What do we have in common with these two and what can we expect to happen when we have renewed encounters with our risen Lord? My friend Al Perkins has helped me identify seven seasons of faith that we discover as disciples of Jesus Christ: curiosity, commitment, shock, disillusionment, hope, a deeper search and revelation. My walk with the Lord (and perhaps yours as well) continues to pass through these seasons of faith like weather patterns of my soul.
Curiosity is how they first heard Jesus when they first started to follow Him during His earthly ministry. Like the Greeks who came to meet Him in the Temple, all potential disciples say, “we would see Jesus” (John 12:20-22). Jesus is the Alpha to all meaningful relationships, which begin with curiosity and questions. When I asked Annemarie out for a cup of coffee after Christianity and Western Thought class more than 40 years ago, I was just curios. And so was she. But there was no real relationship until we committed ourselves to a real relationship.
Those disciples also made a commitment when they decided, “I’ll follow Him.” But they were supposed to be with Jesus admitting their discipleship during His trial and execution and they didn’t do that. In the same way today - it isn’t just wearing the right T-shirt with the right scripture verse on it. It isn’t about whether we show up on NFL televised games with the right signs declaring gospel messages, either. But it’s a start and some of us might never walk on beyond this stage or season of faith.
When we see a person we greatly admire fall into disrepute by the media, some of us are not surprised. But some of us who knew the person to be of good character just can’t believe it. These disciples were like the latter. They were in shock when they heard that Jesus had been arrested. The shocking truth is that He was crucified precisely because God loves us. And we did the arrest, torture and execution in our vilest sinful condition. Just as the cartoon suggests: we caught God looking at us “in that way” and we were determined to kill Him.
They were overwhelmed with disillusionment. All that they had hoped for – “that he was the one to redeem Israel” (Luke 24:20) - everything that Jesus had meant to them as the promised Messiah was gone and they felt that there was nothing else to look forward to. The two disciples were like the two characters in the fourth cartoon. As if one sign weren’t bad enough, “The end is near”, the other carries an even worse prediction: “You wish!” Without Jesus the end to the hellish conditions of this world are nothing compared to the prospect of no end to turmoil in hell after death without Him. These wandering disciples were so disillusioned that they could not see how close their salvation was. He was with them all that time of despair.
Hope seems to come from out of nowhere when this stranger starts helping these walking disciples to remember what the prophets had foretold: Sure, the Messiah was to be the prince of peace, counselor and ruler. Yes, even more. But Isaiah also said that by His wounds we are healed and He must suffer and rise up from the dead on the third day. Our salvation relies on repenting by His name so that He may forgive the sins of all nations (Luke 24:44-45). And just as “no scripture was harmed in the preparation of this sermon”, no scripture was altered in the preparation of your personal salvation through Jesus Christ.
They invited Jesus to stay with them. They wanted to make a further search about this stranger and what He had to say. They continued to listen to Jesus (the Living Word of God) review the scriptures including the earliest prophesy of how the Messiah would crush the head of the evil serpent who had brought death to our first parents in the garden of Eden (Genesis 3:15). The end of God’s new creation story was in the battle in which Satan wounded the Messiah on the cross, but the Messiah destroyed death by His perfect life, submissive death and victorious resurrection (Isaiah 53). This journey of the hearts and minds of these two caused them later to remark, “did our hearts not burn within us?” But they didn’t express it with such emotion when they were with Him.
Finally, at the table when Jesus broke the bread with them – this is when and how they recognized Jesus’ true identity. This is the revelation that each disciple must have so as to find out who Jesus really is in his or her own life. It is not so much in what He says, but in what He does at the table. Walking on with God is only part of our relationship with Him. The full cycle requires revelation of the risen Savior and Lord in our midst.
Dear Heavenly Father, whatever season of faith we are in right now I pray that You send Your Holy Spirit to be with each one of us. If we find ourselves just curious, then give us more than just wanting to see Jesus. If we are committed to following Jesus, help us to stay the course and always walk with Him. If we are shocked by the cruel conditions in this world, give us the faith and grace to walk on with Jesus. If we are disillusioned from not feeling or sensing Your presence, then give us hope for the living of these days in expectation of Your coming. If we have hope, but fail to give others hope by sharing Your love and grace, please forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. If we are still searching the scripture for You, please reveal Yourself to us as living among us. For it is in dying that we are born to eternal life by His blood and name: King Jesus, Amen.
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