Life on the Road to Emmaus

We are now, of course, outside of the Days of Unleavened Bread, just by just a few hours. We have learned a lot, hopefully, as you have transited the experience from Passover and through the Seven Days of Unleavened Bread. And as I have mentioned and my message is with you, and as you already understand, the lessons of the Days of Unleavened Bread are carried with us throughout the year.

It is not just relegated to that day, to the one period. They're highlighted, and yet the need for us to resist sin, to overcome, to seek to live by every word of God, and to let God's life, the life of Jesus Christ, be within us.

It is an ongoing, everyday matter that we rise every day to get our daily bread in a spiritual way and live our lives, and develop and walk with God in a relationship that is continual, ongoing, never-ending. That's highlighted during this time, but we have to continue on. As I have striven to always explain to members wherever I get a chance to speak on the Days of Unleavened Bread during that period, the fundamental theme and key is that we recognize that we have the life we live, the unleavened life we live, is Jesus Christ in us, our hope of glory. As Paul said in Galatians 2 and verse 20, the life we now live, as he said, we live by the faith of the Son of God within us.

And that's what it is all about. And it is a message explained, emphasized, re-emphasized throughout Scripture, and all the way through. In the book of Revelation, even in the initial chapters where we think of Revelation as a book of prophecy, which it is, it's also a message from Jesus Christ. It is, of course, the revelation of Jesus Christ to his church. And in the first few chapters, we hear and see direct messages from Christ to his church.

In fact, in Revelation chapter 1 and verse 13, just turn there for a moment as we begin, we find as John receives this vision from Jesus Christ, which came from God to give to the servants, to Christ's servants, God's servants. In verse 13, as John began to focus his eyes on this big vision that he was going to see, he saw a voice and he turned in verse 12, and he said, I saw seven golden lampstands.

In verse 13, in the midst of the seven lampstands, one liked the Son of Man, clothed with a garment, down to the feet, girded about the chest of the golden band. Here is an image, one like the Son of Man. And it goes on to show that this is Jesus Christ. But he's standing in the midst of the seven lampstands, which the later verses show us are symbolic of the church.

And there are actually seven churches that receive a message in chapters 2 and 3. But in verse 13, look at it. He says, in the midst of the lampstands, and if you have seven distinct lampstands, which is what this vision is showing, in the midst of them is Christ, one like the Son of Man, telling us that Christ is in his church. Ephesians 1 tells us that he is the head of the church.

It is his body. And as the teaching develops here in Scripture, he's in the midst of the churches. He's right in the middle of it all the time. Then he gives seven distinct messages in chapters 2 and 3 here of Revelation, and he gives two of these seven churches that are listed, beginning with Ephesus down through Laodicea.

If you turn to chapter 3 and you look at the message that is given to the Laodicean church, one of the interesting visuals is in verse 20 of chapter 3 of Revelation, where Jesus is shown here, and he says, Again, we get this picture of the message from Christ to his church. He's in the midst of his churches, and one of the keys to understanding these seven messages to these seven churches, these distinct messages, is that each of the churches can look at all the others and learn something from each of the messages.

We have something to learn from what is said here in chapter 3 and verse 20 that I think we can focus on today, this day following the conclusion of the Days of Unleavened Bread, and understand in terms of the Christ in the midst of his church, the head of his church, speaking to his church, directing it, walking with his church, and directing the individual members of the church.

Yesterday I talked about the fact that as Jesus showed the disciples they had a work to go out and do, Christ works through human instruments. We are, in a sense, his hands and his feet, shod with the preparation of the gospel and the breastplate of faith and all those things, and God works through his church. And so that's how it is all set up. We have a work to do and Christ is directing it. And so therefore we've got to be kind of in tune with him.

We've got to be listening to his direction, which is what we always want to do at every phase, at every decision, at every level of that, to make sure that we are listening to, hearing.

And to do that, we have to really learn to walk with Christ. And it's in that walking with Christ that I want to bring us down to a story that we find in the Scriptures that I think really fits us to look at, serves us to look at today, as we come out of the days of an oven bread and look to the future. Are we walking with Christ?

