Faith In An Empty Box

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade--kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. --1 Peter 1:3-5

 

A little boy born with Down syndrome attended his Sunday School class faithfully each week. As you can expect, the other children did not readily accept the boy because he seemed different.

 

The Sunday after Resurrection Sunday, their teacher brought in small boxes--one for each child. The children were told to go outside, under supervision, and were asked to find some symbols of new life, and put them in their boxes. So the children ran wildly throughout the property looking for something to fill their boxes.

Once they returned to the classroom, they began to share their discoveries with the class. One by one they opened their boxes to show flowers, butterflies, leaves, and more. Each time the class would "ooh" and "ahh."

 

Then the child with Down syndrome opened his box to reveal nothing inside. The children exclaimed, "That's stupid! It's not fair! He didn't do the assignment right!"

The little boy exclaimed, "I did so do it! It's empty...because the tomb where Jesus laid was found empty!"

 

If Jesus had not risen from the dead, our faith would be foolish and fake. But He did rise from death, confirming His life and His message. The resurrection of Jesus is the basis for our hope of glorious life eternal beyond the grave and equally important a new life of significance and super abundance even before reach our grave.But the fact is – our hope is based on an empty box!

Beloved, we find it difficult to understand and respond to something “empty” especially when according to our understanding we expected to contain something of significance. So did Jesus’s disciples when they were given the news of the “tomb being empty”. Mankind seems to be more naturally drawn to despair than hope.

Have you ever noticed that some of the saddest words in our language begin with the letter D? For example, disappointment, doubt, disillusionment, defeat, discouragement, despondency, depression, despair and death.

Controversial movie producer Woody Allen once gave the commencement address at Yale University. He said the following: "Our civilization stands at the crossroads. Down one road is despondency and despair. Down the other road is total annihilation. I hope we'll take the right road." Woody Allen was obviously trying to be funny, but his statement reflects the despair and pessimism of our times.

Disappointment, doubt, disillusionment, defeat, discouragement, despair and death - all of these words sum up how two of Jesus’s disciples were feeling as they trudged up the road toward Emmaus. Probably that day, late Sunday afternoon they had left the downhearted and confused band of disciples who were afraid and bewildered over what had happened to Jesus on Good Friday. The two men, as they travelled along, were also sad and disillusioned.

The Master they had loved and followed had been horribly put to death – a cruel and degrading death on a cross. Jesus had been made a public spectacle, exposed to the jeers of all who passed by. Only a week before, their hopes had risen to fever pitch when the excited crowds welcomed their Master waving palm branches and shouting ‘hosanna’. But now Jesus lay dead in a sealed tomb. Their hopes were dashed; the dream was over!

But when they thought it was all over, the climax was yet to come and drive them into a whirlpool of perplexity from the report of the women when they get to know this morning that Jesus’s tomb is empty!

Even that didn’t raise their spirits; it only confused them even more. The two despondent disciples walking the road to Emmaus summed up the situation very neatly when they said, "We had hoped that He would be the one who was going to set Israel free!" – Luke 24: 21

Human hope is a fragile thing, and when it withers, it’s difficult to revive. We need to note the number of people who take their own life because despair and discouragement have sucked the last bit of hope out of their lives. Sometimes it almost becomes impossible to hope for recovery. You may even be afraid to hope because you believe that couldn’t to cope with another letdown. Emptiness can be dangerous.

"We had hoped …" said Cleopas and his friend had said. They were saying, "We don’t expect it now, but once we did. We had high hopes for the future, but now those hopes are gone and all we have left is disappointment." Can you identify with the feelings of these two disciples in any way? For each of us the cause of feeling down might be different, but it would be a rare person indeed who could claim that they were not affected by any of those D words - disappointment, doubt, disillusionment, defeat, discouragement, depression, despondency or despair.

As the two men walked along, a Stranger joined them. This was going to be the most significant walk in their whole lives. The Stranger asked them what they were discussing. And so they poured out their story to someone who seemed willing to listen. They tell the Stranger all about their hopes and their disappointments. The last thing they needed was a brisk "cheer up" talk, or being told to "snap out of it". He simply provides a listening ear. As the three men talk of their misery and disappointment, the Stranger walks with them. We know today that the Stranger was Jesus.

