disciple, the one who has no name? Well, some scholars suggest that it just might have been a woman, since they were usually the nameless ones in that patriarchal culture. The men always had their names announced… the women, well they were usually known simply as the wife of, mother of, daughter of…. So Cleopas, whoever he was; possibly a woman, unnamed; both of them to who knows quite where.
It makes you think. Did it really happen just the way Luke sets it down? Or just maybe, was he imagining the event, creating an extended parable, a story that for him captures the essence of what it might be like to encounter the risen Jesus. Which doesn’t mean it isn’t true – that’s NOT what I’m suggesting. Rather, maybe this is one of those stories which is “true”, in the deepest sense of that word, even though it might not have happened exactly as described.
The scholar Dominic Crossan has said that, “Emmaus never happened; Emmaus always happens!” I like that… and by far the more interesting part of that statement is the second half…. “Emmaus always happens.” Easter is not primarily a historic event, per se, but is, rather, an ongoing reality. Easter as a verb… taking place in our time and lives. So maybe the Emmaus story becomes a way of inviting us into an experience of the risen Christ, and there’s not much point in sweating the absolute historical literalness of what Luke is describing; rather, it is a parable that will give us clues about how to discern, what to look for, how to read the signs.
But you know me… an English teacher in my former life, who cannot quite just let things alone; who wants to take the poem, the story, and pull it apart. No, that’s not quite it… rather this Emmaus story feels like a pearl of great price; and I want to hold it carefully in the palm of my hand, and turn it round and round, discovering how it gleams as the light changes and shifts. Different angles, different clues.
So here we go… joining Cleopas and friend upon the road. It’s a well-used metaphor, life as a journey, “on the road” – interesting how early Christians were called “people of the Way”. Here is where we all find ourselves, at times, if not always, on the way, leaving every Jerusalem we have known, for an unknown destination that isn’t clearly marked on the maps. And usually, when we find ourselves on the move, we are carrying a lot of baggage… sometimes running from sorrow and pain, from the breaking of our hopes. “We had hoped that he was the one….” said the two disciples; but it seemed that Jesus wasn’t; crucified, dead and buried – that’s what had happened to their hopes and dreams; and now they were living with sadness, disappointment, even fear, perhaps. A fragment of a poem:
Sound familiar? Do you know that place?After the great blow, we fled,seeking refuge in betweenness,uneasy in cities, happy only on the road,where life’s sliced thin enough to bear.(from “On the Road” by George Slanger)
But here’s where the story gets interesting… well, actually, strange and weird. You see, Jesus joins the two travelers, and begins walking the way with them -- but they don’t recognize him. You have to ask yourself what’s happening here. Two disciples of Jesus… not like they haven’t spent enough time with him to know what he looks like. But even when Jesus starts offered them a walking Bible study session, well, they still don’t catch on. What’s happening here? -- a Jesus who doesn’t look like Jesus, who looks like an ordinary kind of person, the kind you might meet … well, on the road. Your road. Maybe Luke’s suggesting that the first thing you have to accept about experiencing the risen Christ is that you probably won’t recognize it… him; not at first. Christ comes unexpectedly, in the strangest of ways…. and our eyes are closed; we just don’t see it, get it. Maybe it’s our expectations of what the experience should be like; maybe we’re trapped rather than freed by the Biblical story. Maybe we’re too wrapped in ourselves in our own troubles, and have a hard time believing that it’s not just about us. Luke doesn’t tell us why someone doesn’t recognize the risen Christ – but he is clear that it happens. Even back then… and most certainly now; we may find ourselves minding our own business, bustling here and there, and suddenly we are joined by .. well Luke does offer another clue.
