On the Road with Jesus
Sermon
To The Cross and Beyond
Cycle A Gospel Sermons for Lent and Easter
Object:
Larry McMurtry's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Lonesome Dove is about a cattle drive from Texas to Montana in about 1880. The novel includes the preparations for this 1,000-mile journey and a myriad of adventures along the way. A woman is taken on the drive: Lorena. This isn't just out of the ordinary. It's unique. She's brought along by a man who abandons her. She's then kidnapped and terribly abused by outlaws. Finally, Lorena is rescued and continues with the cattle drive, but she's deeply traumatized and defenseless, far from settlements, and she can only cling to the man who's rescued her and hope he'll continue to care for her.
That's all the romance and violence from the novel that we'll talk about this morning (all the stuff that gets our attention); because, next something more unexpected occurs. It's not violent or romantic, but more powerful. In Nebraska, Lorena is brought to a horse ranch and meets the owner, Clara, whose husband is dying. When these two women get to know one another the horse ranch owner, Clara, asks Lorena to stay and work with the family on the ranch. Lorena realizes almost instantly that she's offered a normal life. No matter how attached and hopeful she is about the man she's traveling with, Lorena chooses to stay. A genuinely compassionate and concerned person meets Lorena and she's not only rescued for a stable and respectable life, she's changed. Sometimes on life's road you meet someone who completely changes your life's direction.
The Lonesome Dove cattle drive helps us visualize life as a journey, a road on which we meet people and make decisions, and at times these people's questions help us make decisions. In the Bible it's easy to picture life as a journey. The Old Testament bursts with migrations, travels, and treks to freedom as well as to exile. It's full of sojourners and aliens who wander, and after the Exodus until the Hebrews become established in Canaan, they take a portable worship center on the road with them. In the Old Testament, journeys and caravans are such a constant occurrence that the word "road," which also means "path" or "way," takes on a figurative meaning of conduct or behavior. In the New Testament gospels you find constant traveling. Jesus is an itinerant preacher who depends on God's mercy and the charity of others to support his traveling. Within a generation after Jesus' resurrection the book of Acts records how joyful Christians journey throughout the Mediterranean basin with the good news.
This morning's text occurs just before the Christian faith fully explodes into the world. We're looking at the scripture's report of the first Easter afternoon. While in Jerusalem all is chaos among Jesus' followers, two of Jesus' students are on the road leading west from Jerusalem. Because they're leaving Jerusalem, we can assume they're giving up on Jesus. Their hopes for Jesus have been crushed. The man's dead! They abandon their journey of faith and head home to start over without him. We know there's more awaiting them on the journey, but they think they've reached the conclusion and at this point they've got every earthly reason to forsake their former direction. Maybe when they exited Jerusalem's gate, they even turned back with a gesture of disgust and said, "That's it. We're outta' here!"
Even though they don't know it, they're still on the road with Jesus. He just walks up and joins them but for the moment as the grammar of verse 16 implies,1God keeps them from recognizing Jesus. He asks them what they're discussing as they walk and they're astounded that he hasn't heard what's just occurred in Jerusalem. With Jesus' next question they go on and pour out their hearts, as airplane passengers often do when they discover they're sitting beside a pastor. Here's their great pain: They thought Jesus was the Messiah who'd form an army, toss out the Romans, and establish a free nation of Israel, and by the way, Israel would then dominate all other nations.
They're fleeing Jerusalem, but they've also been disturbed by a bunch of women. The women visited Jesus' tomb and discovered Jesus' body was gone. They returned to Jesus'other students, claiming that angels told them Jesus was alive. The women's report about an empty tomb was then confirmed by others, though they didn't see any angels. But these two ex-students know there's no way out of a crucified death.
At this point on their unknown walk with Jesus, he takes over and explains that the Old Testament aimed toward a Messiah who'd suffer. You could call this the "Genuine Jesus' Seminar," in case you've heard of the current "Jesus Seminar" that alleges nothing miraculous in the New Testament really occurred. This Genuine Jesus' Seminar is carried on walking away from Jerusalem with these sad ex-students. Maybe they too have given up belief in miracles.
As they continue their hike with Jesus, he leads them on a tour of the Old Testament. He shows that the pattern of the Old Testament is God's suffering both with and for Israel, and God's representatives suffer when they faithfully perform God's work. So Jesus isn't just the fulfillment of the Old Testament. His life's pattern is the key to how we understand the Old Testament. God keeps trying -- even through suffering -- to bring humans back to our created destiny within God's family. God keeps trying now, right here on the road with Jesus.
