HOMILY EASTER SUNDAY 03 – A
Witnesses to the Risen Lord
(Acts 2:14, 22b-28; Psalm 16; 1 Peter 1:17-21; Luke 24:13-35)
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The readings on this 3rd Sunday of Easter time are like bookends – they stretch from the appearance of Jesus to his disciples on the day of his resurrection, to the Pentecost event which wraps up the Easter season.
In doing so, they invite us to set our faith and hope on God who raised Jesus from the dead, and to be witnesses to the resurrection of Jesus by our lives of faith and hope.
The Gospel reminds us that this is still the first day of the week – continuing the theme of new creation the resurrection of Jesus is all about. Two of the disciples (they could be a husband and wife) are heading to Emmaus, a resort town, to escape the danger, disappointment and stress of associating with Jesus, and go back to their old ways. Jesus enters the conversation incognito, as he does in our lives so often, through both friends and strangers.
They then live out the Eucharist in what follows: the Penitential rite (the disciples unburdening themselves onto Jesus); the Liturgy of the Word (Jesus explaining the scriptures to them that were all about him), the Liturgy of the Eucharist (recognizing him in the breaking of the bread), and the dismissal (the disciples, hearts burning within them, turning around and going back to Jerusalem to re-join the community and share their story of their encounter with Jesus).
The first reading can be best understood in terms of the story of the Tower of Babel. There, people were not only trying to have more power and influence over the gods by the height of their tower – they were also trying to make a name for themselves. That is an important note because the apostles themselves, just before the Passion of Christ, were also hoping to make a name for themselves by following Jesus. They were arguing who would sit at his right and left hand once he came into his kingdom. They still had no idea of the kind of Messiah Jesus was, and the kind of kingdom he came to inaugurate.
What happened at Pentecost, over and above the miracle of speaking and hearing in strange languages, was that these same apostles, so caught up in the games of power, status and control, absolutely and totally forgot about making a name for themselves. Instead, they were completely and fully fascinated by what God was doing in their lives through the out-pouring of the Holy Spirit. Their lives had completely changed focus, from prestige and power, to the reality of the Risen Lord. Finally, they understood what the reign of Jesus was all about – a whole new kind of power and authority in the world.
The power and authority that God loves and uses most is not the power of pneuma (compressed air like a hurricane); nor dunamis (dynamite like an earthquake), nor energia (energy like electricity) but rather exousia (the power of a child to melt the hardest hearts, the power of powerlessness, and true, genuine authority). It is this power and authority that the apostles experienced at Pentecost, that captivated their hearts and filled them with hope and boundless love for the world.
Filled with the knowledge of that new power, Peter simply could not help himself. He who had denied Jesus three times, and had protested so often that Jesus could not and should not suffer, nor wash his feet, now spoke up boldly that this same Jesus was now risen from the dead, because it was impossible for him to be held in its power. A whole new way of life was now available to anyone who would believe in Jesus, and surrender his or her life to him.
Richard Rohr, noted spiritual writer and speaker, has a unique insight into the nature of this power of powerlessness. He writes, “Paul’s expectations of the Messiah, and therefore of who God is, are turned absolutely upside down. Remember, the Jews have been an oppressed, occupied people. They’re never on the top. They’ve been waiting and waiting for some great, historic figure who is going to liberate them: who is going to stand up to Rome, to Egypt and to Syria. They are longing for the Anointed One, the Christ, the Messiah, who would finally give them some dignity in human history.
But in his Christ experience on the Damascus Road (Acts 9: 3-8), the One that Paul encounters is a crucified loser! This is no military figure. This is someone who was crucified outside the city walls in the manner that slaves were killed. Paul had to utterly redefine what power is, what leadership is, what this new reality is that God is bringing us into. Clearly, God descended to get to us; we did not climb a ladder of righteousness to get to God!”
Therefore, Paul idealizes not power, but powerlessness. “When I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:10). “I glory in nothing except in the cross of Christ” (Galatians 6:14). Is he a masochist? No, he’s found what he calls “the mystery that has been hidden since the beginning of time” (1 Corinthians 2:7): that we don’t break through and transform history from the top, but from the bottom.”
A museum guide explained over and over the picture of the Emmaus account that was hanging in the museum, quite by rote. However, after his wife was diagnosed with cancer, and he had journeyed with her for some months, he suddenly gained a great insight into the painting as he was explaining it to some patrons. He realized that he was the one on the road to Emmaus, and that Jesus had been walking with him, supporting him in journeying with his wife through her illness. From then on, that painting took on a whole new meaning, and his explanation of it a whole new tone.
The Eucharist we celebrate today is actually our own Emmaus walk with Jesus – sharing our story with him, listening to him in the scriptures, and recognizing him in the breaking of the bread.
May it empower us to be like the early disciples, hearts burning within us, to go out and share our story of Jesus encountering us on our own Emmaus road, and witnessing to him risen from the dead.
