Sermons

A Little Myopia

Deborah L. Hughes                      Third Presbyterian Church
April 10, 2005                             Luke 24:13-35

Let’s take a step back a few days to Easter.

Well, not the glorious Easter that we celebrated here together two Sundays ago, with brass and timpani and choirs, with children excited by bunnies and stimulated by chocolate, and, yes, even adults excited by --what? Memories and reunions? Expectations and fanfare and sure indications of Spring? What is it about Easter that causes droves of people to return to church at least that one day of the year?

No not that Easter. Not the Easters of our childhood, or even Easters celebrated in this millennium.

Let’s go all the way back to that first Easter—of course, it wasn’t called that then—that first Sunday that came after that awful Friday—not a good Friday at all—that horrible, terrible, Friday, when Jesus was crucified.

Let’s go back to the first Easter that came three days after the crucifixion. That day when some women went to the tomb to attend to the body and found it missing. That day when Simon Peter went himself to see if it was true. That day when some of the women and men who had been Jesus’ followers reported that they had seen the angels, too, or even Jesus himself, not dead, but risen from the dead.

Let’s go back to that Sunday, because that’s when we’d find the two walking together on the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus. That was the very day, the Gospel of Luke tells us, that they embarked on their journey.

It’s about seven miles from Jerusalem to Emmaus. Some of it hilly, so it would take two, maybe three, hours to walk, depending on the pace. Like walking from here almost to Fairport, only rockier and steeper in places. No sidewalks, of course, but no cars, either.

They were talking—a better translation might be “debating” about what had happened.

Of course they were! What on earth were they to make of all this! Jesus was supposed to be the Messiah. He was the One who had come to liberate Israel! He was the One who was to draw the people back to God, restoring the relationship between God and God’s chosen people. Now he was gone, and what had changed? Now, he was gone, and the Roman Empire certainly was not changed.

Was it all a fake? Was it all a lie? Had they been fooled by some kind of cruel hoax—putting their hopes in this man of Nazareth? They had trusted him, believed in him, followed him. Their lives had been changed. They had seen the lives of others changed. And they had expected even greater changes to come. He had confronted corrupt powers, he had charmed great crowds. Jews and Gentiles alike responded to the truth in his teaching. Rich and poor had come to him, believing in his healing power.

But he had been shamed, and ridiculed, and humiliated, and crucified. And now he was dead.

Well, was he dead? Some said they’d seen him, alive! Not that he’d survived the crucifixion by some miracle of strength, but that he had risen from the dead. They seemed so totally convinced by their own experience. . . were they confused from grief? Were they delirious? Had they loved this man so much--invested so much hope in his life and leadership--that they could not let him go?

And what did ‘resurrection” mean? Apparently it was not the resuscitation of a corpse-- Jesus revived to resume his former life and broken body until the day he might die again, finally. No, somehow this was some new mode of being that seemed to be spiritual to some or quite corporeal to others.

And, if he were risen from the dead, what would be the point of all that? What was the point to a Messiah—to a presumed political and religious leader—if he wasn’t able to lead people here on earth? How could he restore Israel when he had so easily been defeated by a handful of Roman guards? How could he bring release to the captives, how could he bring justice for the poor, how could he advocate for the widow and the homeless? How could he call people to account for all the ways they had strayed from God’s intent, now? What good could come from some kind of spiritual ghost?

Can you hear the two friends wrestling with each other and with their own hearts on the road that day? Can you imagine what questions they might have had? What agony they might have experienced? How crushed they might have been to have lost their leader, to have witnessed the violence that triumphed over their champion?

They wrestled almost 2,000 years ago, but similar wrestling continues in the hearts and minds of people today. Just ask our current confirmation class. They genuinely ask, what sense are we to make of the death of Jesus of Nazareth? How are we to receive the story of resurrection? Are we really supposed to believe that all the rules of nature were suspended that Easter morning? When we say “Jesus is my Lord and Savior,” what does that actually mean?

Perhaps some of you would admit to wrestling with these same questions—if not today, on some days during your walk of faith. Even those of us who have been members, and elders, and church leaders might confess to wrestling with these notions once in awhile.

We would not be alone. According to the Barna Group about 44% of Christians are “notional Christians.” These are people who consider themselves to be Christian, but do not claim they know their eternal destiny and are less likely than others to embrace core Biblical doctrines (such as the bodily resurrection of Jesus). (http://www.barna.org ©2005 The Barna Group, Ltd.)

