The Return Trip From Emmaus

Good afternoon, everyone! Hello to everyone on Zoom out there. Hopefully everyone's enjoying the Sabbath. It's that time of year where you can almost feel the grass growing when the sun comes out. It's probably going to be happening all afternoon while we're here together.

Well, the title for my sermon today is The Return Trip from Emmaus. The return trip from Emmaus.

No, I'm not starting new biblical truth. Have you ever noticed how a journey you take, have you ever traveled to someplace new? And when you go there and you're on your way, whether you're walking, you're driving, riding your bike, it seems like a shorter distance coming home than it does going out there. And there's actually a whole body of psychological study about that phenomenon, which is called the return trip effect. And if you have trouble sleeping some time and you feel like looking into some mostly useless knowledge, you can look up the return trip effect and you can see all the different theories that are out there about why it seems like it's quicker when you're returning from somewhere than when you first went there and it was an unknown location.

One of the big arguments is that our perception of time is slower when we're on unfamiliar territory. Perception of time is slower when we're on unfamiliar territory. And that argument would indicate that when we're coming home, the milestones, the things we're passing, where we're going is more familiar. And somehow, in our mind, the way we approach things, we process that as being a faster trip. Whether that's true or not, and all the other theories that are out there for it, we won't go into the merits of those. But I think as we think about the Bible and as we read the Bible, it is something that's really applicable because we tend to view everything that happens and that we read in the Bible through today's lens.

And understandably so because that's where we live. And in a way, we're looking backwards down the road with the familiarity and the understanding of all of the things that have happened since the time when these accounts were written. So what I'd like to do today is look through this, and especially starting with the account of the road to Emmaus, as we were encouraged a few weeks ago to think about and read about these things that happened between Passover and Pentecost as we're approaching Pentecost.

And I'd like to take from this a couple of things about Jesus Christ and understanding about Jesus Christ and the church that we can put to use hopefully in our lives today and understand more about what it was that Jesus was saying. So again, the title of the message today is the return trip from Emmaus, because I want to kind of go back and walk that road in the opposite direction and see what we can see.

If you want to turn with me to Luke 24, we're not going to go through this entire account. We read this a few weeks ago in services. It's a time a couple of Jesus' disciples were walking down the road to the town of Emmaus, and it was after the time that Jesus Christ had died, and they were somewhat dejected.

They were talking, and Jesus Christ came and started to walk down the road with them. They didn't understand who he was. They didn't recognize who he was. We'll pick up the account in verse 19, because they were talking and talking about all of the things that just happened, and he asked them in verse 19, said, What things are you talking about? And so they said to them, The things concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who is a prophet, mighty indeed, and word before God and all the people.

And they went on in verse 20 to talk about how the chiefs, priests, and the rulers delivered him to be condemned and crucified him. And they shared in verse 21 that they were hoping it was he who was going to redeem Israel. And indeed, beside this, they say, today is the third day since those things happened. And so this account was happening before they knew that Jesus Christ had been resurrected. And they were dejected. They were disappointed. Their hopes were dashed, because as it says in verse 20, I'm sorry, verse 21, that they were hoping that he was going to be the one to redeem Israel.

So their hopes and what Jesus Christ was had been dashed. They go on to talk a little bit more about some of the things that happened, the accounts of those who were saying that Jesus Christ had been raised. And then in verse 25, Jesus, again, without divulging who he was, said to them, Foolish ones, slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken, ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter his glory. And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.

Now, when we look back at that, there's not really anything that terribly stunning, is there? Because we recognize the scriptures of the Old Testament. We read the book of Matthew. We read other accounts. We see exactly how the Old Testament laid out the prophecies that came through to Jesus Christ. And so it seems a little odd, actually, when we read this, of why would you have to spend all this time explaining this?

The disciples were walking with Jesus Christ for three and a half years. Surely they knew this.

