Luke 24:13-35
Now on that same day two of Jesus’ disciples were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. And he said to them, “What are you discussing with each other while you walk along?” They stood still, looking sad. Then one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?” He asked them, “What things?” They replied, “The things about Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be condemned to death and crucified him. But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things took place. Moreover, some women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning, and when they did not find his body there, they came back and told us that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said; but they did not see him.” Then he said to them, “Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?” Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.
As they came near the village to which they were going, he walked ahead as if he were going on. But they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.” So he went in to stay with them. When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight. They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?” That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together. They were saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!” Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.
I think that one of the interesting things that is going on here is that they were talking to Jesus about Jesus. But what they seemed to be focused on was what they thought Jesus was going to do and how he was going to do it. They never considered that He rose from the sea like He said He would. In their minds, they had an idea how things were going to look and when they didn’t look that way, they couldn’t see what was really going on.
A point made in this passage is that Jesus can appear to us and yet no matter how familiar we think we are of Him, no matter how much time we’ve spent with Him, no matter what we think Jesus would or should look like if He showed up, incarnate, we most likely would not recognize Him and if we did, it would only be after He left.
I think a case could be made that before they could recognize Him right there with them, they had to learn to see him in the scriptures. As we encounter Christ in our world, He points us to the scriptures and gives us insight.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through Him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it. John 1:1-5
Christ is the light. We are the darkness. Christ is the Word, the Word is the light. Apart from the Word, we cannot understand or recognize Christ in our world. Jesus was right there with men that should have been able to recognize Him, yet they couldn’t. He didn’t try to convince them to recognize Him, rather He tried to show them were He was and always has been and how it is the scriptures that reveal Him to man.
I am convinced that all of us encounter Jesus, in the flesh, at some point in our lives, and probably more than once. Yet we don’t recognize Him. We’re not meant to recognize Him in the moment. The sheep and goats in Matthew 25, both said, “when did we see you Lord?”. Whether we’re being a sheep or a goat, we are still not meant to recognize Christ when we directly encounter Him. It is only after that we become aware, if we do become aware, that we had an encounter with Christ. Perhaps we can’t recognize him because we are so convinced of what its going to look like when He shows up. We’re so focused on our ideas, our plans, our hopes that Jesus is going to fix that when he shows up as our neighbor who needs help, we don’t recognize Him and look elsewhere. And we just have to live with that. Loving our neighbor is loving Christ. And Christ answering our prayers is always a call to participate in loving like He loves: laying down our lives for those we love. We pray for our lives to get better and easier and for less suffering and struggle. So Jesus calls us to let go of what is making them harder and causing suffering. He calls us to let go of what our ego desires, our shadow self, our false self. It is our desire for stuff, status, accumulation, that is causing most of the unhappiness in our lives. Yet when Jesus shows up to help us learn to let go of all that, our hopes are dashed because we expected Him to create all that for us.