Are we able to see him in the midst of our church fellowship, in the midst of our own lives, and are we able to hear what he says to us as a church, and certainly as individuals in our own life? Are you listening to Jesus Christ? Because he is in you, as the unleavened bread, if you will, of sincerity and truth. His life, through God's Spirit, that power is within you, guiding you, directing you, and you're yielding to it and being led by it, and you understand and you know when it's Christ leading you, or something else, maybe you, your own self-will, can you distinguish between you?

That's a critical matter of our daily Christian walk with God.

There's a story back in Luke 24, I think, that helps us to understand this and give us some things to think about. Luke 24 contains a story of two disciples, again on the day after Christ's resurrection, walking on the road to Emmaus, a small village kind of north and probably a little west of Jerusalem. Luke 24, verse 13, you may have a subhead in your Bible, the road to Emmaus. The title of this message is, Life or Living on the Road to Emmaus for Us Today. As this story opens, it is the day after the resurrection. It's that same Sunday that we were talking about when they went to the tomb. It's a little later in the day. It's two other disciples beyond the twelve, and the ones that the other accounts talk about. Luke is the only one that records the story of the Gospels. Let's look at it and see what we can learn.

Let's begin in verse 13. Behold, he says, two of them went that same day after his resurrection to a village called Emmaus, which was from Jerusalem about three score for longs, very short distance. So they're walking a few miles. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. Now, what had happened? Well, what had happened was Christ had been arrested. He had been tried, beaten, scourged, and crucified a few days earlier.

And the days of an oven bread had transpired, or had begun. The Sabbath, the first day, and then the weekly Sabbath. And now then the empty tomb. These are the things that had happened, and they were talking about it. Lesson number one. We have to be talking about the things of God, the things of the Bible. We need to be chewing on these things and always seeking to grow and understand. That's what these two were doing, is they were wanting to understand what had happened.

And they were talking together, like you and I do. We come to church, we fellowship, get over the coffee pot, talk in our groups, over a few snacks, or if we have the luxury and privilege through the week, and we talk about God, we talk about the Bible, we talk about what we're learning, we're talking about what we may be going through, spiritually, physically, and the challenges, we talk to one another.

And at times, even as things happen in the church, things happen in terms of the messaging of the church, and we talk about things. These two were talking about the things that had happened, which were obviously of great import and momentous. Verse 15, it came to pass that while they communed together and reasoned, keep this in mind, they were talking about the things of God.

Things happen when you talk about the things of God, as opposed to who's leading the Masters tournament, or how my Cincinnati Reds are doing right now, or my St. Louis Cardinals, the two teams that I care anything about, as the baseball season gets going. Those are diversions, and they're interesting, and maybe for you it's NASCAR. I know where I am, so I've got to mention NASCAR here.

I mean, NASCAR fans in the room? Okay, whatever. Maybe it's what's growing in your garden. We all have diversions and interests, and that's great. Maybe cars, it might be sports, it might be a hobby, quilting, ladies. But the things of God are different. When we talk about the Bible on the Sabbath and through the week, things happen. While they communed together and reasoned, Jesus himself drew near and went with them. Here are two disciples walking down the road, and all of a sudden, up from the bushes, how does this happen?

You try to imagine yourself. They drew near. He drew near and he went with them. He just kind of appeared. He suddenly walked up behind you. Sometimes you get into a conversation, and you get oblivious to people around you, and all of a sudden somebody else comes in. Comes up upon you.

Well, hi. This is kind of what happens here. Christ drew near. But their eyes were holding that they should not know him. Just like, again, at the empty tomb, Mary didn't initially recognize Jesus. Well, they didn't recognize him. Here's this person in their midst. Two of them, unnamed disciples at this point.

They talked, they conversed, they reasoned. They discussed. The idea, the meaning here is that they were literally, as they say, discussed these things. Talked together. The literal meaning is to throw back and forth. Kind of like tossing a ball back and forth.

