PRACTICING RESURRECTION

(Preached on Sunday, April 6, 2008)

While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, but their eyes were kept from recognizing him.                  -Luke 24:15-16

 

So, did Easter Arock@ your world? 

It=s been two weeks.  Have you experienced dramatic changes in yourself, your life, your world as a result of the drama of Easter?  That=s what we hope for, isn=t it?  I know I have for most of my life, and to some extent still do C look for God to show up in dramatic fashion. Unfortunately for me, that is not how God usually works.  That is why the Emmaus story is so important for me to hear on a regular basis.  This is a perfect story for the church to consider several weeks past Easter.  Why?  Because, if the truth be told, we are always finding ourselves on that road.  Not the one between Emmaus and Jerusalem, literally.  Rather, faith is always the journey between the shipwrecks of Good Friday and the incredible hope of Easter morning.  Sure, two weeks ago Easter was glorious and the world was filled with hope.  But did you notice something? Did you notice that the news headlines the day after Easter, and the day after, and the day after, seemed uncannily like the ones before we sang, AChrist the Lord is Risen Today!@?  Did you notice that, despite the Sunday interlude of pancake breakfast, Easter egg hunts, and AChrist is risen C Christ is risen indeed@ greetings, our bodies still show signs of aging and our world still shows signs of cracking?

 

What difference has Easter made?  I really believe this story holds the key for unlocking that question.  The story of Emmaus does not answer the question , AHow did God raise Jesus from the dead?@  Or even the question, AWhy did God raise Jesus from the dead?@  This story deals with the question of how Easter gets to us where we live.

 

What makes this story remarkable is how unremarkable it is C it is so wonderfully believable and ordinary.  Cleopas and his companion are nobodies who have no idea what God might be doing.  They could be any one of us.  Their road to Emmaus is an ordinary road, the road each of us is on every day.  It is a road filled with ordinary despair, and ordinary, Monday-morning drudgery.  It is a story about a journey, about meeting a stranger, about sitting down at a table and sharing a meal.  It=s a story about Easter among us.

 

The power of the Emmaus story is that it was a symbol for the early Christians of the Christian life.  The moment of truth for the disciples was not whether the tomb was empty but that Jesus was experienced as a living reality, as being present in their lives.  The promise of the story is this: if you want to experience the resurrection of Jesus in your life, where you live, get up in the morning and put one foot in front of the other and head down the road.  Continue on your journey expecting God to find you. It isn=t our unshakable faith and deep spirituality that connect us with the risen Christ, but our simple acts of faithfulness in practicing resurrection in our daily lives.

 

How do we practice resurrection?  The story offers us at least three practices.  The first practice is to truly listen to one another, especially to the pain, sorrow, grief, and confusion of our lives.  The Easter season, full of blooming flowers, alleluias, and the joyful shouts of children finding eggs, can be hard on those who are hurting and grieving.  Nothing is more painful than sadness and grief when everyone else is seemingly all sweetness and light.  Jesus comes to two disciples who are grieving the loss of a loved one (Jesus himself).  The first thing Jesus does is to just quietly draw alongside of them and walk with them.  He doesn=t open his mouth, doesn=t try to explain, doesn=t try to take away the pain or make a joke to lighten the mood.  He quietly stays with them.  Second, not presuming to know the source of their sadness, he asks good questions.  What are you discussing?  What are the things that have happened? 

 

It really is amazing what Jesus modeled for us here.  The triumphant, risen, glorious Christ traveled incognito and listened to their fears, doubts and tentative hopes.  In our twisted way of thinking, very important people do not listen to us.  They speak with us and more often talk at us.  The more August the person is supposed to be, the more we are supposed to shut up and listen to them.  Plus, we often think the most important thing we are to do for people is tell them how to fix their lives.  But not Jesus, whose glory the universe cannot contain, he listened to them.  He said: ATell me about it.@  They did; unburdened themselves to him.  He listened.  That is an important way to practice resurrection: by listening to one another.

 

But Jesus does more.  After he listens, he then shares what he does know.  There is no friendship, human or divine, which is not two way.  A true friend is not just a mobile garbage bin into which you unload all your negativity.  Friends listen to each other.  Dialogue not monologue is what we hunger for.  Jesus first listened to them, and then he shared his perspective, what he knew of how God was working in his life, and in the world. 

 

Because he first listened, Jesus was able to connect what he shared with them in a way that moved their hearts.  As they recalled later, their hearts were burning within them as they walked and talked with him on the road.  He was connecting with them, even though they did not recognize him, at a deep, heart level.  He was restoring their hope.  He brought them back to themselves and to what they had learned.

 

Which is evident in the third practice of resurrection: hospitality.  The two disciples walk with Jesus seven miles, listen to him talk and teach, feels their hearts burning within, yet never recognize him.  But when they extend the practice of hospitality which they had learned from Jesus, welcoming the stranger to their table, offering food to the hungry, giving shelter to the traveler, then their eyes are opened and they recognized him.  When we create welcoming space, share our resources, and offer the generosity Jesus taught us to offer, we are often amazed at the way we encounter the risen Christ and discover Easter joy.

 

That is why we regularly practice hospitality by gathering around the Communion Table.  We remind ourselves how God welcomes each one of us, all of us, everyone to God=s table.  We experience again God=s gracious hospitality and we remember how easy it is to extend, how simple it can be, and how powerfully life-changing it can be for someone to be welcomed, not as a stranger, but as a friend.

 

Dr. Tony Campolo tells the story of a Christian colleague with a Ph.D. in English Literature who quit his job and became a mailman because Christ opened up a new tomorrow in his life.  Tony went to the man=s apartment to try to persuade him to change his mind.  He couldn=t change his mind, so he tried the old Protestant work ethic thing.  He said: ACharlie, if you=re gonna be a mailman, be the best mailman you can be.@  He looked at Tony with a silly grin and said, AI=m a lousy mailman.@  AWhat do you mean, you=re a lousy mailman?@  He answered, AEverybody else gets the mail delivered by one o=clock; I never get back until about five-thirty or six.@  AWhat takes so long?@ Campolo wanted to know.  He said, AI visit!  That=s why it takes so long.  You wouldn=t believe how many people on my route never got visited until I became the mailman.  But I=ve got this problem.  I can=t sleep at night.@  Tony asked, AWhy can=t you sleep?@  He said, AWho can sleep after drinking twenty cups of coffee?@