On the Way to Emmaus

On the Way to Emmaus
By Johann Conrad Seekatz

“Then they drew near to the village where they were going, and He indicated that He would have gone farther. But they constrained Him, saying, 'Abide with us, for it is toward evening, and the day is far spent.' And He went in to stay with them.
Now it came to pass, as He sat at the table with them, that He took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened and they knew Him; and He vanished from their sight.
And they said to one another, ‘Did not our heart burn within us while He talked with us on the road, and while He opened the Scriptures to us?’”
Luke 24:28-32
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Two disciples walked a dusty road, unknowingly accompanied by the risen Christ. Confused and grieving, still heavy from the crucifixion, they didn’t recognize Him. Though the Savior had “drawn near…their eyes were holden that they should not know him” (Luke 24:14–16). How often do we walk our own roads, burdened and uncertain, failing to see that He is already beside us?

As the disciples shared their grief and dashed expectations, Luke captures their sorrow in just four words: “but we had hoped” (Luke 24:21). We had hoped that things would be different. We had hoped our friend and teacher would still be alive. We had hoped. This is a phrase we all utter. We had hoped the cancer would heal. We had hoped the marriage would work. We had hoped the money would last. We had hoped our children would choose differently. We had hoped it would be clearer what we should do now.

This is what we say when we’ve run out of hope — when expectations have been dashed, cherished dreams have died, and there’s seemingly nothing left but to figure out how to move forward. And the Savior listens. He hears the disciples out, letting them ‘cast all their cares’ on Him. And then, when they are done, He tells their story back to them. As He does so, their story changes. In His retelling, it becomes what it really was all along — something far richer and more beautiful than they had first understood in their pain. “Here’s what you’re leaving out,” Jesus seems to say. “Here’s what you’re missing.”

Arriving in Emmaus, having offered them a revision of the story they were telling themselves, Jesus gives them the choice to continue on without Him, and stick with their old stories. What if they had? What if they had let Him walk away and returned to life as before? They would have missed the story’s glorious ending.

On the Way to Emmaus reminds us that the Lord often comes quietly, even when we think He is absent. He meets us where we are, retells our stories, and reveals Himself to us as we abide with Him. May we look more closely at our own journeys. Christ may be nearer than we suppose, teaching us in quiet ways, waiting to be recognized in the breaking of bread, or the breaking of a heart ready to receive Him.

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