They were throwing the items back and forth and chewing over it and talking about it. Like you do about things. But they were seeking to understand the meaning of the most important weekend in all of history. And Jesus was walking with them. Which, again, gives us this wonderful image that we can draw a lesson from. That, as we saw in Revelation, that Christ is in the midst of the lampstands. He's in the midst of the church. And even to one of them, he says, I'm knocking at the door. Kind of like that. Let me in! Which, you know, there's a whole other lesson from there. You can imagine a church that wouldn't let Jesus in.

He had to be knocking at the door standing outside. We won't go down that part of the road today. But the very image here is that Christ walks with His church, and He does it throughout time. He asks throughout history. He says, I will not leave you. You will not be orphans. He says to the church that I will be with you even until the end of the age. And so He's not left the church. It is the body of Christ, and He is the head of the church.

And so this is what we should learn here as we talk about this particular episode here. Their eyes were restrained that they did not know Him. And so in Matthew 17, He said to them, what kind of conversation is this that you have? What kind of conversation is this that you have with one another as you walk and are sad? You know, Christ knows our conversations, one with another.

He says, you know, where two or three of you are gathered, there I am. It should be a lesson, if not a warning to us to certainly when we're all together, watch what you talk about. He's there. We invoke His presence in every prayer of our services, and He is with us. And so our conversation should reflect in a positive way upon this way of life. And literally, there's a lot of food for us to think about here, the things that we do talk about. I've had people tell me through the years, as they might complain, you know, how complaining goes. We all do it.

I've had people complain to me as a pastor. People don't like to talk about the Bible when we're at church. They want to talk about this or that, everything else but. They don't want to have a spiritual conversation. To which I sometimes reply, well, what's on your mind? What are you doing about it? You know, the pastor's only limited so much, and he can teach and instruct and set an example.

But what we do is up to us. But it is a lesson for us to think about that. And Christ asks, what kind of conversation is this that you have as you walk and are sad? If Christ ever questioned us about our conversation, your conversations at church and among the people, how would you answer? What kind of conversation are you having this week? Well, it goes on here. The one then whose name was Cleopas, the one of them is named, answered and said to him, are you the only stranger in Jerusalem and you've not known the things which happened there in these days?

They didn't recognize Jesus. Are you the only one? Where in the cave have you been living in? Aren't you on the Internet? I mean, what had happened was big. This prophet, this one who claimed to be the Son of God, this master rabbi from Galilee had been killed. They knew about that.

And the Son had turned dark at midday and there had been an earthquake. And the great veil of the temple had been rent in two. They knew that. And people had come out of the grave and were walking the streets of Jerusalem. You don't think that spread quickly? They didn't need Twitter back then. And that's why... are you the only stranger? Where have you been? These things have happened. You've not heard? So they stopped at this point when Christ spoke to them. They were a bit discouraged, again like some of the other disciples, a bit at loose ends.

And so in verse 19, Jesus said to them, What things? He kind of just plays into it. And they said unto him, Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, which was a prophet, mighty in deed and word before God and all the people. An interesting statement.

These two disciples who are not of the twelve, but they were close enough to be called by Luke disciples. And for Jesus to pay attention to them in this story. And remember, Luke gathers this story of this incident years later. He probably did it when Paul was imprisoned down in Caesarea, as this book of Acts tells us.

Luke had quite a bit of time then to travel through Judea and Galilee and gather the stories about Christ that he put into the Gospel that he wrote with his name on it. Luke. And this is one story that it seems that he gets and is led by God to put into his story where the other three Gospel writers don't.

And what is said here is very interesting. They refer to him as Jesus of Nazareth, a prophet, mighty in deed and word before God and all the people. And so the focus is on Christ as a prophet, which is good. He was a prophet, but he was more than a prophet. Now he did good things, many mighty deeds and words among the people. The emphasis is on the spirit working through Christ doing that work. If you hold your place here and turn over to Acts chapter 10.

