Jesus After the Resurrection: The Emmaus Road

The Bible presents a real view of life, and I want to be real about life. Today we are going to look at the Emmaus Road story to take a look at life that I hope will both encourage and challenge us.

Scripture: Luke 24:13-35

That very day two of them were going to a village named Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. While they were talking and discussing (reasoning) together, Jesus himself drew near and went with them.  But their eyes were kept from recognizing him. 

And he said to them, "What is this conversation which you are holding with each other as you walk?" And they stood still, looking sad (skuthropos, gloomy, sullen, dark.) Then one of them, named Cle'opas (probably Jesus’ uncle), answered him, "Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?"  And he said to them, "What things?" 

And they said to him, "Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people,  and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him. But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. 

Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since this happened. Moreover, some women of our company amazed us. (“Nothing seems to make sense, confuse, amaze, astound.") They were at the tomb early in the morning and did not find his body; and they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels, who said that he was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb, and found it just as the women had said; but him they did not see. 

And he said to them, "O foolish men, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken!  Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?" (“heavy or weighty.”) And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. 

So they drew near to the village to which they were going. He appeared to be going further, but they constrained him, saying, "Stay with us, for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent." So he went in to stay with them.  When he was at table with them, he took the bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. And their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he vanished out of their sight.

 They said to each other, "Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the scriptures?"  And they rose that same hour and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven gathered together and those who were with them, who said, "The Lord has risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!"  Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread.

What do we learn about Jesus  - and real life - on the road to Emmaus?

1. Life is hard, but Jesus joins us in our journey

Through Jesus, God entered a world He created in which grief and joy cross paths constantly. 

• Jesus’ baptism moves into the temptation in the wilderness

• Jesus does miracles, and people set traps for him

• Lazarus lives/Lazarus dies/Lazarus lives

• Crowds love Jesus/villages hate him

• Triumphal entry/crucifixion/resurrection

This tension continues. Apparently, Jesus’ followers can expect to experience this too because now, on the Emmaus road, despair is followed by great joy. The resurrected Christ did not demonstrate the fullness of His glory by removing all the uncertainty and turmoil from life – He demonstrated the fullness of His glory by redeeming these things. 

You may have noticed that Jesus has not removed all the turmoil and uncertainty from your life. 

• Coronavirus roller coasters…

• Marriages overwhelm us one day with happiness and bury us the next day in anger or frustration…

• Jobs fulfill and crush us, sometimes on the same day…

• Physical health comes and goes…

• Freedom from temptation/overwhelmed by temptation…

• Or, like those on the road to Emmaus, the way in which you sense God near – or far - can change dramatically. 

Jesus walks with us spiritually like he walked with them physically.  That’s the promise of the Holy Spirit, right?  Jesus did not remove his disciples from this tumultuous world, and he does not remove us - yet.  One day He will. He joined them, and he joins us, and he offers redemption and restoration that point the way toward our ultimate reconciliation with Him. In the midst of this ebb and flow of life, look for him. He will show up with his Holy Spirit, his Word, and his people. Read the Bible, pray, and put people on the road next to you. Don’t walk alone. God will open your eyes when the time is right, and you will recognize that Jesus has been walking with you all along.

2. Jesus is content to remain hidden at times even though He is always near.

We do this with kids all the time, especially when they are young.  They have no idea that we are listening or watching, and yet we are. We care; we want them to mature on their own, but we know that can’t mature properly without us. We watch, and wait, and in our imperfect ways we help, and give them distance, and let them figure it out, and intervene, and correct and challenge and encourage…. In our imperfect way, we are trying to figure out how to balance being obvious and being hidden as we let them go and hold them close at the same time.

When Jacob was traveling (Genesis 28:11) he had a dream that he was in the presence of God. God spoke to him there. Jacob said, “Surely God is in this place and I did not know it.” If historians are correct, the Emmaus road revelation happened at the same place that Jacob dreamed he was visited by God.[1]  At the same place, the same thing happens: “Jesus was in this place and we didn’t know it.”

God could have miraculously revealed himself to Jacob at any time.  On the Emmaus road, Jesus could have instantly caught up with those guys and BAM, thrown back his hood and said, “Guys! It’s me!”  But he didn't. 

