The Gospel of Luke 24:13-35 The Road to Emmaus

Good morning. We're going to be going through Luke 24, 13 through 35, as Randy just read for us here. And I have a confession to make. This is one of my favorite passages. I really, really like it. And one of the reasons is because Dr. Luke alone writes about this. this road to Emmaus. In fact, one of the reasons for selecting Luke as one of the Gospels here is because about half of what Dr. Luke writes is original to him, exclusive to him, and this is one of those passages. It's significant, it's fairly lengthy, but a really great passage.

Summarizing here, we have this on the top of page one of your handout. Here are the appearances of Christ from the resurrection to the ascension. We're going to be looking particularly at this passage here in Luke 24. 13-35 today. One of the comments that I would make is that the next one listed to the Apostles, Thomas absent, and I have listed Luke 24, 36-43, and John 20, 19-24, it is possible that those are actually two different appearances. And so I just, you know, comment on that. And we'll take a look at that next week here.

One of the things, just to get some perspective, on the day that Christ was raised from the dead, and we looked last week at just the empty tomb appearances, Jewish families had just celebrated the Passover that had taken place for most on what we would call Thursday night. That would be April 2nd. 33 AD.

But for the Sadducees, they actually would celebrate it the next day, the day in which Christ was crucified. It was then the first day of unleavened bread would follow, and then Christ was raised on the same day as firstfruits, so three days after the Passover. So you have on the bottom of page one this presentation here.

So the first day there would be Friday, that would be Passover, but it would be the day after for most when the Lamb is slain. Christ is crucified and buried on that first day, Friday, and then you would have The first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which we would call Saturday, that was the day in which the Sadducees, particularly, but the Sadducees and the Pharisees together would ask the Romans to seal the tomb and to guard it. And so that would be the second day, remembering, of course, that the Jews in their culture would consider a part of a day as a whole, right? in the way they would speak and think about it. The Sunday in which Christ was resurrected would be the second day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, but that would be called First Fruits.

And we use the word fruits, but actually it would be a presentation of usually the barley harvest. That was the first thing that would come among the harvest season. That was the day Christ was raised, the third day. And again, because of the Jewish mindset, it would be just a part of a day as counted as the whole. And that would be April 5, 33 AD. All right, so now we have Luke 24, 13 and 14.

And behold, two of them were going that very day to a village named Emmaus, which is about seven miles from Jerusalem. And they were talking with each other about all these things which had taken place. So the name Emmaus, by the way, means warm springs.

Nine different locations have been proposed. So it's not a matter of not having any idea that there is an Emmaus, but lots of possibilities. The seven mile distance, however, eliminates a lot of them from consideration. And so looking at a map of all of Israel, here is Jerusalem as a starting point. And so zeroing in on that area, this would be the approximate location of Emmaus with several different proposals there being candidates. So they're walking, you know, the seven mile distance, which is enough time they can have a significant conversation. And that's what we'll be looking at here this morning. Here's Bethlehem to the south, about six miles to the south. So you see Emmaus is a similar length of walk. So here's Luke 24, 13 and 14. Behold, two of them were going that very day to a village named Emmaus, which is about seven miles from Jerusalem, and they were talking with each other about all these things which had taken place.

What are all these things? This is the trials and the crucifixion and the Jesus burial, none of which they had any idea was about to take place. And so these were all shocking events to these disciples here. So here's Luke 24, 15-17. While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself approached and began traveling with them.

But their eyes were prevented from recognizing him. And he said to them, what are these words that you are exchanging with one another as you are walking? And they stood still looking sad. You can imagine, here they are going along talking, and Jesus, you know, what is it you're talking about? And it was so heavy on their hearts, they actually had a gloomy appearance and just stopped.

Just couldn't even walk. It stopped their walking. So, one of the things we have to look at here, after reading this account, you might be wondering why Jesus didn't come up to these disciples and say, hey, I'm Jesus. I'm resurrected. It's me. Why didn't he just do that? Well, we've got to talk about that.

In truth, Jesus had told them a number of times, all four Gospels recorded, that he was going to be taken before the Jews and put on trial and he was going to be crucified and that he was going to be buried and rise again on the third day. He told them that multiple times. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John all record multiple instances of Jesus telling them that in advance. About 16 different passages.

So, that's not the right kind of so, okay. Why didn't the disciples understand? Why didn't they get it after all these multiple times of telling them about it? And why didn't Jesus just come out and tell them plainly, hey, I'm Jesus, I've died, you know, I've been resurrected, it's me. Why didn't he just tell them that, right? He told them before and they didn't seem to get it. But there actually are two reasons, at least, why they didn't understand.

