The Emmaus Disciples

The Emmaus Disciples

Luke 24:13-35

            This is one of my favorite parts of the Easter narrative.  It has always held fascination for me.  I think, at least in part, it’s because of what’s left unsaid as much as what is said.  What has been left unsaid creates an interest in knowing more.

            Who were these two disciples?  They’re obviously not part of the twelve-man inner circle.  We may not be able to recite all twelve names from memory, but we know there is no Cleopas among them. 

            We assume the Last Supper was limited to Jesus and the twelve.  That’s the way DaVinci painted it; but were there more than these thirteen in attendance?  We don’t know, of course, but there is at least an outside possibility that the Emmaus disciples were there.

            One thing we do know:  not all of Jesus’ disciples came from Galilee.  These two lived in Emmaus, which was about six or seven miles from Jerusalem.  We know Jesus visited Jerusalem on other occasions before this last one.  We remember John talking about Jesus teaching in the temple on several occasions and being surrounded by crowds.  Some of those listening would have chosen to follow him, including, quite likely, the Emmaus disciples.

            Luke mentions one of them by name—Cleopas—but doesn’t name the other one.  It has always been assumed they were both male, but that’s not a good assumption.  They were sharing living quarters, not likely for two adult males in that culture.  It is more likely that this was a married couple, returning to their home after Passover and the Sabbath.  John (19:25) says that one of the women at the cross was “Mary, the wife of Clopas.”  Was this the same man? And was Mary his wife?  Quite possibly. 

            Why didn’t Luke mention her name as well as that of her husband?  We could argue that women in that society were not as important as men.  But more than any other gospel writer Luke is sympathetic to women.  He tells more stories about women than the other gospel writers, and paints them in a more positive light.  Of course, we don’t know, and anything we say is mere speculation. 

            Let’s proceed on the assumption that the two disciples were husband and wife.

            So…it’s late afternoon of the first Easter. Cleopas and Mary, two of Jesus’ disciples, are walking from Jerusalem to their home in Emmaus.  If the distance is at least six miles, and they walk at a pace of twenty minutes or so a mile, the journey will take them at least two hours to get home. 

            Today, even going as slowly as thirty miles an hour, we could drive that distance in about ten minutes.  Even those of us who walk for exercise don’t walk for two hours at a time.  In our world that’s an incredible amount of walking.  Yet how else were they to get where they needed to go?  Walking was the most common method of traveling from one place to another. 

            We don’t often think about it, but when we read of Jesus going from place to place in Galilee with his disciples, that’s the way they traveled—and the distances between places would have been more than six miles.  If six miles of walking boggles the mind, remember that Jesus and his disciples also walked from Galilee to Jerusalem.  That distance is just under eighty miles.  You do the math.  The time would be measured in days, not hours—and remember, they would have had to eat and sleep along the way.

            All this makes the Emmaus journey more special.  A man and his wife, traveling home late in the afternoon, despondent because their leader has been executed, encounter a stranger, who, over the course of a couple of hours explains, using the Hebrew Scriptures, why the Messiah had to suffer and die.  When, at their home, Jesus reveals himself to them and disappears, they turn around and walk another two hours back to Jerusalem.  We can imagine this was a happier trip, and that they covered the distance in less time—all to tell the good news.

            To what lengths will we go to share our good news?

           

Shades of Jiminy Cricket

Shades of Jiminy Cricket!

Hebrews 10:19-25

            Most of us know the story of Pinocchio, both the original tale and the version created by Walt Disney.  It’s a good story, made visible and more striking by the Disney storytellers and animators. 

            In the animated version we follow Pinocchio from his creation as a puppet by Geppetto, through his enlivening as a reward to his creator, through his misadventures, and finally to the realization that freedom does not mean license to do anything that comes to mind.

            In the Disney version, the character who tries to provide guidance to the willful boy is Jiminy Cricket, Pinocchio’s conscience.  From his first appearance he tries to tell the puppet-become-boy how to live so as not to cause harm to himself, Geppetto, or anyone else.  Pinocchio will have none of it, but insists on his own way, paying increasingly more serious consequences for ignoring the advice of his conscience.

