Clearance Sale in the Talking Shop

Text:  Luke 24:13-35

            The Gospel reading grabbed my attention.  “‘He was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people’” (24:19, NIV).  Had I heard wrongly?  Or had the reader inadvertently misread the passage?  I had to find out!  Consulting my Greek New Testament I read “ergw kai logw” – deed and word.  All the translations and paraphrases I looked at, including the Authorised Version, maintained the deed and word order.  The exceptions were the New International Version and the New English Bible.  I do not know why this choice was made.  Perhaps “word and deed” simply sounds better.  It is interesting that both the NIV and the REB both follow the Greek word order in Colossians 3:17 (word/deed) and 2 Thessalonians 2:17 (deed/word).  Why am I making such a fuss?  Is it a big deal?  Surely word/deed deed/word are inextricably linked and, if word/deed is easier on the ear then it should be followed. 

That the deed/word reversal of the Greek ordering takes place in relation to Jesus suggests that there is something significant going on, even if it is an unrecognised theological agenda.  The deed/word reversal may have to do with the types of theological approaches that view truth as something beyond us revealed and then put into practice.  It is the Word of systematic theology, doctrine, and orthodoxy being applied.  Whether this arises out of conservative concerns for the inspired, inerrant Word of God, or the Barthian focus on orthodoxy guided by scripture and the confessions, it gives priority to word in relation to deed.  Whatever the motivation the reversal of deed/word breaks a crucial lens through which to read this story. 

“Jesus was a prophet mighty in deed and word” alerts us to the fact that actions define what we say.  The death and resurrection of Jesus gives meaning to everything he said.  What impact would it have on our Christian lives and church communities if we grasped that our doing is the definition of our doctrine? 

There’s a clearance sale in the Talking Shop.  Unlike the Walking Shop next door in which the prices are going through the ceiling, the Talking Shop is going out of business.  People are tired of promises that aren’t kept; weary of words expended ad nauseam in blogs and newspapers; wary of words that distort instead of clarifying.  The Walking Shop is selling what people want:  actions.  In the Talking Shop politicians promise change and a new kind of politics.  In the Walking Shop people make change happen.  They get involved.  They get dirty.  They have a hard look at the problems and imagine what the solutions look like.  They find ways to implement them.  Words are cheap.  Actions are priceless.  The slogan in the window of the Walking Shop catches the eye:  Don’t just say something!  Do it!

Two disciples head to Emmaus.  It was a seven mile journey from Jerusalem.  They were putting one foot in front of the other.  They’re doing something.  As they walk they talk.  They reflect.  Deeds do not annul words.

They were walking away from the grisly events of Jesus’ crucifixion.  They were walking away from their grief:  the loss of their friend and all the hopes and dreams he embodied for them.  They were walking away from the locus of God’s action in the Lukan narrative:  Jerusalem.  As they walk they mull over the things that had happened.  Their talk is not about theory but an event.  Does this not suggest to us that the best theology is God-talk which teases out the absence and presence of God in the world in which we live? 

Whilst they are talking and discussing they are joined by a stranger.  Inexplicably their eyes are kept from recognising Jesus.  These disciples allow this unknown person to join in their God-talk.  It strikes me that theological dialogue is best done in open community.  God-talk is enriched when new partners are welcome to join in the discussion.  New insights are gained as we look at things in ways that would have been closed off if we had been inhospitable to the stranger. 

For Cleopas and the other disciple, insight comes through questioning.  Jesus asks his new companions what they are talking about ‘as they walk along’.  The fact that the ‘walking’ is reiterated here suggests the importance of the journey...of the action of physically walking.  The journey...the walking...is the movement they are making towards understanding as Jesus questions and listens, then breaks and gives.

Cleopas is incredulous that Jesus doesn’t know what’s happened in Jerusalem.  How could their new found companion have come from the city and missed out on the ‘things that have taken place”?  Again, notice the emphasis on the activities/events of these days.

Jesus asks, “What things?”  This stranger really doesn’t know what’s going on!  They’re surprised and yet his question convinces them of his ignorance. 

Does Jesus’ questioning have anything to this say to the Church about evangelism and pastoral care?  His question invites his two companions to tell their story...to share with him what they have seen and heard.  In sharing the good news would we not do well to ask questions and settle down to listening to the stories of others?  How can we make plain the love of Jesus in the lives of people we do not know or understand?  In the pastoral encounter, would we not do well to ask questions and listen carefully – even to the stories we’ve heard a thousand times before?  A question carefully put and ears willing to hear opens up the possibility of seeing Jesus in the midst of our brokenness.  Listening is an activity that evokes the word.