Notice just a couple of other statements here. In Acts chapter 10, in verse 38, this is where Peter went to the home of Cornelius, the centurion, and where God was opening the door of faith in the church to the Gentiles. As Peter preaches a sermon there to the household of Cornelius in Acts 10, verse 38, just to jump into the middle of it, he talks about how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth.

And keep in mind, Luke is the same one who wrote Acts as what we're reading back in the Gospel of Luke. Same kind of wording, Jesus of Nazareth. God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit, and with power who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. And so, as Peter explains here in this particular message to the home of Cornelius, what was being done, we see Luke kind of casting it in much the same terms, but God was with him.

It was being done by the power of God through the Holy Spirit, as Christ was the Son of God and the Son of Man in that sense. And he went about doing good. Back in Luke 4. Again, keep your finger in Luke 24, but turn back to Luke 4. And look at how Luke puts some of these things back here in verse 1. Luke 4, verse 1.

Then Jesus, being filled with the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness. You begin to see how Luke focuses in on the work of the Spirit being done in and through Christ in his own ministry. Down in verse 18 here of Luke 4. As Christ stood up in the synagogue in Nazareth, his hometown, on the day of Pentecost, which is when this happened, he was given the book of the prophet Isaiah, and he opened the book, and he found the place where it was written.

Verse 18, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor, and he has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, and set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.

And again, the focus by Luke here is on the work of God's Spirit being manifested through the ministry of Jesus Christ here. And that's what he's doing. So if you go back to what these two disciples say in an answer to Christ, his basically his question, well, what was going on? And they said that, well, the things of this prophet, Jesus of Nazareth, mighty in deed and word, before all of the people, they knew all of those things, and this is what was being done.

But the reality was that Christ was more than a prophet. He was God in the flesh. He was the Son of God. And his death and his resurrection prove that and show that. I talked about yesterday, and as we have emphasized, that his death, his blood was shed for the remission of sins.

And his resurrection is that we might also have that life as well. We're saved by his life, not by his death. His death forgives or sins, reconciles us. But Paul shows in Romans that we are saved by his life. The fact that he was resurrected, we have the hope of eternal life then. And so therefore, Christ was more than a prophet.

He was not just an enlightened rabbi that sprung up out of Nazareth and was somehow closer to God than anybody else and was used that way. He was the Son of God. And this is very important. So let's go back to Luke 24.

And let's pick up the thread of the story. Let's look at verse 20 now.

They go on and say, how the chief priests and our rulers delivered him to be condemned to death and have crucified him. But we trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel. And beside all this, today is the third day since these things were done.

Meaning here is that it is beyond that third day since those things were done. Christ had been resurrected as the day was ending, the evening before, at the end of that third day. And this was then that fourth day since then. So today is the third day since these things were done.

And so what was a day of joy, and should have been a day of joy, there was still one of a bit of bewilderment for these disciples as they were still trying to figure it out. And they weren't alone. The others among the twelve were still grappling with that because they go on here in verse 22 to explain. They say, Yea, and certain women, also of our company, like Mary and others, made us astonished which were early at the sepulchre. When they found not his body, they had also seen a vision of angels which said that he was alive. And certain of them which were with us went to the sepulchre, found that even so, Peter and John, found that even so as the women had said, but him they saw not. The tomb was empty. For these disciples, they were still a bit bewildered in trying to figure it out. Perhaps they weren't fully convinced of it and hadn't been fully proven. In verse 25, then, Jesus replies to them, he said, O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. A little slow to understand. So their conversation, sincere as it was, didn't reflect a full understanding of what had happened yet.

They were still trying to, and it's understandable, a man that a man, who they respected and were following, had died as one thing. That was a shock. And that now, the idea that the tomb was empty and some were saying that he was risen, others were perhaps, what could it be? And they were trying to figure it all out. It's understandable from a human perspective that they were slow to believe in that sense.

And Jesus was very patient. Christ is always patient with us in our belief. We all progress at various levels in our understanding. And we should be patient, first of all, with ourselves. We should be patient with one another and any and all others. And as we come to a knowledge and the knowledge that we have, you know, just look among yourselves here.

