April 26th, 2020: Jesus In-Between

Now on that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, and talking with each other about all these things that had happened.  While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, but their eyes were kept from recognizing him.  And he said to them, “What are you discussing with each other while you walk along?” They stood still, looking sad.  Then one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?” He asked them, “What things?” They replied, “The things about Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be condemned to death and crucified him. But 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 took place. Moreover, some women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning, and when they did not find his body there, they came back and told us that they had indeed 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 they did not see him.” Then he said to them, “Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?” Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures. As they came near the village to which they were going, he walked ahead as if he were going on. But they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.” So he went in to stay with them. When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them.  Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight.  They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?”  That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together.  They were saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!”  Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.

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Are you a morning person or a night owl?

I’m morning, all the way. I’m almost always the first person awake at my house, and I love those moments somewhere between night and day. Usually I’m up before the birds, so I’ll get up, make myself a cup of coffee, and sit in God’s presence for a bit. I often use those solitary moments that follow to do some writing, my sermon or more recently my daily devotional thoughts. Then the birds begin to sing, harbingers of the daylight to come.

This week Kitty Mann told me of a story she heard on the news about songbirds during this pandemic. As the world has grown quiet as humans have huddled in our homes from Cairo to Clearwater, ornithologists suspect that birds may be singing a little more, even changing their tunes, singing a new song. What a fascinating development in this in-between time—this liminal space between what was and what is yet to come.

We stand in the threshold between what has been and what is yet to come. We are not the first people to be living in an in-between time.

Today we heard a story about a couple of individuals who find themselves in between Jerusalem and Emmaus, but in the curious space between Jesus’ crucifixion, death and burial, and experiencing the risen Lord. It’s still Easter Sunday in this story from the Gospel of Luke. And in Luke’s telling, Mary Magdalene and several other women go to the tomb at dawn to tend Jesus’ body. They find the stone rolled away from the empty tomb, and two angels appear telling them that Jesus has risen. And while it’s pretty remarkable that these women encounter two angels and have a whole conversation, they do not encounter the risen Lord personally, in Luke’s telling of the story.

So later on that same day, two disciples are walking seven miles to Emmaus when they meet up with a curious stranger along the way. One of the disciples’ is named “Cleopas,” and the other is unnamed—perhaps Luke leaves the other disciple unnamed as an invitation for us to imagine ourselves as the unnamed disciple?

Part of what makes this stranger so, well, strange, is that he doesn’t seem to know anything of the biggest news in Jerusalem, that Jesus of Nazareth had been turned over to the Romans and executed. You and Cleopas “had hoped”—in other words, your hope is gone, crushed—you are hopeless. This stranger appears to know nothing of these events. It would be like running into someone who was unaware of coronavirus. “Where have you been? Hiding under a rock? (Who is this weirdo?)”

The journey from one place to another continues, and the stranger opens up the scriptures to you, teaching you and Cleopas deep truths about the Messiah. And when the day is growing short and the two of you arrive at your destination, the curious companion appears to be travelling on. You urge him to join you, and he does.

Let’s stop here for just a moment. Let’s stop before the story resolves, as all stories do. Let’s allow ourselves to stay in the tension, between unknowing and knowing, between death and resurrection, between hopelessness and hopefulness.

It’s difficult—the in-between. Between the almost nearly but not quite hardly.

Like, remember those awkward years between childhood and adulthood? I have a 12-year-old at my house. He’s not a child, exactly, as he towers six inches over his mama. But he’s not yet a teenager. Lanky and awkward with feet still too big for his body. Sometimes I look at him and can almost see a man. At other times he’s a little boy who needs his mama. The in-between.

Maybe you’ve been in-between homes, like my family was when we first came to Florida. Most of our possessions were in a pod in a warehouse full of identical pods. We were in a temporary space that wasn’t quite vacation and not quite home.

Maybe you’ve been in-between jobs. Nearly 15 years ago, I left my campus ministry position when Southern Baptists and I decided we’d had enough of each other. I didn’t have another position lined up. It was the Fall, when UPS hires additional staff for the Christmas season. So I applied, and got a temporary position as a driver’s assistant, dropping off packages to speed things up for the driver. So I went to my training, got my brown uniform with the sexy brown shorts, and awaited my assignment. They never called. Ha! They took one look at me and said, “Nah.” I remained in-between.

Our world is in-between. I am convinced that going forward, we’ll mark time by “pre-corona” and “post-corona.” We do that to some degree with 9/11—sometimes you’ll hear people say, “Before 9/11 . . .” What else will be different? We somehow grasp that things are forever changed, but in the in-between, it’s hard to say just what it’s going to look like when we get there.

And let me just pause here for a moment—it’s OK to feel sad or scared or a little down in the in-between. Please allow me to normalize those feelings for you. At times I’ve been sad and scared and a little down too. Because I’m human. And you’re human. And the disciples on the road to Emmaus were human too and had given up hope.

But here’s what I know, and what we must keep in mind when we’re sad or scared or a little down: all stories resolve. Maybe not in the way we hope or expect. But we will not be in-between forever.

Back to the story.

So the curious stranger joins you and Cleopas for dinner. He takes bread, blesses it, breaks it and offers it to you and bam! You recognize the curious stranger as Jesus, risen from the dead! He vanishes, and everything becomes crystal clear in retrospect. “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?” Duh!

I don’t know how long our uncomfortable in-between will last or just how uncomfortable it might become for some as we hold out hope for a vaccine or an effective treatment or herd immunity or an economic recovery.

But I know that all stories resolve, even the story that we’re living at this moment. But until that day comes, however it comes, know this: Jesus walks with us in the in-between, whether we recognize him or not.

And maybe, just maybe, if you listen real closely, you might even hear it—there is a new song rising up out of the in-between.