•  God could have spared me two major breakdowns I’ve had in my life, but he didn’t. 

• God could have healed my father, but he didn’t.

• God could have averted my heart attack and the depression and anxiety that followed, but he didn’t. 

• God could take away my ADD now that I can’t take medication for, but he hasn’t. 

• God could remove the coronavirus with a snap of his fingers, but he hasn’t.

 Does this mean He is absent in these cases? No, and this geographic location in the Bible –with first Jacob’s story and now the Emmaus road walkers –remind us: “Surely, God is in this place, and I didn’t know it.”  

It’s relatively easy to follow Jesus when he is right in front of you casting out demons and raising the dead.  But when you don’t know where He is?  When you can’t sense His presence?   I wondered if God is honored even more when we continue to be His disciple even when we think we are walking alone?

There is no doubt in my mind that in all of these situations, God’s Spirit is present and working. In all these situation, I know that the message of Scripture stabilized and sustained me. (More on both of those in a second). But I’ve been thinking a lot about a third provision of God’s grace: walking with friends.  

It is much easier to keep going when you have a walking buddy. Many times we don’t sense God is near; one way to we find strength is by walking with others.  This is why we stress relationship at our church.  Nobody needs to walk their Emmaus road alone.  

I don’t have a verse for this – this is Anthony, not the Bible – but I suspect that when we want to see God, more often than not God meets that desire by sending us His people, his ambassadors/representatives/ icons. His image-bearers.

3) Jesus will reveal Himself in His time 

    The two disciples did not recognize Jesus on the road. Revelation is required. 

 He reveals His Glory Through His Word. Jesus could have just made them feel it without opening the book – I mean, the book is about Him after all. He could have just skipped that step and popped out.  But they had the Scriptures, so He walked them through the Scriptures as the way of revealing Himself even though He was right there. The early church continued this tradition: pointing to Jesus by pointing toward the Bible.

• Old Testament quotations and allusions found in the Gospel of Matthew (which was written especially for Jewish readers)

• The apostles' sermon material found in the Book of Acts (Genesis 22:18; 26:4; Deuteronomy 18:15-19; Psalm 2:1-2, 7; 16:8-11; 110:1; 118:22; Isaiah 53:7-8; 55:3; and Amos 9:11-12)

 If you are walking the Christian road, and you need to see Jesus….read the Bible.  This is the FOUNDATIONAL revelation. 

He reveals his glory through His suffering. Jesus tells them: “Wasn’t it necessary that the Messiah suffer to reveal His glory?” Then Jesus showed them through the breaking of the bread: At the Last Supper he had said,  “Take, eat, this is my body which was broken for you.” The Messiah must suffer to enter in to his glory.  Jesus was SHOWN through the Bible.  Jesus was KNOWN by them through the breaking of the bread, just as His glory was revealed to the world through His suffering.

Jesus wants us to share in His glory. How will this happen?  Through our suffering.

Romans 8:17-18 (NIV) “Now if we are children, then we are heirs--heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory. I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.”

 There are all kinds of suffering.  We will never pray in the Garden of Gethsemene while sweating drops of blood, but we will experience our own gardens, where we see death or what feels like a kind of death coming, and we will pray for our cup to pass…and for God’s will to be done.  In our suffering, the glory of Christ revealed in us is heavy. 

Have you ever been around people who have suffered, and in their suffering God brought out a weightiness to them, a maturity, a profound sense of wisdom and godly transformation? That's the glory that is revealed in us, I think. The glory of a faithfully transforming God who corrals all things into the service of transforming us into the image of Jesus.

But that is actually is not the focus of the kind of suffering mentioned in Romans.   This is suffering specifically for the cause of Christ. If mere suffering ushers in God’s glory, imagine what happens when we suffer for the sake of our commitment to Christ. 

• Jesus commands us to be pure, and we suffer in our struggle to remain pure in our thoughts and actions. Saying no to sexual temptation and opportunity can be epic.   But if I want to share in the glory of Christ’s purity, I must be willing to suffer the hardship of sexual restraint.

