The Stranger on the Road to Emmaus

                   

                      On that first Easter Morning

Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem. They were talking
with each other about everything that had happened.

As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus Himself came up and walked with them; but they were kept from recognizing Him.

He asked them, "What are you discussing together as you walk along?"
They stood still, their faces downcast...
                 
And they told Him what had just happened in Jerusalem -- all of it -- the horrible suffering of Jesus, their hopelessness, their confusion when the women visited the tomb that morning and about the angels who said Jesus was really alive...

So Jesus explained:
Did not the Christ have to suffer these things and then enter into his glory?

And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, He explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.
                            -- Luke 24:13-27

There's only one key to unlocking the mystery about God's activity in the world - then and now - the Hebrew Scriptures.

For observant Jews, in the first century as well as today, the writings of Moses and the Prophets are the nearest things to the mind of God in human language.

"If God is alive, then the Bible is His voice," writes Jewish thinker Abraham Heschel.

It is to this book, and no other, that the Stranger immediately takes His listeners.

What does He tell them?

We are not given the details, but we can guess from the preaching of the early church what was said to them on the Emmaus road.

From the opening pages of the Bible, the two friends are reminded of the fierce and unfaltering love of God for the world He has made.

His divine love burns hotter than any star in the universe. Here is love that is never lazy, indulgent, or indifferent, but always vigilant -- committed to the perfect good of the beloved.

The Stranger describes the deep enmity that has rejected this love and spoiled the world, the rage of those who will not yield their hearts to their Creator.

Men and women, made to love God and enjoy Him forever, somehow succumbed to the forces of deceit and darkness set against Him symbolized by a serpent.

"You will be like God," the serpent whispered.

Instead, they became captives to the suffocating selfishness of a life cut off from God's goodness.

No one, the Stranger, insists, no matter what his status or achievement in the world, can escape that state of affairs.

It would remain the burden and the blight of human beings everywhere in every age -- unless a Rescuer were sent to set them free.

The crucifixion and resurrection of the Messiah, God's Christ, is God's Secret Rescue Mission to free the world from the forces of darkness.

Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him....They asked each other, "Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked with us the road and opened Scripture to us?"

Then they joyfully rushed back to Jerusalem and joined the other disciples in spreading the good news.

       "He is risen! Christ is risen indeed!"

In the desert of my heart

I am appreciating more and more the "outline" or "format" Derek Prime talked about. In my prayer journal for today the Lord's Prayer connection is "Thy Kingdom Come" and the topic is stated as "The extension of the church and the coming of God's Kingdom through the preaching of the gospel."

Derek Prime's system is really helpful. But, when you get back to basics, it is not the understanding of the thing, or the systems used, or the helpful hints we all search out so diligently -- it is so much more profoundly simple -- it's the doing of the thing -- that's what keeps me back at the starting point instead of running steadily toward the goal ... the problem is not in the learning or understanding -- it's in the doing -- a knot in my will, not in my brain.

I need to look at that knot and begin unraveling it. Oh, I know it is the Holy Spirit that does that. But right now, these days, I don't go to Him for that. Why? I feel dry and empty these days. It shocks me how much harder it is to lean on Jesus, to come to Him in need and desperation, when my spirit is dry -- you would think it would be the opposite.

I am thinking about W. H. Auden's elegy to William Butler Yeats -- the last verse:

In the desert of the heart
Let the healing fountains start....

I need those healing fountains. And I know where they are.....why don't I just hurry up and GO?!?!?

Ye who are weary.....COME HOME!!!!

The last two lines of the verse are:

In the prison of his days
Teach the free man how to praise...

This intrigues me...teach the free man how to praise...not the prisoner...the free man...

Can I get there from here?

As a hart longs for flowing streams, so longs my soul for thee, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and behold the face of God?

O God, thou art my God, I seek thee, my soul thirsts for thee; my flesh faints for thee, as in a dry and weary land where no water is. So I have looked upon thee in the sanctuary, beholding thy power and glory.

I stretch out my hands to thee; my soul thirsts for thee.

With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation.

I will open rivers on the bare heights and fountains in the midst of the valleys; I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water

.

Ho, every one who thirsts, come to the waters; and you that have no money, come, buy and eat!

For waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert; the burning sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water.

And on the banks, on both sides of the river, there will grow all kinds of trees for food. Their leaves will not wither nor their fruit fall, but they will bear fresh fruit every month, because the water for them flows form the sanctuary. Their fruit will be for food, and their leaves for healing.