Discussions about the historical Jesus versus the Jesus of faith have been renewed in this age by popular authors such as Marcus Borg and John Shelby Spong and even through fiction such as Dan Brown’s DaVinci Code and films such as Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of Christ.”

It has been quite some time since we’ve thought of the gospels as diaries kept by the disciples as the events occurred. The Bible is not a series of video clips that document events as they actually happened. Instead, we know that the stories about Jesus were written down two generations or more after Jesus was crucified, and that each gospel was shaped by the writers and their audience and intended to interpret the story in ways that would be powerful and meaningful to the current generation.

When we ask, “did this really happen just this way?” Probably the most honest answer would be, “We may never know exactly what happened.”

As Marcus Borg asserts,

Did Easter nevertheless involve something happening to the corpse of Jesus? On historical grounds, we cannot say. What we can say, however, is from the standpoint of Christian faith most crucial: Jesus’ followers continued to experience him as a living reality, and in a new way, namely as having the qualities of God. Now he could be known anywhere, and not just in a particular place; now he was the presence which abided with them, “Immanuel” (which means “God with us”); now he was “seated at the right hand of God,” participating in the power and authority of God; now they knew him as both Lord and Christ. . . Suffice it to say that he who was put to death because of his passion to transform culture in the name of the Spirit was not swallowed up either by death or culture. Indeed, Spirit triumphed over culture. (Marcus Borg, Jesus A New Vision: Spirit, Culture, and the Life of Discipleship, ©1987, p. 185.)

William Sloane Coffin addressed a similar question about his understanding of the miracles of Jesus:

Miracles do not a Messiah make. But a Messiah can do miracles. If you ask me if Jesus literally raised Lazarus from the dead, literally walked on water and changed water into wine, I will answer, “For certain, I do not know. But this I do know: faith must be believed before it is understood, and the more it is lived, the more things become possible.

He goes on to share his own experience of miracles:

I can also report in home after home I have seen Jesus change beer into furniture, sinners into saints, hate-filled relations into loving ones, cowardice into courage, the fatigue of despair into the buoyancy of hope. In instance after instance, life after life, I have seen Christ be “God’s power unto salvation,” and that’s miracle enough for me. (Coffin, William Sloane, Credo, © 2004, Westminster John Knox Press, p. 10.)

Faith is not a science experiment. The resurrection of Jesus is not a thesis that can or should be proved through analysis.

In truth, if I could hand you a DVD that confirmed this story in all its details, how many of you would doubt its authenticity, assuming it was a Hollywood production, not journalism?

Two things revealed Jesus to Cleopas and his companion that day. First, Jesus interpreted the Jewish scriptures for them and placed the Messiah in a different context amidst of God’s ongoing relationship with humanity.

We are accustomed to setting Jesus in the context of God’s plan. We do that every year in Advent and Christmas, as we set the stage for “Immanuel, God with Us” in the birth of the Messiah, the prince of peace.

But what we now take for granted was once a radical, new concept, introduced here, and in the other Gospels and the Epistles-- that Jesus really was the Messiah, the Christ, come to restore humanity to a relationship with God in a very different way. In Luke, go all the way back to Moses to see the plan of God unfolding in the teaching of Jesus. In the Gospel of John, go all the way back to the beginning of time itself: “In the beginning was the Word. . ”

The second way that Jesus was revealed to the companions was in the breaking of the bread. Here, the one who was their invited guest assumed the role of host by blessing and breaking the bread with them. And as he does so, their eyes are opened.

The image reminds us of the feeding of the five thousand, and of the last supper with the disciples. But now, on this side of Easter, this image clearly reminds us of the Lord’s Supper that we share together in worship.

Now, here’s an interesting perspective: Cleopas and his companion don’t open their own eyes. As Charles Cousar has observed, recognition of Jesus as the Christ is “not the end product of an intellectual or existential search by the seeker. It is the gift of God. . .” (Brueggeman, Walter, et al, Texts for Preaching: Year A, c 2004, p 281.)

I was a little myopic as a child.

Actually, that’s an understatement. I am nearsighted enough that Jesus (and my own mother) could have walked right next to me, and I might not have recognized either of them! I’ve always identified with the blind man who opens his eyes after Jesus touches him and looks toward people and reports that he sees “trees walking”!