But why would he have expounded these things to them and pointed them out to them if they already knew it? Wouldn't they have been able to recite all of those verses right back to him? So let's look at this through the eyes of those taking the journey. And while we'll never know exactly the words that were spoken, I would say that there are a lot of clues in the Bible. And the clues would be the things that the apostles themselves later wrote and said, as recorded in some of the Gospels, and as recorded in the book of Acts. This is relevant, of course, now because we're living in this exact time period, the last week now before Pentecost, and it would have been only a few weeks earlier, way back when, after Jesus Christ had been raised, that he would have been talking about these things, too, as disciples. Now, I'd like to look at it in two dimensions today as we take this return trip from Emmaus, and the two elements are, number one, the purpose of the Messiah, and secondly, the suffering of the Messiah. The purpose of the Messiah and the suffering of the Messiah. We're going to cover a lot of territory here in a short period of time. The purpose is not to go super deep and dig into everything. That could take hours and nobody's going to stay awake that long. But what I'd like to do is hopefully spur some thought, give you a few ideas of additional places to look and read over the course of the upcoming week as we get towards Pentecost, if you're inclined to do that. So let's go back again here to Luke 24, and we'll read verse 21, because these two disciples expressed something that plenty of people at that time period would have been thinking when they said we were hoping that it was he talking about Jesus who was going to redeem Israel. Now at this point in time, the Jews were looking for a Messiah, and much more so because they were living in their homeland, but they were living under control of the Romans. And you can read history. There were groups called the zealots who tried to foment resistance against the Jews. They were usually killed and put down pretty quickly and pretty violently by the Romans because they were causing insurrection against the government.

And so the Jews were looking for this divine Savior to come to throw off this yoke of Roman bondage and governance to be able to once again have their own land and their own freedom in their land without the Romans getting in the way. And again, what's stunning in looking back at this, as these two disciples are saying, they themselves were hoping that Jesus was going to be the one to physically redeem Israel. After three and a half years walking with Jesus, they didn't fully understand what he was about. And it's easy to say or think maybe they were just kind of dumb or they didn't fully have God's Holy Spirit at the time, but I would venture to say there was more to it than that because for a variety of reasons, Jesus Christ decided not to reveal these things to them before that time. And one of the clues we have for that is verse 27 of Luke 24, which again mentions that Jesus began at Moses and all the prophets expounding to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. If he'd done that before, there wouldn't have been much point in doing that again. They would have already known it. They wouldn't have been dejected for that matter because they would have already understood this entire roadmap.

Can you think of where the first New Testament reference is to the church?

We think about the day of Pentecost, and that's of course the day that the Holy Spirit came and the church was established, but it's not actually the first mention of the church in the New Testament. That mention is in Matthew 16. Let's turn there. Let's take a little time reading through it and read this account as Jesus Christ first speaks about the church. And what I find really interesting and compelling is it's not an isolation. It's tied to a very specific idea.

And that idea is the messiahship and the authority and the power of Jesus Christ, his identity as the Son of God. It ties directly, as we'll see here, to the existence and the establishment of the church. Matthew 16, starting verse 13.

We'll read the whole passage and then we'll go back and take a part of a few pieces of it.

When Jesus came into the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, So they said, And Jesus answered and said to him, And I say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it. I'll give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and what you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. And he commanded his disciples that they should tell no one that he was Jesus the Christ.

Now we see a term here a couple of times that comes up, which is the Christ. The anointed one, or the Messiah, is what it means, literally. It's a title. So we often say Jesus Christ, as though that's his first name and his last name, but we look in the Bible, it actually identifies him as Jesus, his name, the Christ, which is the office or the position that he holds, which is being the anointed one or the Messiah of God. And there are a few unique elements that come here.

The first one I'll call home court advantage. All right, in a small way, it's kind of like the Miami Heat going 2-0 in the Boston Garden in the NBA playoffs, for those of you who watch basketball. Jesus Christ was going to a place where he did not have home court advantage.

Let me read a bit of what Barclay says about Caesarea Philippi and this setting here. He says, Caesarea Philippi was an area associated with idols and with rival deities. The area was scattered with temples of the ancient Syrian Baal worship. Hard by Caesarea Philippi, there arose a great hill in which was a deep cavern, and that cavern was said to be the birthplace of the great god Pan, the god of nature. In Caesarea Philippi, there was a great temple of white marble built to the godhead of Caesar. It is as if Jesus deliberately set himself against the background of the world's religions in all their history and splendor and demanded to be compared to them and have the verdict given in his favor. So he went to a place that was regarded by a whole bunch of different believers and false gods, and he went directly there and he proclaimed himself to be the Christ, the Messiah. And so he was sending a very clear message. And if we read all of the events that happened after that, you can see how fairly quickly after that, if you read, for example, the rest of the book of Matthew, everything begins to unfold as he starts to get into the altercations with the scribes and Pharisees. He begins to talk about the fact that he's going to be crucified. All of these events that lead ultimately to his crucifixion and death unleash after this event where he reveals himself and what he is to the disciples.

