Church of the Good Shepherd
3700 Rutherford Street
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania 17111-1997
The Reverend Kester T. Sobers, III, Pastor
Third Sunday of Easter
2002
2002
“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. He had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.”
Could it be that I had seen my favorite Emmaus story, the story that I have used in countless sermons on the Holy Eucharist, seen it mistakenly in a kind of vacuum? An end in itself? Instead it’s really all about the journey. A journey not unlike the one being taken by the depressed and defeated Cleopas and an unknown companion on the road to the inn at Emmaus. It’s a journey where again and again we, dejected, depressed, even lost, find ourselves saying, “Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.” In the late 18th Century our ancestors in faith began singing, “Abide with me, fast falls the even tide.” In the Lutheran Book of Worship, Evening Prayer, Vespers, begins, “Stay with us, Lord, for it is evening, and the day is almost over.” I have stood by bedsides and in funeral homes and prayed that prayer. I have experienced and reminded those who care for the sick that the worst time in a hospital is when all the visitors have left and the lights in the corridors are dimmed. One of the most poignantly beautiful new hymns is the one from With One Voice which goes in part, “Stay with us, till night has come: our praise to you this day be sung. Bless our bread, open our eyes: Jesus, be our great surprise.”
Life,
you
see, is the
Jesus had been the host at that supper the night before he died. As things turned out, it could hardly be called “The Last Supper.” In a very real way he himself was the food itself. We easily recall what has become ritual in virtually every corner of Christianity: Taking, blessing, breaking, and giving. He and we say, “Take and eat.” He did not say “Take and understand” because no one could have done it. But, we can always eat, and often! And the Scriptures teach us that whenever they sat down from that time on and took a bite of bread or sipped a swallow of wine, not only was his voice in their ears, but he was there, both comfort and challenge! So they ate together a lot because they needed all the help they could get in figuring out how to live their new lives. Have you ever sat with loved ones over good food and wine, and while there is nothing “religious” about it, it is most certainly “holy?” Easter had changed everything. Easter has changed everything.
How often have we said that the real liturgy takes place after we leave this place? How often have we in daily life been “cut to the heart?” Think about that honestly. Ponder it prayerfully today and often during the coming weeks. In Jesus’ body “broken” for us there is “remembrance.” We dismembered are remembered. It’s the answer to prayer, “Abide with me.” Or “Stay with us Lord, for it is evening” or even “What shall we do?” But it is also the reality of Jesus saying to Mary after their tearful reunion in the garden, “Don’t cling to me.” It is also Jesus’ vanishing act at the inn at Emmaus, after it seemed that it was all going to finally make sense, and the reunion commence.
I’ve never added 3,000 to the church after one of my sermons, and I have a Master’s degree in “divinity.” Rather than my sermons “cutting to the heart” I try to listen patiently as people explain why they can’t fit in a time to have their children baptized or fulfill the promises they made at baptism, or why they can’t come to church or why their circumstances in life make it impossible for them to share their blessings with God’s work or why for them forgiveness is out of the question. But day by day, week by week, we continue to walk the road to Emmaus together. Jesus patiently teaches us, he endures our foolishness and slowness of heart to believe, and, in his brokenness, we are again and again “remembered.” We are remembered. And then, and then, the journey begins anew.
--K.T.S.
April 14, 2002
April 14, 2002
Psalm 116:1-3, 10-17
Second
Gospel: Luke 24:13-35
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