Perspectives

Scriptures:  Acts 2:14a, 36-41; I Peter 1:17-23; Luke24:13-35

Perspective

The 1951 Japanese movie Roshamon, considered a masterpiece, tells the story of the encounter of a samarai and his wife with a notorious bandit from the viewpoints of a variety of characters – the bandit, the wife, and even the dead samarai, as told through a medium, plus various witnesses.  As one might expect, the accounts do not jive, and it becomes evident that most of the characters are trying to spin the events to his or her best advantage. 

Of course, we don’t have to venture back to 60-year-old Japanese classic movies to experience how much our vantage point shapes our narrative.  Watch any episode of Judge Judy and you’ll find at least two different persons – plaintiff and defendant – narrate the same incident, but each from his or her perspective – and of course, to his or her best advantage.  And then Judge Judy announces her ruling, bangs her gavel, and that’s that.   

Since Easter, our Gospel readings have concerned appearances of Jesus after the resurrection – first to Mary and one or more of Jesus’ female followers, then to the eleven remaining apostles, and now to two followers of Jesus traveling on the road to Emmaus.  Today’s reading from Luke’s Gospel is a bit like Roshamon, or Judge Judy in that essentially the same sequence of events is related by multiple parties. 

Luke relates the story of two followers of Jesus, one of whom is named Cleopas while the other is anonymous.  They are walking – more likely fleeing – from Jerusalem, where Jesus had been crucified, to their own home in Emmaus, about seven miles from the city.  

They are accosted by a stranger, who appears entirely out the loop regarding Jesus’ crucifixion.  Of course, Luke tells us that the stranger is Jesus himself.  The two  travelers on the road to Emmaus relate their version of what had happened – Jesus of Nazareth, a prophet mighty in deed and word, was handed over by the religious establishment to be crucified by Rome – but we – Cleopas and his companion – had hoped Jesus would liberate Israel from Roman rule.  And then some women who followed Jesus were babbling about angels and an empty tomb.

And then the stranger relates back to them the same story – but from a different perspective.  The stranger tells the two travelers that all that happened, including all the suffering encountered by Jesus, was necessary and indeed had been foretold in Scripture.  The stranger also told the travelers that it was likewise foretold that Jesus would rise from the dead, and be taken into glory. 

The two travelers aren’t yet convinced, but they like what they’re hearing – and it was nearly sunset – so Cleopas and his companion invited the stranger to stay with them.  When Jesus was at table with the two, he took bread, blessed it, broke it, and gave it to them – the very things Jesus did at the Last Supper - and at that moment, in the breaking of the bread, Cleopas and his companion recognized Jesus – and at that moment, we’re told, Jesus vanished from their sight.  At that point, Cleopas and his companion reverse course – having just fled the seven miles from Jerusalem, they go back to Jerusalem and find the eleven gathered together, where they find the eleven, and share their story of how Jesus had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.

How does Jesus become known to you, to me?  Each of us process new information differently.  For many, especially lifelong church folk, reading and hearing Scripture is a primary way in which Jesus is made known to us.   Yet, Cleopas and his traveling companion knew their Scriptures, and indeed as the stranger on the road was speaking, we’re told that they felt their hearts burning within them – and yet they still didn’t recognize who was in their midst.   For us, what we’ve learned in the past can make it easier or harder to recognize new insights that God may have for us – past learnings can be like well-worn ruts that keep us in the same tracks, or they can be bridges that help us make connections from what we’ve learned to what God would have us learn.

Prayer and meditation are also primary ways in which Jesus is revealed.  We’re not specifically told that Cleopas and his traveling companion prayed, but certainly in Jesus’ crucifixion, it would have appeared that their prayers had come to nothing, had been rejected.  But in meeting Jesus on the road, their prayers were answered, in ways they never could have anticipated.

But for Cleopas and his companion, the moment that Jesus took, blessed, broke the bread and gave it to them that sealed the deal.  Perhaps they were more visual learners than verbal learners, as seeing Jesus take, bless, break, and distribute the bread reminded them of what Jesus had done at the Last Supper.  Being at table over broken bread prompted them to recognize Jesus in a way that hearing the Scriptures expounded to them didn’t.    In Christ, God came to meet us as  human beings where we are, just as we are, in all our brokenness – and in these post-resurrection appearances, Jesus met his followers in a variety of ways, so that each would recognize Jesus – the women by seeing Jesus in the garden, Peter by seeing the empty tomb, Thomas by seeing the wounds of Jesus’ crucifixion, and the two travelers by seeing Jesus in the breaking of the bread.

Cleopas and his traveling companion met Jesus in the breaking of the bread.  It is often in our hospitality that newcomers most readily meet Jesus.   Folks can have scripture quoted to them all day long, but the folks who quote Scripture – be they street evangelists or TV preachers – often do it mostly to condemn, and that’s how people outside the church generally hear Scripture, as condemnation.  It’s in sharing hospitality – sharing what we have with others, be it ever so humble, that Jesus is revealed – to us and to others.

While Jesus was at table with the two travelers to Emmaus, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them.  In a few moments we will be sharing in the sacrament of Holy Communion

Sacraments have been described as “visible words”.  Like those on the road to Emmaus, may we, wherever we are on life’s journey, experience the risen Christ in the sharing of bread.  Amen.