Jesus has taught a fine seminar on the Old Testament. He's interested these two fellows, no matter their broken hearts and muddled minds. But he's only intrigued them. If they were fish, we'd say they're hooked but not landed. Yet, Jesus'two disappointed, crestfallen ex-students demonstrate that they remember something of what the earthly Jesus taught them. They exercise hospitality and invite him to stay with them. The risen Jesus, no matter how his resurrected glory is hidden from their eyes, practices the same kind of ministry as the earthly Jesus: He goes in to eat with them. Before his resurrection he habitually ate with all kinds of people. No matter the Pharisees'strict religious regulations about whom and whom not to eat with, Jesus ate with everyone: rich, poor, religious, non-practicing, women, men, scoundrels, biblical scholars. He got into trouble for indiscriminately eating with people. Here he just continues what he's always done and eats with ex-believers who are hopeless, disillusioned, and confused.
While they're eating with this stranger who joined their gloomy journey, Jesus becomes the host and turns their meal into worship. "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" (vv. 30-31). This is where Jesus'Old Testament summary comes alive, as though Jesus himself is a portable worship center. They realize that their hearts burned when Jesus walked with them and explained the Bible.
One can quote scripture all day and not impress people that it's any more important than the score of a baseball game. The objective statements of scripture must be confirmed by the subjective response of our heart. Boy do their hearts burn! And now also their eyes see. The two unfortunates have been on the road to understanding God's love. It's a suffering love, desiring that we all accept God's grace in Christ, and then that same love sends us out to do something about God's love.
These discouraged former believers have their faith re-ignited by Jesus. They return to Jerusalem, which they thought was the place of great disaster, but they find it the epicenter of Jesus' earthshaking resurrection. They rush to tell the others the news of what's happened on the road with Jesus and at the supper with Jesus. On the road and in the meal they've begun to understand what God can do even with human suffering.
That's the end of their story, and it's a happy ending. We should never, however, forget how painful was the beginning of their Easter evening walk. Jesus had suffered. We need to remember Jesus' meeting them in suffering because Jesus still joins us on life's real roads. He finds us in our pain, and even here he continues to teach us not only about the Bible, but about his resurrection's power in our lives. Jesus teaches us of God's love even when we think we've reached the end of life's road.
On August 31, 1983, in Anchorage, Alaska, Pam Joy Lowry got off the bus, unexpectedly darted in front of the bus into the street, was struck by a car and died. She was almost thirteen years old. Seventeen years later her mother, Christy, put in writing part of the family's experience in grieving for Pam. She published a little book, Pam: Life Beyond Death; Joy Beyond Grief. She told of the numbing grief as well as the friends, church, and pastor who helped her family and the special way that Pam's friends and their parents supported Pam's family as well as one another. Christy Lowry wrote of the family's visit to the morgue and the visits to the cemetery and how each member of the family grieved differently. Above all Christy affirmed that God was with them in that suffering. Christy had profound spiritual experiences that helped her to understand and to trust God's love even in grief.
As hard as it was to have one's child dead on the road, Christy dedicated her book for bereaved people "and their supporters as they journey together through loss toward a divinely intended, hard-won, and personal relationship with the Author of all of life."2
She calls grieving with God's help a "journey." Our Lord Jesus is alive and cares enough to join us on our journey, whether at the moment it's one of grief or joy. On life's road, he's the one we meet who's like none other. He'll walk with us and eat with us, teach us the Bible and host us at his table in worship. Even when we seem to be inviting him to come to us, we realize that he's inviting us to come to him, all of us who are weary and overburdened.
He comes to all kinds of people, those who are fresh out of hope or faith, those who are grieving, or those who are too shocked yet to grieve. And with the slightest response from us he'll take us with him forever.
Meeting Jesus changes us so that we now live for him and model our life upon him. Our task is to take Jesus with us into our homes and families, into our businesses and schools, into the neighborhood where people work and where children play and where tragedies and suffering occurs. This much we know about Jesus' style: If we won't take him to these places and to these people, he'll show up there anyway.
Communion
Our Lord Jesus is the host who invites us to this meal. He prepares the meal for those who are out of faith, out of hope, and out of love. He offers food to the disillusioned, confused, and doubting. We don't come here because we are abounding in virtue or goodness. We come because Jesus walks along life's road, finds us, and simply says, "Follow me." Amen.