One is they had teachings and expectations that were in the way of their understanding. Have you ever been in a situation where you think, well, you know, I have to unlearn something before I can learn something? At times that happens to us, and that was the situation with them. They had teachings from the culture that were in the way of that, and we'll be going into that in a minute here.

But secondly, they were not yet given the Holy Spirit who would lead them to the truth. We'll be talking about that as we get into the book of Acts and the passage in which we'll close out the book of Luke next week. but they weren't given the Holy Spirit and so they didn't have in their hearts and in their minds the proper means of understanding what Jesus was telling them.

Here's Luke 24 18, one of them named Cleopas answered and said to him, are you the only one visiting Jerusalem and unaware of the things which have happened here in these days? So imagine, here they are thinking, wow, this guy is really clueless. How is it possible that he doesn't understand this? Of course, what Jesus is trying to do is to draw out of them, you know, okay, what do you see and understand?

And let's go from there. So according to Christian tradition here, Cleopas was Jesus' uncle and Joseph's brother. He might have been the husband of Mary, wife of Clopas, so it would be a question there, are those the same person, a variant spelling of the same name, who was present at Jesus' crucifixion?

John 19.25 records that. But that's not known with certainty. That's sort of a, you know, I wonder if we've got a variant spelling here. So, Luke 24, 19-21 reads like this, and he said to them, what things?

And they said to him, the things about Jesus the Nazarene, who was a prophet, mighty indeed, and word in the sight of God and all the people, and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered Him to a sentence of death and crucified Him. But we were hoping that it was He who was going to redeem Israel.

Indeed, besides all this, it is the third day since these things happened." counting a third day as a part of a day, right? Part of a day is counted as a third day. All right. So, what they said was very revealing. This is who they thought Jesus was, okay? Jesus of Nazarene, who was a prophet, mighty indeed. Oh, they really didn't quite get it, did they? Well, there's a lot of things they didn't understand. They also said it was a third day since these things had happened. So this very likely means, with almost certainty I would say, Jesus resurrected early that very same day. Right? Verse 24 seems to confirm this event took place on the very day that Christ was raised.

Now, redeem Israel. What did they think that that meant? It's important for us to understand this. Exodus 6, 6 and 7, say therefore to the sons of Israel, I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will deliver you from their bondage. I will also redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgments. So what did they think of redeem Israel meant?

To keep Israel from being under the Romans. Take them out from under the Romans. And then in verse 7, Then I will take you for my people, and I will be your God, and you shall know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. So they were thinking Jesus was going to take them out from under the Romans. Oh boy.

Okay, here's another example out of 2 Samuel 7.23, And what one nation on the earth is like your people Israel, whom God went to redeem for himself as a people and to make a name for himself and to do a great thing for you and for awesome things for your land, before your people whom you have redeemed for yourself from Egypt, from nations and their gods.

That's what they thought Jesus was going to do. He's going to get us away from the Romans, out from under the Romans, put the Romans out. Won't that be great? That's exactly what they had in mind. They were thinking of Gideon in Judges 6-8, you know, redeeming Israel out from underneath the Midianites. Here's Psalm 25-22, redeem Israel, O God, out of all his troubles. That's what they thought Jesus was going to do. Here's Luke 24-21. All of our joys and our disappointments do flow from our hopes and expectations. And notice their wording. We were hoping. That's very important for us to take a look at. We need to not have a we're hoping kind of hope, don't we?

They were hoping that Jesus would be the one to free the people of Israel from Roman rule. That's what they were hoping would take place. Now that's been completely dashed because the Romans themselves were the ones that crucified Jesus. They thought, oh boy this is something, they thought their hope was ended at the cross.

Isn't that amazing? Is that where hope ends? That's where hope just begins, right? But they didn't understand that yet. This belief is so deeply ingrained in the disciples that even on the day that Jesus ascended, here's Acts 1, 6-8, so when they had come together, they were asking Him, Christ, saying, Lord, is it at this time you are restoring the kingdom to Israel? Now, put yourself in the disciples' place. Alright, this crucifixion thing is really confusing. And then you go in complete surprise. You go and resurrect on us and you show up at different places and disappear. That's all very confusing.

But are you back on with the program now of restoring the kingdom to Israel? See that? All this stuff you did was really, really complex and perplexing and confusing, but now are you restoring the kingdom to Israel, finally? Are you getting on with that program? See, they still had that in mind up to the day that Jesus ascended. Jesus says, nah, we've got something else going on. And they're going to learn about that. Now, something else we have to understand, it was a part of their mindset.

