Infinite Presence

The Third Sunday of Easter

Luke 24:13-35

Infinite Presence

“Then they told what had happened on the road,

and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.”

I have always known that my parents love my brothers and I very much. That was very clear in the home where we were raised, and it continues to be clear in the healthy relationship that we all still enjoy with one another. (I mean not that everything was just always peachy. I was known to get the old wooden spoon once in a while!.........You know its a funny thing, those wooden spoons never quite hurt like you thought they would. I am actually quite thankful for that come to think of it!) Personally though, I don't think I ever was really able to fully understand just how profound my parent's love for my brothers and I was and continues to be until I was blessed with children of my own. For me, it was in the birth of my own children that I realized just how deep and unconditional the love that was given me really was.

I have also learned something else through this experience of parenthood, and it has to do with the love of a mother. I do not wish of course to say that a father's love for his child is somehow less than that of a mother's, but I must admit that what I have seen in the kind of love my mother has for me, and in the kind of love my wife Carla has for our children shows me that a mother's love for her child is, well, just different. It just seems to be somehow special. It seems complete. Tender and sweet, yet stern and powerful. A mother's love seemed to be ever present. In our struggle and hurt they showed us compassion and protection, in our need for guidance and correction they put us in our place, and they joined us in celebration through our joy and accomplishments.

Even now as grown men and women, adults and perhaps parents ourselves, out on our own and living our own lives, I think that voice and guidance is still often heard for most of us, almost like a second voice of conscience. The love of our mother's still remains. Actually, I would even argue, though I do not know from personal experience, that even in death, as I have seen with my wife Carla and her mother Pilar, the mother-in-law who I never had the honor of meeting but who I feel I know so well, I would argue that a mother's love is so big that their presence, their voice and their guidance still seem to carry on within us even in death. The care, the compassion, the encouragement, correction and the guidance. The somehow Infinite Presence.

Of course, this being Mother's Day, I was thinking about such things as I was preparing for this morning, (and let me take this opportunity to wish all the special Mother's with us today a very happy and blessed mother's day) but it kind of all of a sudden struck me that this idea of a strangely constant and ever present love is actually exactly what I was hearing in this morning's Gospel lesson about the road to Emmaus. That is what I believe our Gospel lesson today highlights for us. Now, obviously, I am not saying that I saw a message of infinite motherly love in this lesson, though I suppose that would make for an interesting sermon! However, what I clearly did see was a very important message for us all about the constant love and infinite presence of our Christ.

We encounter Jesus this morning at an interesting time. Three days ago He was crucified, died, and was buried, and all that His disciples know is that His tomb had been recently opened and found empty with the exception of an angel explaining that Christ had been raised. At the very moment we see Him this morning, Jesus is accompanying two of His relatively unknown followers on their way to Emmaus, somehow without their knowing it. The disciples are frustrated, confused, and they explain to the hidden Christ in their midst of the incredible events that have recently taken place, and they speak of the fact that they do not fully understand what has just happened nor what it all means. They are looking for their Lord, and yet, He is with them all along. Ever present.

Now, I find it interesting that biblical scholars suspect this story we call the road to Emmaus to be a later addition to Luke, and they highlight several points which make this story suspect. The writing style does not seem characteristic of the author of Luke. The story of the road to Emmaus is unique to Luke and does not appear in the other synoptic Gospels other than a slightly similar story in Mark, and the main disciple in this story, Cleopas, is never mentioned in any other scriptures and therefore is not known, while the other disciple walking with him is never even named at all. So, on one hand, this piece of scripture does seem to be quite out of place. However, the uniqueness of this scripture alone does not at all mean that there is nothing of worth in this morning's Gospel lesson. Actually, on the contrary, I heard a very clear message from this morning's scripture. You see, what I believe we are to realize this morning and live into always is exactly what the disciples in today's scripture had not yet discovered at first, and then quite abruptly witnessed in the breaking of the bread, the infinite presence of Christ. For them, the Messiah had been found, then He disappeared. Bewildered, they went searching for Him, but didn't realize until it was revealed to them that He is risen indeed, and that He was with them all the while. I think the lesson is not very different for each of us today, though we stand on the other end of the Resurrection. We are to realize the infinite presence of God.

Now, I could be wrong, but I believe this is a message that we Christians need to hear these days. For in reality, are we not ourselves constanlty on the road to Emmaus? I mean, is it just me, or does it not seem that we, like those disciples, are forever seeking, searching, looking for our Savior, all the while we proclaim our belief that He is risen? It seems to me that often times, instead of worshipping and celebrating God, which remember is the actual point of church, we mostly just end up coming to church as seekers desperately reaching out for the slightest touch and yearning for a meager glimpse of the risen Lord. So, therefore, I find myself asking what happened? Where did we go wrong? Where did Christianity lose its grip on the Good News, and when did Christians cease to live out their Easter reality? You and I, Brothers and Sisters in Christ, are constantly on the road to Emmaus.

So this is what I would like for us to take with us from here this morning, the realization of Christ's constant presence with each of us. Let us be freed of our seeking and searching and begin to truly live into our intended reality, inherited through our Baptism, as people who not only acknowledge the ever present God in their lives, but who also recognize that they are some of the very vessels of Christ's love in this world. After all, do we not surround ourselves with reminders of this reality every single time we come together for worship? Is it not the very point of our sacraments to show us that Christ is present even in the very ordinary?

Consider the sacrament of Holy Baptism which we are about to witness in a few moments. In it ordinary every day water becomes both our death to sin and the birth waters of our new life, and those receiving this sacrament go from children of God to vital members of the Body of Christ and living witnesses of the Holy Spirit. Consider the sacrament of Holy Eucharist. In it every day ordinary bread and wine become the Body and Blood of Christ, the ultimate gift of love before our eyes, and we, kneeling before the altar, become carriers and messengers of that love for this world. The One extraordinary God is recognized in the many ordinary things of this world. As Christians, we are always called to this. To take the ordinary, all things, and to see and recognize God's presence in all of it. That is what I see in the road to Emmaus, and that is the lesson I believe we are to take with us today; true belief in the reality of the Risen Christ in this world and in each of our lives.

I would like to end with something that I think speaks very well to our Gospel lesson this morning and something that expresses in a different way my own personal and frequent prayer for our being made open to the constant presence of Christ in our lives. It is a blessing that I learned from a Lutheran pastor who was a close friend of mine, and I think it will serve to drive my point home.

As you go on your way, may you realize that Christ goes before you to lead you; that Christ goes behind you to encourage you; that Christ goes beside you to accompany you; that Christ goes above you to watch over you; that Christ goes below you to lift you up; and that Christ lives within you to fill you with His peace.

Amen.