__________
1. The verb is in the passive voice, which I take as a "theological" or "divine" passive where the subject of the verb is not expressed, implying that God is the subject.
2. Christy Lowry, Pam: Life Beyond Death; Joy Beyond Grief (Anchorage: Christy Lowry, 2000), p. 10.
That's all the romance and violence from the novel that we'll talk about this morning (all the stuff that gets our attention); because, next something more unexpected occurs. It's not violent or romantic, but more powerful. In Nebraska, Lorena is brought to a horse ranch and meets the owner, Clara, whose husband is dying. When these two women get to know one another the horse ranch owner, Clara, asks Lorena to stay and work with the family on the ranch. Lorena realizes almost instantly that she's offered a normal life. No matter how attached and hopeful she is about the man she's traveling with, Lorena chooses to stay. A genuinely compassionate and concerned person meets Lorena and she's not only rescued for a stable and respectable life, she's changed. Sometimes on life's road you meet someone who completely changes your life's direction.
The Lonesome Dove cattle drive helps us visualize life as a journey, a road on which we meet people and make decisions, and at times these people's questions help us make decisions. In the Bible it's easy to picture life as a journey. The Old Testament bursts with migrations, travels, and treks to freedom as well as to exile. It's full of sojourners and aliens who wander, and after the Exodus until the Hebrews become established in Canaan, they take a portable worship center on the road with them. In the Old Testament, journeys and caravans are such a constant occurrence that the word "road," which also means "path" or "way," takes on a figurative meaning of conduct or behavior. In the New Testament gospels you find constant traveling. Jesus is an itinerant preacher who depends on God's mercy and the charity of others to support his traveling. Within a generation after Jesus' resurrection the book of Acts records how joyful Christians journey throughout the Mediterranean basin with the good news.
This morning's text occurs just before the Christian faith fully explodes into the world. We're looking at the scripture's report of the first Easter afternoon. While in Jerusalem all is chaos among Jesus' followers, two of Jesus' students are on the road leading west from Jerusalem. Because they're leaving Jerusalem, we can assume they're giving up on Jesus. Their hopes for Jesus have been crushed. The man's dead! They abandon their journey of faith and head home to start over without him. We know there's more awaiting them on the journey, but they think they've reached the conclusion and at this point they've got every earthly reason to forsake their former direction. Maybe when they exited Jerusalem's gate, they even turned back with a gesture of disgust and said, "That's it. We're outta' here!"
Even though they don't know it, they're still on the road with Jesus. He just walks up and joins them but for the moment as the grammar of verse 16 implies,1God keeps them from recognizing Jesus. He asks them what they're discussing as they walk and they're astounded that he hasn't heard what's just occurred in Jerusalem. With Jesus' next question they go on and pour out their hearts, as airplane passengers often do when they discover they're sitting beside a pastor. Here's their great pain: They thought Jesus was the Messiah who'd form an army, toss out the Romans, and establish a free nation of Israel, and by the way, Israel would then dominate all other nations.
They're fleeing Jerusalem, but they've also been disturbed by a bunch of women. The women visited Jesus' tomb and discovered Jesus' body was gone. They returned to Jesus'other students, claiming that angels told them Jesus was alive. The women's report about an empty tomb was then confirmed by others, though they didn't see any angels. But these two ex-students know there's no way out of a crucified death.
At this point on their unknown walk with Jesus, he takes over and explains that the Old Testament aimed toward a Messiah who'd suffer. You could call this the "Genuine Jesus' Seminar," in case you've heard of the current "Jesus Seminar" that alleges nothing miraculous in the New Testament really occurred. This Genuine Jesus' Seminar is carried on walking away from Jerusalem with these sad ex-students. Maybe they too have given up belief in miracles.
As they continue their hike with Jesus, he leads them on a tour of the Old Testament. He shows that the pattern of the Old Testament is God's suffering both with and for Israel, and God's representatives suffer when they faithfully perform God's work. So Jesus isn't just the fulfillment of the Old Testament. His life's pattern is the key to how we understand the Old Testament. God keeps trying -- even through suffering -- to bring humans back to our created destiny within God's family. God keeps trying now, right here on the road with Jesus.