What the Jews once said about the two Messiahs in Isaiah 52, 13 through 53, 12. So that's at the end of Isaiah 52 and all of Isaiah 53. So many centuries ago, the rabbis viewed the Old Testament, by the way, they don't call it the Old Testament, do they? The rabbis, they didn't call it the Old Testament because they didn't have a New Testament, right?

But they viewed as teaching there would be two messiahs, two different ones. One was Messiah ben Joseph, that is, Messiah son of Joseph, the son of Jacob, who would go through a difficult time. Messiah ben Joseph, who would suffer and die, and Messiah ben David, who would reign. Two messiahs. And so they were thinking that Jesus was the second one, Messiah, son of David, who would reign.

And this thing about Jesus dying on the cross and being crucified and resurrecting and all that, very confusing. Messiah ben David was far more publicly taught, as a matter of fact, if you think about it, Wouldn't it be great if Messiah Ben David would get us out from underneath these nasty pig-eating Romans? They eat bacon, right? So, Messiah Ben David was far more publicly taught and anticipated, and that's what people thought Jesus was.

Messiah Ben-Joseph was seen as this Isaiah 52, 13 through 53, 12, right? But they really didn't understand that. They didn't talk about it very much either. So why didn't the Jews see Jesus was the Messiah Ben-Joseph and the Messiah Ben-David, right?

It was the Pharisees who taught these two messiahs, and they were in fact the champions of this teaching. The Sadducees didn't believe it. The Essenes thought that both the Pharisees and the Sadducees were both going to hell. God had chosen them to go to hell. They were the Calvinists of their day.

But since the Pharisees were the champions of this two messiahs teaching, One Messiah who's going to suffer and die and the other Messiah who was going to raise the Messiah who suffered and died and come and push out who was ever in power, the Romans, right? They were expecting Messiahs, two Messiahs, who would be very supportive of them. Because after all, we're the champions of this teaching, right? Since Jesus was not supported, they figured he can't be the Messiah, right? Because the Messiah is going to love us Pharisees. That's their thought, right? They didn't see a good fit.

Luke 24, 22-24 reads like this, But also some women among us amazed us. When they were at the tomb early in the morning and did not find his body, they came saying that they had also seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just exactly as the women also had said, but him they did not see.

So here, as we talked about last week, were the women who visited Christ's tomb. We have Mary Magdalene in all four Gospels as being listed. The other Mary, who was Mary the mother of James, is listed in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. We have, in addition to that, Salome in the Gospel of Mark, and Joanna, and others. So we said last week there were at least six women who were there visiting the tomb, and quite possibly more.

So who were they? The other Mary was the mother of James the Less and Joseph, also called Joses, nickname. Salome was the wife of Zebedee and the mother of the disciples James and John. She was the one who came to Jesus and said, Hey, can my son sit on either side of you in the coming kingdom? Right? That's her. Joanna was the wife of Chusa, probably more likely Husa, right?

Okay, a steward of Herod Antipas, and as Dr. Luke records, there were also other women among them in addition to these, so say at least six, quite likely more. Now, one of the things that this account tells us, because women were the first ones to see the empty tomb, Mary Magdalene was the first one to see Christ raised. The fact that that is recorded in Scripture is a testimony to the truth of the account. If you were making up a story to be sold to the Jews, you would not make up that women were the first ones to see Jesus' tomb, you would not make up the story that Mary Magdalene, a woman, was the first one to see Christ raised.

You wouldn't. Why would you not do that? Because the women were not considered valid as far as testimony was concerned. They were completely unreliable in the Jewish culture. They would not have been allowed to be witnesses. So you would not make up this story this way. It testifies to the truth of the account. These accounts were not made up. And this is one of the reasons why.

Now, one of the things they said was, but him, Jesus, they did not see. Here they are telling Jesus face to face that though the tomb is empty, nobody's seen Jesus. Right? That's kind of ironic. You know, nobody's seen Jesus as they sit there and tell Jesus. So that's kind of a little crazy.

So what this is also telling us is that the count was among the very earliest of Christ's resurrection appearances. They're saying nobody's seen Jesus. So think of this. These disciples were not rejoicing in the resurrection of Christ, were they? No. Nobody has seen him, they're telling Jesus, who's resurrected. On the day he's resurrected, they're not rejoicing, but what are they? Very, very sad.

Now, they'd also seen a vision of the angels who said he was alive. Let's think about that. Even a miraculous appearance of angels saying that Christ was alive did not bring them to believe that Christ was resurrected or to understand. Isn't that amazing? Miraculous appearance of angels didn't do it.