He calls Jesus the “stranger”, the “paroikos”… “are you the only paroikos in Jerusalem, the only stranger who does not know these things?” Jesus disguised as the paroikos… the stranger, the foreigner, the alien; the one who lives on the edges… the one you least expect. Maybe that’s why we don’t expect him; we’re anticipating something more grand, more familiar, perhaps more like us. But, says Luke, take a closer look at the strangers who cross your path; and be to engage them, to encounter them, to talk to them. And be prepared to be surprised. Note that the turning point in the story, the moment of recognition, it comes when the two disciples invite the stranger who is Jesus to stay with them, to share a meal with them, to break bread together. When the paroikos sits at table with you, when you share food together … well, you have a very good chance, says Luke, of encountering the risen Christ.
But let me backtrack in the story just a bit. I get pretty excited by Luke’s description of the Bible study session that Jesus conducts, as he re-interprets Scripture for them . This is Jesus as rabbi; no, almost more like trickster… I mean, it is funny…you don’t often get to say that about a Bible story…. there are these two heartbroken disciples pouring out their sorrow about Jesus’ death to the very man himself… good thing they didn’t say anything rude… but still; you can just see Jesus, ruefully shaking his head… maybe tempted to say… “Hey guys….let me give you a hint.” A strange “teachable” moment.
But suddenly our laughter shifts when we hear the zinger in the midst of Jesus’ talking about the Bible, interpreting the Scriptures -- “Did you not know that the Messiah must suffer before entering glory?” Now there’s a switch for you, a messiah who suffers, instead of one who comes with power and might, wearing a golden crown, fixing everything up right away. Maybe the cross wasn’t just total despair, but ended up saying something about what life really is … and death too. Maybe, says Luke, you will catch a glimpse of the risen Christ in the presence of holy suffering… suffering that is chosen because of love and justice. Not just the suffering that inevitably comes because life is frequently very hard… no, the suffering that is chosen, that is carried because of the beloved neighbour and the stranger; that’s when the Christ is present and alive. Another clue.
“Were not our hearts burning within us?” that’s what they finally asked themselves as they recalled that encounter with Scripture. Let me tell you, I think I’m going to use that line to advertise our next church Bible Study – “Your hearts will burn within you! Guaranteed… or your money back.” But maybe it’s true… these stories of encountering holiness, connecting with God, they have a way of catching you up, setting your heart to beating more quickly as your world shifts, and suddenly you see life differently, and yourself too. It’s a strange claim perhaps, but Luke seems pretty convinced that when the stories are told, and interpreted, always interpreted so as to connect them to our own times lives – when that happens, it’s possible to experience the risen Christ. Which is really why you read and study the Bible… not for rules or even for theology, but for encounter with God, so exciting, so real that your heart feel like it’s burning within you!
Then of course there is the final turning of the pearl, a soft and gentle gleam, a last clue. Because remember, Cleopas and his friend still don’t recognize Jesus. They’ve had all kinds of clues… the stranger encountered on the road, invited in; the stories told and re-interpreted, so that hearts burn; the strange power of suffering in the name of love… but they still don’t see Christ. For them, it takes one final step. The actual breaking of bread – “he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.” Is it the very act of breaking, since neither bread nor lives can be shared until they’re broken open? Or is it in the moment of sharing… bread, resources, the wherewithal’s of life? Can God comes to us in something as simple and yet wondrous as food? And did you catch how Luke is linking this Emmaus meal with previous meals that Jesus and his disciples had shared? The last Supper for instance, the Passover meal in the upper room from a few days ago, when Jesus speaks the same verbs… take the bread, bless the bread, break the bread, give the bread. Or even earlier, the feeding of the 5000 with five loaves of bread – take, bless, break, give… talk about hearing a re-interpretation in action.
Which in a strange way brings us to today… to the communion you are invited to share… here, very soon. Luke says you have a chance of encountering Christ in that meal… when holy bread is broken. If you just keep your eyes open. Maybe your heart will burn… just a bit perhaps. Maybe you’ll see the paroikos, the stranger near you, suddenly shine radiantly, maybe just a glimmer, and you’ll suspect, even if just for a moment, that you are seeing an angel in disguise. Maybe you’ll be surprised at the strange, disturbing and holy ways the risen Christ can be revealed in our midst. May it be so… please God. Amen.