Jesus has taught a fine seminar on the Old Testament. He's interested these two fellows, no matter their broken hearts and muddled minds. But he's only intrigued them. If they were fish, we'd say they're hooked but not landed. Yet, Jesus'two disappointed, crestfallen ex-students demonstrate that they remember something of what the earthly Jesus taught them. They exercise hospitality and invite him to stay with them. The risen Jesus, no matter how his resurrected glory is hidden from their eyes, practices the same kind of ministry as the earthly Jesus: He goes in to eat with them. Before his resurrection he habitually ate with all kinds of people. No matter the Pharisees'strict religious regulations about whom and whom not to eat with, Jesus ate with everyone: rich, poor, religious, non-practicing, women, men, scoundrels, biblical scholars. He got into trouble for indiscriminately eating with people. Here he just continues what he's always done and eats with ex-believers who are hopeless, disillusioned, and confused.
While they're eating with this stranger who joined their gloomy journey, Jesus becomes the host and turns their meal into worship. "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" (vv. 30-31). This is where Jesus'Old Testament summary comes alive, as though Jesus himself is a portable worship center. They realize that their hearts burned when Jesus walked with them and explained the Bible.
One can quote scripture all day and not impress people that it's any more important than the score of a baseball game. The objective statements of scripture must be confirmed by the subjective response of our heart. Boy do their hearts burn! And now also their eyes see. The two unfortunates have been on the road to understanding God's love. It's a suffering love, desiring that we all accept God's grace in Christ, and then that same love sends us out to do something about God's love.
These discouraged former believers have their faith re-ignited by Jesus. They return to Jerusalem, which they thought was the place of great disaster, but they find it the epicenter of Jesus' earthshaking resurrection. They rush to tell the others the news of what's happened on the road with Jesus and at the supper with Jesus. On the road and in the meal they've begun to understand what God can do even with human suffering.
That's the end of their story, and it's a happy ending. We should never, however, forget how painful was the beginning of their Easter evening walk. Jesus had suffered. We need to remember Jesus' meeting them in suffering because Jesus still joins us on life's real roads. He finds us in our pain, and even here he continues to teach us not only about the Bible, but about his resurrection's power in our lives. Jesus teaches us of God's love even when we think we've reached the end of life's road.
On August 31, 1983, in Anchorage, Alaska, Pam Joy Lowry got off the bus, unexpectedly darted in front of the bus into the street, was struck by a car and died. She was almost thirteen years old. Seventeen years later her mother, Christy, put in writing part of the family's experience in grieving for Pam. She published a little book, Pam: Life Beyond Death; Joy Beyond Grief. She told of the numbing grief as well as the friends, church, and pastor who helped her family and the special way that Pam's friends and their parents supported Pam's family as well as one another. Christy Lowry wrote of the family's visit to the morgue and the visits to the cemetery and how each member of the family grieved differently. Above all Christy affirmed that God was with them in that suffering. Christy had profound spiritual experiences that helped her to understand and to trust God's love even in grief.
As hard as it was to have one's child dead on the road, Christy dedicated her book for bereaved people "and their supporters as they journey together through loss toward a divinely intended, hard-won, and personal relationship with the Author of all of life."2
She calls grieving with God's help a "journey." Our Lord Jesus is alive and cares enough to join us on our journey, whether at the moment it's one of grief or joy. On life's road, he's the one we meet who's like none other. He'll walk with us and eat with us, teach us the Bible and host us at his table in worship. Even when we seem to be inviting him to come to us, we realize that he's inviting us to come to him, all of us who are weary and overburdened.
He comes to all kinds of people, those who are fresh out of hope or faith, those who are grieving, or those who are too shocked yet to grieve. And with the slightest response from us he'll take us with him forever.
Meeting Jesus changes us so that we now live for him and model our life upon him. Our task is to take Jesus with us into our homes and families, into our businesses and schools, into the neighborhood where people work and where children play and where tragedies and suffering occurs. This much we know about Jesus' style: If we won't take him to these places and to these people, he'll show up there anyway.
Communion
Our Lord Jesus is the host who invites us to this meal. He prepares the meal for those who are out of faith, out of hope, and out of love. He offers food to the disillusioned, confused, and doubting. We don't come here because we are abounding in virtue or goodness. We come because Jesus walks along life's road, finds us, and simply says, "Follow me." Amen.
__________
1. The verb is in the passive voice, which I take as a "theological" or "divine" passive where the subject of the verb is not expressed, implying that God is the subject.
2. Christy Lowry, Pam: Life Beyond Death; Joy Beyond Grief (Anchorage: Christy Lowry, 2000), p. 10.