In verse 14, we see him compared, as the disciples, answer to John, to Elijah, to Jeremiah, to different people that were there. So John was, of course, someone who was contemporary with Jesus Christ, stood for a figure who was talking about national repentance. They're saying, Jesus, many people say you're another one of these figures who's calling for national repentance, for Israel to repent so God can save and redeem them. Elijah, someone who restored true worship to Israel back in the old days. Remember Elijah and the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel, where God came in and miraculously brought fire down from heaven, considered one of the greatest of the prophets by the Jewish people. But that's not who Jesus was either. And Jeremiah, who also gave very powerful prophecies. And here, what's being said is Jesus saying, no, I'm not any of those things. I am the Messiah. I am nothing else other than the very Son of God. And he wants everyone to understand that, at this point, his disciples, and later the entire world. What I find interesting here, too, is that it moves directly from saying, when Peter says, I know who you are, I believe that you're the Son of God, he goes directly from there to the establishment of his church. And so he's saying, in effect, yes, I am the Messiah, and I am not the Messiah coming to physically save this nation at this point in time. I am the Messiah, and I am coming to establish my church.

I think we know the play on words that happens here in verse 17 and into verse 18, where Jesus says to Peter, on this rock I will build my church. Now, some people will say that rock is Peter himself, but we know, as we read other scriptures, for example, Acts 4 verse 11, that talks about Jesus Christ, the stone rejected, being made the chief cornerstone.

1 Corinthians 3 verse 11, which talks about Jesus Christ being the foundation.

Ephesians 2.20, which talks about Jesus Christ as the cornerstone. We know from those other scriptures that Jesus is talking about himself. He's kind of making a play on words. He's saying, you're Peter, you're little rock, you're a pebble, which is what petros means in Greek, and then upon this rock, petra, the larger rock, referring to himself, he will build the church.

And these other scriptures that I just read to you or mentioned to you, confirm that, that it's on Jesus Christ that the church is built. But what I want to make clear here is what he's talking about here is he's tying his Messiahship directly to the fact that he will establish his church, and he will be the rock and the cornerstone of that church.

So you think about inaugural addresses, you think about the Gettysburg Address, you think of when leaders come out and they say, this is my purpose, and this is what I stand for, and this is what I'm going to do. I view that as one of those moments for Jesus Christ, as he made it very clear to his disciples, or at least tried to, what he was about and what it was that he was going to do.

Turn with me, if you will, to Matthew 28. This is carried forward in what Matthew talks about.

It's often talked about as the Great Commission, when Jesus Christ talks to his disciples shortly before he ascends to heaven, and he tells them what they're supposed to do. Essentially, what is the operation of the church supposed to be? And what I find compelling here, too, is he ties these two things together again. I don't know if we notice that always when we read it. In verse 18 of Matthew 28, Jesus came and he spoke to them, the disciples, saying, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Essentially saying again, I am the Christ, I am the Messiah. Therefore, in verse 19, go and make disciples of the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I've commanded you, and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age. So again, what I want to underscore here is Jesus Christ had these opportunities as he was talking about his power and his authority to say what he was about.

And what he was about was building a church, leading people to him through the Holy Spirit, and having the people that he called continuing to proclaim his name to the world. Very clear that he was not saying, all authority is given to me, therefore, I am going to save this physical set of people. I'm going to overthrow this governmental entity. He didn't say any of those things. What he was clearly about, as we lead into this time of Pentecost, was building his church. That mission tied directly to his authority. So what's the lesson from this for the church today? What is it that we should learn about this and consider? There are probably hundreds of lessons we can draw from it. I'm going to draw a specific one, and we'll start in Ephesians 1 verses 19 through 23.

