This morning we come to one of the best written passages in the Gospel of Luke; it may be one of the top ten amazing passages in all Scripture.  We are in Luke 24 and we will be walking on the road to Emmaus. Let’s just go ahead and jump right into the passage.  As we go through Luke 24:13-35 I will stop and point out why I believe this story is one of the high points of Scripture. 

Luke 24:13-16  Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem. They were talking with each other about everything that had happened.  As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; but they were kept from recognizing him.

It is still Easter Sunday.  Jesus has been dead for three days.  The two are on their way back home.  Reading between the lines just a bit, I am going to assume this is a husband and wife; Cleopas and his wife, Mary. We find their names in the Gospel of John.  I may be wrong about this, but I suspect I am not.  They are on their way back home to Emmaus, discouraged, confused and quitting, when Jesus, incognito, begins to walk along with them. 

Immediately, we begin to see Luke is doing more than telling a simple story.  Just as we have seen throughout the Gospel of Luke, we see here, he is talking about us.  This is more than just a story, this is my life!  When I am confused, when I am discouraged, when I am taking it to the house and giving up, Jesus joins me on the road and walks with me; often times incognito. This is already a wonderful passage. I am already encouraged.  Jesus joins me when I am discouraged. But let’s keep going.

Luke 24:17-21   He asked them, "What are you discussing together as you walk along?" They stood still, their faces downcast.  One of them, named Cleopas, asked him, "Are you only a visitor to Jerusalem and do not know the things that have happened there in these days?"  "What things?" he asked. "About Jesus of Nazareth," they replied. "He was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people.  The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel.”

Can’t you feel the hurt in these four words, “But we had hoped”?  They knew Jesus.  They knew his magnetism.  They had seen his miracles. They had heard his marvelous words.  They just knew… he was the one who would save Israel.  They could visualize Jesus leading a mighty army against the Romans and redeeming Israel to its former glory. “Throw out the Romans!  Bring in Jesus of Nazareth.  He’s the man!”  But he was crucified.  And dead messiahs are failed messiahs.  And so they were walking with their faces downcast back to the house. They, evidently, had been wrong about everything; “But we had hoped.”

Wait a second!  That’s me again.  I know what God is doing.  I have a plan and surely God is going to accomplish my plan.  I have it all orchestrated; the way it should be.  I have it all composed just like it ought to be. I have it all choreographed. Surely, God and I are on the same sheet music.  But when God doesn’t dance to my music, I quit singing and start walking on the road to Emmaus.  Don’t you see what Luke is doing?  Isn’t this amazing?  He is telling a story about Cleopas and Mary as well as a story about me and you.  As I said, this is an amazingly well written passage.

Luke 24:22-24   “In addition, some of our women amazed us. They went to the tomb early this morning but didn't find his body. They came and told us that they had seen a vision of angels, who said he was alive.  Then some of our companions went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but him they did not see."

Cleopas and Mary were a little slow on the uptake.  They should have hung around Jerusalem just a little longer.  The women came back with this story about an empty tomb and some angels.  They should have stayed and listened to them.  How about a little faith?  Even with the women’s testimony they still headed down the road to Emmaus. 

But who am I to criticize them?  If it is not about me, if God doesn’t do it my way, if God is working through others, do I listen?  Luke is teaching me another tough lesson.  God works through others, too.

Luke 24:25-27   He said to them, "How foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken!  Did not the Christ have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?"  And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.

I would love to have heard that sermon. Don’t you wish CNN had been on the scene and got that whole message on tape?  Well, maybe not. They probably would have edited it and messed it up. That lesson as they walked along the road would have been inspiring. 
-Adam and Eve; this is where the plan began.
-Abraham is symbolic of giving a son
-Moses was the same kind of deliver
-Isaiah told all about it the suffering Savior

As they walked the 7 miles to Emmaus they learned what it was all about. I would have loved to been there, except for the rebuking part.  Jesus calls them foolish and slow.  They had missed the entire point.  They were expecting God to deliver Israel from suffering.  But instead, Jesus came to deliver Israel through suffering.  There was a plan in place for God to take human form and come to this world and suffer, so that he might enter into his glory.  This is the Christmas part of the sermon.  Jesus came to this world to take on the sufferings of this world in order to renew all creation. 

But this is still a story about us. We often times still miss the point.  Our walk with Jesus is supposed to join him in his suffering.  The way to glory is through suffering.  The way to life is through death.  The way to freedom is through surrender.  But we still struggle with Christmas being all about the sugar plums and not about the sacrifice.  Luke, who tells the best Christmas story in Scripture, wants us to know Christmas is all about the cross.  Anyway, Jesus explained all this to Mr. and Mrs. Cleopas as they walked on the road to Emmaus.  And then they arrived. 

