April 19, 2026
Easter 3, Year A
Luke 24:13-35
Epiphany, Winnipeg
“On that day two of them were walking along the road, talking about the things that had happened these past few days.”
Every year on Good Friday there is a walk through downtown Saskatoon, where Val and I used to live, that follows the fourteen stations of the cross. There were hundreds of people,bmaybe close to a thousand sometimes, I’m not sure, and we would go on a long walk, with a cross being carried and leading the way up front. We stopped along the way at places like the courthouse, a food bank, an MLA’s office, a youth drop-in…and at each place we’d read a piece of the Good Friday story, and we’d pray, and we’d sing. It was sometimes touching, sometimes kind of kitschy. I’d often go along, sometimes just to follow the path and more often to join with other university chaplains in leading the prayer and the singing at one station or another. It was kind of obvious what we were doing. We all knew the story well, we knew where it was going and where it would end, and what would be happening three days later.
I thought this week that maybe there should be a walk on Easter Sunday afternoon. We could call it an Emmaus journey. It wouldn’t have to be very organized. We could just call people together, maybe at 4:00. We’d start at one place and set off for a location about ten kilometres away. It wouldn’t need anything planned, and nobody would stop to pray and we wouldn’t need
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someone up front leading us or a police escort to stop traffic. We could all just walk or roll or push or pull our way along, and talk about what had happened earlier that day. Most of us would have heard something in the morning or late the night before about Jesus being risen. In a crowd of a hundred or a crowd of dozens, there would be some people who would be all Easter-excited, because Easter can be like that. There would be some skeptics who wondered what it all means or if it even really happened. Some people might have a sugar buzz from all that chocolate, there might be a few pastors and priests who would rather be at home having a nap after the last weekend’s worship schedule.
We would all just move along and talk about the day. No doubt we’d talk about other things in life, like work or spring or school or relationships or what we watched on Netflix last night. If you were travelling with someone you knew well you might talk deeply about joys or sorrows. There would be someone walking through the crowd, coming up to random people to ask what we’re talking about. Some of us might say, “Hey, I think that’s supposed to be Jesus.” Some of us would enjoy the questions, and some of us would probably think it’s weird that a random stranger just walked up and started talking to us. Then, when got to where we were going, right around nightfall, someone would call out to get the crowd’s attention, and they’d say a prayer, and break a loaf of bread, and there’d be bread passed around, and maybe we’d think that that’s just like Jesus, and then we’d all go home. Maybe tell someone what happened as we travelled together on the road that afternoon.
3 On that same day, that first Easter, two of the group of Jesus’ followers were walking along the road to Emmaus. It’s the day of Jesus’ resurrection, the day when some women went and found an empty tomb, the day when the women told the disciples but the disciples couldn't believe that Jesus was alive…on that same day two of the group were walking away from Jerusalem to a town called Emmaus.
They can’t stop talking about what a hard week it’s been and what a strange day it’s been. Then Jesus joins them and asks them what they’re talking about along the way. When he asks, they just stop walking and go quiet for awhile. They don’t know it’s Jesus; as Luke puts it, “their eyes were kept from recognizing him.” But his simple question stops them cold. Now they can’t just keep moving. They have to stop and ponder awhile.
Did you notice that line right in the middle there? “While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, but their eyes were kept from recognizing him.” These two are getting the best Easter sermon anyone could ever get, right there when Easter itself was only a few hours old, and the risen Jesus was only a few hours old, but they just can’t see him. They don’t recognize him….and it’s not their fault.
I missed that detail before. Their eyes were kept from seeing him. We rolled that around at Bible Study the other night, and we never quite answered our own questions about what that might mean: Their eyes were kept from recognizing Jesus. We didn’t find a definitive answer, but maybe the point is just that they didn’t understand what was going on, and it wasn’t their fault. Right at the start of this new story, this new story that has called us to get together like this for two thousand years, things aren’t always clear, and we see two of our own who can talk and talk about what’s happened but still find it hard to see the risen Jesus on the road with them. Sometimes we can can talk and talk about what’s happened but find it hard to see the risen Jesus on the road with us. That’s just part of what it is to be human, and to be people of faith, and to be the church together. Sometimes we just don’t know.
Sometimes we don’t know where God is in all this or maybe sometimes we even wonder if God is…in these strange and difficult times. And you know, it’s a kind of comfort to hear that it was like that right from the start, with those disciples who were some of the first to be with the risen Jesus. Even they didn’t recognize Jesus, they were kept from recognizing him, and it wasn’t their fault. Maybe it just wasn’t their time to know yet. If it feels sometimes like you just don’t know, it’s not your fault. If you can’t see Jesus on the road with you, it’s not your fault.
And that’s OK, because even if we don’t know it, Jesus does walk the way with us.
Jesus’ walking partners do recognize him soon enough. He walks with them and talks with them, and when he sits down and breaks a loaf of bread with them, they suddenly see who it is! But then he disappears. And that too is what our life of faith is like. Sometimes there’s a high point where everything makes sense and we see what’s going on. But the high point doesn’t always last, or maybe it doesn’t ever last, and more often than not, we’re just trying to figure it out and find our way in the world.
Figure it out and find our way when it’s a challenge and it’s tiring.
Figure it out and find our way when we know we’ll be changed but we’re afraid of what that might mean.
Figure it out and find our way when it’s dangerous or frightening and we just wish we could get away.
Find our way when everything seems to be going well, and there’s joy all around.
Figuring it out and finding our way towards social justice, or toward an uncertain future, or towards healing our relationships.
And Jesus walks with us on that way.
Our life together is kind of walking together along the road, sometimes talking about what’s happened, agreeing or disagreeing, sometimes really busy and sure our direction is clear, or sometimes stopping and being silent…but always being on the way together.
In this life of faith the point is not that we figure everything out, because God has figured it out already on a cross and an empty tomb. And now we just try to work out what that means in our life together and our life in the world. We aren’t really given all the answers; instead we’re given a gift; a gift that says we don’t need to cling desperately to a clear moment or a crisp understanding or some kind of certainty. A gift that says that it’s OK – it’s normal, it’s even faithful - that we seek and wonder and sometimes really don’t know.
And we’re given the gift of a community that forms while we travel along the way. People come and go, weave in and out of the group, staying on the way with us forever or staying on the way for a few days then walking the way with another. But there’s always someone else on the road with us. We’re called together into this; even to be unsure together. Then to pause and break bread together. At a communion table, or at a dinner table like those two on the road with Jesus. And the broken bread is enough to sustain us along the way.
Who’s on the road with you? Is it just you? A friend? Two friends? Just us? The whole neighbourhood? Walking down Dalhousie together? Who’s on the road with us? Which one’s Jesus? Sometimes we just don’t know. But Jesus is on the road with us, on the way with us. When it’s all clear. Or when it’s not so clear. We walk together. The time will come when we’ll see clearly. And while we wander along, we’ll stop to break bread. While we wander along, always, Jesus is there. We’ll see.