Vital Signs: In the Breaking of the Bread Richmond s First Baptist Church, April 30, 2017 The Third Sunday of Easter Luke 24:13-35 When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight. They said to each other, "Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?" Mechanicsville. That s about how far away Emmaus was from Jerusalem about as far away as Mechanicsville is from Richmond. And if you can picture yourself walking from here to there then you can imagine what it must have been like for the two disciples in today s Gospel reading. With a few differences of course. Those disciples wouldn t have had to dodge the traffic on Highway 360. There would have been other pilgrims heading home from Passover; a few donkeys on the road; maybe a dog or two. But not all that traffic! Those disciples would have been able to talk to each other as they walked, able to share all their thoughts and feelings, and what they were feeling, primarily, was grief, the kind of grief you might feel on your way home from the funeral of a close friend. But it wasn t only grief. It was also disappointment. Because, as Cleopas says in verse 21, they had hoped that Jesus would be the one to redeem Israel. Let me say more about that. In Jesus time the Jews had very specific expectations about the Messiah, not all that different, really, from what some Jews still expect. The Judaism 101 website insists that, Belief in the eventual coming of the Messiah is a basic and fundamental part of traditional Judaism. It goes on to say, The term messiah literally means the anointed 1
one, and refers to the ancient practice of anointing kings with oil when they took the throne. The Messiah is the one who will be anointed as king in the Last Days. He will be a great political leader descended from King David. He will be well-versed in Jewish law, and observant of its commandments. He will be a charismatic leader, inspiring others to follow his example. He will be a great military leader, who will win battles for Israel. He will be a great judge, who makes righteous decisions. But above all, he will be a human being, not a god, demi-god or other supernatural being. i Which is different from the way Christians think about the Messiah, but probably not so different from the way Cleopas and his companion thought about him as they walked down the road to Emmaus. The Judaism 101 website explains it like this: It has been said that in every generation, a person is born with the potential to be the Messiah. If the time is right for the messianic age within that person's lifetime, then that person will be the Messiah. But if that person dies before he completes the mission of the Messiah, then that person is not the Messiah. And what is the mission of the Messiah? To redeem Israel, and to do it in a very specific way. Listen: The Messiah will bring about the political and spiritual redemption of the Jewish people by bringing them back to Israel and restoring Jerusalem. He will establish a government in Israel that will be the center of all world government, both for Jews and gentiles. He will rebuild the temple and re-establish its worship. He will restore the religious court system of Israel and establish Jewish law as the law of the land. ii In Jesus time the expectations weren t all that different. The Jews weren t looking for a Messiah who would rebuild the temple, because the temple was still standing, but they were looking for one who would sit on the throne of his ancestor David, who would run 2
the Romans out of Israel and restore the nation to its former glory. Cleopas and his companion had hoped that Jesus was the one. He was a prophet, they said, mighty in word and deed. Remember how powerfully he preached the good news of God s coming Kingdom, as if it would be here any day? Remember how he healed the sick, cleansed the lepers, raised the dead, and cast out demons? No wonder they had hoped! But now? Now he was dead. And what does the Judaism 101 website say? In every generation a person is born with the potential to be the Messiah. If the time is right for the messianic age within that person's lifetime, then that person will be the Messiah. But if that person dies before he completes the mission of the Messiah, then that person is not the Messiah. And Jesus had not completed the mission of the Messiah. He had not run the Romans out of Israel. He had not taken his place on David s throne. He had not restored the nation to its former glory. No, he had died on a cross like a common criminal; he had been buried in a borrowed grave. For Cleopas, his companion, and all those others who had been hopeful, Jesus had been a colossal disappointment. But. That same morning some of the women in their group had gone to the tomb that very morning to anoint his body, and when they did they saw an angel who told them that Jesus wasn t there, that he had been raised from the dead. It was an unbelievable story, and at first Cleopas and his companion hadn t believed it, but now, on the road to Emmaus, they were talking about it, discussing it, and wondering: if it were true, would it mean that Jesus could still fulfill the mission of the Messiah, that he might yet be the one to redeem Israel? They were deep in that discussion when a stranger joined them on 3
the road and asked them what they were talking about. They stood there looking sad, and then Cleopas said, Are you the only stranger who hasn t heard about the things that have happened in the last few days? What things? Jesus asked. And then Cleopas began to tell Jesus about Jesus. And the irony is delicious, isn t it? Because there is Cleopas, looking sad, as he shares his disappointment with the risen Christ. Would you be disappointed if you were talking to the risen Christ? Of course not. But Cleopas doesn t know who he s talking to. His eyes were held from recognizing Jesus, Luke says, possibly by his unbelief, but also, possibly, because Jesus had changed. If you were listening to the children s sermon this morning you heard me say that the very sad caterpillar didn t recognize his old friend even though he was standing right in front of him. It s because his old friend had changed. He had been through a complete metamorphosis. He wasn t a caterpillar anymore; he was a butterfly. And if you ve ever looked at caterpillars and butterflies side by side you know: they don t look the same. Suppose that resurrection involves a similar metamorphosis. Suppose that you, when you are raised from the dead, aren t exactly the same person anymore. You might have the same personality, the same memories, but your old body might be replaced by a new one, as different as a butterfly s body is from a caterpillar s. I m not saying that Jesus looked like a butterfly. I m just saying he looked different than he had before. His bruised and broken body was now healthy and whole. Maybe that s why Cleopas didn t recognize Jesus. Maybe that s why he stood there, looking sad. But that s when Jesus says, Oh, how foolish you are! And how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah should 4
