Good Morning - this Third Sunday of Easter! Christ has Risen. The Question is: Has He risen for us?

As always, I want to thank you for the invitation to be with you this morning. It has been a hectic week for me, and next week will prove to be even more hectic. Thanks to Pastor Doepken's invitation, however, I had no choice but to block out a whole day yesterday - escape from the turmoil of Jerusalem, if you will, and spend a few quiet hours "Walking the Road to Emmaus" with my Lord. So, thank you.

My own personal "turmoil in Jerusalem" included a couple days of negotiations for the nurses at Providence Hospital, a couple of grievances, my husband's sixtieth birthday and surprise announcement that he plans to retire next month, and some other personal changes and challenges. If Jesus had tried to walk up beside me this week to start a conversation with a question like, "Whatcha thinking about?," I would have replied with something like the two disciples did, "Don't you know what has been going on?" The disciples at least stopped, listened, and offered Jesus both their attention and their hospitality.

I snapped, "This conversation will just have to wait until Saturday."

So, yesterday, I finally turned towards Emmaus - and sure enough, Jesus was waiting for me along the road. He had some things He wanted to show me. It had been a long week for Him, too, and tears were in His eyes. I apologized for making Him wait a week. He said others had made Him wait much longer. We began to walk.

The Road to Emmaus is paved now. I've seen photographs. The road has been moved and the security checkpoints have been re-located a couple of times - but there is still a road - all the way from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv - and Emmaus is about half way between.

Emmaus isn't called Emmaus anymore. It's called Canada Park. I kid you not. Canada Park. The Romans called the village Nicopolis. The Palestinians called it Imwas - until 1967. That's when it became Canada Park.

You see, Emmaus is located in the Latrun area of the West Bank - supposedly within the border of Palestinian lands, but controlled by the Israelis. The area used to be a buffer zone separating the Israeli and Arab forces in the aftermath of the 1948 war. Immediately following the 1967 war, Israeli forces completely destroyed three villages, including Imwas, and evicted the residents. Imwas itself was bulldozed under, and in 1976, a recreational area called Canada Park was established on the site by the Jewish National Fund, a Canadian fund-raising group.

The place was landscaped -- trees were planted - it's all very lovely - and the villagers who had worked this land to support their families for generations - became Palestinian refugees. Most of them, and their descendants, now have been absorbed into the population of Ramallah - the city where Colin Powell will be chatting with Yassir Arafat some time today.

So Jesus had His own problems. We walked along quietly for some time. This was the second place Jesus had appeared to His followers following his Resurrection. The first was at the tomb. The second was later that day along this same road. The third was later, back in Jerusalem. But along the road to Imwas was where two disciples, nearly two thousand years ago, began their long spiritual journey of understanding of the Being and Mission of Jesus and their role in it.

Two thousand years ago, along this walk, Jesus spoke of the Hebrew Scriptures - explaining to His companions all that was said in all the Scriptures concerning Himself.

Yesterday, Jesus also directed this Reluctant Disciple to the Hebrew Scriptures, only this time, He spoke of the original Palestinian conquest - that conquest which is outlined in the Book of Judges. Joshua led the battle back then - somewhere between 1200 and 1300 B.C. The Palestinians were called Canaanites, because this was the Land of Canaan. After the death of Joshua, it was Judah who was called by the Lord, according to Scripture, to finish the possession of this land.

The men of Judah attacked Jerusalem and took it. They took the hill country, the Negev, the western foothills. The men of Judah took Gaza, Askelon and Ekron. And the list goes on. But it was not a total conquest.

Jesus recalled that Manassah did not drive out the people of Beth Shan or Megiddo nor their surrounding settlements - for the Canaanites were DETERMINED TO LIVE IN THAT LAND. (Judges 1:27) The same went for those living in Gezer, Kitron, Beth Shemesh, and so forth. The Canaanites were pressed into forced labor, it was true, but they would not leave. This was their land, too.