Everybody's at a different spot in the journey on the line of faith in one sense. Some of us have been at this for 30, 40, 50 years or more, while others less than 10. There have been gaps in some of our lives as well. God is very patient with us. He was showing patience with these. He chided them a little bit. And by him calling them fools and soul of heart, I bet he had a big smile on his face.

And he was considerate of them. And he probably, in his own way, says that about me and some of us at times, you know, Darris, you're kind of foolish. You should know this by now. You've forgotten it. And he probably says that about some of us as to where we might be as we kind of figure it out. So keep it in mind. Be patient with yourself and be patient with each other. And be patient with others that might be brand new at any point and come into our midst.

I have thought in recent, just recent years, what if we suddenly had, in the United Church of God, an influx of brand new people. Brand new. What would it do to a congregation like here in Charlotte and Hickory? What if you had 15, 20 people all of a sudden come into the Hickory Church of the United Church of God, who were brand new? They don't know Herbert Armstrong or any other name from the past. They don't care. Not that they don't care, but they don't care.

They care about Sabbath and their learning. They don't know about our history. They've come to know to learn about the Sabbath. They don't know our traditions. They don't know our culture. What would it do to you folks? They want to learn, and they want to obey God, or they wouldn't be here on a Saturday, or coming to a, you know, driving a few extra miles.

But what if that would happen? I've thought about that, because to be real blunt, it has been a long time since the church, as we know it, put whatever name you want on it, has had any significant influx of people. We would have to go back to the early to mid-1980s to find the last significant influx of new people. And I'm talking about significant numbers. Some of you would be reflected in that. And have you come into the church in the 1980s?

Okay. I mean, my mother came into it in the 1960s at a time when we had really big growth. Like I've said, I don't know if I said this publicly, when I first came here, we, you know, the World Tomorrow television program was on W, the NBC station here in Charlotte, every single morning before the Today Show, five days a week. And the minister that I worked under had a stack of letters on his desk that high of people to visit that he couldn't get to.

And I spent the first three months running up and down Interstate 85, between Salisbury and Statesville and Concord, Canapolas, all the way down to the far reaches beyond Greenville, down south of Greenville's part, way down in there, just visiting brand new people. And a lot of them we baptized, came into the church in early 1970s. If we had something like that happen today, it would be a, I'd welcome it, but it'd be a challenge. Because every one of us would have to be very patient with them, because they don't know our traditions that we have in the Church of God.

They don't know our culture. And every church, and quite frankly, every fellowship has a unique culture. Fellowships that have sprung up in the last 25 to 30 years, they go by other names, including the United Church of God, you develop a distinct culture. And we all have a distinct culture. And we would have to be patient with one another. So that's one thing you might kind of tuck away and pray that we all can be in a sense of, like Christ, He was patient with these disciples here. He's continually patient with us as we endeavor to get our work together, and as He will add those whom He will to the Church.

It's God that gives the growth. And He was very patient with these disciples. So be patient with yourself, be patient with each other, and be patient with God, just as we're seeing this develop here. Let's go back to the account. Verse 26, He said, In other words, this is what should have happened. The trial, the death, the scourging, and the resurrection. All of this, He was to have suffered this according to the plan. And in verse 27, it's very interesting. Christ then, at beginning at Moses, and all the prophets, He expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.

Christ, He probably just did it from rote memory. He didn't open His New King James. He didn't even open a temple, then roll out a temple scroll. He had it right there. He said, you know that scripture back in Deuteronomy? Back in the law? You know that Psalm? You know what Isaiah said in what we call it chapter 53? He didn't call it chapter 53. You know what Isaiah said? That's what's happened. He began to explain to them the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.