• Jesus commands us to love people, and we suffer as we taken on the burdens of relationships with others.  But if want to share in the glory of true Christ-like love, I might have to be deeply wounded and still come back for more.  I’m not suggesting there are never times we should walk away. Abuse is a thing. Even the  disciples “shook the dust off their feet” at times and moved on. But in the normal course of life in a fallen world, love demands sacrifice. We will be broken and spilled out for those we love. 

• Jesus wants us live lives of self-sacrifice, and generosity, and patience…and we can suffer as everything within us wants to be selfish, and greedy, and impatient.  But if we want to share in the glory of Christ, we have to deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow. 

• You might suffer as you stand for the truth of Scripture, and because you love Christ so much you will not compromise.  But you are sharing in the glory of Christ.

 Can we all agree the world needs to see the glory of Christ?  It was seen in the suffering of Jesus on the cross; today, I suspect it will often be seen when we pay a spiritual price for the cause of Christ. 

2 Cor 4:7-11 (NIV). “But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body.”

He was known to them in the breaking of the bread.  “Do this in remembrance of me.“ I think the world will see His glory, as we are broken too. Amy Carmichael, a missionary who worked in India for 55 years, once wrote (and I paraphrase):

‘Have you no scar? No hidden scar on foot, or side or hand? I hear you described as mighty in the land: I hear them hail you as a rising star: Have you no scar? Have you no wound?  As the master is so shall the servant be.  Pierced are the feet that follow me; but yours are whole. Can you have followed far if you have no wound? No scar?’”

We share in God’s glory when His glory fills us – and we display God’s glory when it leaks through the cracks as our lives are broken on his behalf, and for His glory.  But we do not lose heart, because we realize:

1 Peter 5:10 (NIV) “And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast.”

Life is hard, but Jesus walks with us. Sometimes He hides, but He always reveals Himself and His glory through His word and His life. If you are willing to be broken for the cause of Christ, God will reveal His glory through you, and will one day restore you. 

And actually, that’s going to be our focus next week: the restoration of Peter, in the final chapter of the record of Jesus’ life on earth. 

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[1] “When Jacob was travelling the sun set (early Jewish legends explained the pointed reference in Genesis 28:11 by saying God had caused it to set prematurely to force Jacob to stop there) and he had a dream that he was in the presence of God. God spoke to him there. And the name of the place was originally known as Luz — in the Septuagint it is Oulammaus. In the Codex Bezae this is the name used for Emmaus in Luke 24. In an early reading of Luke (perhaps the earliest) the Emmaus road revelation happened at the same place that Jacob dreamed he was visited by God.” http://vridar.org/2007/11/17/the-logic-and-meaning-of-the-emmaus-road-narrative-in-luke/

Reflecting The Glory Of The Lord

“A glass can only spill what it contains.” - mewithoutyou

That’s not bad insight into life. We often hear the phrase, “garbage in, garbage out,” but that’s true of good things as well. Jesus taught this clearly:

"The good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth what is good; and the evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth what is evil; for his mouth speaks from that which fills his heart.” (Luke 6:45)

You don’t have to be a Christian to recognize this. What we pour into our lives is what will eventually pour out of it in some way. It’s one reason people are increasingly talking about the power of entertainment.  There are ways to filter it – there’s a lot to be said about learning how to read, listen and watch as a Christian who listens and sees through the eyes and ears of Jesus – but in some fashion, what comes in will come out.

• CNN’s Health section online featured an article entitled “Should Smoking Trigger an R rating?”  The author noted, “For every 500 smoking scenes a child saw in PG-13 movies, his or her likelihood of trying cigarettes increased by 49%.” [1]

• The Official Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics reported: “Youths [12-17 years old who viewed sexual content on TV] in the 90th percentile of TV sex viewing had a predicted probability of intercourse initiation that was approximately double that of youths in the 10th percentile... Exposure to TV that included only talk about sex was associated with the same risks...”[2]

What we dwell on matters. There is a reason Paul wrote to the Philippian church to focus on things that were good, true, and lovely (Philippians 4:8).  The idea of this verse is not that we retreat from anything bad – we would have to live in a bubble – but that we actively pursue a mental and emotional diet made up of predominantly wholesome things.

We all fill our glass with something. The words and actions and attitudes that overflow will reflect the abundance of images and ideas with which we have filled ourselves.

