This phrase described Cleopas and his companion (wife) as they walked the seven mile journey from Jerusalem to the village of Emmaus on the afternoon of resurrection Sunday. (Their story is the primary resurrection story in the gospel of Luke, Luke 24:13-35.) As they walked along, discussing all that had happened, Jesus joined them ... but they did not recognize him. "Their eyes were kept from recognizing him."
The text does not tell us what kept their eyes from recognizing him. The story guides our speculation: the mind-numbing shock of Jesus' crucifixion, their heart-wrenching grief over Jesus' death, their crushed hopes and disorienting disappointment, their struggle to make sense of the women's vision about angels, their speculations about the missing body, their questions about how to rebuild their lives without the hope Jesus stirred in their hearts (24:18-24). The story doesn't tell us what blinded them to Jesus' presence. It simply relates the fact. Jesus was present but they did not recognize him.
While the story does not tell us what kept them from recognizing Jesus, it does emphasize their lack of understanding of scripture. Three times, the text speaks of Jesus helping them understand his suffering and death in light of the teaching of scripture (24:25-27, 32, 44-47). Perhaps that lack of understanding was the blinding factor. They had not expected him to be crucified. Thus, when he was killed, they didn't expect to see him again. They thought of him as dead, not alive.
It seems to me, their experience reflects our experience. Their story is our story.
We, like them, do not recognize Jesus because we, like them, do not understand the truth of scripture. We misread scripture. We read through the lens of what we already believe. In doing so, we naturally look for what we already believe, using scripture to validate how we think. This way of reading scripture puts God "on our side" and makes us "right." It leaves us unchanged. We also read scripture through me-oriented lens. We interpret it from how we want things to be or how we believe things should be. That's how the disciples interpreted what the scriptures said about the messiah. This way of reading scripture makes us the ultimate authority. It creates God in our image.
This way of reading and understanding scripture is normal. But while it is normal, it creates a major problem: it blinds us to God. We miss God just as the disciples we kept from recognizing Jesus. We miss God's presence just as the disciples did not recognize Jesus' presence. We miss God's work just as the disciples did not recognize what God was doing in Jesus' death and resurrection.
If we are to recognize Jesus, a different way of reading and understanding scripture is needed.
That different way of reading and understanding scripture, the Emmaus story reminds us, comes through revelation. In the story, Jesus taught Cleopas and his companion the scriptures. In our stories, we are taught by the Spirit (1 Corinthians 2:10-13). The Spirit uses scripture to teach us the things Jesus taught (John 14:25-26). As a result of the Spirit's teaching, our thinking is transformed. It reflects the ways of God (what Paul called "the mind of Christ," Philippians 2:5). And our lives are transformed. They reflect the grace and forgiveness of Jesus, the servant spirit of Christ.
The Emmaus story ends with the statement "then their eyes were opened and they recognized him" (Luke 24:31). May our eyes be opened so that, in recognizing Jesus, our lives may be shaped by him.
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