Now, we think a lot about authority and probably from our family background, maybe bosses we've dealt with, other people who've had positions of authority over us. We probably have a very specific thought in mind as soon as we hear the word authority, don't we? And I venture to guess for many of us it's not a positive association because, as humans, we don't tend to be great at wielding authority. But let's look at the authority of Jesus Christ and how it's described.

Ephesians 1 verses 19 through 23. Paul here writing to the Ephesians says, What is the exceeding greatness of his power toward us who believe according to the working of his mighty power? Which he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead, seated him at his right hand in heavenly places, far above all principality and power and might and dominion and every name that's named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come.

So in case there's any doubt, anything you can throw out there, Jesus Christ is over it, is what Paul is saying, said at the very right hand of God. He can't get any higher than that without being God himself. But notice in verse 22 he says, There's a difference. Maybe it's subtle and we don't recognize it at first when we read this, but there's a difference in how the church is talked about versus these principalities and powers and dominions and other names where it's simply said that God is over there, or Jesus Christ is over them. God has given him all power over those things.

But how is his church described? Certainly he has power and authority over his church, but it's described in a different way as his body, as the way that he fulfills all in all.

There's a different level of relationship. There's a different type of relationship there between Jesus Christ and the church versus Jesus Christ and all of these other things that he has power and dominion over. We can probably think about Ephesians 5.

If we read that section in verses 22 through 33, there Paul talks to the Ephesians about marriage and the marriage relationship, and he likens that relationship of what a marriage should be when God is dominant over that marriage, when God is guiding that marriage, and the relationship between husband and wife. And he likens that to the relationship between Jesus Christ and the church.

How he gives himself for the church, how he cares for and loves the church. And he lays out this close relationship, the most intimate relationship that human beings can have, as what that relationship is between Jesus Christ and the church. He does not lay it out as Jesus Christ gets to say what it is and you do it or he whacks you over the head. He talks about a loving husband, talks about husbands loving your wife as yourself, just as Jesus Christ loved the church.

There's a difference in relationship there than what we might often think about as straight-up authority. The care that God has that Jesus Christ has for the church, talked about as the very bride of Christ. Turn with me then, if you will, to 1 Corinthians 3. We'll read this a little bit further in 1 Corinthians 3 verses 16 and 17. Again, talking about the uniqueness, really a groundbreaking way that Jesus Christ is dealing with us as human beings compared to the way that he dealt with humans before the time of the Holy Spirit coming out and the church. 1 Corinthians 3 verses 16 and 17.

Here Paul writing to the Corinthians says, do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him, for the temple of God is holy. Which temple you are.

So God is talking about the holiness of us as his people and collectively as his church. Those who he's given his Holy Spirit to, those that he cares for, as a husband is supposed to love and care for and be tender toward his wife. And so he's revealing a completely different relationship, a groundbreaking relationship with mankind, that he begins to roll out as he's talking first in this area where many other pagan gods were believed to have come from and have dominion over.

And he says, no, I am the Christ. I have all power in heaven and earth. God has given that power to me and I will use it to establish my church, to dwell in that church, to care for that church, and to empower that church through my spirit. How amazing is that what Jesus Christ was doing?