In 2 Corinthians, Paul makes a similar claim:  We will become what we see. He uses the analogy of a mirror reflecting, but the idea is the same.  

“As we see and reflect the glory of the Lord, we are transfigured by the Spirit of the Lord in ever-increasing splendor into his own image.” (2 Corinthians 3:18)

In essence, we are mirrors that reflect the things at which we look. It’s another way of saying that what flows out of us will be an indicator of what’s been filling us. Before we talk about that more, I need to give a context to this sentence. Paul was talking to the early Christians about the Old Testament Law. 

2 Corinthians 3:7-18

7-11 The administration of the Law which was engraved in stone (and which led in fact to spiritual death) was so magnificent that the Israelites were unable to look unflinchingly at Moses’ face, for it was alight with heavenly splendor. Now if the old administration held such heavenly, even though transitory, splendor, can we not see what a much more glorious thing is the new administration of the Spirit of life? If administering a system which ends in condemning men was a splendid task, how infinitely more splendid is administering a system which ends in making men good! And while it is true that the former temporary glory has been completely eclipsed now, we do well to remember that is eclipsed simply because the present permanent plan is such a very much more glorious thing than the old.

12-17 With this hope in our hearts we are quite frank and open in our ministry. We are not like Moses, who veiled his face to prevent the Israelites from seeing its fading glory. But it was their minds really which were blinded, for even today when the old agreement is read to them there is still a veil over their minds—though the veil has actually been lifted by Christ. Yes, alas, even to this day there is still a veil over their hearts when the writings of Moses are read. Yet if they turned to the Lord the veil would disappear, and they would understand how their Scriptures point to Christ. For the Lord to whom they could turn is the spirit of the new agreement, and wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom and boldness to proclaim His message.

18 But all of us who are followers of Christ do not have veils on our faces as we see and reflect the glory of the Lord. We are transfigured by the Spirit of the Lord in ever-increasing splendor into his own image.

This passage raises some questions for me: Why is the Law glorious even as it brings death? Why didn’t Moses want them to see his fading glory? How does our being unveiled reflect the glory of the Lord? Since all of this sets the table for verse 18, let’s try to work our way through these questions.

Question #1: How is the Law glorious even though it brings death? Because it was a teacher, a guide to show us how God wants us to live (Romans 15; 1 Corinthians 10). In Galatians 3, Paul wrote,

“Until the time when we were mature enough to respond freely in faith to the living God, we were carefully surrounded and protected by the Mosaic law. The law was like those Greek tutors, with which you are familiar, who escort children to school and protect them from danger or distraction, making sure the children will really get to the place they set out for.” (from The Message’s commentary)

If someone asked, “What does God want me to do?” the Israelites had an answer – 613 answers, in fact. If you had asked a follower of Baal or Molech what their God wanted them to do, they would not have known.  They just hoped they were doing the right thing, and if something went wrong, they offered increasingly gruesome sacrifices to appease a mysterious, unknowable, and petty god.

When God gave His Law, He gave something of Himself to His people.  Now the will of God could be known. Do this, not that.  And if you keep God’s laws, all will be well. We tend to think of the Law as oppressive; the Israelites were grateful that God made himself known. [3]

You can fill up with God’s law, and if you do that well, good things will overflow….

God’s covenant with His people through the Law of Moses was a conditional covenant; that is, if they kept it, good things would follow. If they didn’t bad things would follow. In some ways obedience to the law was a case study in spiritual cause and effect. That’s an idea we can wrap our minds around because we see it all the time. If we practice, work, use self-discipline – good things happen. We can lose weight or build muscle or make money or hit a softball or graduate or expand our vocabulary or play an instrument or get really good at Wii bowling if we know the rules and try hard enough….