            Each time Pinocchio contemplates a new adventure, Jiminy Cricket warns him of the dangers involved in following that path.  Pinocchio blows by him like an NFL running back past a cheerleader.  Sure enough, Pinocchio suffers the consequences of his willful behavior, finally endangering both his life and Geppetto’s.  Somehow, with Jiminy Cricket’s assistance and his own determination, Pinocchio manages to escape every situation, coming finally to the realization that freedom must have limits if we are to live in a way that ensures happiness for us and for everyone around us—at least we hope he has learned that lesson.

            People refusing to listen to their conscience is a repeating theme in literature.  If we are wise, we will read these cautionary tales, learn from them, and avoid the pitfalls that await us if we ignore our conscience.

            According to Strong’s Complete Concordance (a book which lists significant words in the Bible and where to find them) the word conscience does not appear in the Hebrew Scriptures.  It is, however, found frequently in the New Testament.  Does this mean conscience is a Christian concept?  The word may be found only in the New Testament, but the concept is evident from Adam and Eve on.  We know their story, what happened to them when they didn’t follow their consciences.  Jacob also comes to mind as someone who had to suffer consequences because of his conscience-deafness.  The prophets were sent by God to be the conscience of Israel.  Often they were ignored, as the rulers led the people into one destructive situation after another.

            The first problem with conscience is that it can be ignored. As Nicholas de Chamfort said, “Conscience is a dog that does not stop us from passing but that we cannot stop from barking.” Pinocchio, Jacob, Adam and Eve and so many others have proved that conscience cannot stop us from doing what we want; it can only warn us of the dangers that lie ahead. 

            And that brings us to the second problem with conscience.  The barking of the dog becomes weaker and weaker the more we pass by it.  Perhaps the dog becomes so used to us that it doesn’t try as hard to stop us.  Or perhaps we become more and more deaf to warning barks.  Whichever is true (most likely some of both), the more we ignore our conscience, the easier it becomes to ignore it.  Pinocchio saw Jiminy Cricket as someone who was trying to stop him from having fun—until it was almost too late.

            The writer of Hebrews encourages us to “draw near [to God] with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience…”

            Good advice for all of us:  listen to our version of Jiminy Cricket.  He knows what he’s talking about.

Choosing One's Own Way

Choosing One’s Own Way

Ephesians 4:30-32

This has long been one of my favorite Scripture passages.  My first introduction to these verses came through a church choir anthem by T. Tertius Noble.  I fell in love with the music, then with the words.

In a way, this is an enlargement of the golden rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”  It’s interesting how many of the world’s religions profess some version of this axiom. 

Paul’s list of behaviors to avoid is all about negative ways of communicating with others: bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, slander—attitudes we do not want people to display towards us.  I know I don’t like to hear angry words directed at me—even if I deserve them.  My first reaction is to display anger in return, and that isn’t going to make the situation better.

On the other hand, Paul’s list of positive behaviors—kindness, tenderheartedness, forgiveness—are ways I want people to interact with me, so that is how I must treat them.  Paul is expressing once again the Golden rule, “Show to others the positive behaviors you would like to have them show to you, and avoid those negative behaviors you do not want to have them show to you.”

Fair enough.  We can’t expect people to interact with us positively if we are not positive towards them.

People trapped in negative situations most often behave negatively, either towards those causing the negative situation, or to those caught in that situation with them.  It’s natural.  It’s what we would probably do in their place.  Dare I say it’s human nature?

I can’t imagine a more negative situation than the concentrations camps of World War II.  The atmosphere was not simply negative but inhumane.  We will never know the full extent of the atrocities committed in those camps in the name of racial purity.  Those who suffered through imprisonment there had—and have—every right to be angry about their mistreatment.  But listen to the words of Viktor Frankl, a holocaust survivor.

“We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread.  They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing:  the last of human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”

To choose one’s own way.  No one can make us behave positively—or negatively.  It’s our choice how we will live our lives, how we will interact with others, whether we will choose to be one who comforts or one who passes on the anger which has been displayed to us.

