Do I Know You?

This sermon was preached on April 6, 2008 at the Presbyterian Church of Laurelhurst in Portland, Oregon. The text for the day was Luke's account of Jesus' post-resurrection appearance to the disciples on the road to Emmaus, Luke 24: 13-35. It was also communion Sunday.

I’ve lived in Portland for almost 20 years—the longest period of time that I’ve lived anywhere. And I’m often amazed —delighted— sometimes embarrassed— that wherever I go now in the city, I seem to run across someone I know. This has happened to you, too, I’m sure of it. For a big city, Portland is a very small town.

This past week, as part of my job in hospice, I was visiting a nearby nursing facility when I ran into a member of this church, who was also there for a visit. It took me a moment to figure out who he was and where I knew him from, but I was thrilled to remember his name and to be able to greet him. It took him a moment, but he also remembered who I was, and where he knew me from, and we were able to exchange greetings and good wishes and say “See you in church this Sunday!”

Let me tell you a story about a meeting that didn’t go quite that well. About a year ago, the kids and I were sitting in the Keller Auditorium downtown, waiting for a show to begin, when a woman came in and sat down behind us. She looked so familiar to me.

I just knew I knew her—I just knew I’d spent time with her somewhere, I knew that I knew her name, and yet—I couldn’t figure it out. I turned around and said, “Hi, do I know you? Have we met before?” “No,” she said. But she had a tiny little smile at the edge of her mouth, which I thought was curious.

I was so sure I knew this woman that I just kept racking my brain trying to figure it out. After a few more moments, I turned around again and said, “You look so familiar. Did you give a workshop or something that I could have gone to?”

“No,” she said, “I don’t think so.”

And then the show started, and it was wonderful, and we enjoyed it, and the kids and I went home, but I was still puzzled.

It was months later when the truth dawned on me. I did know her, and I remembered how. I had last seen her in the operating room.

She was my doctor. In fact, she was the gynecologist (can you say that word in church?) who had performed a little surgery on me the year before. She knew me— or certain parts of me— very well indeed— but it wasn’t the kind of acquaintance she— or I— would have cared to acknowledge right there in the middle of a crowd in the Keller Auditorium.

When it comes to recognizing people, knowing who they are, in unexpected places--context is everything. Would I have known my doctor that day if I’d seen her in the place where we last met, the hospital? Absolutely. Would I have known her that day if we’d been dressed as we were then?-- if she’d been wearing a white coat and I’d been wearing a paper apron? I think maybe I would have. But there in the Keller, dressed in our civilian clothes, waiting for a show, my doctor looked familiar but I didn’t recognize her.

Without the context—the place, the clothes, the purpose—those signs and symbols and actions that defined our relationship--I didn’t know who my doctor was, how she fit into my life, what purpose she’d served, or what she had done for me.

This morning we read together Luke’s account of Jesus encountering two disciples on the Emmaus road. It’s a story about a remarkable appearance in an unexpected place, of identity concealed and revealed, of recognition—recognition that comes not from time or place, nor even through companionship and conversation--but through signs, and symbols, and actions.

In this passage, the time is “that very day” that Jesus’ body has been found missing from the tomb and the women have told the disciples their story of angels and resurrection. The place is the road to Emmaus, some 7 miles from Jerusalem. And the people are two of Jesus’ disciples, stunned and confused and heartsick, walking that dusty road. They are talking about the events of the past days in Jerusalem—Jesus’ betrayal and trial, his crucifixion and his body’s mysterious disappearance—when they are joined by a third person, a stranger, who walks with them, listens to their painful story, shares Scripture with them, and ultimately joins them for dinner.

It is only at dinner, as the stranger takes bread from the table, blesses it, breaks it, and gives it to them, that, as Luke tells it, “their eyes were opened and they recognized Jesus.”

These two disciples had spent all day on the road with Jesus, and yet they only recognized him when he provided for them that familiar context of table fellowship and performed for them those familiar signs, symbols, and actions he had shared with them before, as he fed the multitudes and as he presided at the Last Supper. Jesus took the bread, he blessed it, he broke it, and he gave it to them. And their eyes were opened and they recognized him.

Take, bless, break, and give—it’s a sacred rhythm that reveals Jesus to the disciples as the Son of God, the present Savior, the Christ resurrected from the dead, the King of Heaven living among them. Take, bless, break, and give. It’s the same sacred rhythm that we as a church family hear in the words of institution on days like today, when we gather at the Lord’s Table for Holy Communion as a fellowship of believers—a sacrament that shows us who Christ is, binds us to him and to one another, and seals us in God’s covenant of salvation and grace.

Take, bless, break, and give. It’s how the disciples recognize the risen Jesus on the Emmaus road. It’s how we recognize and participate in Christ in the sacrament of Holy Communion.
But as we look at our scripture reading for today, and as we ponder our lives as Christians in the world, perhaps the sacred rhythm of these four simple verbs has even more to say.