And thousands of years later, both the men of Judah and the men of Canaan are still there. Ariel Sharon and Yassir Arafat still glare at one another and cry, "Murderer! Terrorist! God gave ME this land, not you." Both men are correct. And both send their young men and their young women on suicidal and genocidal missions to prove it. Four hundred bodies, a thousand bodies, how many more bodies to prove it?

It is true. God gave them both the land. God made a covenant with both peoples, through separate Sons of Abraham. What could God possibly have been thinking?? Jesus shook His head and wept as we walked on toward Emmaus.

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The Walk to Emmaus has become a primary symbol of the Christian Faith Journey. What does it all mean? What is my role in all this turmoil, if any?

Christians such as myself and even whole churches are sometimes blinded by preoccupation with our own immediate difficulties. The two disciples were probably walking home after the events of the past week in Jerusalem. Nothing turned out as they had fervorently believed it would. They were sad and hopeless. They saw no redemptive purpose in the things that had happened. It had all been for naught.

And yet, the risen Christ "came near and went with them," opening the disciples' eyes to his presence. When they arrived in Emmaus, Jesus "took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them," and their eyes were opened. They recognized him as Jesus, the risen Lord. Within the hour, the two disciples left Emmaus and returned immediately to their friends in Jerusalem. As they told stories about their encounters with the risen Lord, Jesus visited them again with a fresh awareness of his living presence.

And my prayer for each of us is that during this extended Easter season, we each experience that fresh awareness of Christ in our personal lives. That we each experience a "personal resurrection" through our developing relationship with our Lord.

However, the story of Jesus' resurrection does not conclude with the disciples' personal spiritual experiences. Jesus ascended to the Father, and the disciples became the body of the risen Christ through the empowerment of the Holy Spirit. They became The Church. The disciples were sent forth by the Spirit to bear witness. They learned to walk in the spirit of Jesus, to proclaim the gospel to a disbelieving world, and to persevere in this commitment through spiritual companionship with one another.

The Walk to Emmaus offers today's disciples a parallel opportunity to rediscover Christ's presence in our lives, as well as to support our return to the world in the power of the Spirit to further God's mission with this hurtful and hurting world.

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Pastor Doepken also reminded me that today was "Churches Uniting in Christ Sunday" - so I figured that I better look that up, too. The birth of the Churches Uniting in Christ is very recent - January 19, 2002 - to be specific. CUIC is the culmination of forty years of dialogue among nine different church groups: the United Methodists, Presbyterian Church USA, Episcopal Church, International Council of Community Churches, United Church of Christ, Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, and the African Methodist Episcopal Church. The Evangelical Lutheran Church of America is a "Partner in Mission and Dialogue".

The churches have pledged to live more closely together in expressing their unity in Christ, and specifically to combat racism together, mandate racial justice, and renew the churches' commitment to the struggle for equal human rights and the defense of economic rights for all people.

How does this Churches Uniting in Christ mission correlate with the Walk to Emmaus two thousand years ago and the Walk today? Are we dealing with racism in the Middle East? I think we are. Are we dealing with human rights and the defense of economic rights for all people? I think we are. 

We cannot all be United States Secretary of State Colin Powell. He knows what his mission is in the Land of Canaan: a cease fire - followed up with a peace plan that sticks. It's been more than three thousand years in the making. Colin Powell will be quite a man if he pulls it off. Knowing that, he went anyway. That's a miracle in and of itself. He answered the call.

What's our role in this world peace-making? Will we answer the call even if the odds of success seem, oh so, slim?

Some of us have been assigned to further God's peace plan in our families and in our neighborhoods and communities - and in the process, to combat the spread of racism and promote justice through good parenting and/or positive civic involvement. Before we start anywhere, some of us must first start by furthering God's peace plan in our very own personal souls.

Before we get started on renewing the Church's commitment to human rights and social, racial and economic justice - maybe we have to review our own commitment to these ideals first.

We need to take time for that Emmaus Walk. Take time for that meal with our Lord. After some refreshment and reflection, then maybe we'll be ready for that trip back to Jerusalem.

Or as we are told in I Peter: 22-23 this morning:

"Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for your brothers and sisters, love one another deeply, from the heart. For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring Word of God."

Amen.

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