Luke 24:28-31   As they approached the village to which they were going, Jesus acted as if he were going farther.  But they urged him strongly, "Stay with us, for it is nearly evening; the day is almost over." So he went in to stay with them.  When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them.  Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight.

The couple on the road urged Jesus strongly to come into their home.  That has to be what we do too.  Jesus is not going to force himself on anyone.  They had to urge him.  And when we urge Jesus into our homes, he will break bread with us and reveal himself to us.  Jesus is revealed in the breaking of the bread!  This is amazing enough, but the connections here are intricate.  Get this.

The first “meal” ever recorded in human history is found in Genesis 3.  Watch what Luke is doing with Genesis 3.

Genesis 3:6-10   When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, (sound familiar? 24:31) and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.  Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the LORD God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the LORD God among the trees of the garden.  But the LORD God called to the man, "Where are you?"  He answered, "I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid."

When Jesus shares the meal with the couple in Emmaus he is undoing the first meal from the couple in Eden.  The first meal opened their eyes to sin.  The last meal opened their eyes to salvation.  The first meal made the couple want to hide.  The last meal revealed Jesus. The first meal brought sin into the world. The last meal brought the one who came to seek and save that which was lost.  Isn’t this an amazing connection?  Luke had to have been thinking about Genesis 3 when he penned these words.

It gets even more amazing.  This is the 8th meal in Luke.  If you carefully read through Luke you will find there are 7 meals before this one where it says Jesus sat down at a table, or was invited to eat, or was at a banquet; something pretty clear that it is a meal.  If this is then the 8th meal, what does that mean?  7 is the number for completion.  God created the earth in 6 days and rested on the 7th.  Now this is the 8th meal, the beginning of a new creation.  Is Luke slick or what?  As Jesus reveals himself in this 8th meal he reverses the Adam and Eve meal and inaugurates the new creation!

So, we have Jesus being invited into their home as guest, but then he becomes the host.  Isn’t that the nature of our Lord’s Supper?  We invite him to join us as our guest and then he becomes the host of the meal.  His presence at our table fills us with faith.

I told you this was an amazing section.  Let’s finish the story. 

Luke 24:32-36   They asked each other, "Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?"  They got up and returned at once to Jerusalem. There they found the Eleven and those with them, assembled together and saying, "It is true! The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon."  Then the two told what had happened on the way, and how Jesus was recognized by them when he broke the bread.  While they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, "Peace be with you."

Our hearts burn with truth when we listen to the story.  Didn’t you experience that as we read Luke 24?  Even as we read this story, 1,974 years later, the truth of who Jesus is still burns within us. 

But there is another amazing connection here.  Luke is connecting the story of Emmaus to the story he told way back in chapter 2; observe the connections.

Luke 2:41-50  Every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover.  When he was twelve years old, they went up to the Feast, according to the custom.  After the Feast was over, while his parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but they were unaware of it.  Thinking he was in their company, they traveled on for a day. Then they began looking for him among their relatives and friends.  When they did not find him, they went back to Jerusalem to look for him. After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.  Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers.  When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, "Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you."  "Why were you searching for me?" he asked. "Didn't you know I had to be in my Father's house?"  But they did not understand what he was saying to them.

Here are the connections:
-Both stories begin at the Feast.
-Both stories begin in Jerusalem
-A couple, in both stories, has lost Jesus. Isn’t that cool?
-Both stories move away from Jerusalem and then come back.
-Jesus is lost for 3 days in both stories.
-They found Jesus back in Jerusalem.
-Jesus rebukes both – “How slow of heart to believe” and “Didn’t you know?”
-He was in his Father’s house: He was in the breaking of the bread.

Perhaps, that is the bottom line of Luke 24:13-36.  Life is often a journey of faith.  Sometimes on that journey things don’t work out like you thought they should have and you get discouraged.  You think Jesus has deserted you.  But he hasn’t.  Sometimes you just can’t see him.  Sometimes you are like Joseph and Mary you’ve lost the son of God.  When you are feeling this way; when you are heart broken, when you are on the road to Emmaus going away from Jerusalem, the solution is to seek Jesus in his Father’s house and find him in the breaking of the bread.  There is where your faith will be renewed and you will see Jesus.  Wow!  Let me read that again.

I told you it was a great story; top ten for sure.  I hope it is your story.  My prayer is you can find Jesus, anytime you lose him, in our fellowship and in our sharing of the bread together.  That is why our church is so important.  We are here to help each other rediscover Jesus.  Fellowship, worship, and faith are all wrapped up together. Our time together, our lives together, our sharing together is where we can see Jesus.  The theme for this year is, “Lord, I Want to See.”  Luke’s answer is, we see Jesus in the breaking of the bread; in his Father’s house.