Jesus Christ came to show us what it means to be completely human.  We see in his life how we are supposed to live: comforting, caring, repaying evil with good, doing unto others what we would have done to us—above all, forgiving rather than passing on anger. 

This is how we must live, not only because, as Paul says, to live in the negative grieves God’s Holy Spirit—as serious an offense as that is—but because we must treat others as we ourselves would be treated.

Is it easy?  Of course not!  It’s much easier to be negative in negative situations.  That’s why, as Frankl says, there were so few comforters, so few sharers.  But to comfort, to share, to be tenderhearted and kind—to forgive!  That’s the real human nature.

The Differences that so Easily Beset Us

The Differences that so Easily Beset Us

Romans 10:11-13

The Hebrew Scriptures tell the story of a Middle Eastern people as they evolved from Hebrews, to Israelites, to Jews, and as they grew from a single family into a nation.  They were never a large nation, but their location made them an important one.  Surrounded by larger nations, who saw Israel as ripe for conquest, they maintained an uneasy existence until being overrun by the Assyrian Empire (the Northern Kingdom of Israel) and Babylon (the Southern Kingdom of Judea).  Eventually they and their neighbors were conquered by Rome.

The Hebrew Scriptures tell not so much the history of this people as the story of their relationship with their God, YHWH.  From the Bible’s perspective, when the nation followed YHWH’s commands the people prospered.  When they turned their back on YHWH they encountered disaster. 

Alone among the nations of the Middle East they worshiped a single deity.  Their neighbors and conquerors served multiple gods, each responsible for one or more specific functions.  Israel served one God who provided for every need anyone could imagine.  There was no need for other gods; theirs was all-sufficient.

One of the negative results of the nation’s relationship with YHWH was a sort of spiritual ego trip.  By the first century, despite their political subservience to Rome, they believed themselves spiritually superior to all other nations.  They were, they claimed, God’s chosen people, even though their chosenness didn’t seem to be doing them much good on the political front.

Enter Jesus, who turned the Jewish world upside down with his claim to be not just God’s Messiah, the anointed one, but God’s Son, and therefore himself God.  The Jewish religious leaders took exception to his claim.  How could God be split in two?  How could God be anything but one?  This was blasphemy!  The leadership also objected to Jesus because his teaching was in direct opposition not only to what they taught, but how they lived.

And then came Paul—Saul until his conversion, and until his conversion a Christian-hating, pagan-hating separatist.  His beliefs permitted no recognition of or association with anyone but true-believing Jews.

Jesus brought him a life-changing, attitude-changing experience.  Paul went from an exclusionist to an inclusionist.  He found himself saying, under the guiding hand of Jesus, “For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him.”

He says this not just once (to the Romans), but again to the Galatians (“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus”), and once again to the Colossians (“Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free, but Christ is all and in all.”)

This privileged son of Abraham now saw that all who believed in Jesus as the Christ, the Messiah, were the spiritual descendants of Abraham.  There were no distinctions between believers.  Their belief in Jesus Christ obliterated all other distinctions—those of race, religious background, socioeconomic status, and gender. 

Unfortunately, too many Christians today try to reinstitute those differences.  Some want to elevate one gender over another.  Some want to make distinctions by social class, or race, or political beliefs.  They need to hear the words of Kate Sheppard, who said, “All that separates, whether of race, class, creed, or sex, is inhuman, and must be overcome.”

Jesus Christ, who came to show us what it means to be truly human, couldn’t have said it better.

Keeping Safe in Times of Trouble

Keeping Safe in Times of Trouble

Psalm 91

            “[The one] who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty.”

            This is a powerful psalm.  It promises God’s protection in all kinds of trouble:  pestilence, the terrors of the night, slings and arrows, noonday destruction, plague.  In all these trials God will shelter the one who trusts completely.