Isn’t that a great picture – Jesus walking along the road with His despondent and confused disciples sharing their troubles? Suddenly this 2,000-year-old story is brought into the present. When disappointment, doubt, disillusionment, defeat, discouragement, despondency, depression, and despair fill our lives, Jesus is the unseen "Stranger" walking alongside us, listening to us, and if we are willing to hear his voice, revealing Himself to us. He’s not too much in a hurry to make His presence felt. He wants to give you time to share your heart and then He will have His moment with you.

As Cleopas and his friend talked about the cross, their bewilderment and sorrow, Jesus reassured them and helped them. How did he do it? He pointed them to what God says in the Bible. Luke tells us, "Jesus explained to them what was said about himself in all the Scriptures, beginning with the books of Moses and the writings of all the prophets". Jesus must have given the Emmaus travellers the best ever lesson on the Old Testament, reminding them how sin came into the world through the disobedience of Adam and Eve, and how the prophets foreshadowed a saviour who would be obedient even to the point of death. He may have reminded them of Abraham - how he almost sacrificed his son - and how the heavenly Father did sacrifice his Son for the sin of all people. No doubt, he would have referred to Isaiah’s description of the Suffering Servant of God who "was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities" (Isaiah 53). It’s not that these men hadn’t read their Bibles, but that their understanding was clouded by the idea that the Messiah would come with glory and power and rain down fire on their enemies.

John 20: 8 – 9 So the other disciple who had first come to the tomb then also entered, and he saw and believed. For as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that He must rise again from the dead.

You see, Scriptures are not limited, our understanding is. So we only go as far as we understand. We are unwilling to step into the unknown. So many a times what we think is emptiness maybe a place or moment of immense significance and we need the Risen Lord to journey with us graciously to open our minds, further our understanding and take us beyond where we have ever been.

The two-hour walk to Emmaus must have seemed like five minutes. The two disciples could feel the despondency and sorrow they felt in their hearts change into understanding and hope as the "stranger" explained that Jesus’ death was a part of God's great plan of salvation.

When disillusionment, depression and defeat dominate our lives, Jesus walks with us just as He walked with the two men on the road to Emmaus. He points us to God's Word of promise in the Bible that tells us again that we are God's dearly loved children and that He will stand by us through thick and thin. He turns our despair into hope.

Afternoon turned to evening and then evening into night. The two disciples asked the "Stranger" to stop with them for the night and at the evening meal he "took the bread, and said the blessing; then he broke the bread and gave it to them". Suddenly it dawned on them who the stranger was. It was their Master raised from the dead. Jesus himself had ministered to them in their sadness. Now they knew why a change had come over them as they walked on the road. They now knew why their despondent hearts had been changed to hearts filled with hope and renewed faith. Jesus had revealed himself to them in His Word and through the sacrament.

I can imagine Cleopas and his friend standing in amazement; perhaps embracing in great joy, asking each other, "Wasn't it like a fire burning in us when he talked to us on the road and explained the Scriptures to us?" Their world had come together. They had experienced something precious and powerful of the grace of God. Because of His love for his despondent disciples, graciously Jesus came and met them on the road to Emmaus. Graciously He cleared away the fog of confusion; He showed to them the heart of God and His plan of salvation, and finally He revealed himself to them – He was alive, risen from the dead.

At the moment the "Stranger" reveals who he was, He vanishes from their sight. But He has not gone; He is still visible to those who have the eyes of faith.

The road to Emmaus is a symbol of the Christian life. This story is about despair. It is a story about meeting a Stranger, hearing his words of comfort, sitting down at table and sharing a meal. This is story about the meaning of Resurrection Sunday for us. It enables us to see that our risen Lord gives hope and joy, when all we see is disappointment, discouragement and despair. It enables us to see the world around us not as stinking tomb, a place of death, decay, and defeat, but as a place waiting, groaning toward God's final victory.

The change that took place has been described like this.
"Their lives prior to this moment were like a smouldering fire that gives no light, just smoke to cloud things up. But once they came into the presence of the Risen Lord their hearts were ablaze! A burning fire gives light for all to see, and they saw, understood and believed! All because of the Risen Lord! Jesus’ victory became their restoring hope. It became the anchor of their lives" (author unknown).

If you are walking the Emmaus road right now or when you will walk it in the future with those sad Ds - disappointment, doubt, disillusionment, defeat, discouragement, despondency, depression, and despair – let’s remember we are not walking alone. The unseen "Stranger", the risen Jesus is walking with us.

When our Emmaus road is filled with discouragement and despair, let’s walk it with Jesus. Walking with Jesus, our road will become a great highway of companionship, conversation, belief and hope.