Oh, You Again!
Oh, You Again!
Luke 24:13-35
He died a little over five weeks ago, on Good Friday. And yet, we’ve seen him, we’ve experienced his presence, heard his voice and felt his push every day since that third day after his death. He’s been outside the empty tomb, inside a locked room, on a mountain in Galilee, and on a beach at the Sea. We can’t stop seeing him, experiencing him. It’s almost as if this will keep happening from now on for the rest of our lives.
If we are so fortunate. And if we are paying attention. Pray with me …
All those places and two more to explore before we come together and are touched by Holy Fire and filled with the Holy Spirit. This morning and next week we’ll be in the twenty-fourth chapter of the Gospel of Luke, encountering the Risen Christ with the disciples who walked with him in this world. This morning … we meet him once again, this time on the road to … an uncertain geographical place scholars say, but to a place that is synonymous today with a “transformative journey” of one sort or another - Emmaus.
Remember back to Good Friday, April third this year. In the days between his crucifixion and his appearances – the disciples experiences – on Easter, we are supposed to imagine what this world would be like for us – for everyone – if Love (with a capital “L”) was not a part of it. And, as hard as it may be to imagine life without God, or our own salvation through anything other than the Love of God we find in Christ, I think it’s just as hard for us to recognize that love, Christ, in our midst every day. We recognize it in this place because we’re together – singing, hearing, proclaiming and celebrating. We recognize it in this place during this hour because your Pastors just won’t let up on you! But how long does “resurrection recognition” last? With the exception of Easter Sunday, perhaps Christmas Eve, and maybe the other Sundays of the year, we – like the two travelers in this morning’s scripture story so familiar to us – (we) walk around all year failing to recognize that Easter isn’t a day, or a week or two! Failing to realize that Life, saving Love, and salvation walk around within us every single day of our lives, teaching us new lessons, breaking bread with us, and reminding us of all we’ve been taught, and of our own call to the world. So, let’s try again to make it stick beyond this hour together.
The very first thing that we should notice in our Resurrection story this morning, the “Road to Emmaus,” is that it takes place “on that same day”, the first day of the week, Easter day. Like the experience of the disciples in John in that locked room, it happens the same day that two angels in dazzling clothes reminded the women who showed up at the tomb what Jesus had said about “rising on the third day.” It’s the third day. And the women have run from the tomb to tell the eleven. Now … Read Luke 24:13-21a:
13(Now) on that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles[a] from Jerusalem, 14 and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. 15 While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, 16 but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. 17 And he said to them, “What are you discussing with each other while you walk along?” They stood still, looking sad.[b] 18 Then one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?” 19 He asked them, “What things?” They replied, “The things about Jesus of Nazareth,[c] who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, 20 and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be condemned to death and crucified him. 21 But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.
This is the beginning of the most developed and the most beautiful of all the appearance stories we have in our Gospels. And in Luke, the Emmaus story serves as a transition, a transition between the followers “ambiguous” reaction to the empty tomb. Remember that when the women – Mary, Joanna, and Mary – told the apostles what they had seen and heard at the tomb early on this day, it “seemed to them an idle tale”! (Peter got up, saw it all, and went home amazed. But no others.) So this story moves us from that “non-response/suspicion/fear” to the ultimate appearance of Jesus to all of the disciples, found in verses thirty-six and following. That’s a set up for next week’s exploration. (You should come back.) But, this morning is that transition.
You see, these two disciples were making their way to Emmaus, about 7 miles from Jerusalem, talking about all of the dramatic events that have taken place in the last few days. As the story unfolds in these first verses, they will in effect give a summary to the stranger that joins them – to us – of all that Jesus did in his life with them and of the final days of his “passion”. But they relate all this without full understanding, they’re just details, specifics of a worldly set of events. The last sentence of our reading makes that known: We had hoped he was the one to redeem Israel. They’re just reporting memories and sharing a timeline, sad as it was. They haven’t yet “gotten it”. And this is the fundamental purpose of this, the Emmaus story: This experience – an experience of the Risen Christ within us and among us – reveals the true meaning of death and resurrection. After reading it, after understanding it, after experiencing it, we will finally “get it.” And God will be able to speak to us through Christ as we are spoken to in the final appearance in Luke.
But let’s explore this morning’s experience more deeply, first. I’m not sure many of us have “gotten it” yet.
The key moment comes when the risen Jesus joins the two disciples and walks with them. Luke has set the stage for Jesus' own interpretation of his suffering. The suffering and death of Jesus were to be understood not as an ultimate defeat of God's purpose, but as the necessary pathway to new life. Read Luke 24:25-27.
25 Then he said to them, “Oh, how foolish you are and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! 26 Was it not necessary that the Messiah[e] should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?” 27 Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.
Beginning with Moses and the prophets and then drawing on “all the scriptures”, We are reminded that the pattern of “life emerging from death” is a fundamental pattern of the entire biblical saga: From the original chaos God creates life; from the slavery of Egypt comes freedom and a homeland; from the destruction of exile comes the renewed people. And the hearts of these two would-be followers start burning.
As they came near the village, Jesus would walk on, but the two urge him strongly to stay. Something is happening to them. Yes, “it’s almost evening and the day is nearly over”, but they want this stranger to stay with them. They need this stranger to stay with them. The fire was started. So, he does. And as they share their meal, all is revealed … Read Luke 24:30-32.
When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. 31 Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him, and he vanished from their sight. 32 They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us[f] while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?”
When they recognize his presence, when they allow his Way to be present in their minds, in their hearts, in their body and soul, it is complete. Tangible, visible, scientifically verifiable proof is no longer needed. Simply faith, trust in and fidelity to the Way of Christ. We walk by faith, and not by sight. So … Read Luke 24:33-35.
33 That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem, and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together. 34 They were saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!” 35 Then they told what had happened on the road and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread. The Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.
In our own recognition of how alive Christ is, we learn that others have recognized it, too. And we are one step away from Holy Fire and Holy Spirit. We are a community of believers. And where two or more of us are gathered … powerful and mysterious things can happen that have nothing to do with the supernatural.
Life, saving Love, and salvation walk around with us, and within us, every single day, teaching us new lessons, breaking bread with us, reminding us of what we’ve been taught and of our own call to the world.
I wonder if we’ll ever get so used to Jesus appearing, to Christ within us, that whenever he – whenever it shows up, we simply say, “Oh, you again. What shall we do today?”
We’re close … I think. Maybe closer than we’ve ever been. Our hearts are burning within us, too. Ready to be set on fire. One more week. And then we can begin to tell others, again, what has happened and is happening to us with even more understanding, conviction and faith than ever before. For now, let’s sing …
Christ our companion, hope for the journey, bread of compassion, open our eyes.
(Day of Arising, “Glory to God” hymnal, no. 252)
Amen.
Reverend Joel Weible, Pastor
Pewee Valley Presbyterian Church / May 10, 2026
