Scripture | Luke 24:25-27

Hey, we're going to be in Luke chapter 24. Luke chapter 24, starting in verse 19. And it says, and he said to them, what things?

And they said to him, concerning Jesus of Nazareth, a man who was a prophet, mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death and crucified him. And we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes. And besides all this, it is now the third day since these things have happened.

Moreover, some women of our company amazed us. They were at the tomb early in the morning, and when they did not find his body, they lied. They came back saying that they had even 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 as the women had said, but him they did not see.

And he said to them, oh, foolish ones, and slow to heart to believe all the prophets have spoken. Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory? And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. This is the word of the Lord.

You may be seated. Today we get the opportunity to talk a little bit about a story of Jesus meeting two people on a road. It's called the Road to Emmaus. Now he meets these two individuals, and he starts talking to them and conversing back and forth with them now. I realize that for most of us, this would be a very foreign idea, because oftentimes I will walk on trails all throughout Northwest Arkansas in preparation for my sermon.

And unless I see one of you guys, I ignore everybody else, generally speaking, right? And most of the time, whenever we're talking and we're going around, we're not really conversing a lot. And so this story feels a little bit foreign to us, but I think there's probably the closest that we can come up to this type of story is that Jesus is conversing with people, that he's traveling along the probably the closest that we can come up to that in the year 2026 is on occasion, you might talk to the person beside you on an airplane, right?

And for most of us still at that point, most of us probably sit down and we put our headphones in. We don't really try to engage, but then every so often somebody tries to say something to us and we're like, why did I have to sit here? And but yet that sometimes happens. Not too often, but I remember a few years back I was on an airplane.

I was actually on the last row of a Spirit Airlines flight, which, you know, is about to go down. Something's going to happen if you're on the last row of a Spirit Airlines flight. And and I was sitting on the last row of a Spirit Airlines flight and, and I sat there. I was actually in the middle seat that day.

And I was sitting there waiting. And eventually this guy came in and he sat on the aisle seat, and already I could, I could start to smell a little bit of alcohol on his breath. And he was very friendly. He was very talkative. He was talking to literally everybody. As the flight attendant walked by. He was like, hey, can I order two fireballs?

And she's like, sir, we're not even off the ground yet. Like, you have to, you have to wait. I'm like, this is going to be a little bit of an interesting flight now. And so he's talking. I'm wearing like an o, a football shirt because, you know, I'm a Christian and and so he, he sees that we start talking college football.

I'm like all right this is our right. Like he's very loud. And I'm like, I hope people don't realize like we're not together. But like, I'm just trying to be nice to this guy. And we're going back and forth, back and forth and eventually we're up now in the air. He has like a plethora of little bottles in front of him.

He's still talking so incredibly loud, and I'm just trying to steer away from politics and all of this other stuff. Like I was like, I don't want everybody in the next eight rose to hear this. And finally he asked me the question, the question that usually honestly shuts the conversation down. He said, what do you do for a living?

Now, normally whenever people ask me that and I say I'm a pastor, they're like, okay. And then like, they just they just shut up because now they're thinking about all the curse words they said the last ten minutes. And but at that moment he's like, so what do you do for a living? And I'm like, I just wish him to be quiet.

He's like, what do you do for a living? And I was like, I'm a pastor. And he's like, no way. I'm an Episcopal priest. And.

And the conversation went downhill from there. And.

You know, most of us, we don't have these type of interactions. But today we're going to see a story of Jesus on the road to Emmaus. And he has a story. And it's a much more surprising story, much more surprising ending than that, because he now is going to meet these men on the day that he just rose up from the grave.

And so I'm actually going to start a little bit higher. We just read through the main verses for today's passage, but I want to get a running start here. So let's go back up to verse 13. It says that that very day, that very day is Easter morning is Sunday morning, the resurrection day. So they are literally walking back home.

The two of them were going to a village named Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem. So that Sunday morning there's two of his disciples walking back now to Emmaus, assuming that all the things of event were over. Now, now, number one, what we're going to be talking about here today is this idea of Scripture. We've been talking about spiritual disciplines.

And today we reached this idea of Scripture. Now, my main point today is not to prove that Scripture is true. We could give many, many sermons on that to prove that Scripture is true. I'm going to assume for the most part, that you guys actually already believe that it's why you're here. And really, my main point is to to make Scripture a bigger part of your life.