I hope you’ll allow me a little latitude here for imagination; as an ancient rabbi says in a book of Jewish wisdom about the Torah, “Turn it, turn it, for you will find everything is in it.” I don’t know if you can find everything in this story of Christ’s appearance in Emmaus, but there’s certainly lots there.

Here’s one thing that I think is there, and I’ll quote this because I think the author puts it much better than I could. Writer Craig Kocher says:

“One possible interpretation of the Emmaus road story is to reflect on the four actions of the meal: Jesus taking, blessing, breaking, and giving, as the whole story of God’s saving work in Jesus. In Christ, God takes us as his friends. In Christ, God blesses us with the first fruits of creation and the gift of his very life. God is then broken on the cross for our salvation, and we are broken with him in his death, so that through Christ’s resurrection we may be given away for the work of his kingdom.”

Take, bless, break, and give—it’s not bad as a summary of salvation history, is it?

Here’s something else I think is there. Look at the Emmaus road passage and note the movement of the story as a whole. Jesus comes alongside the disciples when they are traveling, dusty and tired and grieving. He doesn’t start right in with trumpets and heavenly lights and a margarita party for “The Big Reveal.” He doesn’t jump right in with proclamations or Advice from on high in the voice of Charlton Heston (who I’ve been thinking about today).

Instead, he comes to them quietly and gently. He takes—or receives—what they have to offer—their companionship, their words, their story of pain, and loss, and confusion.

Once he has heard and honored their story, Jesus transforms it for them. “Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and be glorified?” he says. I love this because I think this is one of the central challenges and responsibilities of ministry in general—taking the stories and experiences of our own lives and showing how they reveal the sacred story of God’s work among us.

Jesus takes the disciples’ words of pain and he shows them how their experience reveals the work of God. Jesus transforms their story from one which proclaims sadness into one which proclaims joy. He blesses their story, and by doing so blesses them.

Jesus takes what the disciples have to offer, and he blesses it with transformation. Then, Luke tells us, “beginning with Moses and all the prophets, Jesus interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning the Christ.” Jesus breaks open the mysteries of prophetic scripture and reveals how his death and resurrection fit into God’s plan and God’s provision as witnessed to by generations of the faithful.

And then Jesus gives: he gives the disciples bread at table, and he gives them the ability to recognize him, to know his resurrection and presence with them personally and incontrovertibly.

Take, bless, break, and give. It’s a sacred rhythm proclaimed at the Lord’s table, a sacred rhythm revealed in salvation history, and a sacred rhythm that runs throughout today’s Gospel passage from Luke.

And I believe that this same sacred rhythm of taking, blessing, breaking, and giving, following Jesus’ example in this passage-- is a good way— even if it’s a shorthand way— of thinking about the life of faith and how our ministries to others can reveal and make known the presence of the risen Christ.

Like Jesus, as we minister to another person on our own roads of life, our first task is not to proclaim, to preach, to judge, or to warn. Our first task is to come alongside, like Jesus did with the disciples on the Emmaus road, to walk together, to take or to receive what that person has to offer us—their pain, or their joy, their silence or their story—to be with them, to stay with them, to share time and presence.

Following Jesus’ example, our ministry also needs to bless others or be a blessing to others—whether that means helping someone reframe their experience by thinking about how it reflects and reveals God’s sacred story—or whether that means offering them the simple blessings of time and attention, or of warmth and safety, or of presence and love.

In our ministries we are also called to break open the scriptures, as Jesus did—to study them, to interpret them, to discuss them with others—to explore the history of God’s work in the world and his devotion to his people, to bring our scriptural understanding to bear on our life and work--to let God’s word live in us, guide us, and bear fruit in our hearts, minds, and actions.

And we are also called upon to give—both concretely and spiritually. Following Jesus’ example, our ministries must give of our substance and of our selves—we must offer to others, as Jesus offers to us, both the bread which nourishes the body—food, clothing, shelter, safety, protection-- and the bread which nourishes the soul—love, understanding, compassion, meaning, and purpose for our lives.

Take, bless, break, and give. These four small and powerful verbs form a sacred rhythm of sign, symbol and action that opens the eyes of the disciples and allows them to recognize Jesus as the Christ, the Savior. This same sacred rhythm reveals Jesus’ power and presence to us at the Lord’s table, proclaims God’s salvation history, and runs throughout today’s Gospel passage from Luke.

As we gather around the Lord’s Table today, may we recognize and experience the presence of Christ in the shared words and actions, signs and symbols, of our sacrament of Holy Communion.

And as we go from this place and take up our own journeys on our own Emmaus road, may we follow the example of the risen Christ as we encounter and minister to dusty and footsore fellow travelers in our church, in our communities, and in our homes. May our eyes, and theirs, be opened. And may we recognize Christ in our midst—and in one another-- as we take, bless, break, and give, of our substance and of ourselves, in the name of the living Christ.

Amen.