For three years, however, you have to think about this. For three years, people had not believed even after seeing miracles with their own eyes. when the Sadducees and Pharisees heard that Jesus had resurrected Lazarus, which, by the way, was only a week before this. What did they want to do? They didn't go, Wow! This guy raises people from the dead! What did they want to do? Kill them. Right? It's amazing their lack of insight. And the same thing is true here.

Even eating food that was produced by a miracle, seeing it with their own eyes, Do you know that one of the disciples who picked up the extra food after distributing it was Judas? Seeing a miracle does not automatically get across to people. Judas decided that he would betray Christ after seeing Lazarus resurrected days before. Isn't that amazing? Even Christ predicting his own resurrection didn't get the point across.

One of the things that we gather from this, we say nobody was expecting this. I have to make note of a couple of minor exceptions, and that is that certainly Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea had some prior notice that Christ was going to be crucified. It does not appear that they had any concept that Christ was going to be resurrected in a couple of days. Certainly Nicodemus might have thought, oh, well, I'm not going to spend a pile of money on all these burial claws and spices and everything because he's going to be resurrected in a couple of days, right? So that's not what he thought. This is not a story that anyone would make up. None of them were expecting to have Christ be crucified and then resurrected in just a couple of days.

In truth, we say three days. He was in the tomb by the Jewish custom. But how long was it? It's less than 48 hours. Less than 48 hours. Not only is it a story that no one would make up, up to 500 people seeing Jesus at one time in at least 11 different events over 40 days time is not a mass hallucination. Not a mass hallucination.

Here's Luke 24, 25 through 27. He said to them, Oh foolish men and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Excuse me, that's not complete reference there. So Lazarus was raised only eight days before. So Jesus referred to the Scriptures. The Scriptures would have meant at that time only the Old Testament as we call it. Many times Jesus pointed people back to the Scriptures, the Old Testament, instead of the traditions that they would tend to add to scripture with.

You have on page four of your handout, at least hopefully things printed out properly here, this is some prophecy fulfilled by Christ. There are in fact over a hundred prophecies fulfilled by Christ, so these are a listing of some of them. So the sheep of the shepherd, would be scattered, for example, is one of them. Betrayed by a close friend is another one. And so there are a number of these prophecies fulfilled by Christ.

Christ would, in fact, go over these very passages and tell these two disciples about those verses. He would go over those and say, these were predicted, and now they're fulfilled. Now, rather than Jesus coming up to them and saying, look, I'm Jesus, I'm Christ, you know, you guys, I'm resurrected, and so you guys need to believe in me, what did he do? He went first to these scriptures, some of whom, some of which we've listed here, and first presented and then explained the scriptures to them.

Now, think about this for a minute. Would you like to have Christ explain some Scriptures for you? Yeah, that would be a great thing. Imagine what these guys were kind of, oh, they don't know who this guy is, but he's explaining the Scriptures for them and only afterwards do they come to understand. Wouldn't that be an amazing experience?

However, we often do learn in a similar pattern. We first have to come to understand God's word clearly. Then we believe it and place our faith in the revealed facts. Isn't that what he did with them? And that's what he does with us, really. This is what is meant by, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Walk by faith in what is revealed and not by sight. Here's Luke 24, 28 and 29.

And they approached the village where they were going, and he acted as though he were going further. But he urged them, excuse me, they urged him, saying, Stay with us, for it is getting toward evening, and the day is now nearly over. So he went in to stay with them.

Now one of the things to keep in mind here, this would be according to Jewish custom. Jewish custom was you must be hospitable. You must be hospitable. So they would have done that anyway. But even that being the case, you also get the impression that they sense this guy has a lot to tell us and we don't want it to stop.

Here's Luke 24, 30 and 31. When he had reclined at the table with them, he took the bread and blessed it, breaking it. He began giving it to them. Then their eyes were opened. By the way, this is, their eyes were opened by an action from God. Not just, oh, this guy breaks bread and prays like somebody we know, right? And He vanished from their sight. See, Luke 24, 16 has already told us, but their eyes were prevented from recognizing Him.

They needed to come to a recognition of the truth of Scripture and believe it first. Before just having a, hey, I'm Jesus, I'm resurrected, good to see you guys again, right? So these disciples were given sufficient explanation by Christ from God's Word in order to come to a true understanding of Scripture. As they walked those probably seven miles between Jerusalem and Emmaus, So their eyes were open, they saw Christ just long enough to finally realize who the stranger was they'd been talking to and serving as hosts.