Then he showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city; also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.

Can I get there from where I am now? My soul trusts in Him who made me and carries me in His arms. YES, He can bring me back. Yes, He can take me there, even from where I am now, and YES, He will!


(Psalm 42:1-2; Psalm 63:1-2; Psalm 143:6; Psalm 87:7; Isaiah 12:3; Isaiah 41:18; Isaiah 55:1; Isaiah 35:6-7; Ezekiel 47:12; Revelation 22:1-2; RSV)

Screwtape Letters - - C S Lewis

When I was growing up, C. S. Lewis' Screwtape Letters was a big hit. Later he wrote so many more books that Screwtape's (Screwtape was a senior demon) letters to his trainee (Wormwood, a junior demon)) have been almost forgotten, at least neglected.

Narnia, Mere Christianity, Weight of Glory and Til We Have Faces are on most people's bookshelves. I don't see Screwtape much any more.

These "Letters" were among Lewis' earliest writings. He was still a relatively new Christian.

He describes Screwtape  as a demon who holds an administrative post in the bureaucracy ("Lowerarchy") of Hell. He is mentor to Wormwood, the new, inexperienced apprentice tempter.

Screwtape gives Wormwood detailed advice on various methods of undermining faith and promoting sin.

Here's Screwtape's letter to Wormwood about Pleasure:

Screwtape -- Hell's View of Pleasure

Never forget that when we are dealing with any pleasure in its healthy and satisfying form, we are, in a sense, on the Enemy's ground.

I know that we have won many a soul through pleasure. All the same, it is His invention, not ours. He made the pleasures: all of our research so far has not enabled us to produce one.

All we can do is to encourage the humans to take the pleasures which our Enemy has produced, at times, or in ways, or in degrees, which He has forbidden.

Hence we always try to work away from the natural condition of any pleasure to that in which it is least natural, least redolent of its Maker, and least pleasurable.

 An ever-increasing craving for an ever-diminishing pleasure is the formula. It is more certain; and it is better style. To get the man's soul and give him nothing in return--that is what really gladdens our Father's heart.
             
                                                             ***********************


Lewis includes a lot of doctrine and observations of human nature in these illuminating letters.

The world that Screwtape and Wormwood live in is a messed-up (or bent as Lewis would say) morally reversed world, in which greed and self-indulgence are seen as the greatest good. Neither demon is able to understand, or acknowledge, true virtue when he sees it.

Sounds like the same world we live in today!

Satan Wants Food - Our God wants Sons

                (How Satan views us and how God views us)

A conversation between Satan's head demon recruiter and one of his new recruits - He is explaining how Satan's goals are different from The Enemy's (our savior God's) goals --

The Demon trainer is named Screwtape. He tells his new apprentice --

"To us a human is primarily food; our aim is the absorption of its will into ours. But the obedience which our Enemy demands of men in quite a different thing. 

One must face the fact that all the talk about his love for men is not (as one would gladly believe) mere propaganda, but an appalling truth. He really does want to fill the universe with a lot of loathsome little replicas of himself, not because he has absorbed them but because their wills freely conform to his. 

We want cattle who can finally become food; he wants servants who can finally become sons. We want to suck in; he wants to give out. We are empty and would be filled; he is full and flows over."

                    - From Screwtape Letters, by C S Lewis

Talking to Yourself

Psalm 103:1-2

   "Praise the LORD, my soul; all my inmost being, praise His holy Name. Praise the LORD, my soul, and forget not all His benefits."

  Here is a good example of the psalmist talking to himself. When David writes phrases like "my soul" and "o my soul" he is saying, "I am talking to myself."

(What do you say when you talk to yourself?)

What is he telling himself in this Psalm? He is saying "Praise the LORD," and "don't forget how God as blessed you!"....really great things for us to say, too, when we talk to ourselves!

(You could take out those words - 'my soul' -  and put your name in their place.)

 Maybe it would be good for us to stop now and remember how God has blessed us! 

Remember the old song, "Count Your Blessings"? We used to sing it a lot - I don't hear it much anymore. Maybe that helps explain why we are so cynical and pessimistic these days.

Count your blessings. 

Name them one by one.

Count your blessing 

See what God has done!

Count your blessings

Name them one by one

And it will surprise you

What the Lord has done!

Maybe this would be a good time to take out your journal - your big one - and start making that list...and it may surprise you -- what the Lord has already done for you!

What's first on your list?