            Is this true?  If it is, no believer would be worried about the current health threat, Covid-19, the coronavirus pandemic that is sweeping nearly every country on this planet.  Yet we know that cannot be true.  Many among those who are ill, and many among those who have died must be sincerely faithful in their trust in God.  Many must have sought refuge under God’s protective wings.  How then can we reconcile the psalmist’s words of protection with the reality of what we see happening around us?

            Should we say, “Well, this was true when it was written, but it may not be true now?” 

            Should we say, “God’s protection is only valid if we follow the suggestions of the health personnel?”

            “Should we say (most pernicious of all), “Well, their faith just wasn’t strong enough?’

            Should we say (equally as cruel), “It was God’s will that they should become ill, or die.  God’s ways are beyond our understanding.  God must have had a reason for letting this happen?”

            I don’t know about you, but I am offended by these answers.  They posit a God who plays favorites, who makes decisions on a whim, who plays some sort of game of “eenie, meenie, minie, mo” with our lives.  This is not a God I can believe in or worship. 

            But we are still stuck with the promise.  The psalm says God will protect those who seek shelter in the presence of the Most High, who rely faithfully on the protection of the Almighty.  Is there a way to claim this promise even though it seems not to be true?

            Perhaps our problem lies in our taking the words at face value.  It’s easy to do that, to read the words on the page and come to the conclusion they mean exactly what they say, with no subtlety of interpretation, no search for deeper insights.

            First, we have to overcome two problems with any text written originally in another time and another language.  Any version we read of this psalm in our everyday Bibles is a translation from the original Hebrew.  One of the “toys” I use in sermon preparation is a Jewish Study Bible.  Often the notation in the margin will say, “meaning of Hebrew unclear,” or some such words.  I’m not saying this applies here, but there are always problems in translating from one language to another—even for experts.

            There are also problems in translating from one era to another.  Those problems become more involved the greater the distance in time between the two eras (ours and the one in which the text was originally composed).  Something is always lost in trying to understand the past.

            Second, we must be aware that what the psalmist means by protection may not be what we mean.  How does God protect us in times of danger?  We know God does not always save us.  God never promised us a trouble-free life.  We are as susceptible to hard times as any non-believer.  There is no bed of roses for us any more than anyone else.

            God promises to be with us in times of trouble.  God may not free us from hard times, but God will see us through.  Through Isaiah God says, “When you pass through the waters I will be with you.”  That’s a promise we can believe.

Joyful Christians

Joyful Christians

Matthew 6:16-18

            I love Robert Louis Stevenson’s writing.  I missed reading his adventure stories as a boy, but I’ve enjoyed getting acquainted with them as an adult.  I have also had the privilege of singing songs written by the English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams on texts from Stevenson’s poetry.  What we may forget is that Stevenson was also very quotable.  He said, “If your morals make you dreary, depend upon it they are wrong.”

            Gloomy Christians.  We’ve all seen them, gone to church with them, been trapped in conversations and meetings with them.  What an experience!  Everything is wrong.  They remind me of A.A. Milne’s character Eeyore, the donkey who complains about everything.  He can’t see the bright side of any situation.

            Or maybe they’re like Johnny Carson’s character, Priscilla Goodbody, the NBC censor, who tried to make sure nothing even the slightest bit naughty appeared on the network’s programs.

            Or perhaps like the disciple Thomas.  We call him Doubting Thomas because of his part in the resurrection story, but we might also call him Gloomy Thomas for his comment in John 11:16.  Jesus announces they will be returning to Judea to heal (raise) Lazarus.  On their previous visit, Jesus was almost stoned by the religious leaders.  Thomas, with all the gloom he can muster, says, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

            Nowhere in the gospels do we read that Jesus was gloomy or despondent.  We know he was frustrated with his disciples at times because they didn’t undeerstand what he was trying to teach them.  We know he became angry with the hypocrisy of the Jewish religious leaders.  We know he was upset over his coming trials when he prayed in Gethsemane.   We know he suffered pain and agony during his torture and execution.  But there is no record of him ever being gloomy.  He seems to have been a cheerful, happy person as he carried out his ministry.

