Monday, May 1, 2017

His Words Come First As He Walks With Us

Third Sunday of Easter
April 30, 2017

Luke 24:16
His Words Come First As He Walks With Us

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen!

Before His glorious death, Jesus must have walked hundreds of miles on the dusty roads of Israel. So why not seven more?

On this most busy of days, Jesus was visiting with many of His disciples. And two of them were walking away from Jerusalem to Emmaus, a seven-mile trip. And Jesus joined them on the road.

And He does it again. He gives these disciples first His Word, then His body. Just like with Mary and Thomas, He wants them to trust His Word alone. Thats why He hides His presence from them—He wants to be found in His Word.

And what wonderful words! After rebuking them for their failure to connect His promises to the actual events unfolding right around them, He explained to them what the Scriptures said about Him. How I wish Cleopas had written down this most illuminating of all catechism classes, but we can take some very wise guesses as to what Jesus taught. He would have taken them back to the beginning when He promised Himself to Adam and Eve. And then when He promised Himself to Noah and then Abraham. He would have proclaimed the words of King David in Psalm 22, that are the Words of Christ:

My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?
Why are You so far from saving Me,
so far from My cries of anguish?
PSALM 22:1 NIV

And ends with these triumphant words:

All the ends of the earth
will remember and turn to the Lord,
and all the families of the nations
will bow down before Him,
for dominion belongs to the Lord
and He rules over the nations.
All the rich of the earth will feast and worship;
all who go down to the dust will kneel before Him—
those who cannot keep themselves alive.
Posterity will serve Him;
future generations will be told about the Lord.
They will proclaim His righteousness,
declaring to a people yet unborn:
He has done it!
PSALM 22:27-31 NIV

These words are fulfilled in Christ! And these words filled these believers with joy and gladness! They were those of whom Jesus spoke,

Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.
JOHN 20:29 NIV

Perhaps you have had the chance to talk with a stranger, and as the conversation went on, you both began to realize that you were followers of Jesus, who knew how deep sin goes, how Jesus' death and resurrection satisfied God's anger at our sin, how Jesus gives us this peace through water, word, body, and blood, and how we followers follow Jesus' way of the cross—suffering and loss, with Jesus always there for us. In other words, you both realized you were Lutherans. This joy might give you a sense of the joy of these Emmaus disciples.

Naturally they did not want this mysterious friend who had connected the dots for them to depart from their presence. So they asked Him to stay with them since it was getting late. He said yes, and soon they saw for just a moment.

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.
LUKE 24:30-31 NIV

They ran back to Jerusalem and told the others what they had seen, and then they saw Him again and knew it was Him for a whole evening and for the rest of their lives.

And so it is with us. Jesus stays with us in the evening and the morning, when we are home and when we are at church and when we travel on the road. He is always with us through His Word.


For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His Life as a ransom for many. Alleluia! Amen!

https://soundcloud.com/pastor-luke-boehringer/2017-04-30-sermon-emmaus

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