But through his prophets, God warned over and over again: “This is not going to go well.” And it didn’t. The Law made it official that we the people (as seen in the Israelites) are never good enough.  God can tell us exactly what He wants us to do, and on our own we will just not do it. On our own, we will inevitably fill ourselves with sin even though we know it will eventually spill out of us and onto others. This is in line with how Paul describes the Law:

“The Law’s purpose was to make obvious to everyone that we are, in ourselves, out of right relationship with God, and therefore to show us the futility of devising some religious system for getting by our own efforts what we can only get by waiting in faith for God to complete his promise. For if any kind of rule-keeping had power to create life in us, we would certainly have gotten it by this time.”  (Galatians 3 as written in commentary by The Message)

The law unfortunately answers one of life’s most important questions: Can I be good if I try hard enough?  No.  It shows you the path of life,  and if you stay on that path it will give you life, but… you will wander off of it. [4]

Question #2: Why didn't Moses want them to see his fading glory?

A glory that is so obvious to everybody – and then fades -  is a problem. To all the people watching, apparently Moses was tight with God – and then he wasn’t.  I suspect Moses was ashamed of this. Pride makes us hide the parts of our life that shame us.  Ron Ritchie writes (I think correctly):

“He realized that as long as he wore the veil, the people showed him respect because they believed that he was still visiting God; otherwise, why would he keep the veil on? But when Moses had not been in the presence of God, the glory of God began to fade underneath the veil…. For Moses the veil represented a false sense of competence, power, authority, glory, and pride. He used it to cover his fear and inadequacy… he sought in his own strength to compensate for the glory that had faded from his face.”[5]

That veil couldn't hide the fact that God’s glory was leaking out through the cracks made by sin. If I understand this passage correctly, Moses couldn’t keep God’s glory, and he was ashamed.

Question #3: Why are we unveiled now?

Because a) we do reflect an ever increasing splendor as we are transformed into the image of Christ,  and b) we don’t need to be ashamed when we fail.  And perhaps – much to our surprise – even in our failure the glory of God does not fade.

Let’s look more closely at Paul’s claim.  He expands the symbolism of hiding behind the veil and writes that followers of Jesus are not meant to hide.  They are meant to be on display; in his image with a mirror, they look at the glory of God without shame, and they fully reflect the permanent, ongoing transformative presence of the glory of God in their life.

Our life with Christ is meant to be an ongoing transformation in which we increasingly behold the person and work of Christ, increasingly become changed deep in the core of who we are, and increasingly become filled in such a way that we display the glory of God by His presence and work in our lives.

We remove the veil because it’s not about us. When we have the glory of Christ in our lives, it won’t be because we were awesome. It will be because “we are transfigured by the Spirit of the Lord in ever-increasing splendor into his own image.”

It’s an ongoing process. There’s no way we can escape being sinful and flawed – and that’s okay. After all, who can deny that we still have our ups and downs? We all have times when our reflection wavers, when what spills out of us when we go over the rough roads in life is just not anything we are proud of.

So what is the glory of Christ in our lives that does not fade and should never be hidden? I believe it is the grace and forgiveness that accompanies Christ’s salvation.

The way in which Jesus intends for the world to see his glory is not through our ability to live perfectly. We don’t need to be a crystal clear glass filled with AquaFina.  We can be a bottle from the trash filled with muddy rain water and still show God’s glory, because it is through God’s strength in our weakness that His glory is seen.

Let’s revisit last week. I made the point that people will reach conclusions about Jesus by looking at the people of Jesus.  That’s daunting. Here’s where we are relieved of the pressure to be perfect.

When we offer Christ to others, we don’t need to wait until we are perfectly clear of mud and junk, and we don’t need to wait to “unveil” who we are until we can present ourselves just right. We aren’t offering us to other people. We are offering a Savior who takes us with all our impurities and makes us new.

We are meant to, with uncovered lives, without shame over the visible gauge of our ability to be good or bad on full display, let God display what real glory is like in the person and work of Jesus.