He used the prophets, beginning with Moses, to prove that He was the Messiah. He was the one that those Scriptures were talking about. Now what happened here in verses 25, 26, 27 are very important to understand. With great clarity, they show that the sufferings of Christ, as well as His glory, were all predicted in the Old Testament that all the Old Testament Scriptures are important. We live by every word of God. Because He took those, as did later on Peter and Paul and the others would take, the Scriptures from what we call the Old Testament.

They didn't call it that at this moment. To them, this was the Scriptures. It was the laws. It was the writings. It was the Word of God. The church begins to show how they all pointed to Him and that they were all very important. What we begin to see here with Jesus doing this here is that the way that the writers and the apostles, the men who would write the New Testament, used the Old Testament and began to write about the Gospels and the stories and the letters, they didn't, by their own creativity, refer to passage from the Psalms and explain it differently.

They followed in the method by which Christ, here in His post-resurrection phase, taught them. And this is a very important passage to show. Christ is showing something that Peter would later write in a letter to Timothy, and it's recorded in 1 Timothy 3 and verse 16. Paul would later write to Timothy that all Scripture is given by the inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, and for instruction in righteousness. 1 Timothy 3.16, very key Scripture. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God. And it's profitable for establishing doctrine, teaching, and instruction in righteousness, and correction. All Scripture.

Christ is taking all Scripture that was at that point and explaining Himself, and that it applied to Him. Now, they're still not getting it here, these two disciples. Let's go back to verse 28.

And they drew near unto the village where they went, which is Emmaus. And He made as though He would have gone further, but they constrained Him, saying, Abide with us. It's getting dark. The days about over. Come on in. Stay a spell.

Pull up a chair. Have a meal with us. They were showing hospitality, being very gracious. Stay with us. So He went in to be with them. Verse 30, it came to pass that as He sat at the meal with them, He took bread.

Part of the staple of the meal, He took bread and He blessed it, and He broke it, and He gave it to them.

Kind of like a Passover meal. He blessed it, He broke it, and He gave it to them. It wasn't the Passover meal, but you see the same symbolism, imagery at least. And when He gave it to them, verse 31 says, their eyes were opened. And they knew Him, and then He vanished out of their sight. He was gone.

It was when the bread of life gave them the bread that their eyes were opened, and they finally realized this is the Master. This is who it was. And they said to one another, verse 32, Did not our heart burn within us while He talked with us by the way, and while He opened to us the Scriptures? Very interesting statement. Wow!

They had more now to talk about. But here's what they said, and this is what... Here's the lesson. Did not our heart burn within us while He talked by the way, and explained the Scripture? Christ was in their midst, as we see that He is in the midst of the Church.

And He was explaining to them the Living Word. It was a unique moment. Wouldn't we love to be taught by Jesus? The Word, teaching us the Word.

I have to think that when He got done with whatever He explained, and would if He were to teach us, it would be crystal clear. No ambiguities, no uncertainty. If Christ were to give us a Bible study, it would be far better than anything I could give, or any others of us in the ministry would be... It would be airtight. No doubt. Crystal clear. Stirred action.

Complete, perfect. All the spokesmen's club speech points that we have had in our manual of how to give a presentation. Everything would be answered. And it would be wonderful. It would be wonderful. Well, here's what they said, our heart burned within us. There was an excitement. There was a passion. There was a flame. There was a zeal. There was an excitement. Now the story kind of ends right here. Christ disappears.

And Cleopas and his companion, they reflect on their feelings and how they felt. And they felt fed. They felt, in a sense, kind of warm. They feel satisfied. And this is something that comes from talking about God and the things of God. As these two people had been walking on the road to Emmaus, talking about these things, Christ came in their midst.

He comes in our midst. He communes with us. We, where two or three are gathered together in my name. There I am in the midst also. It's a living principle and truth that we all need to think about more than we probably do, and myself included. And labor, being able to labor in the Word and to read the Word more than we probably do.

And to talk about it with God. We talk about it among ourselves and to make it a part of our conversation. So that it burns within us, just as it did these two. That's what life on the road to Emmaus is all about. I'm going to fall over here.

That's what life on the road to Emmaus is all about.

