First United Methodist Church
April 7th, 2024
Rev. Lauren Hall
The Reality of the Resurrection
When you see a picture of Jesus, what do you expect to see? A friendly welcoming face? Long hair? A beard? Open hands? What else? A halo? Or perhaps a glow of some sort? Usually when we look at an image of Jesus, we are looking at an image that is four or five hundred years old. Although there are modern paintings of Jesus, society tends to reject these images, either because they look too much like our five hundred year old Jesus or because they look too much like someone we don’t recognize.
There was once a Roman Catholic Priest who was assigned to be the chaplain of a retreat center. He was told to commission a painting of the Virgin Mary to hang in a prominent place in the gathering room of the center, and so he did. But when his superiors saw this new painting, they not only removed the art from the room, but they also removed him from his post. They said he was not competent to hold the position. The painting depicted Mary in her mid-teens, as she probably was at the birth of Jesus, and very pregnant. In this painting she was probably about 8 months pregnant, because in the gospel of Luke, Luke describes her as “great with child.” Although the Directors of the center affirmed that it was an accurate depiction of Mary, they weren’t comfortable with displaying the painting. The painting they replaced it with showed Mary as a beautiful thirty year old, slender, and looking very much like a movie star. The Directors of the retreat center were more comfortable with the familiar looking Mary.
The paintings that we are used to seeing were done mostly by Italian painters. A couple of years ago I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Chicago and looked at some of the religious paintings from the renaissance period. Even if I didn’t already know what Jesus was supposed to look like, it wouldn’t have been difficult to pick him out in all the paintings, because he had a familiar glow around him. There were pictures of the baby Jesus, Jesus during his ministry, Jesus on the cross, and the resurrected Jesus. In each one of them, Jesus is dressed in bright white, and he is surrounded by a golden glow, almost as if he shined in some way.
Obviously, these artists did not literally think that Jesus shined. They just thought that he should shine because when you are raised from the dead, you are different. What they were trying to do was to show in art that the only way you can really know Jesus is through Easter, which is through the lens of the resurrection. Because they are artists and can’t use words to describe this difference, they illustrate the resurrection with a glow. Whether we look upon Jesus at his birth, in his ministry, on the cross or on the road to Emmaus, we see on him the glow of the resurrection. Even though the pictures show him in scenes that occurred before the resurrection, they were painted after the resurrection, and therefore, the glow has to be there.
In our scripture this morning, we encounter two disciples who are walking on the road to a small village called Emmaus. They are close enough to Jesus’ intimate circle to have heard about the empty tomb and Mary’s sighting of Jesus, three days after their leader was crucified. They walk the road slowly, sadly discussing the situation. Suddenly, a stranger approaches them. We know from the narration that it is Jesus, but the disciples don’t recognize them.
It is natural for us to wonder why they didn’t recognize him. They had received Jesus’ teaching. Like Mary, they had probably sat at his feet. Perhaps there had been times when they spoke to him face to face. And yet…here he is, walking with them now. And for some strange reason, they don’t realize who he is…until he does something familiar.
Like the pictures we have grown accustomed to seeing, Jesus probably appeared to them with his post resurrection glow. They knew him the way he was before the resurrection, and now, even though he was flesh and blood present, he was different. When you are raised from the dead, you don’t look the same, act the same or sound the same. And so Jesus appeared to the disciples as a stranger, and until they invited him to join them in their home, they didn’t realize who it was that was traveling with them. When Jesus picked up the loaf of bread from the table, said a blessing, broke the bread and gave a portion to each of them, his identity was made known to them. And then, as soon as they realized that they had been with Jesus the whole time, he disappeared! They didn’t even have a chance to acknowledge it.
Isn’t that the way it always is? We have a brief encounter with Jesus and before we realize the reality of the moment, he is gone. As we reflect back on that moment, we think of the things we should have said or done or of how we might relive that experience differently. But we never know when we will meet Jesus.
