The gospel reading for today - Easter 3 - was the familiar story of the road to Emmaus. Two disconsolate disciples leave Jerusalem and meet someone on the road, who asks “What are you discussing with each other while you walk along?” “Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?” one replies, and tells of the execution of Jesus of Nazareth, whom they had thought was "the one to redeem Israel." Still, some women had claimed that his tomb was empty... The stranger responds “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?” He goes on to interpret the scriptures explaining why this should be so.
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 they sit down over food, and as he breaks bread they recognize him - and he vanishes. “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road," they say to each other, "while he was opening the scriptures to us?” and return to Jerusalem to report whom they had seen, which is why Luke, telling the story, lets us in on it from the start: "Jesus himself came near and went with them, but their eyes were kept from recognizing him." That somewhat spoils the surprise, but presumably that's how they reported it too, "we met Jesus!" rather than "we met someone who turned out to be him."
It's a great story, and has produced remarkable art juggling these points of view, the moment when, in the blessing and breaking of the bread, the disciples see Jesus - just before he vanishes again from their view. (Or perhaps a servant woman recognizes him before they do.) But hearing the story again today I was caught by the words from earlier in the story. “Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.” Years ago, perhaps even before the fall of the wall, I was in Berlin and was struck by the words inscribed over the door of a Protestant church, words I remember as "verweil mit uns, denn es will dunkel werden." Along the way I must have worked out where these words came from but I don't think I quite worked out that they are addressed to Jesus but unawares. The disciples' hearts are burning and they have heard of the empty tomb, but cannot yet believe. The person they invite to stay with them is, so far as they can at that point imagine, just another person, though one whose reading of the scriptures gives them hope, a solitary traveler they invite into their company. Their words from just before they understood, not Luke's - or Jesus'. Human, profound.
