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The Road to Emmaus

Say,

Today is the 3rd Sunday of Easter. We are getting close to the end our ecclesiastical journey for
the year.

Todays Gospel Reading from Luke 24:13-25 is about two disciples journey to Emmaus, which is 7
miles walk from Jerusalem, 2 days after the crucifixion of Jesus. I will not deal with the narration
about what transpired during the journey, other than to say that the two disciples were oblivious to
the identity of the stranger who came up to walk alongside them in the journey to Emmaus. I will
come in at the tail end.

We refer to Luke 24:28 -31 - 28 When they drew near to the village to which they (the two
disciples) were going, he (Christ) made as if to go on; 29 but they (the two disciples) pressed him
(Christ) to stay with them (the two disciples) saying, 'It is nearly evening, and the day is almost
over.' So he (Christ) went in to stay with them (the two disciples). 30 Now while he (Christ) was
with them (the two disciples) at the table, he (Christ) took the bread and said the blessing; then he
(Christ) broke it and handed it to them (the two disciples). 31 And their (the two disciples) eyes
were opened and they (the two disciples) recognised him (Christ); but he (Christ) had vanished
from their (the two disciples) sight.
As to Christ appearing in person and disappearing or vanishing at will, before I go on, let me
remind you of what Jesus said to Nicodemus in John 3: 7-8 - Do not marvel that I said to you, You
must be born again. The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell
where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit. This should give
you an idea what the resurrected Christ is, but we will elaborate further on this vital point later.
As Jesuits we are trained to contemplate on the tenet that we have to see God in everything and
see everything in God. The wonderful message at the tail end of the journey on the road to
Emmaus (Luke 24:28 -31) is that God is beside each one of us on our journey through life, though
we often fail to recognise Gods presence. We are by analogy like the two disciples on the road to
Emmaus who experienced the wise and life-giving presence of God (Christ) in the stranger who
walked by their side and explained the Scriptures to them. It was only at the breaking of the
bread however that they recognised who the stranger was.
The two disciples could be taken to have made the journey to Emmaus to escape the turmoil and
upheaval and anxiety that persisted in Jerusalem after the death by crucifixion of Jesus and
rumours of his resurrection as reportedly told by angels to Mary Magdelene. This is how by
analogy we live our lives, most of us. We run away from our Cross when our expectations of life
are not met. We see life in worldly terms and yet we seek eternal life, not understanding the
dichotomy or the incongruence between the worldly and the spiritual. In metaphorical terms we
see an empty tomb in worldly sight and we are still in worldly terms looking for the corpse; and
expect a heavenly solution to our worldly dilemmas!
We do not quite understand the nature of the resurrection of Jesus as Christ. We take it to be
some arcane magic that is taboo to attempt to make sense out of it. We have made Christianity a
blind faith! In part this is due to what the resurrected Christ said to Doubting Thomas who had to
see to believe in John 20:27 - Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed

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are those who have not seen and yet believed. Let us rephrase this in common parlance -
Thomas, you have to actually worldly see to believe. Blessed are those who do have to worldly
see to believe. As I said to Nicodemus (refer John 3:3), only those who are reborn in the spirit, can
see the kingdom of God (the Holy Spirit), (refer John 3:5) unless one is born of water and the
Spirit, he cannot enter (see) the kingdom of God (the Holy Spirit), for (refer John 3:6) that which is
born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Jesus was of course born of
water (as Son of Man) and the Holy Spirit (as the resurrected Christ)!
If we refer back to our earlier passage from todays Gospel reading - 30 Now while he (Christ) was
with them (the two disciples) at the table, he (Christ) took the bread and said the blessing; then he
(Christ) broke it and handed it to them (the two disciples). 31 And their (the two disciples) eyes
were opened and they (the two disciples) recognised him (Christ); but he (Christ) had vanished
from their (the two disciples) sight., you will note that the two disciples could not see or recognise
Christ until he broke bread with them! Note that this is not Jesus breaking bread as in Holy
Communion at the Last Supper but Christ the Holy Spirit breaking bread! If Christ were not the
Holy Spirit he would not have appeared and vanished at will like the wind! When you have Holy
Communion with the Holy Spirit you are in fact baptised by the Holy Spirit! That is why you can
suddenly see the kingdom of God! That is why they could suddenly recognise Jesus Christ!
In the first ever sermon given by our 1st Pope St Peter, he said in Acts 2:32-33 - God raised this
man Jesus to life, and all of us are witnesses to that. Now raised to the heights by Gods right
hand, he has received from the Father the Holy Spirit, who was promised, and what you see and
hear is the outpouring of that Spirit. Take note, this is from the horses mouth, i.e. from St Peter as
a real life 1st party witness, the resurrection that is Christ, as to his reappearance to the disciples -
what you see and hear is the outpouring of that Spirit (the Holy Spirit)!
Salvation is therefore of the spirit. There will not be any dead corpse come alive or a dead mortal
becoming an immortal! Forget about the fear of mortal death. We carry death as a Cross because
we are humans, but humans must die anyway!. We cannot run away out of fear from our Cross,
whatever shape, form. manner or dimension it takes or may take in our lives. Just as our worldly
human body will die, our worldly sins will also die with us or carry over to another worldly
existence, for even sins have to follow the rule that we render unto Caesar what is Caesars and
we render unto God what belongs to God.
Remember that God is Spirit! The only sin of our eternal spirit son of God is the Original Sin of
Adam, of separation from God. Salvation of the spirit requires redemption or forgiveness of this
Original Sin; and redemption takes place automatically, when we return home like the Lost
Prodigal Son. For when we return home to God and God accepts us back unconditionally and
wholeheartedly with feast and celebration, the separation ceases; and therein and thereby lies the
redemption or forgiveness by the Spirit Father. Note the Spirit Father forgives the Original Sin of
separation and it doing so it is He who redeems the Original Sin; it is not the Lost Prodigal Son
who redeems, although his coming home, like a repentance for his wayward-ness, was the
catalyst. It is not like what most Christians think that we have to repent or make amends or suffer
some spiritual penitentiary punishment or seek forgiveness etc., etc. for our worldly sins to get to
heaven. Reconciliation between Spirit Father and spirit sons is nothing like that at all. The Spirit
Father celebrates the homecoming of the Lost Prodigal Son, as he is, no matter how tainted he is
or how worldly sinful he had been in his alter ego son of man.