But but even in this, I feel compelled just to share a couple of things. Number one, if you watch, like the History Channel or you read some kind of dumb scholarly books, sometimes one of the common theories, if people refuse to accept the resurrection story, they'll call it the swoon theory. And the swoon theory says that after Jesus got brutally murdered, after they disfigured him to the point where he didn't even look like a man after they put nails in his hands and nails and his feet, and they whipped him mercilessly, like, after all of that, then they say, well, maybe he didn't actually die.

Maybe he was just really, really hurt. And then they brought him off the cross and they they wrapped him up and lent him cloths so tight that it was almost like a Band-Aid. And after three days in the cool temperature of the cave, then he got up and he was all right. Now, this idea now directly confronts that because now it says that this Jesus, the same Jesus, is going to be walking seven miles to Emmaus.

Listen, I don't like walking seven miles when I'm healthy. I don't like walking seven miles. If I step on a Lego, I'm not walking much more than a block. Right? And yet now, Jesus, three days after he's brutally murdered, is just jogging over to a mass seven miles. There's no other explanation for this other than that he was resurrected.

And it goes on to say in verse 14, and they were talking with each other, these are the two men about the things that had happened while they were talking and discussing together Jesus himself, junior, and went with him, but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. Now this might be a supernatural blinding that they would have known him, no doubt, but like they didn't recognize him, maybe because it was a supernatural miracle, or maybe it was simply because they just saw him get brutally murdered three days ago, and you don't expect to see him well again.

And so now they are walking down the street. There's a third person that comes alongside of them, and they're just talking, and they're talking pretty loud because the last few days have been pretty eventful for them. The last few days they have just seen Jesus get brutally murdered. They have just seen all the events that we know of the Easter story, the Good Friday story.

And so they're talking very loudly. And so Jesus now is right beside them, which is just a reminder, like, be careful what you talk about, because Jesus is probably pretty near to you as well. In verse 17 it says, and he said to them, what is the conversation that you are holding with each other as, as you walk?

And they stood still, looking sad. Have you ever asked the wrong question? Have you ever asked like, hey, why is everybody here? Well, George died, you know, it's like that's that's that's the overall tone of it. And they just stop and they, they start to look sad because he just asked them what happened. This what are you talking about?

And in verse 18 it says, then one of them named Cleopas, answered him, are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that had happened there in these days? And he said to them, what things? It looks sad. And then they're like, essentially Jesus is like, hey guys, what are you talking about? Cleopatra's response was like, hey man, you've been living under a rock.

She's like, kinda, yeah, actually, yeah, that's behind it, you know?

Everybody would have known this. Everybody would have seen this. And by the way, here's another good example of the Bible being true. Mentions his name. And that's like the name you could have forgotten. Who cares what this guy's name is, except for when Luke wrote this 2000 years ago, like, Cleopatra was probably still alive, and he lived in a very small village called a morse.

So if you did not believe the resurrection, if you read through the entire Gospel of Luke and you're like, I can't believe this. Luke is like, check my sources, go to Emmaus and go talk to Cleopatra. He will verify all of this scripture is true. And now he comes back not knowing that he's talking to Jesus says like, are you the only one?

I can't imagine? Like, probably for the rest of eternity, Cleopatra is in heaven being like, I can't believe I asked Jesus that question, right? And so the rest of verse 19, it says, and they said to him, concerning Jesus and Nazareth, a man who was a prophet, mighty indeed, a word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him in verse 21, the start of it it says, but we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.

We had hoped. Notice it switches to the past tense like we were really, really hoping. But now all the hope is gone. They were so close, by the way, like look how they described them in the previous verse. They said he was a man and that that is accurate. He was 100% man, also 100% God, but he wasn't 100% man and he was mighty in word and deed.

He could do miracles. He spoke like nobody else could. He was mighty in all of that. And then now they he was crucified unjustly by the chief priest. I thought they were so close. And then now they said, but we had hoped that he was the one to redeem or set Israel free, said Israel free from Rome. And that's where they missed it.

See, they missed it because they thought that Jesus was going to set them free from Rome, without realizing that Jesus had a much greater plan than that. It wasn't just to set them free from Rome, their physical bondage, but it was set them free from their spiritual bondage and death itself. And they started to look around. And now they lost all their hope because that Jesus is dead.

And now all the things that we are hoping for isn't true. And they were making a mistake. The same mistake that we often make. See, we need to interpret your experiences through Scripture, not Scripture. Through your experiences. You know, oftentimes we look around and we say, man, my life is hard. I'm going through this difficult season. But God in his word said that he has a plan for me, that he loves me.

