On this third Sunday of Easter, we hear Luke’s version of Jesus appearing to his disciples after his resurrection.
This year, I find Luke’s version particularly helpful, because we live in an age of confusion.
We live in an age in which we are bombarded with information, but what is true? And in the confusion, we sometimes have trouble keeping track of who we are. So by default we accept various broad definitions that society says defines us—the color of our skin, our political party, our religion, where we live, and the list goes on and on. Sometimes we buy completely into our identities, so sure of ourselves that we end up losing any freedom we might have had to grow and change. Or we are so busy rejecting our identities that we end up empty, having no idea how to fill the resulting void of meaning. Who am I? I don’t know!
We also get mixed up about who God is. What is really true about God? We can never know God completely in this lifetime, but the more we want to know about God, the more that God will reveal to us. But just when we think we know who God is, something happens to shake up the comfortable but incomplete identities we tend to assign to God.
Luke is the gospel writer who reminds us that turning to scripture when we are confused is a great idea!
Scripture is an entryway into God. Scripture tells us who God is, who Jesus is, who the Holy Spirit is, and who we are. Scripture is the story of God’s love for all from the very beginning.
On the road to Emmaus in Luke’s gospel, the two disciples discuss all that had happened in Jerusalem when Jesus was crucified, and who they thought Jesus was—the Messiah—but he’s been dead three days—now they’ve heard from the women that the tomb is empty, and that angels told the women that Jesus was alive.
These two men are so confused! If Jesus was the Messiah, how could he have been put to death? How could he possibly be alive if he had died on a cross and been laid in a grave?
And so as they walk along, Jesus himself walks up beside them and asks them what they are talking about. Jesus interprets to the two the things about himself in the scriptures, going all the way back to Moses and all the prophets.
The two disciples finally realize who Jesus is when they sit down at the table with him at the inn that night, and he takes the bread and blesses it and breaks it and gives it to them.
Then, when these two rush back to tell the others that they have indeed seen the risen Lord, and all of the disciples are talking together, Jesus shows up in his resurrection body and again, he reminds them all, just as he had the two disciples earlier, of all he taught them about himself in scripture when he was alive. Jesus opened their minds to understand the scriptures, Luke says.
Jesus reminds the disciples that through what they ALREADY know from scripture, they know who God is. They know who Jesus is, their risen Lord, and they know who they are, and who they are becoming. And they are now the witnesses to what scripture says.
To us Christians, scripture is the most helpful to us when we read it as Jesus is asking the disciples to do, and that is through the lens of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus himself.
Sometimes people will say, “I don’t know where to even start with this Bible. It’s confusing.”
So pick up the Bible with the intention of learning more about God, more about Jesus, and more about yourself.
Come to scripture with an open and prayerful mind, wondering what it is that God wants to say to you through the words you are about to read. When something is unclear, pray over the words and ask for God’s guidance.
I think that the best place to start reading the Bible is with the gospels themselves. The word gospel, after all, means Good News, and starting with good news is a good idea.
I’d start with Luke’s gospel. Luke writes his gospel specifically for Theophilus (that name means ‘lover of God’) so that Theophilus may know the truth concerning the things about which he has already been instructed.” Since Acts is a continuation of Luke, I’d go ahead and read Acts, because Acts is the story of what happened when the Holy Spirit came and the early Christians took the good news of Jesus out from Jerusalem into the rest of the world.
Then I’d go back and read the other gospels. I’d probably read John next, then Mark, and save Matthew for last, always reading with the intention of learning more about God, Jesus, and my own life—who I am and who I am becoming.
In the Old Testament, I’d start with the Psalms. The Psalms give us a good profile of God, and God’s love for us. And the Psalms are unvarnished, covering every human emotion, including the ones we’d be ashamed to admit having. Sooner or later, you will read a psalm and think, “Whoever wrote that knows exactly how I’m feeling right now.”
The gospels and the psalms together do a good job of bringing God’s love to life in so many visible and understandable ways.
As we read scripture we also start finding out who we are—as today’s reading from I John says, “Beloved, we are God’s children now, what we will be has not yet been revealed.”
As God’s children, we are growing in God’s love. As the epistle writer says, “What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is.” To have this hope of growth in God, to become more like Jesus every day, then encourages us to “purify” ourselves, because Jesus is pure.
Through his study of scripture, Martin Luther became convinced that the Church had strayed from God’s message of love, forgiveness and redemption. Martin Luther’s reading of scripture during a very confusing time in his own life helped him to learn more about himself, that instead of being a hopeless miserable sinner, he was a beloved child of God, and that he did not need to buy or earn his way into God’s favor, because God’s grace through Jesus Christ made Martin Luther worthy to stand before God. Five hundred years ago, on April 17th, Martin Luther made this famous statement when he refused to recant what he had written that took the church to task. Luther said, “I am bound by the Scriptures I have quoted and my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and will not recant anything, since it is neither safe nor right to go against conscience. May God help me. Amen.”
Scripture contains in it the directions for living in a way that will please God and bring you joy and peace, even when your life is falling apart around you, as Martin Luther’s life seemed to be falling apart when he was excommunicated from the church and labeled as a heretic and had to go into hiding. But even though he was not free to move around safely, Martin Luther, because of what he had learned from his study of scripture, was a free and joyful man, because he was no longer separated from God’s love out of the fear of his own imperfections.
Scripture helps us to identify the things in our lives that are keeping us separated from God and one another. Following the example of Jesus helps us to get our lives back into sync with God.
Although we may read scripture in solitude, the study of scripture is ultimately a team sport.
Jesus tells all the disciples, not just one disciple, that they are all witnesses to the Good News.
We are all witnesses to the good news. Not just one of us—but all of us! Jesus wants us all to go out and proclaim the good news.
So as we prepare to proclaim the good news, we study scripture together. We study together so that we can correct one another, encourage one another, learn from one another, and be inspired by one another.
And then we can help one another along as we proclaim the Good News that Jesus brings to all of creation. Scripture teaches us about forgiveness, reconciliation, God’s love for us, and our love for one another as beloved children of God! Knowing scripture helps us to speak proficiently in God’s language of love as we share the Good News.
Jesus himself stands among us today, for he said that when two or three of us are gathered together in his name, there he will be in the midst of us. And just as he did on that day of resurrection, as he came to the disciples, if we will listen, we can hear him speak to us even now through scripture, as he opens our minds to his word and his love, and sets our confusions aside and gives us his peace.