Luke 24:13-35

One of Agatha Christie’s heroes is Mr. Harley Quin. He shows up long after a crime is committed, because he believes that you see more clearly what happened long after the fact. He says that at the time, you are too filled with emotions to understand what is happening. I completely recommend her book of short stories based on Mr. Quin and it is an intriguing idea. For example, most historians change their view of a President as time elapses after a presidency. It is easy to tell the terrible ones right away such as Harrison who died within the first month. It is easy to see the ones that are mediocre such as the first Mr. Bush who only had one term. It is less clear the impact of a Ronald Reagan or a Bill Clinton until 50 years later.

 There are so many times in life when we cannot see clearly. The cure may be very simple, but without it we are blind.

 Christians in America have always had a vision problem when it comes to Jesus Christ. There are so many times when we don’t recognize him in the midst of us. What you hear in church on Sunday is not what most speakers on Christian radio say. And the confusion goes deeper than our thoughts about the world and our society. We often do not clearly understand what God wants for our own lives or how to live a life that feels blessed by God.

 In today’s scripture, we will travel with the disciples at a confused moment in their lives. In this account, Jesus accompanies them, but they do not recognize him. If you hope that Jesus is traveling with you, even if you don’t feel it, then this passage was written for you and I pray that the ending will help you in your life.

 The disciples did not all get to see the risen Christ. After the crucifixion, some leave the city of Jerusalem, because they feel that their movement is over. Their hopes were crushed. Christianity was essentially a political movement, led by rural fishermen like Peter who had leadership skills, but not familiar with Jerusalem’s leading restaurants and villas. Poor people were suffering from both poverty and the oppression of Roman taxation and the message of freedom that Jesus preached and the talk of the new kingdom in Mark chapter 1 fired their dreams.

 Jimmy Carter was teaching a Sunday School class and someone asked him if freedom was what God wanted most for people. His answer was that rich people think that freedom is the most important. But poor people don’t want freedom, they want justice. If there is no justice for poor people, they may die today. The issue can’t wait. Mary and Martha were probably richer. Their comfortable home was why Jesus returned there to rest. But many of the disciples had days when they did not get the minimum 1800 calories to stay alive. The miracle that fired them up? There was no greater miracle than the feeding of the 5,000 and the feeding of the 4,000. Those two miracles, one in Jewish territory and the second in Gentile territory defined who Jesus was in the minds of poor people. And now he is gone.

 So the disciples are deep in discussion when Jesus comes alongside them and listens. Incredibly, they are so sure that they understand who he was and what his message was and how it failed that they do not recognize the real person. They do not recognize the risen Christ physically and they do not recognize his thoughts and ideas.

 There is a story that as a young man, Mahatma Gandhi studied in London. After. learning about Christianity, and after reading the Sermon on the Mount, he decided that Christianity was the most complete religion in the world. It was only later, when he lived with a Christian family in East India, that he changed his mind. In that household he discovered that the word rarely became flesh -- that the teaching of Jesus rarely was recognized in actual Christian living.

 For many Christians, not just these two on that 7 mile walk to Emmaus, Easter has come and Christians have missed it. Some of us may identify with a Nikos Kazantzakis' character who exclaimed, "God forgive me . . . this year . . . I have not felt Christ rise."

 The beauty of Christ is that he accepts the confusion of life that day …. and this day. We live in a moment when many Christian radio speakers have reduced all of America’s problems to gay marriage and abortion. And I believe that the risen Christ is walking alongside the American church, saying we have to be interested in the 99% of the Bible that doesn’t touch on either of those topics.

  How can we expect to see Jesus if we do not respect his Word? Christ's capacity for understanding defies our comprehension. This one known as the Prince of Peace does not shy away from chaos and conflict. This one who taught us to pray accepts people who are so troubled that they can't pray.

 Churches have gotten the reputation of being the place that you come when you are sure of what you believe, but Jesus walks with people who don’t yet recognize him.

 I got an email this week from a secular friend and it is a snarky hit on Christians. He points out that the more secular areas of the nation have better lives than the ones with higher fundamentalism. He writes, “Since our divorce rate is 22% lower than the Christian coalition's, we get a bunch of happy families. If you need people to fight in Iraq, just ask your evangelicals. And you believe life is sacred unless we're discussing the death penalty or gun laws”

 This is not our message.  Too much of the Christian message is simply seen as a way to blame the world’s problems on someone else. We need to find our way again to the message of Jesus, as in Luke 4. I came to set the prisoner free, heal the brokenhearted, proclaim a new day of salvation, and give sight to the blind.

 If you are struggling this morning, unsure about your beliefs or how life all fits together, I can’t give one simple sermon that will clear it all up. But I can tell you that you came to the right place to struggle.  Jesus did not immediately identify himself. He waited to hear them. Perhaps this time of prayer is needed for you. I have been out in the prayer garden several times this week. Even in its roughest form, it already invites you to stop and let anxiety and distress, doubt and anger flow out so that the peace of God may flow in.

 And Jesus is recognized during the breaking of the bread. I don’t quite understand this passage. It may be saying that communion is a special time and miracles happen at the table of the Lord. Some churches believe that even though that has not been my personal experience. What I am sure that Jesus is teaching is that our new sight comes as a gift.

 If you are struggling with a personal decision, a crossroads in life, or what scriptures guide the Christian view of war or society, simply ask God this morning that you will receive the gift of sight. In the end, the disciples got the new perspective and new hope and all that excitement as a gift. They didn’t work for it, they didn’t slowly reason it out – Jesus broke bread and suddenly they knew it all.

Jesus wants to be your companion on the road you travel. He has people to bless, lives to touch, hearts to transform. He calls you. He invites you to new sight and a part in his revolutionary movement to transform the world into burning hearts for God.