You can imagine, for disciples sitting back there and having never had these things said to them, or illuminated for them, you can understand why they didn't get it the first time it was said to them. Which is again clear from that Emmaus Road incident. These things were said to them. They just didn't have the tools to fully understand what was going on. And that's why it took that time, those 40 days when Jesus was with them, between Passover, or his resurrection, and Pentecost, as he was teaching them all of these things out of the Old Testament scriptures that prophesied what he would be. And they needed to understand and fully process all of that so they could lay it out in what they later wrote in the Bible, as well as preaching. So to summarize this section, Jesus revealed that his messiahship was extremely different, very different from what was understood by the very biblically literate people of his day. These people memorized scripture. Many of them had large portions, if not the entire Old Testament, the Torah at a minimum, memorized. It wasn't a matter of understanding or knowing the words of the scripture. It was understanding what those things meant. He taught, Jesus did, a direct progression from his messiahship to the church to a spirit-powered relationship with individuals who make up that church, a direct line between those things. And taking the return trip from Emmaus, we can see it. And because of the things that Jesus explained between Passover and Pentecost that was later laid out through the disciples, we can now see that thread all the way through the Old Testament. Let me give you a few examples as we wrap up this section. Jeremiah 31 verse 31, where the prophet says, the days are coming when I will make a new covenant with Israel. He says, I'll write the law in your hearts. I'm going to change your heart. Instead of a heart of stone, you'll have a heart of flesh. We can understand what that meant. For whatever reason, that was not illuminated to the people at that time, but I'm willing to bet that's something Jesus Christ talked with them about during this period after his resurrection. Psalm 51 verse 17, David writes, the sacrifice of God is a broken spirit and a contrite heart. David writes in other places how, you know, God doesn't want the sacrifice of bulls and goats. That doesn't please him. Did people really have...were they equipped to understand that in the sacrificial system? Perhaps not. Certainly not to the fullness that they did as Jesus Christ revealed these things to them. Isaiah 66 verse 2, to this man will I look, he who is poor of a contrite heart and trembles at my word. A clear pointing to the idea of repentance and the idea that through repentance and taking on the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we can have salvation and forgiveness of sins. So at the center of Jesus Christ's messiahship is this unique relationship of God dwelling in us both as individuals and collectively as a body that's not only under his authority but that he loves, cares for, nurtures, and develops. So that's the messiahship of Jesus Christ and the purpose of it. Let's look secondly at the suffering of the messiah, the suffering of the messiah. Again, this is something that when we look back, we take pretty much as a given. We understand, we read Isaiah 53 as we go through the Passover service. We understand how the prophets talked about how Jesus Christ would suffer. But let's go back again to this trip on the Emmaus Road in Luke 24 and we'll read verses 25 through 27. Jesus said to them, again, they didn't know at that point in time that it was him, O foolish ones, slow of heart to believe, in all that the prophets have spoken, ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and entered into his glory.

And then beginning at Moses and the prophets, he expounded them the scriptures, the things concerning himself. Their slowness of heart, their foolishness, their lack of understanding, as he said, was tied directly to this lack of understanding that Jesus Christ would suffer.

And I think it hit exactly at the model that was in their heads of what the Messiah would and would not be. Because again, if you believe that the Messiah is the conquering king who's going to bring physical salvation to the people of your time, at the point that he's crucified on the cross and dies, the jig is up. And historically, they would have seen groups of zealots over a period of time. This is written in history. I believe there's even some reference to it in the Bible.

Zealots who would rise up, rebel against the Romans, they'd get killed, their people would scatter and go on their way. And you can understand how the disciples, without having processed everything yet, would have thought, he's been killed, it's another one of these great disappointments.

Now we've got to rebuild. We built our last three and a half years on something that didn't pan out.

He wasn't who he said he was, and now we're going to go on our way. Fortunately, that wasn't the end of the story, and that's clearly what Jesus Christ was pointing out beginning at this point in time.

But this was not within their model. Again, there are clues to the fact that Jesus Christ emphasized these things to them in this time so that they would understand. Also, clues that people in general at that point in time did not understand the idea that the Messiah would have to suffer and not simply be a conquering king. Three quick examples that I'll read to you. They're all in acts.

So as we read through acts, we can see, maybe in a way that we haven't focused on before, these two things tied together, that the Messiah must suffer, that it was pointed out in the scriptures.

It's interesting because that ties exactly to what's written in Luke 24 that we were reading.

Acts 3 verse 18 is the first of these things.

Here, it says, just breaking into the passage, "...the things which God announced beforehand by the mouth of all the prophets, that his Christ would suffer, he is thus fulfilled." Now, if everyone understood that, they knew the prophets. If they understood that the prophets were talking about Jesus Christ and that the Messiah would have to suffer, they wouldn't have to emphasize this point. But they did.

