The First Sunday after Easter

Isaiah 43:1-12, Psalm 66, Acts 10:34 to end, Luke 24:13 to end

         

The month of January was a rough month for the parents of Edith Sydney Kemp.  During the last week of December, Edith had a new sister, her 3rd birthday, Christmas, and a week with her Grandparents.  After all the December excitement, she was emotionally bankrupt for the next month.  I felt similar the first week after Easter.  For six weeks, during Lent, I prepared for Easter Sunday. The excitement picked up in a frantic pace on Palm Sunday and continued for the entire Holy Week, when I felt the painful depths of Good Friday and then the glorious heights of Easter Sunday.  Then on Easter afternoon, the excitement faded like the helium in a birthday balloon.  I woke up Easter Monday, lying on the floor with my emotions shriveled and my spirit limp and weak.    The triumphant song I sang on Easter, “Christ the Lord is risen today, Alleluia!” had become a song of despondency:

I could hear the church bells ringing
they pealed aloud your praise …
[But] I could not find you anywhere
could someone please tell me the story
of sinners ransomed from the fall
I still have never seen you, and somedays
I don't love you at all[1]

 

These despondent words ask an important question, if Jesus Christ has been resurrected (which he was), how do we see him today?[2] Or to put it differently, how does Jesus Christ, who appeared so alive and near last Sunday, remain with us throughout the year?

Our Gospel lesson answers this question.  We come to see the risen Jesus the same way the two disciples on the road to Emmaus saw him, through words and bread.[3]  We – just like the two disciples on the road to Emmaus- come to know Jesus Christ through words, the words of scripture as St. Luke records, “And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.”  All the words in Scripture show us Jesus Christ and now you know why we read four lessons (Old Testament, Psalm, Epistle and Gospel) from the Scriptures every Sunday.  We –just like the two disciples walking the road to Emmaus - see Jesus Christ through the breaking of bread as St. Luke records, “When [Jesus] 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.”  Bread, especially the bread of the Eucharist, shows us Jesus Christ and now you know why we break the Eucharistic bread every Sunday.  The risen Jesus can be known and can be seen today in the simple words of Scripture and in the breaking of plain bread. 

If, however, all the words in the Scriptures concern Jesus Christ, why do we fail to see him?  If the Jesus Christ is revealed through the simple act of taking, blessing, breaking, and distributing bread, why do we fail to see Jesus at every meal, especially the sacred meal of the Eucharist?  There are many reasons why we are blind, but I would like to mention just one today.

When Emily taught kindergarten, she had a difficult time teaching the children how to write legibly.  The children were so focused on what they were doing, writing letters, that they failed to see the lines on the paper that were there to guide them in their letter writing.  By focusing on their actions rather than then on the guides, the children were blinded by their own achievements and performance, but their achievement was an illegible mess of scribbles.  Such is the case in our life.  We, like Emily’s kindergarten students, fail to see Jesus because we  are blinded by focusing on our actions and our performance.  In order to write legibly, Emily’s students needed to focus on the writing guides.  In order to see Jesus, we need to focus on the guides Jesus has given, words and bread, rather than focusing on our actions and performance.   

I suspect that many of Emily’s kindergarten students failed to see the guiding lines because they thought the lines were simple and plain.  Why pay attention to faded pink and blue lines, when you have the power to make a line that is big and bold? Likewise, I suspect that many people fail to see Jesus because we think the words of Scripture are to plain and simple.  The words of Scripture are indeed simple and plain.  There are, of course, highly polished works of grammatical and literary significance in the Scriptures, such as the book of Ruth and Hebrews, but large portions of Scripture are written with simple sentence structures and in plain language.  Why pay attention to the simple sentences and plain words of Scripture when we have the power to write complex sentences using polished words?  As Rudolf Bultman, an influential New Testament Scholar put it, “It is impossible to use electric light and the wireless and to avail ourselves of modern medical and surgical discoveries, and at the same time to believe in the New Testament world of spirits and miracles.”[4]  We assume that we have surpassed Scripture.  We assume, with Rudolf Bultman, that what we are doing is more important than the words of Scripture.  Thus, instead of Scripture guiding us into the presence of Jesus Christ, we ransack Scripture to find proof texts bolstering our own intelligence and labors and this blinds us. 

I also suspect that many of Emily’s kindergarten students’s failed to see the guiding lines on the paper because they thought the faded straight and narrow lines were boring.  Likewise, I suspect that many people fail to see Jesus in the breaking of the bread because bread is boring.  While it is true that some bread is beautiful and ornate, most bread is boringly nutritious.  We prefer those things that are outwardly fancy, ornate, and beautiful – like cupcakes - but inwardly have little nutritional worth.  Fearing boredom,[5] we fill our lives with fancy and ornate things.  We pass our time pursing exciting activities less we appear to be a bore. This blinds us from seeing Jesus in the breaking of bread, the common and boring sustenance found in every culture of the world.  Instead of seeing Jesus at every meal, especially the Eucharist, we gaze intently upon our ornate and fancy, but hallow, actions.  Thus, instead of bread, guiding us into the presence of Christ, we toss the bread to the dogs and stuff our mouths with cupcakes. 

The two disciples on the road to Emmaus saw Jesus in the words of Scripture and in the breaking of bread.  Jesus still reveals himself in these two things.  The question we must ask ourselves, therefore, is are we seeking after the face of Jesus using his guides or are the unintelligible, jots and scratches of our own labors blinding us.


[1] David Bazan, Secret of the Easy Yoke

[2] In many ways, we are like the Prophet Elijah, who in I Kings challenges the prophets of the pagan god Baal to a test.  The god that destroys a sacrificed bull with fire from heaven is the true god, the god Israel should worship.  From morning until noon, the prophets of Baal called upon their god to consume their sacrifice with fire, but nothing happened.  After Elijah prepared his sacrifice, arranged 12 stones to be an alter and piled upon the alter wood, he dug a trench around it big enough to hold 13 quarts of water and then saturated the bull, the wood, the stones with enough water to fill the trench.  Following Elijah’s simple prayer, fire fell from heaven and consumed the sacrificed bull, the saturated wood, the stone altar, and all the water in the trench.  We would expect that after such a powerful demonstration of God’s power, glory, majesty and presence that Elijah would have never had doubted God again, that he would never again fear for his life, but that is not what happened.  After God’s display of power, glory, might Elijah fearfully ran into the desert because he was afraid of Israel queen, Jezebel.  We hear this story and we think to ourselves how could Elijah be afraid of a petty queen after God so clearly demonstrated his power, might, glory, strength and all consuming presence, and yet we fell the same way after Easter, the day we commemorate the greatest display of God’s power, might, glory and majesty when his Son broke out of his tomb alive.  Shortly after, God revealed himself to Elijah, not in fire, not in a mighty wind, nor in an earthquake, but in a small whisper. 

[3] The answer is so simple and yet so profound I am tempted to say with Tertullian, the church father, Prorsus credibile est, quia ineptum est -“It is to be believed because it is absurd.” De Carne Christi (5.4)

                                                                                                 

[4] Rudolf Bultman on Demythologization and Biblical Interpretation, The Christian Theology Reader, edited by Alister McGrath, pages 142-44.

[5] “The two foes of human happiness are pain and boredom.” Arthur Schopenhauer, Essays, Personality; or, What a Man is. Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations.