Luke 24:13-35
Easter 3 - Year A
Progressive Christians have gone around hanging their heads, remembering the way life used to be, uncertain of their spiritual sensibilities in the midst of hostility toward them. Yes, we have been on an Emmaus walk.
It is not enough to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps and say, "I'm not going to stand still any longer, I'm not going to be sad." Even if we could so pull ourselves up, it would only be for the briefest of moments, it wouldn't last.
Just as our namesakes of old there is the need for an organizing vision that not only puts our past in perspective but brings the energy to gather with folks of like mind and together move on.
We pray that the Methodist Federation for Social Action gathering, Voices of Faith: From Swords to Plowshares just completed will have proved to have been an Emmaus table moment that moves them on.
We pray that the Peace Not Poverty [missing url] gathering of one million people online to create a written Declaration for peace and justice and against the Iraq War will bear much fruit. The developed declaration is to be read tonight at Riverside Church 7-9 pm EDT as we continue to Break the Silence. The current plan is for this event to be shown on C-SPAN - check your listings.
I pray we are doing more than just chatting with one another here but that energy is being developed to gather as we can and move forward into living the gracious love of G*D.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2005/april2005.html
Somewhere from here (either 60 stadia or 160 stadia) we have wandered. Our wandering included our muttering about all the imponderable "why?" questions of life. We look at it this way; we look at it that way; we look some other way.
Somewhere from here our reflections become our main attraction. We just love our speculations. Why are we the only ones to have our experience and insight?
Living in the realm of the speculative seduces us away from opening our eyes to a world just outside our cave.
Living in the realm of the speculative is artificially exciting. It takes all our time and energy to package the unknowable into some world-view and to protect it from the latest learning.
The antidote for this is to hear our internal excitement described as "foolish, dull, slow in both mind and heart." If that much can get through, even an everyday activity such as eating together can become numinous.
Now we have a purpose that will bring us back here to where we began and to see it again for the first time. And now we find those others who are also first seers. We can join forces by going our own ways with new eyes to see who isn't here and break from doctrinal and polity straitjackets to fire their hearts and imaginations.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2005/april2005.html
"Save yourself from this corrupt generation." So goes the appeal in every troubled time.
The question is not so much an us/them mentality or saved/unsaved designations. Those are constantly changing according to experience and willingness to have same. Rather, how does one be in while not of the world (and it's lesser known counterpart which is just as important - to be of while not in the world)? This question comes from the little word "from" [apo in the Greek] that has two definitions:
1) from - "of separation"
2) in - "of origin"
So it might also read, "Save yourself within your originating generation."
In particular this is a question of intention or direction. Does saving oneself mean oneself alone or does it mean that saving oneself entails the salvation of all?
Repentance and Baptism are very much like a Sabbath. Is the Sabbath made for us or are we made for the Sabbath? Sabbath, Repentance, and Baptism (and other Sacraments) are best considered as stimuli for the reestablishment of community that has fractured. They are mediational tools. They are vehicles for saving a generation.
- - -
purified truth in angry hands
is dangerous to one and all
such truth becomes organized
for its own sake, not yours
growing truth in hopeful hands
builds genuine mutual love
among differing generations
for their sake, not mine
cooperative truth in faithful hands
grows heart-deep love in our midst
binding our differences with balm
for healing wounds, including yours
birthed anew from perfect to whole
fractures perish in a new light
living enduring inviting feasts
for bountiful living, including mine
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_04_01_archive.html
With or without power from on high Jesus is capable of surprising.
We seem incapable of recognizing Jesus on the testimony of someone else, even a fellow-traveler on our way. Jesus isn't recognized as present even when we relate past tales and experiences with him. Jesus isn't recognized in all the prophetic scripture that might be re-pointed toward him.
Jesus becomes recognizable in the breaking of bread and the sharing a cup. And, then, like any good catalyst, leaves unchanged, but leaves a changed situation. Jesus becomes a new community and gives it space to re-form.
Later we hear. witness added to witness, that a resurrection has taken place. And, yet, fear is a first reaction to a next surprise visit by Jesus. Again our fight or flight response needs to be addressed with a word of new perspective and possibility – peace.
Here the whooshing wind of a new creation doesn't come immediately after a word of peace and a revelationary reorientation. Now we hear - it will be coming. Those of us who know the story can see this as a setup by Luke to get his sequel (Acts of the Apostles) off to a fast start. And, so, we are left hanging having taken all the courses, done our best with the tests along the way, and written a thesis based on our gifts. No diploma, no power from on high, and here we are.
Can it be so or is it Luke's understanding that, like a maple double samara (winged fruit), the disciples are to be maturing in Jerusalem and when the time is ripe they will be spun two-by-two out into the surrounding countryside. Maturing is different than waiting, though it does entail waiting.
How's your maturing going where you are? How's your partner in ministry? How's your spinning outward going? How's your readiness for a surprise?
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2008_03_01_archive.html
A conversational gait is 3 miles per hour. A seven mile hike, let’s say 2 and a half hours. If they were dragging grief along, perhaps 3 hours.
It is reported that somewhere in that three hours Jesus caught up with them. Was he returning from Emmaus or catching up from Jerusalem or coming at a tangent? This could turn into one of those famous word problems, if a train left Station A at . . . .
For the moment presume that Jesus was resurrection accelerated and caught up to the grief laden from Jerusalem. With sad faces, closed ears, and teary eyes they were pretty well encapsulated. Jesus might have had to go over the heritage from Moses and other prophets several times to have gotten through to weary travellers. All in all Jesus might have had an elevator ride’s amount of total messaging time. How might you tell the story of your own prophetic journey in a convincing and condensed amount of time? What would the clincher be?
Regardless of how well-told or concise you were with those who would be sympathetic to what you had to say or how much time you had to convert an enemy, it would still probably come down to a symbol or an action that would make the difference.
In this Eastertide, may you pick up a lesson from your Lenten Discipline and put down some accumulated habit in order to find one compelling action that best reveals your G*D oriented living. Odds are that folks will better respond to that than to a 300 page memoir. What blessing might you give that would awaken folks to new life possibilities for themselves?
Don’t just wonder what Jesus would do - do what you are called to.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2011/05/luke-2413-35.html
so go on
gotta love those travelers
on their way to Emmaus
so discouraged
so grief wrapt
so isolated
they knew what they knew
to the exclusion of all else
so head empty
so heart full
so dualistic
and along comes the unrecognized
a Christ in surprising guise
so expectant
so insulting
so traditional
at best they were distracted
at worst entertained
so far away
so closed
so hungry
even an eternal-oriented Christ
knocks the dust off and moves on
so much to do
so prophetic
so opportunistic
just when we want more palaver
anything to cover our loneliness
so comforting
so directive
so so-so
old prophecy no longer cuts it
new creeds are much beside the point
so feast
so bless
so go on
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2011/05/so-go-on.html
Eyes open? Recognize what is around you? And it's gone!
Now make meaning out of that.
From ignoring to questioning and dismissal, we come to a time of Wow! Well, now that we take time to consider, we remember being attentive all the way along and ready to receive any good news in the midst of our personal tragedy. What an amazing time we had and we will hold on to it forever.
Ahh, yes, revisionist history — a long and many-storied tradition.
Now we are in the process of making daily bread more sacred than it is by its very nature. Somehow or other what was missed at Thursday night's repast is now reinterpreted. Of course it is not just us looking again, but a duly authorized interpretation — G*D says this is what it meant and you always knew it.
Love Prevails is currently at a denominational meeting of the Connectional Table (implementers of General Conference past). After attending their last meeting in October (being a cause of an agenda adjustment) and a series of letters back and forth since then, we are present, again, to continue the work of removing discriminatory legislation from the United Methodist Church. There is work to do as the church institutional has responded to a new opportunity to get better by repeating processes already accomplished in the 1980s.
There is a sense that the Connectional Table is still all wrapped up in their immediate concern about loss of membership and not clear about the mercy and compassion they have received and so can't see where it needs to be applied. After the discrimination is finally off the books, we can fully expect the Connectional Table to take credit for working toward that all along.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2014/04/luke-2413-35.html