            Cleopas and the other disciple identify the person at the centre of the action. Jesus of Nazareth, a prophet mighty in deed and word was turned over by the chief priests and leaders to be condemned to death by crucifixion.  It becomes clear that this is more than a newspaper article in which the two have a passing interest.  They are emotionally involved.  Their identities are wrapped up in this Jesus.  They reveal that their hope disappointed was that Jesus was the Messiah – the redeemer of Israel.

            They touch on the fact that it is the third day since Jesus’ crucifixion and the women confounded them with a story of an empty tomb and of angels saying Jesus was alive.  It’s amazing that the women remember Jesus’ words and believe and yet their words are dismissed as female hysteria.  Yes, some of the disciples went to the tomb and found it was empty but no sign of a risen Jesus.  By contrast, Cleopas and the disciple hear the word and see Jesus but, unlike the women, they do not remember his words and therefore cannot believe do not recognise him.

            Jesus has heard their story.  Words tumble from their lips.  Now he challenges their ‘foolishness’.  This foolishness is identified with being ‘slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared!’  They did not catch on to his words - his threefold foretelling of suffering and death.  This stranger starts with Moses and works through the prophets and interprets Jesus into the texts.

            The two disciples arrive on their doorstep and the stranger appears to be going on.  They implore him to stay because the day is coming to an end.  The darkness is falling.  It is amazing that as the night falls their eyes are about to be opened.  They could not see Jesus in the full light of day and yet in a shadowy room, as he takes bread, blesses it, breaks it, and gives it to them their eyes are opened.  In the moment of recognition Jesus vanishes. 

 So why does the Church in all of her expressions bemoan declining numbers, denominational differences, and social irrelevance?  What would happen if, instead of escaping our brokenness through trying to revivify ourselves and our institutions, we simply embraced our brokenness and lived out our woundedness?  What if, in humility, we offered our scars to our world and shared in their suffering and pain?  What if we had the courage to break bread and let the crumbs be scattered as a sign of healing and hope?  Does fractured bread open eyes to the reality of Jesus right in front of us?

            It is in the broken bread that we come to recognise the risen Jesus.  It is in the breaking of the bread – in the doing of the deed – in the sharing – that the disciples perceive the burning in their hearts as the stranger opened the word.  The words are set alight in their hearts only after they see Jesus in broken bread.  Deed illumines word. 

Have you ever had the experience of understanding something long after you were taught?  When I did my first theological degree I couldn’t see the point of the spiritual formation classes.  Why study psychology and anthropology?   It was only with the passage of time that I came to say, “Did not my heart burn when my teachers taught me?”  It was experience of life and the realities of ministry that helped me to see the value of the wisdom my teachers spoke.

Bread broken, eyes opened, the word illumined, set these two disciples on another journey.  They go back to Jerusalem to bear witness to the resurrection.  After hearing of Simon’s discovery they declare that Jesus was made known to them in the breaking of the bread.  Do we recognise the importance of the breaking of bread in the Church’s mission?  In the breaking of bread eyes are opened to the crucified/risen Jesus. 

There’s a clearance sale in the Talking Shop.  There’s no market for the kind of theology that takes the Word made flesh and turns back into Word.  The Walking Shop knows that the value of wisdom is in the doing.  It’s no good if your doctor prescribes 4 miles of walking a day and you decide to drive it.  It’s not the destination but the manner in which you travel that matters.[i]

Let me tell you a story:  “The explorer had returned to his people, who were eager to know all about the Amazon.  But how could he ever put into words the feeling that flooded his heart when he saw flowers of breath-taking beauty and heard the sounds of the forest at night?  How communicate what he felt in his heart as he sensed the danger of wild beasts or paddled his canoe over the treacherous parts of the river?

He said, ‘Go and find out for yourselves.  There is no substitute for personal risk and personal experience.’  To guide them, however, he drew up a map of the Amazon.  ‘They siezed (sic) upon the map.  They framed it in their Town Hall.  They made personal copies of it.  And everyone who had a copy considered himself an expert on the Amazon, for did he not know every turn and bend of the river, and how broad it was and how deep, where the rapids were and where the falls?

The explorer lived to regret that map.  It might have been better if he had drawn nothing.”[ii]