suffer these things and then enter into his glory? And if you have ears to hear it, it s almost like a butterfly explaining to a caterpillar how he became a butterfly. And there are things about that process I didn t know until last week. I listened to a podcast where a woman named Molly Webster talked about her visit to the Florida Museum of Natural History in Gainesville. iii She was in the rain forest exhibit with her guide, Andre, who was showing her all the butterflies in there thousands of them. But the most interesting part was going on behind the scenes, in a separate room where hundreds of new butterflies were about to hatch. You know what a chrysalis is, right? It s that little sleeping bag the caterpillar crawls into before it begins to change. Some are green, some are brown, some are gold (in fact the word chrysalis comes from the Greek word chrysos, meaning gold ), but do you know what goes on inside the chrysalis? I didn t. I thought caterpillars simply began to sprout butterfly wings. But they don t. No, the caterpillar turns to mush. Its muscles and organs dissolve. According to Molly Webster, it becomes a kind of pale, yellowish-whitish goo. At the Florida Museum of Natural History, right in front of her, Andre the guide cut open a chrysalis a day after a caterpillar had crawled inside, and all that was left was goo. When he squeezed it, the goo came out, but there was no trace of the caterpillar. Molly thought it was disgusting. But suppose she said that to a butterfly, and the butterfly said, Silly human! That s how the miracle happens. The old body breaks down, it turns into goo, the cells recombine, new structures emerge, and ta-dah! A butterfly is born. And suppose she said, You have to do all that to become a butterfly? And it said, Yep. It s like my momma used to say: You ve got to die 5
before you can fly. Now, that s ridiculous, of course; butterflies can t talk. But it s not all that different from what Jesus said to these two disciples on the road to Emmaus. He said, It was necessary for the Christ to suffer, and then enter into his glory, which is almost another way of saying, You ve got to die before you can fly. And think about how it happened for him. His dead body was placed in a tomb that functioned almost exactly like a chrysalis. We don t know what happened to his body while it was in there, but we do know that when he came out on the third day he was different so different that at first nobody recognized him: Not Mary, who thought he was the gardener. Not his disciples in that upper room, or at least not until he showed them his hands and side. Not those two on the road to Emmaus. Not the ones in Luke s gospel who thought he was a ghost until he ate a piece of broiled fish in front of them. Even in that last scene in John s Gospel, where the disciples were having breakfast with Jesus on the beach, John says, None of the disciples dared ask him, Who are you? They knew it was the Lord. Did they? Well, yes. They did. His body may have changed. He may have traded in his old body for a new one, or as they say in the Bible, his earthly body for his glorified one. But he was still the same person on the inside, where it matters. He still had what we humans would call the same heart, the same mind, the same soul. Is that comforting to you at all? Does it give you any hope for your own resurrection? 6
As I learned about caterpillars and butterflies last week I thought about how many times I have been at a funeral and watched them close the lid on the casket. Some of those caskets are wood, some are metal, some of them are little more than cardboard boxes. But in every case it always feels so final. That s the last time we will see that particular person on this earth. But what if we knew the casket (or the urn full of ashes) was simply the chrysalis where that person s body would undergo metamorphosis, and someday emerge as something beautiful and new as different from the body we put into it as a butterfly is from a caterpillar? The Bible says that s what will happen: that all of us who believe will be transformed. In 2 Corinthians 5 Paul says, If anyone is in Christ there is a new creation. In 1 Corinthians 15 he says, I tell you a mystery, we will not all die, but we will all be changed. To illustrate, he talks about little, shriveled-up seeds being buried in the ground and strong, green plants coming up, but he might just as well talk about caterpillars becoming butterflies. It s a similar metamorphosis; it s death giving way to life. These things actually happen in nature. Little resurrections are going on all the time, all around us. This is not just wishful thinking: this is real. It seems to be the way God does things. And maybe that s why Jesus was so impatient with these disciples on the road to Emmaus. How foolish you are, he scolds, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer all these things and then enter into his glory? It s as if he were saying, Look, you two! Death is a door, and glory is on the other side, and you can t get to glory without going through the door! Any questions? Well, they did have questions. They wondered if Jesus could still be the Messiah if he had died. And so he reminded them of 7
all the passages in Scripture that proved it was true: passages like Isaiah 53, where it says, He was wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for our iniquities, but where it also says, Out of his anguish he shall see light ; passages like Psalm 16, where it says that, God will not let his holy one see corruption; passages like Psalm 118, that says, The stone that the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This was the good news those disciples heard along that road, and as they heard it their hearts burned within them, realizing that if it was true then not only Jesus but they, their loved ones, and their best-loved hopes could be raised from the dead. When they got to Emmaus they begged this stranger to stay and have supper with them. He did, and when he did he took bread, and blessed it, and broke it, and gave it to them. Was it in that old, familiar action that they recognized their old, familiar friend? Had they seen him do it a hundred times before and knew it couldn t be anyone else? Maybe it was that. Maybe, when he reached out to give them the bread they saw the nail scars in his hands for the first time. Or maybe it was that knowing look he gave them just before he vanished from their sight. Whatever it was, they knew it was Jesus, and that he was alive, and they said to each other, Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us? Their hearts were burning, Luke says, which may be exactly how it feels, When dead hope comes back to life. Jim Somerville 2017 Shall we pray? Lord, if it was true for you, could it also be true for us: that death is a door, and glory is on the other side, and that if we can find the courage to walk through it we will find ourselves someday standing with you and all those others, blinking in the bright light of Resurrection? Help us see that the redemption of a single nation is too 8
small a thing for you; that what you have in mind is the redemption of all creation, and that you are working on it even now. Amen. i http://www.jewfaq.org/mashiach.htm ii Ibid. iii http://www.radiolab.org/story/goo-and-you/ 9