And so now, because I'm going through this difficult season, his word can't be true because my lived experience doesn't live that out right now. And what do we just do? We just switched ourselves to say, I am the arbitrary truth, not scripture. When we could have said, you know what Scripture says that God's Word is true and that he does have a good plan for me, that he loves me.

I am going through a hard time. That's not a lie, but I bet that hard time is now building something up even greater. I bet I can trust them even more, and the more that we start to lean into this, and the more that we start to understand that this is the truth, that we can cling to everything else in life.

We don't know if we're actually seeing what's true or not. We can only see a small little fraction of the truth here in this world. But we can see Scripture and we can know that that's true. So interpret everything in your life through this lens. In verse 21 it says, yes. And besides all this, this is them still talking.

It is now the third day since these things had happened. Moreover, some of the women of our company amazed us. They were at the tomb early in the morning, and when they did not find his body, they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels who said that he was still alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it, just as the women had said, but him they did not see.

So now they come back again, and they're like, what's even crazier? They're telling Jesus, not knowing it was Jesus. What's even crazier is that some women, Mary went to the went to the tomb, and then they saw angels, but they didn't see Jesus. And then there's Peter and John, and they ran out to go to the tomb as well.

And by the time that they got there, they didn't see Jesus either. They came back and they reported all of these things, which, by the way, means something about Cleopas and his buddy right now that's walking down the road like they would have been in the room with the disciples. That's how close they were to Jesus. They weren't part of the 12, but they were like number 13 and number 14.

And so they hear all of this, Cleopas and his friend here, that now Jesus, who has been brutally murdered, is. Now there's the people saying that whom they trust, whom they know is that they're saying like, no, he's risen up, he's not there anymore. And then clear pits. And his friend is like, well, you gotta go. Like what?

Like America's got, Israel's got talent. I was on tonight. I don't I don't know why in the world like you would. I don't know why in the world that they would have to leave. But clearly they didn't believe. They didn't believe that he was actually risen up in the dead. If they would have believed that he was risen from the dead, they would have stayed.

They were in the room. They were hearing these testimonies once again because like they were hearing all the stories from everybody else around them, and yet they still did not believe even then. And that's when Jesus says, and he said to them, oh foolish ones, slow of heart to believe all the prophets have spoken, oh foolish ones, slow to heart to believe.

Notice this is Jesus now speaking. He doesn't go back and he doesn't say, why didn't you believe all the testimonies of Mary, of Peter, of John? Why didn't you believe them? No, he doesn't even reveal himself yet. But he asked them this important question like, why didn't you believe all that the prophets had spoken? Why didn't you believe what Scripture was actually saying?

Why didn't you believe it? See, because Jesus opened the scripture before opening their eyes. And oftentimes for us as well. How many times do we say, God, I want you to speak to me, and our Bible is closed and we say, God, I'm really struggling. I need a word from you. And yet we haven't actually opened up his very word, the very Word of God, that can change everything.

See? Because in this word is the words of love. It's the words of life. It's the words of everything that we need. He wrote us a book, and it has everything that we need to live this life. And the more that we start to study it, the more that we start to see God. And he goes on, he says, was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?

And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them all the scriptures the things concerning himself.

Says. Wasn't it necessary that the Christ that means the Messiah, the Anointed One, wasn't it necessary?

Didn't you read the prophets? Didn't you read Moses? And I love this. He now has seven miles. I don't know how long it takes to walk seven miles. I get tired, probably take me all day, but I don't know how long it would have taken them. But just imagine for seven miles. Jesus now says, didn't you read the scriptures?

Didn't you read Moses? And for seven miles they got to hear the greatest teacher of the scriptures. The guy that wrote it himself, start to point out how every little part of that scripture points back to him. I wonder what he talked about right as he was walking down that road that day. I wonder, did he go back all the way to Genesis 315?

The proto on is what they call it the first gospel that says right after he died, right after Adam and Eve sinned. Then there was already a promise in Genesis 315 that says, one day there will be a seed of a woman, which doesn't really happen, ever. But a seed of a woman was going to come and he was going to crush the serpent's head.

I wonder if he talked about Genesis chapter 12 whenever Abraham was called out of the wilderness and said, and then he was promised and said, one day you're disciple. One day one of your sons is going to bless the whole entire world. As they were walking down the road that day, I wonder what he was talking about. I wonder if he told them the story of Abraham and Isaac because he was talking and said, remember how Abraham was going to sacrifice his one and only son?

