“Walking with Jesus on the Road of Life”
Luke 24:13-35

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Pastor Kevin Vogts
Trinity Lutheran Church
Paola, Kansas
Third Sunday of Easter—May 4, 2014

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Even secular historians agree that the Gospel of Luke is one of the most masterfully crafted works of literature in the Greek language.  From a literary standpoint, today’s Gospel Reading is a marvelous, engaging story.  don’t get me wrong; it is not fiction, it is factual history.  These events really did happen exactly as Luke reports.  But, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, Luke reports these events in the form of a masterfully told story.  You are invited to follow along today’s Gospel Reading we look at “The Mystery of the Empty Tomb.”

Scene I—The Mysterious Stranger

The story opens on the afternoon of Easter Sunday.  Two disciples of Jesus are walking home from Jerusalem to an outlying suburb, Emmaus.  “Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem.  They were talking with each other about everything that had happened.” 

So much had transpired at Jerusalem that past week, from Jesus’ triumphal entry into the city on Palm Sunday, to his crucifixion on Good Friday, to “The Mystery of the Empty Tomb” that very Sunday morning. These two disciples of Jesus are talking back and forth about all these things, questioning, debating, trying to come up with some answers, some explanation for it all.

Now, a new character is introduced, the mysterious stranger.  “As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; but they were kept from recognizing him.”  We in Luke’s audience are in on the secret, but in some way the Lord clouds the two disciples’ recognition so that they do not realize it is Jesus himself walking with them. 

Scene II—Flashback

“He asked them, ‘What are you discussing together as you walk along?’ They stood still, their faces downcast.”  These two disciples are devastated because they think they are on their way home from a funeral, Jesus’ funeral.  “One of them, named Cleopas, asked him, ‘Are you only a visitor to Jerusalem and do not know the things that have happened there in these days?’  ‘What things?’ he asked.” 

Now comes a flashback to the previous week: “‘About Jesus of Nazareth,’ they replied. ‘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.’”  Their utter hopelessness is sadly reflected in the past tense: “we had hoped.”  They thought all their hopes were dead and buried with Jesus.

“And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place.”  What is so significant about the third day?  Several decades ago a famous rabbi in New York City, whose followers considered him to be the messiah, died.  I remember seeing a spokesman for this rabbi’s followers on the evening news saying quite confidently, “We expect him to rise from the dead on the third day.”  They did not get that idea from the New Testament or Christianity, but from various prophesies of the Hebrew Scriptures, the Old Testament.  In the same way, the two disciples assume the mysterious stranger will realize the significance of it being the third day.

“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.”  Maybe the prophesies have come true; maybe Jesus really is the Messiah; maybe he really did rise from the dead on the third day! 

But in that culture, the women’s testimony by itself wouldn’t be trusted.  Greek-Roman society was very chauvinistic, and women were not allowed to testify in court because their witness was considered unreliable.  That is not at all God’s attitude, or the Bible’s teaching, but simply the attitude of that day and age, just as there are many things in our own culture and society that aren’t necessarily the way God wants them to be.  Well, the disciples are products of their time, and so they think that the women’s report of the empty tomb is simply hysteria, and they send Peter and John to check their story out. 

By the way, the fact that all four Gospels record that it was women who discovered the empty tomb is a strong testimony to the Gospel’s authenticity.  In the Greek-Roman world, if you were going to make up a story like that, because of the chauvinistic attitude of that society you would never cast women as the first witnesses.

“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 him they did not see.”  There had been a glimmer of hope, but the flashback ends on another note of utter hopelessness: “him they did not see.” 

Scene III—The Scriptures Are Opened

“He said to them, ‘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?’”  Jesus says they should have known their Bible better, and they should have believed it.  Then they would have understood the events of Holy Week.  “And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.”

Scene IV—The Mystery Solved

“As they approached the village to which they were going, Jesus acted as if he were going farther.  But they urged him strongly, ‘Stay with us, for it is nearly evening; the day is almost over.’ So he went in to stay with them.  When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them.  Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight.  They asked each other, ‘Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?’” 

The mysterious stranger is revealed; it is none other than the Lord himself.  And that solves “The Mystery of the Empty Tomb.”  Jesus of Nazareth really is the Messiah.  His suffering, crucifixion, death and resurrection were all foretold by Moses and the prophets.  He is the One who did redeem Israel, and not only Israel, but the whole world. 

As Peter says in Today’s Epistle Reading, “For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed . . . but with the precious blood of Christ.”  You are included in that Good News; your sins are all forgiven because your Savior gave his life and shed his precious blood for you.

“They got up and returned at once to Jerusalem. There they found the Eleven and those with them, assembled together and saying, ‘It is true! The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon.’  Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.”

What is the moral of the story of “The Mystery of the Empty Tomb”?  Our lives are often like the experience of those two disciples on the road to Emmaus.  We walk through life with disappointment, pain, grief, confusion.  By ourselves we can’t come up with any answers to explain it all.  But then the Lord joins us on our way through life, joins us to him through the Sacrament of Holy Baptism.  He listens to us as we pour out to him our troubles and sorrows in prayer.  Then he speaks to us through his Word and opens the Scriptures to us.  He reveals himself to us in the Breaking of Bread, the Sacrament of Holy Communion.  And, like the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, through our encounter with him in the Word and Sacraments and prayer, our hearts burn within us with the fire of faith, and our despair and hopelessness is lifted. 

It is interesting that the name of only one of the two disciples in this story is given, Cleopas.  Who is the other?  Perhaps it is you.  For the experience of the two disciples walking on the road to Emmaus is symbolic of you, “Walking with Jesus on the Road of Life.”