They had to illuminate the scriptures that they actually pointed to the suffering of Jesus Christ, not just to a conquering king. Acts 17 verses 2 and 3, "...according to Paul's custom, he went to them. For three Sabbaths he reasoned with them from the scriptures, explaining and giving evidence from those scriptures that the Christ had to suffer, and rise again from the dead, saying, This Jesus, who I'm proclaiming to you, is the Christ." Again, in Acts 26 verses 22 and 23, "...so having obtained help from God, I stand to this day testifying both to small and great, stating nothing but what the prophets and Moses said was going to take place." Sounds a lot like the Emmaus Road, doesn't it? "...that the Christ was to suffer, and by reason of his resurrection from the dead, he would be the first to proclaim light both to the Jewish people and to the Gentiles." So there's something new here. There's something that people had to understand and focus on, and it wasn't the fact that another usurper trying to overthrow the Romans had been killed and it's time to move on. It's the fact that this was different.

He suffered because it was prophesied that he would, and he was raised to become the king and the Messiah, just with a very different commission than the people of his time thought. To me, the parallelism is very striking here. These three passages and acts to what's written in Luke, this tie-in between Moses and the prophets are going to the Scriptures and the suffering of Jesus Christ, as pointed out, as they're driving that home. Again, if these things were so obvious to the people of that time, why would that be a center point of the message Paul, and likely the other apostles as well, were preaching to the people of that time? So looking backward, there's much that we can see in the Old Testament that speaks to the suffering of Jesus Christ.

Likely, a lot of this sources back directly to what he taught the disciples during those early days. Isaiah 53, the passage about the suffering servant, is certainly one of those. What I find interesting is, if you ever wanted to go out, look on the internet and look in Jewish forums, Messianic Jewish forums, and other things about the interpretation of Isaiah 53.

What you're going to find is that there's a lot of controversy about it, but the dominant theme for most Jewish people is that Isaiah 53 talks about Judah, the Jews, or the nation of Israel.

Not about a person, a literal person. It's an interesting way that Christians and Jews often talk past each other. I've done the same thing as I've talked with Jewish friends and mentioned the fact that we see in Isaiah 53 that Jesus Christ is prophesied as one that would suffer.

But many in the Jewish faith see that as a prophecy about the Jews or Israel as being people who suffer and will ultimately be saved by the Messiah when he comes.

Even though these things are written in the Bible, they're different frames of reference, they're different views and understanding what they mean. We understand, certainly, through what's been illuminated to us through God's Spirit, what Jesus taught the disciples, the apostles, and what they've recorded, that this does refer to Jesus Christ.

There's other evidence that the disciples didn't understand this concept fully at their time.

Again, I'm going to rattle off a few scriptures here if you want to write them down. We're not going to read through them all. But in Mark 833, Jesus Christ talked about the fact that he was going to die. Peter pulled him aside and rebuked him. He rebuked Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ went right back at him and said, Get behind me, Satan. Peter didn't understand that the mission of Jesus Christ included him suffering and dying for our sins. Mark 9, verses 31 and 32, talks about Jesus foretelling his death and resurrection. And there, it just clearly straight up says, The disciples did not understand. Written, of course, later, but putting themselves back in that position.

Mark 16, verse 11, when the disciples heard that Jesus was alive after his resurrection, they didn't believe it. It's interesting. He said, you know, I'll be raised up after three days. He said, You destroy the temple. I'll raise it again in three days. The people hearing him really didn't understand. He was talking about his physical body, not the literal temple. If that had sunk in with the disciples in Mark 16, 11, when they heard Jesus was alive after the resurrection, they would have said, Aha! Just like he said. Three days, he's up again. But they didn't. They didn't believe it because for whatever reason, and probably because this understanding of the Scriptures just was not something that they'd had. And even though Jesus Christ mentioned it to him, to them, as they were going, they just couldn't grasp what it meant to the point where they didn't believe, even after his resurrection at first, that he'd been raised. And John 10 verse 9 explains again, John 10 verse 9, that they did not yet understand the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead. Again, John written, I believe was the last of the Gospels written, again says, did not understand at that point in time that he must rise from the dead. So that shows it was an understanding that came to them over a later period of time. If you read the book of Matthew, you'll see there how the writer ties back to the Old Testament prophets repeatedly. Matthew is seen by everyone as a book that continually goes back and says, as is written in the prophets, or as the men of old have said, or as was written. And I encourage everyone, go back and read Matthew with this frame of reference, thinking about what is it that Jesus Christ talked about? What did he illuminate from Moses and the prophets? If you read the book of Matthew, it's almost as if Matthew was taking those things that Jesus Christ laid out from the Scriptures and put them in writing so they could be preserved for us and for everyone else who would read those words. So what's the lesson from this for the church today? The Messiah is a suffering servant. Turn with me, if you will, to Philippians 2. This is a Scripture that we tend to read relatively often here in our congregation for very good reason, and it lays out exactly what this means for us as Christians, as those who endeavor to follow Jesus Christ and to be like him. Philippians 2 verses 5 through 8, Let this mind be in you, which was in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bond servant, coming in the likeness of men, and being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself. He became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Now the translation, as we know, is a little bit clumsy here, but what it's saying is Jesus Christ had all of these things.