Don't you think that was a foreshadowing? One day of the coming Messiah was going to also be sacrificed that day. I wonder, as he talked through that, do you think he maybe went through Exodus and he went through Leviticus, and in Leviticus he talked about how there is no forgiveness of sin without the shedding of blood. He could have talked all day, all day about the Tabernacle and how every little part of the tabernacle pointed to Jesus, because there's a wash basin, and Jesus was the living water, there was the bread of life, and Jesus was that bread of life.

There was a lampstand, and Jesus was the light of the Lord. How it all points to Jesus. He could have done all of those things walking these seven miles. He could have spent all day, no doubt talking about the story of David and how one day David says in Psalms 110 that that there's going to be an order of Melchizedek, and that king was actually going to be greater because he was going to be a high priest and he was going to be a king.

He could have pointed all of these things out. That says, David said, that there was going to be, my Lord is going to sit on the throne of mine. It does not make sense unless there's a king, unless there's a messiah that's coming here. He could have talked all about all the prophets, about how Micah promised that there was going to be somebody born in Bethlehem, how Hosea was that there was going to be a flight out of Egypt.

He could have talked all about Isaiah, that promise. A virgin would give birth. And, of course, I promise you that almost as much as I can, that in Psalm 53 he would have talked all about that there was a suffering servant, a suffering servant. That was one day going to live a perfect life. But all we like sheep have gone astray.

We have let everyone to his own way. And the Lord that laid on him the iniquity of us all. And he would have talked through all of that if you could have been there for those seven miles, and you start to see that this Bible, every single page of this Bible now starts to point not to you, not to me.

It points to Jesus. See, the Bible is for you, but it's not about you. The Bible is a love story to you, but it's about Jesus. And the more that we understand this scripture, the more that we breathe it and live it and study it, and every single day to let it get deep down in our soul. The more that we see Jesus.

If you could put flesh and blood on this book, it would look like Jesus. And so how many times, though my own life do I wake up and I say, I don't have time for that today? It's almost like I'm just saying to Jesus, I don't have time for you today. I'm a little bit too busy. And instead he's saying, I wrote a book and I'm in every single one of these pages.

Make this book your life. In verse 28, they drew near to the village to which they were going. He acted as if he were going further. Jesus was kind of funny, like, so he just goes through this seven miles he's walking through. He gives the greatest Bible lesson that they would have ever heard in their entire life. They finally reach a mass.

They finally reach his house. And Jesus is like, all right, see you guys later. And it says then that they urged him strongly, literally in the Greek. It's almost like they physically stopped him from going there. Like, no, like, we will not let you leave. Stay with us, please. For his towards evening. And the day is now far spent.

So he went to stay with them, and when he was at the table with them, he took the bread, and blessed it, and broke it, and gave it to them, and their eyes were opened. See, once again he opened up the scriptures. He said, don't you know the scriptures before? He opened up their eyes? And they recognized them, and he vanished from their sight.

You know, I think this was a supernatural thing. Obviously, it says that he vanished. He was gone. So there's supernatural things at play right now. But as I was thinking about it this week again, I was just reminded of there's probably a reason, in that moment that they realized that Jesus Christ was standing in front of him, because it says that he blessed the bread and he broke it.

And as he gave it to him, they probably finally saw the hands with holes in them, the holes that proved just how much he loved clips and his friend. And what encourages me so much about Jesus as well is like, here's here's disciples number 13 and 14. Like, here's the guys. They were in the room. And yet they decided to leave.

And Jesus said, I need to tell them to that I'm risen up from the dead, that Jesus went and he chased them down no matter how far they ran, no matter how far you run, Jesus is willing to go and find you and open up those scriptures and open up His word and reveal himself and show you his love for you.

And they said to each other, did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us, the scriptures did in our hearts burn that we saw. We felt. We knew something was different. Why? Because they started to open up the very words of God. See, the resurrection proves the Bible, but the Bible proves the resurrection as well.

You say that's circular reason. Take it up with Jesus, because everything in this Bible points to him and they rose, verse 33, in that same hour, and return to Jerusalem. And they found the 11 and those that were with them gathered together, saying, the Lord has risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon. Then he told them what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread.

And if we had more time, you'd see in the very next paragraph than it shows that Jesus Christ himself shows up in that room. So it's like he calls the family back together. They get up, they see Jesus. They now run seven miles back to Jerusalem just now to share the story, the story that they now have a personal experience.

It started with the scriptures. Even with Jesus standing right there, he opened up the scriptures and said, don't believe any other words, but believe these words. And the more that we know these words, the more that we will see Jesus, because he is in every single page. Let me finish this way. I believe he truly is in every single page.

