For Sunday Easter 3A
Collect
O God, whose blessed Son made himself known to his disciples in the breaking of bread: Open the eyes of our faith, that we may behold him in all his redeeming work; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.
Amen.
Reading
Reflection
To mention Emmaus in many circles is to speak of revelation and transformation. It is a city which has become synonymous with evangelical zeal, not because the city is itself a hotbed of faith, but because of this story, this walk. In the twentieth century, ministries like Cursillo and those using variations of Emmaus Walk as their name sought to capture the energy captured in this story: of two people of faith having that faith supercharged by a direct encounter with Christ.
I made my Cursillo in southern Tennessee several years after I was ordained a priest. It was an energizing (and outdated) experience. And one I can see as addicting, actually. Which is also what I observed from these ministries: that people who do them want to keep doing them AND what church to become more like it, too.
During Holy Week, I reminded the congregation that perhaps the most important statement for this season may be this one from John, when Jesus tells the disciples who have witnessed Jesus’s presence with their own eyes, including Thomas, who has received the same experience as the others: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.” Because they all have been blessed already with sight and time and experience so others might be blessed, too.
While all of the power of this story seems to rest on this amazing conversation and opportunity that these two disciples have as they meet Jesus on the road and have the scriptures opened to them, I want to point out that it doesn’t strike me as the story we’re all called to long for, because, once again, these are people who have seen. The blessing comes later for all the rest of us. Not trying to manufacture an experience of the divine on our own terms, but in being somewhere, on a road, perhaps, talking to a stranger, and finding out after the fact that it was Jesus. Or being at home, getting to hear from one of the travelers and praising God for their encounter.