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This wraps of our series on the Emmaus Road which has been a post-Easter story to prepare us for Holy Week. The call of this sermon is to “wake up” to the reality of Easter every morning. To live as followers of Jesus is to be mindful of both the cosmic and street level (the day-to-day-to-week-to-lifetime) ramifications of the empty grave. This is a call to wake up to what Jesus is doing - not just on the pages of Scripture or in the Sunday sermon, but in our classes, jobs, and conversations – not building compartments with our lives, but yielding to the Lordship of Jesus in every part of our lives. This Kingdom oriented life is available to everyone, everywhere, all the time. For the two on the road to Emmaus, their encounter with Jesus led to open eyes, burning hearts, and running feet as they could’t wait to share the good news of a risen Savior. What difference does Easter make in your life today? What does it look like to be Easter Monday people? Spoken word piece by Samara Norris, produced by Tate Kirgiss

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Who is Jesus? This is a recurring question that people ask Jesus and Jesus repeatedly asked others during his ministry. The Bible says that how we answer this question determines our destiny. To find life-changing hope, it says we must come to know Jesus as the disciples did: as the risen Lord. Throughout the last 2,000 years Christians have all ended up saying the same thing, no matter what culture or time period they lived in: “Jesus Christ is Lord.” While we must answer the question “who do you say that Jesus is?” our passage encourages us to ask “what does Jesus say about us?” And we find that he defines two problems in us: how foolish you are, he says, and how slow of heart to believe. We have a problem with our minds (foolishness) and a problem with our hearts (slowness, unbelief). In this sermon we reflect on how these problems play out in our interpretation of life and discover how Jesus addresses this and gives us a new interpretation. In the end, we cannot think or believe our way to him, but rather he comes to us and opens our minds and enlivens our hearts.

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Luke 24:5-8, 13-35, 44-45;
Matthew 21:10; 16:15;
Mark 4:41; 8:29;
Luke 5:21; 7:49; 9:20;
John 12:34-35;
Philippians 3:18;
Isaiah 55:9.

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On the day of his resurrection, Jesus joins two disciples on the road to Emmaus, but they don’t recognize Him. As Jesus engaged with them the disciples are “sad” with “faces downcast” because Jesus had been crucified and his body was no longer in the tomb. They had hoped Jesus was the one to redeem Israel. Throughout his ministry Jesus often asked people what they wanted, encouraging them to get in touch with their desires. God knows what we want and He invites us to communicate our desires to Him. As we walk with and trust Him, God loves to give us good gifts (Matthew 7:7-11 & Psalm 37). So, it is important for us to be aware of our hopes and desires and tell our good Father in heaven about them. When our hopes are dashed or go unfulfilled it’s especially important that we turn to God in lament (Psalm 13).

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Luke 24:17-24

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On The Emmaus Road: 7 Mile Walk This is the introduction to our sermon series out of Luke 24; a post-Easter story to prepare us for Easter. “Walking,” as a metaphor for the spiritual journey one takes with God and His people, is a thread that runs throughout Scripture. As Christians are prone to do, especially in our culture, many have turned the ‘Christian walk’ into an unhealthy kind of works-based assessment so that the question, “How’s your walk with Christ” inflicts anxiety and shame if the present walk is presently difficult or promotes spiritual pride and self-righteousness if we can check all the appropriate boxes of a “successful Christian.” Masks and trophies have, unfortunately, tarnished and blurred this awesome metaphor, so we hope to reclaim and restore it a bit over these next few weeks, because it is the essence of life with Father, Son, and Spirit. In Luke 24, the Resurrected Jesus joins a 7-mile walk with a couple of His followers. This is a story about encountering Jesus: They encountered Jesus on the road. They encountered Jesus through Scripture. They encountered Jesus in the midst of their grief and confusion. They encountered Jesus through a simple meal around the table. They encountered Jesus through walking with Jesus. The invitation for these next few weeks is for us to find ourselves in the story, to be attentive as we walk with others, and to encounter the risen Christ in a whole new way.

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In a culture of hyper-individualism, Christ is building His Church, His House. In Ephesians 4, Paul shifts to the metaphor of Christ’s Body and implores the church to be unified; not for unity’s sake, but as a preview, a foretaste, a sample of God’s revealed mystery, His plan of bringing everything together in Christ. We are one in Christ, but each member has a distinctive role that contributes to the health and mission of the whole Body. As the Body of Christ, we carry the fruit of the Spirit, things like humility and gentleness, patience and forbearance that allow us to maintain unity and, together build up the church, making disciples who make disciples. “God is gathering a people who, moving beyond their own self-oriented inclinations, are learning to love one another as Christ has loved us.” - Woodward and White

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A people of commission, sent out to be a Kingdom outpost of the Spirit. Ephesians 5:8-9 “For once you were full of darkness, but now you have light from the Lord. So live as people of light! For this light within you produces only what is good and right and true.” This is third part of a series we are calling Reframing Church which explores the identity and purpose, function and mission of the church as a whole, and specifically the Campus House community. In chapters 4 & 5 of Ephesians, Paul describes the contrast between the old life of darkness and the new life of light in Jesus. He moves from the inside out, from mindset to relationships. This is a calling to live as People of the Light, exposing the darkness with the truth and grace of Jesus, bringing transformation and impacting the culture with the lived Gospel of Christ. We also talked about the theology of place that gives a new intentionality with how a building can be used to further the mission of the church (as opposed to a consumer driven sequestering from society and culture) which served as a segue to reveal plans for a new House. *Find out more at reframingthehouse.com. “Rather than just inflate the church with people coming from the world, it is equally important to inflate the world with people coming from the church. We must make an impact for the gospel among people for whom coming to church would be the last stop on their list. Suppose for a moment that Christians saw it as their mission in life not merely to be good churchgoing people, but light bearers, grace mongers, and peddlers of hope to a dark, screwy world.” - Rick Bundshuh

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