            The Sermon on the Mount is a collection of Jesus’ teachings on a wide variety of subjects.  It’s a good summary of his message.  If we learn to live by this sermon we will be the kind of people God created us to be.

            Most of the paragraphs in this sermon are short, but each one makes a point about how we should live.  Today’s reading is specifically about fasting, but it is really about our whole approach to the Christian life.

            When some people fasted as part of their religious discipline, they made themselves look sad and gloomy as they walked through town.  They hoped people would see them and say, “Oh, my!  What a good person.  He’s fasting.  Isn’t he wonderful!” 

            Jesus said, “Don’t be like that.  Dress up.  Wash your face until it shines.  Smile.  Look happy.  Be glad you can give up something you enjoy to honor God.  Let (as Robert Louis Stevenson might have said) your morals make you glad.  If you love God and are content in God’s love, let it show in the way you present yourself to the world.”

            No gloomy Christians here.  No dreary moralists.  No Eeyores or Priscilla Goodbodies or Gloomy Thomases in this religion.  God loves us, and we love God.  What is there to be gloomy about?  How can we be sad when we reside in the shelter of God’s love? 

            So…start the day off right.  Wash your face till it shines.  Dress up!  Put a smile on your face.  Let everyone know being a Christian makes you happy.

Being Kind

Doing Kindness

Galatians 6:9-10

            Albert Einstein said, “The ideals which have lighted my way, and time after time have given me new courage to face life cheerfully, have been Kindness, Beauty, and Truth.”

            Most of us (if not all) would agree with Einstein that these three ideals lead to a better path through life.  Keeping them before us like beacons will make us more agreeable, and therefore make our relationships with others more agreeable.  That will lead to a more cheerful outlook.

            Two of these ideals are under our control.  We may not always be able to make life beautiful, but we can always be kind and always be truthful.  It’s difficult if not impossible to always tell the truth, and to always be kind, but the more truthful and more kind we are the more enjoyable life will be, for us and for those we associate with. 

Einstein hit on a way to ensure a cheerful life.  We don’t often think of him as a person.  We’ve made his scientific genius so much the central part of who he is for us that we forget he was also a musician (violinist) and someone who enjoyed interacting with people.  When we consider him in this light, we can appreciate even more his commitment to kindness, beauty and truth.

Paul realized how difficult it could be to always be kind.  Perhaps part of his understanding came from the time he spent reviling Jesus Christ and persecuting his followers.  It took Paul a while to learn kindness (not truthfulness; Paul was always truthful, even though he wasn’t always diplomatic about expressing what he believed was true).  What made him become more kind, I believe, was God’s love at work within him.  When he realized how much God loved him he became able to love others.

            This love of God and others, as I return to so often, was the bedrock of Jewish belief.  When asked about the greatest commandment Jesus said that we are to love God and love our neighbor.  In fact, the only way we can demonstrate our love of God is to love those around us.  This theme runs through the New Testament.  If you read John’s first letter to the churches you will understand.

            But I digress. 

            As he neared the end of his letter to the Galatians, Paul addressed the difficulty in always being kind.  He exhorted his readers with these words: “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.”

            The problem with this statement, as I see it, is the second half.  It sounds as if Paul is encouraging the Galatians to be good for what they can get out of it.  “Do good and you will be rewarded.”  Paul was referring to the eternal reward we have been promised for not giving up.  I’m always suspicious of this motivation.  I believe goodness is its own reward.  That’s the feeling I get from Einstein’s statement:  be kind because it’s the right thing to do. 

            Perhaps that’s what Paul meant.  I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.  One thing is certain:  we have an obligation to do good if only as a way of proving that we love God by loving those around us.  Voltaire may have had this in mind when he said, “Every [one] is guilty of all the good he[she] didn’t do.”  This is Einstein’s statement in reverse.  As being kind will give us a more cheerful life, both in our outlook and by the way others will treat us, so not doing good will pile up a load of guilt that we will have to carry with us.

            Paul understood this as well, writing in v. 7 of this chapter, “whatever one sows, that will he also reap.”  In the end, we will earn the reward for which we’ve worked.