Can you imagine what that was like? You don't know that this is Christ and all of a sudden, and he disappears. Amazing, amazing experience. Oh, that's who this is. That's this guy that has been explaining all this to us. Astounding. Astounding experience. Just as they get this inkling, now I know who you are. He's gone.

Luke 24, 32-35, And they said to one another, Were not our hearts burning within us while he was speaking to us on the road, while he was explaining the Scriptures to us? And they got up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem, By the way, that's a seven mile walk, right? Whoa, we're going right now. I don't know if they finished eating, right? while he explained the scriptures to us, and they got up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem, and found gathered together the eleven and those who were with them, and saying, The Lord has really risen, and has appeared to Simon.

And they began to relate their experiences on the road, and how he was recognized by them in the breaking of the bread." Oh, by the way, you guys know that empty tomb you heard about? The ladies were not kidding, right? The ladies were not nuts. And we actually walked with him and talked with him, and he explained the scriptures, and it's this one, and it's this one, and it's this one. And then he broke bread with us as we invited him to our home. And he prayed over it. And then we realized, who is this? Now, they talked about They talked about having this, you know, we're not our hearts burning within us, right? So, that verse 32 brings up a very important and relevant issue for us, right?

Is this burning within us what we're to pursue? What place do our subjective feelings have in our lives as Christians? Is that supposed to be what guides us? In fact, our culture has been telling us that for decades. Our culture's been telling us that those subjective feelings are what we're really to guide ourselves by. And most of Christendom has gone by that.

Are feelings the ultimate gauge? So these two disciples expressed truthfully what they felt. They felt subjectively. They expressed it truthfully. Note that what Christ was trying to get across to them, however, was the spiritual facts. That's what he spent all this time talking on the road about. He wanted them to understand the spiritual facts from Scripture. Their feelings were supplemental. Were they good? Yes. But they're supplemental, not primary, not foundational.

These two disciples had changed from going home for the night to heading back to Jerusalem. We have realized something so fantastic, we've got to go back to Jerusalem after having come all the way out to this village where we live. So, one of the points we make here is just like the train and the tracks, our faith is to be in the spiritually revealed facts. and the feelings follow just like the caboose faith in the facts is like the train in the tracks and the feelings follow first the other disciples said that the Lord had really risen and he also appeared to Simon and you see this account is summarized in first Corinthians 15 I think they studied it in the first Corinthians elective last week. Then the two from Emmaus shared their experiences and realizations.

Now what Luke records here is the 11. In fact, we know from the Gospel of John that Thomas was not present. One of the things you'll find in the New Testament is that the disciples are sometimes called the twelve, when all twelve are not necessarily present, or the eleven, when all eleven are not necessarily present. That was sort of a term for the group. And then two from Emmaus shared their experience and realizations with these disciples.

It's one of the reasons why in our listing on the first page, I look at, you know, there's an account in Luke and an account in John. Those may not be the same appearances, and I think, in fact, they're likely not. Thomas was not present initially. He would actually not see the Lord directly for another week.

Now, think about this. If you were the Lord, would you do that? Would you have an appearance before ten of the disciples and then wait another week to appear to Thomas? Would you do that? Or wouldn't you want to say, hey, let's get this fixed right now? Well, that's one of the reasons why we can tell this is God's account. and not ours. We wouldn't do that. We would do it differently.

God intends that the spiritual realization of Christ's resurrection change us radically too. So we behold our risen Lord through His Word. It is God's design and intent that we be transformed into the image of His Son. 2 Corinthians 3.18 God intends that as we see Christ risen in His Word, that we're transformed by that realization. He also intends that His life be lived out through us.

This resurrected Lord that these two disciples didn't recognize at first. As a result of that resurrection and our union with Him in that resurrection, because you and I were there in that resurrection, we have a blessed hope. And it's not like these two disciples said we had hoped, but we have a certain hope. We have a specific and assured hope, a blessed hope that He will one day take us to be with Him forever.

I hope it's today, especially before this election. Right? Okay. We have a hope that does not disappoint. These two disciples had a hope in which they got disappointed. Do you want that? No, you don't want that, do you? I don't either. This is a hope that does not disappoint. We won't go, oh, we were hoping. No, we can always hope it's today.

Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for your word. We thank you for what you've spelled out here. We thank you that as we look at the realizations of these two disciples, that we can look at what you revealed to them. And in one sense, we can look at them and say, wow, why didn't they get it? But in another sense, we look at it and say, well, I have things to realize. And we just pray for just continued realizations and understandings from your word. And we just pray in Jesus' name. Amen.