He was there at the right hand of God. He was willing to leave it behind, to humble himself not only to become a human being, but to suffer this ignominious death. And we're supposed to have that same mind in us, that same willingness to serve sacrificial love, to give for one another.

We're expected, as Jesus Christ lives within us through his spirit, to have that same mind and that same attitude. In fact, not only are we supposed to have it, it's the defining hallmark of his church. We're not going to talk about physical organizations versus God's spiritual church, but if you want to understand places where God is working, there is a hallmark that God gives through the Bible in 1 John. 1 John 3, verses 16 and 23. We're not going to read this entire passage. I would encourage you to go back to 1 John 3 if you're looking for something to reflect on over the course of this week. We'll just read these two verses here. 1 John 3, verse 16.

By this we know love because he laid down his life for us. Again, the suffering Messiah.

And we ought also to lay down our lives for the brethren. Verse 23. This is his commandment that we should believe on the name of his son Jesus Christ and, directly tied to it, love one another as he gave us commandment. And that love for one another we see written about so often in the Scriptures as being the hallmark of God's church. You can't have the Holy Spirit living in you and not have love for other people. We've all got our issues, we've got our problems, we've got our hangups from how we grew up, we've got sins we're trying to overcome, and we don't always express that in the way that we should and as fully as we should. But if God's Spirit is in us, it will be knocking those barriers down, piece by piece, as we work and as we love other people. And that will become manifest in people over time. It can't help but come out if Jesus Christ is living in us, if he's working in us as a body, if his Spirit is motivating us. So wrapping up this section, Jesus revealed in this time before Pentecost that the Messiah has to suffer. And, in fact, it was a key part of his mission. It wasn't something that happened by accident where God had to call an audible and say, uh-oh, the Romans captured him and they're going to kill him. I got to change my plans. This was planned all the way along and that's what Jesus Christ was pointing out from the Scriptures. Looking backwards, it seems obvious. But for those at that time, it was actually a disqualifying factor. If you were looking for the Messiah that was going to save the physical nation, at the point that he was suffering and killed, he was not the guy.

That's why Jesus Christ had to point this out. And the fact that this quality of our Savior and King as the suffering servant is actually the hallmark of the church that he's building.

So, in conclusion, as we conclude and close in on our last week before Pentecost, since this was only the broadest of overviews, I'd like to encourage everyone to do a couple of things if you're looking for something to do or to read or to study over the course of this week. The first is to take some time in the book of Matthew. Again, like I said earlier, Matthew devotes itself to pointing out how the Old Testament spoke of Jesus Christ repeatedly over and over.

If you want to, take some notes. Note all the different scriptures where you see those signaling words, as was spoken by those of old, as was spoken in the prophets, as was written.

And see how many times it refers to that. And consider, are these the things that Jesus Christ pointed out to the disciples in this period of time? Secondly, I encourage everyone to look at the activities and the teaching of the apostles in Acts and to see how those mirrored this message of Jesus Christ and the church. So today we took a brief return trip from Emmaus, trying to put ourselves in the shoes of the two disciples who heard Jesus illuminate for them all that Moses and the prophets had written about him. His messiahship is bound directly to the establishment of his church and a unique, groundbreaking, new relationship that he initiated with mankind on the first Pentecost. And his suffering, the fact that the messiah must suffer, and how that teaches us how we are to live as Christians and lays out the identifying traits of sacrificial love that are a hallmark of his church. So as we spend some time on the return trip from Emmaus, let's pray for God's Spirit to continue to work mightily in his church and to lead all of us individually as his people.