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[1] http://www.cnn.com/2012/07/10/health/smoking-trigger-rating-movie/

[2] For more info on this issue, go here: https://ecfsapi.fcc.gov/file/7022283827.pdf

[3] For a longer look at the content, context and purpose of the Old Testament law, check out the series at TC Apologetics. Here is a link to the first post in the series: http://tcapologetics.org/old-testament-law-an-introduction/

[4] “If people in our Christian fellowships today were to announce that they had decided to keep God’s law, we would probably be skeptical and alarmed. We probably would take them aside for counseling and possibly alert other responsible people in the group to keep an eye on them. We would be sure nothing good would come of it. We know that one is not saved by keeping the law and can think of no other reason why one should try to do it. This leaves us caught in a strange inversion of the work of the Judaizing teachers who dogged the footsteps of Paul in New Testament days. As they wanted to add obedience to ritual law to faith in Christ, we want to subtract moral law from faith in Christ. How to combine faith with obedience is surely the essential task of the church as it enters the twenty-first century.” ― Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life In God

[5] https://www.pbc.org/system/message_files/8276/4337.html

Made…For The Glory Of God

In all the things we’ve been talking about in this series, one reality has become clear to me: what we bring to the table on our own power is a whole lot of broken.  God’s design and purpose for us as men and women in complementary community is amazing and full of life – and out of our reach.  We simply cannot do it like we should.

How many times have my wife and I failed to love and respect each other like the Bible commands us?  Men, how many times do we fail to make the world safe for the women around us? Women, how many times have men felt demeaned or belittled around you? In the midst of this brokenness, how is God possibly glorified?*

 Because God is glorified when it’s clear that He is awesome.

 Let’s backtrack to the book of Ezekiel. Ezekiel was a prophet living in Babylonian captivity. The first part of his book explains that the Israelites lost their land because of their sin; the middle part chronicles how other nations will experience judgment for their sins as well. Beginning in Chapter 33, God begins to unveil for Ezekiel what revival and restoration will look like. We will begin in Chapter 36, verse 16:

 “When the people of Israel were living in their own land, they defiled it by their conduct and their actions…I dispersed them among the nations, and they were scattered through the countries; I judged them according to their conduct and their actions. And wherever they went among the nations they profaned my holy name, for it was said of them, ‘These are the Lord’s people, and yet they had to leave his land.’  I had concern for my holy name, which the people of Israel profaned among the nations where they had gone.”

 “I had concern for my name” seems like an understatement.  God’s people show up places, and everybody around them says, “What a bunch of losers. Their own God kicked them out.” They had broken a key commandment: “Don’t take God’s name in vain.” God is not pleased. And yet…

 “Therefore say to the Israelites, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: It is not for your sake, people of Israel, that I am going to do these things, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations where you have gone. I will show the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, the name you have profaned among them. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord, declares the Sovereign Lord, when I am proved holy through you before their eyes.”

 That’s an astonishing passage. After all that God has just said about them profaning his name (his character and reputation), God says He will be show His holiness of His great name through them so much so that everybody who sees them will know that the God of the Israelites is God.**

 “‘For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. Then you will live in the land I gave your ancestors; you will be my people, and I will be your God. I will save you from all your uncleanness…

 God is going to gather up a profane people who defiled the land he gave them, clean them up, give them a new heart, give them His Spirit, and put them back in a land they didn’t deserve – and then he will proudly claim them as His own. He’s not doing this because Israel is awesome. Israel is terrible. This wasn’t like The Voice, where Israel is auditioning while God’s chair is turned around, and He’s waiting until they hit the right note to turn His chair and beg them to be on his team.  That’s just not Israel.

 He’s doing this because He is awesome.  I’m still waiting for Blake Shelton to hit the button on someone who couldn’t carry a tune if it was in a bucket, and when asked why he did it, I just want him to say, “Because this will settle the debate about who the best coach is. You all keep choosing people who are already amazing. Have any of you chosen someone who sounds like cats fighting? No? Watch what I can do with this.”

“‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: On the day I cleanse you from all your sins, I will resettle your towns, and the ruins will be rebuilt. The desolate land will be cultivated instead of lying desolate in the sight of all who pass through it. They will say, “This land that was laid waste has become like the garden of Eden; the cities that were lying in ruins, desolate and destroyed, are now fortified and inhabited. Then the nations around you that remain will know that I the Lord have rebuilt what was destroyed and have replanted what was desolate. I the Lord have spoken, and I will do it.’  (Ezekiel 36:16-36)

 Lest there was any doubt, this wasn't going to happen in a way where the Israelites could take credit. The nations will know that God rebuilt what was destroyed and replanted what was desolate. There wasn’t going to be a couple builders hanging around on the walls saying, “Hey, did you see that cool stonework I just did?” There would be no farmers sitting by the road at their market taking credit for their amber waves of grain.  This was the kind of restoration where the people around them would say, “Are you kidding? How did this happen? Only a God could do this.”

