Walking With The Risen LORD, March 23, 2008

What an amazing journey are the events of this Day, WALKING WITH THE RISEN LORD!
In our hurried and harried existence, we tend to recall this day similar to Christmas eve and morning... During the long night's vigil, after the passover sacrifice, (when snow lay all about) God entered in, and early in the morning before it was dawn the stone was rolled away, during the night Jesus was raised from the dead, and all the next day people visited each other to share the Good News.

But this is a journey that refuses to be amalgamated and reduced down. Like hunting for Easter Eggs, there is one discovery after another, each different and delightful,in ways we had never before imagined, for all these events took place NOT immediately after he died, not all that day, or the next the Sabbath Day, but on the first day of a new time, a new week.

Some rose early, before first light, trying to do the essential things to make life better.
Some of us pop out of bed to go for a run, some need cajoling and constant encouragement to escape the depths of sleep. BUT others, like these who came to the tomb early, rise before anyone else, to make preparations, kindling the coals of fires, making coffee, baking sweet breads that fill the house with spice. They knew they could not change what had happened, they could not ignore the events that had taken place, but they could rise early, they could go to the place, fan the flames that warmed their hearts and carry spices that would remind us through aroma of good days.
But they found surprises they had not dreamed could be. They went to make preparations, and found EVERYTHING ACCOMPLISHED for their benefit. There was nothing that had to be done. Instead, they could share together their tears and hopes and joys.

Emmaus was an obscure place, not referenced in Scripture other than here in the 24th Chapter of Luke, where exactly it was located, or what these travellers planned to do there, no one knows, only that it was about two hours walk, seven miles away, about as far as Auburn or Marcellus. We each have an EMMAUS of our own, a mindless routine that gives us comfort. Going to Church, coming to sit beside the Lake to hear the birds and watch the waves splash rhythmically, going to Wallmart or the Grocery, paying bills, cuddling before a fire, some routine ordinary task that alows our minds to sort and sift and reconfigure. He accompanied them on their journey, and in the midst of all they knew, all that had happened and they could recall, he interpretted and explained how this fulfilled what was to be.

Resurrection is not belief in an EMPTY TOMB, some magician's disappearing act, that makes the body vanish. Resurrection is a RATCHETING UP of the world, to a different gear, another direction. Their world was radically changing, the ROMAN EMPIRE represented a CALLOUSED, CYNICAL, SEDUCTIVE, SUPERFICIAL World, where everything was done in devotion to the Empire, building statues and temples for perpetuity as if to create immortality by having your facade, an idol in your likeness cast in stone or bronze. But people were starving of Malnutrition, while some few hoarded all they had. Others developed influenza, Measles, Malaria, Pox. The Empire had no use for weakness, no means of coping with anything less than pure hard marble and a hunger for violence. AS RADICAL A SHIFT in Human Nature as had ever evolved, something new was born in Christian Resurrection. By breaking bread together, those who had feeding those who did not, people lived through difficult times. Caring for someone with a high fever, comforting them, applying a cool damp cloth, or in the midst of cold sharing a blanket meant that people abandoned by the EMPIRE to suffer and to die instead could live. RESURRECTION is no Magic Trick, no Deception or misdirection, Resurrection is a belief in the power of human kindness to change the world, the power of compassion and solidarity that none should be alone.

SO it is that when the Travelers arrived at where they were going, they entreated the Risen Lord to stay and share with them a simple meal. And Jesus offered a blessing for the meal. We live in a such a hurried and harried existence, wolfing down granola bars and yogurt drinks as a balanced diet. Jesus blessed what they had to share and their hearts were strangely warmed. We rush through meals, rarely sitting down with one another, to help one another sort out our day. And Jesus Offered a Blessing, as simple as “Come Lord Jesus Be our Guest and may this food to us be Blessed”.

But a Resurrection Journey is not something to keep private, our Baptismal Calling, our responsibility is to share with one another, so they ran back to the Upper Room, where many doubted. Faith is not an automatic program, that we go trough the motions and is guaranteed we will be insured free of doubts. Faith is instead a challenge to cnsider the stones aong the journey, to recognize each story as precious as an individual chocolate.