Luke 24:30–35 ‘They asked each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?”’ (v32)
God’s Easter promise is that He’s always with us. We so often struggle to find Him, just like these two downcast disciples. Leaving Jerusalem, they carry deep disappointment, and unknowingly begin to walk away from God. Yet, Jesus doesn’t let them slip away that easily. Accompanying them, He shares from God’s Word, even though they struggle to understand what He says. Like us, these truths can prove senseless whilst caught up in life’s demands, especially when it battles to pass through the filters of our confused emotions. Learning to separate our thoughts and feelings from the presence of God is always an essential challenge.
Offering hospitality to this stranger, they meet with their risen Lord in the breaking of the bread. The truth of God is always the context for our personal encounter with the living Lord. It is only as we meet with Christ that we may know the fullness of life He promised (John 10:10). It is a knowledge deeper than both thought and emotion. Something that expresses its authenticity in the depth of our human essence. I have faced serious challenges to my faith, yet one thing I know, I have never been able to step back beyond that moment when God made Himself known to me. God’s presence is what sustains this fragile pilgrim; I daily return to the hospitality of God’s Word, the bread of life, with many unanswered questions, and meet Him at His meal table.
SCRIPTURE TO CONSIDER: Psa. 34:4–14; Jer. 31:31–34; John 4:28–42; 14:8–21.
AN ACTION TO TAKE: Where and when do you encounter the presence of the risen Christ?
A PRAYER TO MAKE: ‘Lord, You are risen indeed! May I seek Your presence every day. Amen.’