If you want to close your eyes as we start to close up, you can let me just remind you this that in to quote another pastor in Genesis, he's the Word of God creating the heavens and the earth. In Exodus, Jesus is the Passover Lamb, whose blood sprinkled on the door steps of your heart so that you could escape the bonds of slavery and let his.

He's the temple, the holy place where you meet with God. Numbers. He's your ever present guide, your pillar of a cloud by day and pillar by night. In Deuteronomy, he's the prophet coming who is greater than Moses. In Joshua he is a conquering warrior, leading you to the Promised Land and judges. He's a broken savior, rising up to rescue you and Ruth.

He's your kinsman, Redeemer, and first and second Samuel. He's a pure hearted shepherd king who rushed out to face the giants all alone in first and second kings. He's the righteous ruler in first and second Chronicles, he's a restorer of the kingdom in Ezra. He's a faithful scribe. In Nehemiah, he's a builder of the walls. And Esther, he's the advocate, risking his life to restore you into royalty.

In job, he is your living Redeemer and saw him. He's the one who hears your cries in Proverbs. He's wisdom personified. And Ecclesiastes he's the meaning that lets you escape the madness. And song is Solomon. He's a lover and your bridegroom. And as a he's a wonderful counselor, the mighty God, the everlasting father, the Prince of Peace, the wounded for your transgression, and bruised for your iniquities.

In Jeremiah he's the spirit that writes God's laws on our hearts and lamentations. He's a weeping prophet in Ezekiel. He's a river of life, bringing healing to the nations. In Daniel, he's the fourth man in the fire. And Hosea, he's the ever faithful husband pursuing his unfaithful bride. In Joel, he's the restore of all the locals that have eaten in Amos.

He is the burden bearing Obadiah. He's the one who judges the earth in Jonah. He's the prophet cast out to the storm so that you could be brought in. And Micah, he's the everlasting ruler born to us in Bethlehem and mayhem. He's the avengers of God's elect in Habakkuk. The reason to rejoice even when your fields are empty.

And Zephaniah, he's a great reformer in Haggai he's a cleansing fountain. In Zechariah, he's the pierced son whom every eye on earth one day will behold. All of the Old Testament was pointing to the cross. All of the Old Testament was pointing to Jesus. But that's not where the Bible ends, is it? In Matthew, he's the King of the Jews, and Mark, he's the Son of God, and Luke he's a Savior, born to us in the city of David, Christ our Lord.

And John. He's the word became flesh dwelling among us in acts. He is Christ, the risen Lord, proclaiming salvation to the nations. In Romans he's the justifier. In Corinthians, he's the spirit at work in the churches. In Galatians, he's a righteous imputed by faith. In Ephesians, he's a righteous armor. And Philippians is God who meets our every need and gives us joy.

In Colossians, he's the firstborn of all creation. In Thessalonians, he's ascending from heaven, coming to save his church, the one intimacy. He's the one mediator between God and man and Titus. He's a faithful pastor. And Philemon, he's our redeemer in Hebrews. He's our great high priest. And James, he's the life at work of faith. And Peter, he's our living cornerstone in first and second, third John, he's our advocate.

And Jude, he's our God, our Savior, the one who keeps us from stumbling and in revelations. He is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the land slain from the foundation of the world. He's the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

In every single page points to him. And the question then, that I have for you, the question that I have for myself so many times is if all of Scripture points to Jesus, why isn't my life also point to him? If every single page, every single word is about Jesus, can I make every single moment, every single breath of mine also about Jesus?

The only way that you can do that is by reading the letter that he wrote the living, the letter that he wrote for us. Let's take a minute. Spend time with the Lord.

For some of us, we need to get back in His word. Every head out bowed, every eye closed. If you need practical help, our team here has done a great job at providing resources. Every single week you can go to life. That's going to be some scripture resources up there as well, that you can start to get right back into the Word of God.

Father, we love you. Lord. You have been so good to us. You have given us more than what we deserve. That you wrote us a book, a letter, Lord, you could have left us on our own. But yet your love is shown so wonderfully. Lord, I wouldn't know about your mercy if it wasn't for this book. I wouldn't know about your love if it wasn't for this book.

Lord, help us be people, the Word of God, that this is the air that we breathe, the bread that we eat. Lord, that if you take everything else but we just have your word, that's more than enough. We love you, Lord. Let's take another minute. After the service, some of our prayer team will be around as well. You can pray with them.

Let's take a minute before we close out our service today.