In his Gospel, St Matthew tells us that the last words Jesus spoke to his disciples were a promise; a promise to be with them always, until the end of the age. The Greek word that we translate as ‘age’ really implies eternity, and so Jesus’ promise to the disciples was that he will be with them forever. And, as with all Jesus’ words and promises, Jesus’ disciples, the Church, have taken that promise very seriously ever since. Notwithstanding that he has now returned to the Father, we believe that Jesus is still ‘Emmanuel’ – he is still ‘God with us’. But, whilst we don’t doubt that Jesus is still with us today, if we’re going to experience Jesus as Emmanuel today, and be aware of his presence with us, we need to be able to recognise him when we meet him, and that’s something we probably don’t do as often as we could.
The Gospel reading today, is the story of the disciples meeting the risen Lord on the road to Emmaus. And, in many ways, our experience of meeting Jesus in our lives today, mirrors that of the disciples who met him on the Emmaus road. Of course, Jesus himself doesn’t physically walk along with us on our journey along life’s highway, but nevertheless, just like those disciples, we can, and do, meet Jesus in a physical sense, and we do that by meeting him in other people.
Jesus himself taught us this when he said,
“’For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me,I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink?And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’”
I’m sure we all try our best to keep these words in our hearts and minds as we go about our daily lives, and so we do, perhaps, recognise Jesus as being physically present with us in those who are suffering and in need. But what about in those who aren’t in need? Do we also see Jesus in them? Do we, for example, recognise Jesus in those who help those in need? Have we ever recognised Jesus in those who have helped us in some way? Do we see those people as Christ-like, or do we simply see them as good, compassionate people? We should be able to recognise Jesus as being physically present in those who help others because this is what Jesus did himself, but can we see Jesus in those who, perhaps to us at least, seem very un-Christlike, in those who don’t care for or about others, perhaps who even cause the suffering of others? That can be extremely difficult, but we’re called to love all people, and treat them accordingly, not just those who need help, or do help, or who we think are ‘nice’ or who love us. And we’re called to see Jesus in all people too because we’re called to treat everyone as though they are the Lord, as St Paul said:
“Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men,knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.For the wrongdoer will be paid back for the wrong he has done, and there is no partiality.”
So Jesus is with us in other people, we just have to be able to see him and recognise him in them. As we go through the coronavirus pandemic, we’ve seen, and can see, example of all the kinds of people I’ve just spoken about. How many can we see, or have we been able to see, and recognise Jesus in?
One of the ways that we’ll all have been helped, at some time, is by having someone explain the Scriptures to us. And, of course, Jesus is still with us today, and we can meet him today, in and through the words of scripture. But the Scriptures aren’t always the easiest of things for us to understand. We can read the words and we know what the words mean, but do we really meet Jesus when we read the words? If we’re going to do that, we need to understand what we’re reading really means because it’s only when we can understand what we’re reading that we’ll get to know and understand Jesus more fully. And it’s only when we do that and grow in knowledge and understanding that we can be sure we’ve met and recognised Jesus in the Scriptures.
We can be helped to understand, and so to recognise Jesus in the Scriptures, in lots of different ways. We can be helped by other people whose knowledge and understanding are better than our own. We can be helped through studying the Scriptures and sharing with other people the different understandings we might each have. And we can be helped through praying about the Scriptures, through praying for understanding of what we’ve just read. We can meet Jesus and be helped to recognise him in the Scriptures in all these ways, but Jesus can also come alongside us in a very personal way as we read the Scriptures.
Most, if not all of us will, at some time, have had what many people call a ‘religious experience.’ In terms of reading the Scriptures it will probably have been the experience of a sudden revelation of what we’re reading really means. It might happen as a word or phrase that we’ve perhaps not really noticed or taken much notice of, even in a well-known passage of scripture, suddenly seems to jump out from the page to us. It might happen as we suddenly see a new and different meaning to a well-known passage of scripture. And it might happen as the meaning of a passage of scripture we’ve never fully understood before, suddenly becomes clear to us. These are the times when Jesus has come alongside us in the power of the Holy Spirit and opened our minds and hearts to the Scriptures, just as he opened the Scriptures to the disciples on the road to Emmaus. We’ve probably all experienced something like that, but how often have we recognised it as a time when we’ve met Jesus?
The culmination of today’s Gospel reading is the disciples’ recognition of who it is who they’ve been journeying to Emmaus with. They finally see that that they’ve been walking and talking with the Lord, and they recognise him when he breaks the bread and hands it to them. This, of course, is an allusion to the Lord’s Supper when Jesus associated the bread with his body, broke it, and gave it to his disciples, and to the Church’s recognition of Jesus in the sacrament of Holy Communion.
As we read the literature of the early Church, we’re left in no doubt whatsoever, that from the very earliest days, Christians have believed that the bread and wine of the Eucharist is the body and blood of Christ. Unfortunately, arguments within the Church about how Jesus is present in the bread and wine have far too often taken, and still do take, people’s focus away from where it should be, and that is on the very real presence of Jesus with us in the sacrament of Holy Communion. We simply don’t know how the bread and wine becomes the body and blood of Jesus, because it is done by an Act of God and we don’t know how, by what means, what method, God works. All we do know is that Jesus said the bread and wine are his body and blood and that we must eat his body and drink his blood if we want to have life, and to have his life within us.
So the Eucharist is another way in which Jesus is still with us, and in which we can meet him today, if only we can put the arguments about how he is present in the bread and wine of the Eucharist aside and recognise that he is with us. And one way in which all Christians should be able to do that is through the words and actions of the liturgy of the Eucharist. As we not only read and say, but also think about and pray the words of the Eucharistic liturgy, we can recognise Jesus as the one who suffered and died for our salvation. We can recognise him as the one who was raised from the dead so that we could be raised from death too. And we can recognise him as the one who ascended to heaven so that we might have everlasting life with him in his heavenly kingdom. By recognising him in all these ways, we can recognise him as our Saviour, our risen and ascended Lord and our God.
Just as the disciples on the road to Emmaus met Jesus almost 2,00 years ago, we can still meet Jesus on our journey through life today, we simply need to know where to look for him and how to recognise when we see and meet him. Jesus is still Emmanuel; he is still God with us, and he will always with be us, until the end of our age, and all ages.
Amen.
You will find the Propers for the Third Sunday of Easter here.
Parish Church of St Mark Chadderton 