The thing about having restricted vision is that you’re not aware of it. For me, the world was as it was. I wasn’t aware that others perceived it differently. I didn’t think that anyone could see the writing on the chalkboard. Surely, we all watched the teacher make shapes with his or her hands and tried to memorize the letters. I was fascinated by photographs in the National Geographic or on jigsaw puzzles that showed trees where you could actually see the individual leaves from a distance. Look at what George Eastman was able to do with film and optic lenses, I thought!

I wore glasses for years, but they did not fully correct my astigmatism, so the world was a little fuzzy. I was 22 years old before contact lenses had progressed to the point that they could correct my vision to almost 2020. Suddenly, details were brought into focus. And for the first time, I realized that people really could see individual leaves on trees—it was not a miracle of photographic equipment!

Aren’t we all a little bit myopic somewhere in our lives—some places where we are absolutely certain that we see things just as they are—just as everyone must see them-- because we know we’re right! But, in fact, our eyes are closed to the full truth.

In this sense, the road to Emmaus is a metaphor for all our journeys—particularly our journey of faith. As Paul said to the Corinthians, now “we see as in a glass darkly, but then we shall see face to face. . . “

We walk the road of faith, not always knowing where we’re going, not always knowing why. And some of the time—most of the time, for some! We are not really aware of Christ’s presence, or God’s presence, with us. Whether it be the beauty and wonder of the creative world that surrounds us, or the nudging of the Holy Spirit that draws us into unfamiliar places, or the great teacher and healer, who is always willing to share with us the way to live life and live it abundantly.

The two on the road had gone to Jerusalem to follow a man whom they thought would be their Messiah. And they expected that man, that person, to lead and rule their nation, to ascend to power, according to the norms of that society. They got something very, very different, and they didn’t recognize the whole different kind of Christ

Listen to how Napolean Bonaparte perceived Jesus:

Alexander, Caesar, and Charlemagne, and I have founded great empires, but upon what did these great creations of our genius depend? Upon force! Jesus alone founded his empire upon love and to this very day, millions would die for him. I think I understand human nature, and I tell you that all these were men, and I am a man. None else is like him. Jesus Christ was more than a man.

As William Sloane Coffin has observed,
It is terribly important to realize that the leap of faith is not so much a leap of thought as of action. For while in many matters it is first we must see, and then we will act; in matters of faith it is first we must do, and then we will know, first we will be and then we will see. One must, in short, dare to act wholeheartedly without certainty. . .I love the recklessness of faith. First you leap, and then you grow wings.” (Coffin, Credo, p. 7.)

And what truth will be revealed when we dare to walk with Christ? Listen to these words from Daniel Barrigan:

“It is not true that creation and the human family are doomed to destruction and loss—
This is true: For God so loved the world that God gave the only begotten son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life.

“It is not true that we must accept inhumanity and discrimination,
Hunger and poverty, death and destruction—
This is true: I have come that they may have life, and that abundantly.

“It is not true that violence and hatred should have the last word, and that war and destruction live forever—
This is true: for unto us a child is born, and unto us a son is given,
And the government shall be upon his shoulder,
And his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, the Everlasting, the Prince of Peace.

“It is not true that we are simply victims of the powers of evil who seek to rule the world—
This is true: To me is given authority in heaven and on earth, and lo, I am with you , even unto the end of the world.

It is not true that we have to wait for those who are specially gifted,
Who are the prophets of the church, before we can be peacemakers.
This is true: I will pour out my spirit on all flesh,
And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
Your young shall see visions,
And your old shall have dreams.

It is not true that our hopes for liberation of humankind, of justice, of human dignity, of peace
Are not meant for this earth and for this history—
This is true: The hour comes, and it is now, that true worshippers shall worship [God] in spirit and in truth. (Berrigan, Daniel, Testimony: The Word Made Flesh, ©2004, Orbis Books, pp. 211-212.)

You are invited to step into Easter. Not the Easter two weeks ago, not the Easter almost 2,000 years ago. Not the Easter of the past, but the Easter of the present. Come, join these two and that stranger on the road to Emmaus, on the road of faith. If your eyes are closed, come along anyway. If your heart hasn’t burned within you yet, come along; it will. Amen.