 So that’s what God says he will do for the land and for His name. But in the next chapter, Ezekiel has a vision of a valley full of dry bones, lifeless skeletons. God reveals to him what the vision means for the people within the land:

These bones are the people of Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up and our hope is gone; we are cut off.’ Therefore prophesy and say to them: ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: My people, I am going to open your graves and bring you up from them; I will bring you back to the land of Israel.  Then you, my people, will know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves and bring you up from them. I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the Lord have spoken, and I have done it, declares the Lord.’” (Ezekiel 37: 11-14)

 Rebuild what is destroyed, replant what is desolate, and bring life and hope to the dead people returning to a land they had broken but God would heal.  God says to the people of Israel that He will do it for them not because they are great, but because He is great. The nations will know, and His people will know.

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 Here’s the bad news: we are like Israel. People look at us at times and say, “Seriously? You’re a Christian?”  Our spouse or kids or friends know that we can make the land desolate. We will knock our homes and our church to the ground if we aren’t careful. On our own, we are the dry bones, lifeless shells that make a mockery of what it means to be fully alive. Without Christ, we were dead in trespasses and sins (Romans 8:7–8; Ephesians 2:1; John 15:5). While we were yet sinners, Christ went into the grave to bring us back out.

Here’s the good news: What God did with Israel, he offers to us through Christ. Christ alone has the ability to genuinely heal us, to bring us back to fullness of life, to rebuild our homes, our relationships and our souls and bring a bountiful harvest in the midst of desolation in ways we cannot comprehend. Look what we read in the New Testament:

“Blessed be God, the Father of our Lord Jesus the Anointed One, who grants us every spiritual blessing in these heavenly realms where we live in Christ—not because of anything we have done, but because of what He has done for us. God chose us to be in a relationship with Him even before He laid out plans for this world; He wanted us to live holy lives characterized by love, free from sin, and blameless before Him.

He destined us to be adopted as His children through the covenant Jesus inaugurated in His sacrificial life. This was His pleasure and His will for us. Ultimately God is the one worthy of praise for showing us His grace; He is merciful and marvelous, freely giving us these gifts in Christ. Visualize this: His blood freely flowing down the cross, setting us free! We are forgiven for our sinful ways by the richness of His grace, which He has poured all over us.

With all wisdom and insight, He has enlightened us to the great mystery at the center of His will. With immense pleasure, He laid out His intentions through Jesus, a plan that will climax when the time is right as He returns to create order and unity—both in heaven and on earth—when all things are brought together under Christ’s royal rule. In Him we stand to inherit even more. As His heirs, we are predestined to play a key role in His unfolding purpose that is energizing everything to conform to His will.

As a result, we—the first to place our hope in Christ—will live in a way to bring Him glory and praise. Because you, too, have heard the word of truth—the good news of your salvation—and because you believed in the One who is truth, your lives are marked with His seal. This is none other than the Holy Spirit who was promised as the guarantee toward the inheritance we are to receive when He frees and rescues all who belong to Him. To God be all praise and glory!”  (Ephesians 1:3-14)

As a kid, I was always the last one chosen at school recess when captains picked teams.  I dreaded every time we lined up. I just wanted one captain to say, “I want Anthony,” not, “I guess we’ll take Anthony. There’s nobody else left.”

God didn’t say to Israel, “I guess I’ll take Israel seeing how Horus already got the Egyptians and Baal has the Philistines. Fine.” God said, “I want you. I will make something of you, and because it is through you that I will display my glory, what I make of you will be glorious.”

God doesn’t say to us, “Fine. I guess I’ll take Anthony. Or Sheila. Or…” God says, “I choose Anthony.”