It might be in church, during the greeting, or at the moment of a baptism, when you behold the innocent, hope-filled face of a child or an infant. Or perhaps Jesus will show up during a song or a prayer, or at some other significant point in the service. Jesus can appear during Communion, in the breaking of bread and sharing of the cup, when you are standing in line beside someone you never really thought of as Jesus before.
Jesus can appear in the form of a cashier at the Quick Mart, the person who works hard all day, but still takes the time to be kind and personal with you. Jesus can be in the form of the housekeeper at the hospital who smiles when she cleans your room and shows you generosity and compassion in the midst of a really bad day. It can be the person who stops to help you change your tire, or the mechanic who solves your car issue for $50 when everyone else has quoted $500.
The resurrection glow is different in each and every person, but it exists, just as the artists depict it around Jesus in every situation throughout his life. When we are raised with Jesus Christ, we begin to do things differently, and people notice that difference because through us they sense that they are in the presence of Christ even when we are carrying out what seems like ordinary, everyday tasks.
I remember several years ago when I returned from vacation, and I was so ready to be home. I got into my car and had only driven a few miles when I noticed that things weren’t working properly – the car was overheating and I needed to stop driving soon. My roadside coverage would only cover towing for about 30 miles, and of course it was a Friday, after 5, so I wasn’t going to find a local mechanic to fix my car while I stayed overnight in a hotel. God was on my side that day, and I was able to contact a clergy friend within the 30 mile range who connected me with a mechanic from her church. Other details worked themselves out and Rowynn and I eventually found ourselves at home and reunited with our car a few days later. It was a little inconvenient, very expensive and not at all the way I had planned or preferred, but it showed me again that a crisis is only a crisis if you prevent God from getting involved. If I had been looking for God’s intervention that day, I probably would have been disappointed, because I would have been looking in the wrong place and for the wrong things. But God was there, connecting the dots and rescuing me from being overwhelmed by circumstances beyond my control.
You may be thinking, “So what?” Positive outcome – Gratitude – External source.
There is a song that was written a few years ago by Jason Grey, called, “With Every Act of Love.” I like it because it reminds me that our day to day interactions with other people are regular opportunities to share the love and compassion of Jesus Christ. My favorite part of the song is the bridge:
God put a million, million doors in the world
For his love to walk through
One of those doors is you
You can’t get much more direct than that. But I like the chorus too. It goes like this:
Oh - we bring the Kingdom come
Oh - with every act of love
Jesus help us carry You
Alive in us, Your light shines through
With every act of love
We bring the Kingdom come
We can be held captive by many things; fear, anger, self-loathing, hatred, unexpected crises, and so many other confining and restricting realities that can make challenges seem impossible to endure. We never know when we will run into the Spirit of Christ, or how long the encounter will last. We can no more control the Spirit than we can control the wind. But as Easter people, we are not doomed to confinement, because whenever Jesus appears, our own spirits are lifted. It is only afterwards, when we reflect on it, that we realize that the moment was like a fire burning inside of us, and that we have been in the presence of God. Then we may wish, like Cleopas and his friend, that the visit had lasted just a little bit longer – that Jesus would stay with us because it is so good being with him.
Of one thing, however, there can be no doubt. Jesus is still alive and in our world today. The only question is where. and when, we will find him. Let us pray:
Pastoral Prayer
Lord of mercy, it has been a week since the Easter celebration. Our church was beautified with flowers, lovely decorations, banners, lots of people, beautiful music. It was the kind of Easter in which we could celebrate. As we return to our daily tasks and routines, equip us to face the world with the confidence that you are present in everything we do. Let our fear subside! Replace our doubts with certainty in your love and healing mercies. As we have brought names before you this day, asking for your healing touch, be with us as we also receive that same healing love. Today we pray for [names]. Give us joy and courage for all the times ahead; for we offer this prayer in the name of Jesus Christ, our Risen Lord. AMEN.
Benediction
And now, may you go into the world, unlocking freedom in all the ways you discover you can, for yourself, for others, for the world. And may the God who created you to be free, the Christ who showed you what freedom looks like, and the Spirit who is transforming your life even now, be with you now and evermore. Amen.