Christ is coming into our midst. Coming up out of nowhere because two or three or four or whatever, or just one of us in our own, as we commune privately, in our own way, God's there.

And our thoughts and we're reading the Word of God, we're maybe talking about it with God. That's all that we have. Or with one another, if that comes up. You know, sometimes we have so many ways of communicating today. We've got our smartphones and email. And, you know, we think we communicate.

Telephone called each other. I hope you folks, scattered as you are, stay in touch with each other through the week.

I hope you can form those connections because we all need that.

And, though you may not see each other for another week, and sometimes circumstances might be two or three weeks, but that you send an email if that's the way you can communicate, or a text if that's the way it's done, but a phone call, or really the old fashioned way of writing a note.

Pen and ink. We don't go back to pen and ink. You can put that in the mail. You don't have to go Pony Express or Pigeon or anything like that, but talk with one another. Check up on one another. Somebody's not a church, call. Write. Let it be known. You never know when you will make the difference with somebody.

And, you know, if someone's sick, write them a note. Put a scripture in there. Put a scripture that's encouraging.

You know, try to do that a few times a week. If you can do it every day. Do someone different.

You know, even a few other times a week. Just spread some good cheer.

And, send a note and put a thought, put a scripture in there. I was thinking about this. Maybe think about you and our conversation last week. Or, missed you. Hope you're feeling better. Hope this is working out for you that you mentioned to me. Do those things! That's what we need to do to talk among one another of the things of God to encourage one another.

You know, it talks about in Malachi, they spoke often one to another.

And, this is where Christ comes into our midst in that sense. And, leads us and prompts us and guides us to do so many different things. And, then as we may have other opportunity to go a little deeper, as we commune with God, certainly ourselves, where the Word of God burns in our heart.

Just very quickly, in Psalm 39.

I don't know if I'm over time or not.

By my standards, I'm over time, so I apologize. I'll bring this to a conclusion.

I can finish my point here, but Psalm 39, verse 3. Psalm of David says, My heart was hot within me while I was musing, the fire burned, then I spoke, then spoke I with my tongue. O Lord, make me to know mine end, and measure my days, what it is, and I may know how frail that I am.

In prayer, and in our reading of the Bible, as God's Spirit stirs and works within us, just like these two disciples where they said that, Didn't our heart burn within us while He talked with us? Well, Christ is not going to be sitting at our table with us in the same way that He was with them.

He certainly can in spirit and through His Spirit within us. And as David writes here, My heart was hot within me while I was musing, the fire burned. He's talking about thinking about God and the Word of God, the things of God. Then I spoke, and he speaks here in the Psalm, he speaks to God. But my heart was hot. We get passionate. We sense that there's a connection. And you know how those things work. And I'm not talking about God, you know, you're hearing audible voices or tinglings going up and down your spine. I'm not talking about anything like that. So don't go getting squirrely. All right? But, you know, a mature Christian, you know. You know. And there's a passion, there's a zeal, there's a connection that is made. This describes the passion for the Word of God, the way of God, and the truth of God. In the story of the road to Emmaus, two people talked with each other about God and the things of God. They were working through a major challenge together. We worked through challenges in our own personal lives and as a church. Christ appeared to them. Christ will be with us. He'll be in our midst. He'll walk with us as we're endeavoring to walk with Him. This is a model here of these disciples for us to learn how to strengthen and deepen our walk of faith along the road to Emmaus. Christ said, we're two or three are gathered together in my name. I'm there in the midst of them. He said, I will not leave you as orphans. I will come to you. But we have to talk to Him. We have to seek that. We have to make that a part of our life. As we do in our led by God spirit, good things can happen to us in our lives. God will be with us. Let's take this lesson from the road to Emmaus and let's be walking strong, confident in faith, expecting God to guide us in our lives and guide us in our church life. His church as well, to be doing His work. So, brother, it's been, I guess, as I said, a very good opportunity for us to be with you all here during the days. And we wish you all the best. God be with all of you, as we say, until we meet again. So, bid you adieu.