And if I see myself honestly, my reply is, “But…do you see what I have to offer? I’m proud, self-centered, forgetful, offensive, short-sighted, overly sensitive at times and not sensitive enough at others, I over think some things and under think others, I fail as a husband and a father and pastor and teacher and friend. I wish I could take back so many things I’ve said and redo so many situations in life. I want to date my wife again and do it right, and then learn how to communicate effectively early on, and learn how to honor her and love her before 20 years have slipped by …”

And God says, “I know. This is going to be awesome! Have you seen what I can do with even guys like you?!  My name will be made great not because you are awesome, but because I am awesome, and that’s going to be really clear when my Glory begins to make something glorious out of the ruin and desolation you brought to the family.” That’s an imaginary conversation, but the principle is in the Bible:

“Now all of us, with our faces unveiled, reflect the glory of the Lord as if we are mirrors; and so we are being transformed, metamorphosed, into His same image from one radiance of glory to another, just as the Spirit of the Lord accomplishes it.” (2 Corinthians 3:4-6; 18)

We see that with the greatest clarity when he brings the dead to life, when he makes something beautiful from the ashes of our life, when the old, broken, and used becomes new because of Christ.  That’s why Paul writes,

“Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”  (Ephesians 5:14)

God is glorified when it’s clear that He is awesome.

There are times we will not want to rise up from the deadness of our selfishness and pride. I promise you that if you really try to live up the biblical standards for what it means to be a man and be a woman, if you really look hard at how you handle headship and humility… it is not a pretty picture. The only way genuine beauty is brought from the ashes we make of our lives is through Christ.***  So we read in Hebrews

"Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need" (Hebrews 4:16; ESV).

 Men and women, if you have failed to be the kind of man or woman God wants you to be – and you have - commit your life to God, pray for Christ to shine on you as His Spirit gives you life. God will be glorified as you are transformed into the image of Christ. Boldly ask God for mercy and grace… and freely pass it on to those around you who need it, which is all of us... and God will be glorified. 

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NOTES

* Listen or watch Casting Crown’s “Broken Together” for a poignant look at how we need the work of Christ in order live together well.  Listen or watch Mercy Me’s “Greater” for an invigorating look at the promise and hope we can find when we really experience the greatness of God in our lives.

** We see this principle in the New Testament as well. Often, when talking about how men and women are to live together in Christian community (think of the Household Codes and Church codes we talked about earlier in the series), the writers of the New Testament letters give a clear reason: so that God and His Kingdom will be glorified.  Three examples:

• “Live honorably among the outsiders so that, even when some may be inclined to call you criminals, when they see your good works, they might give glory to God when He appears.” (1 Peter 2:12)

• “…give the enemy (opponents, adversaries) no opportunity for slander. (1 Timothy 5:9-10)

• “…that the word of God may not be dishonord. (Titus 2:3-5)

*** There is a great episode in the life of Moses. Not long after the Golden Calf incident, Moses goes to God with a poignant request:

Moses said to the Lord, “You have been telling me, ‘Lead these people,’ but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. You have said, ‘I know you by name and you have found favor with me.’ If you are pleased with me, teach me your ways so I may know you and continue to find favor with you. Remember that this nation is your people. The Lord replied, “My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” Then Moses said to him, “If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here. How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?”  (Exodus 33:12-16)

How will anyone know that God is pleased or that His people are blessed? Not because of their past actions, that’s for sure. And it wasn’t because of their current righteousness. Ever since the golden calf incident God has referred to them as Moses’ people, stiff-necked and stubborn (Exodus 32:7-9). And yet Moses has the audacity to ask, “Will you go with me?”

 When I am in Costa Rica driving, I don’t want a map. I want Delynn or Gloria in the seat next to me.  And when my wife and I struggle in our relationship and we need to go to places emotionally that are dark and frightening, the key question we ask each other is, “Will you go with me? To this counselor… into this part of our hearts…in front of a mirror that will show us who we really are.”

 “Will you go with me?” is the haunting question all of us ask as we go into the dark, into a scary situation, into a new place. God’s presence matters. How will God be made glorious unless He goes with us?

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

• Are there areas of your life where you can see the desolation and ruin of your sin in your relationships, your identity, or your community? In what way to you need to be brought back to life?

• Have there been times in your life when you have clearly seen God bring healing, hope and life back into your life? How was His name glorified in the process?

• Where do you see your need for the Holy Spirit most clearly? When have you most clearly seen the Holy Spirit at work in your life?

• Talk about some times when you have experienced mercy and grace.