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Worldly sins belong to the world of Caesar, the world of the Caesar that is none other than the
false EgoSelf of mortal son of man, the world of the Immutable Law of Cause and Effect, of You
Reap What You sow, the world that was revealed in Jacobs Dream, the world of the perpetual
ascending and descending of Jacobs Ladder, the world of the unclean spirit and his seven more
wicked spirit companions (refer Matthew 12:43-45). Worldly sins cannot be redeemed by God as
God is not our father of the flesh. He is our Spirit Father of the eternal spirit sons of God in us.
Our worldly natural fathers of the flesh would presumably still continue to love us as his worldly
natural children, but cannot redeem our worldly sins either, unless the sins we committed were
personally against them as our worldly natural fathers.
As Jesus said at John 20:22-23, when he first appeared to his disciples after his resurrection -
Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins
of any, they are retained. Christ was speaking at two levels and totally about two different matters
altogether.
As to the 1st matter, refer to what I have highlighted and brought to your attention earlier about the
1st sermon by our 1st Pope St. Peter - what you see and hear is the outpouring of that (Holy)
Spirit. When Christ said - Receive the Holy Spirit. , he was talking and referring to himself, that
he was no longer Jesus, Son of Man, but the resurrected Jesus the Christ in the Holy Spirit!
As to the 2nd matter, Christ was referring to our worldly mortal sins. In the world of Caesar, in our
existence as mortal son of man, if someone has hurt you or caused you wrong and you forgive
them, their sins are thereby forgiven. On the other hand, if the person you hurt or have wronged
does not or has not forgiven you, then your sins against that person is still however retained. God
cannot forgive us our worldly sins in the world of Caesar (metaphor for EgoSelf), and our worldly
natural fathers can only forgive our worldly sins perpetrated against them personally. Forgiveness
is by the person victimised, hurt or wronged. Forgiveness or redemption cannot be by or on the
part of the perpetrator! There is no concept of atonement in the Gospels and specifically in any of
the words of Jesus highlighted in red in the Catholic Bible. Any contrary view is heresy against the
teachings of Jesus! Forgiveness by the victim is all that is required, nothing more, nothing less,
and then the redemption is total and absolute. If it were not so, then what Jesus has just said is a
lie! And that cannot be, can it?
The Immutable Law of Cause and Effect cannot be circumvented by some spiritual mumbo jumbo
magic! We will reap what we sow regardless in terms of our worldly sins. But the severity of the
karmic consequence can be abated or mollified depending on whether our victims forgive us for
the hurt or wrong done to them; and also if we do good deeds then the good karma will ameliorate
the bad karma. That is how the Immutable Law of Cause and Effect essentially works!
Let us return to the journey on the road to Emmaus; continuing in the passage from where we left
off -
31 And their eyes were opened and they recognised him; but he had vanished from their sight. 32
Then they said to each other, 'Did not our hearts burn within us as he talked to us on the road and
explained the scriptures to us? 33 They set out that instant and returned to Jerusalem. There they
found the Eleven assembled together with their companions, 34 who said to them, 'The Lord has
indeed risen and has appeared to Simon. 35 Then they told their story of what had happened on
the road and how they had recognised him at the breaking of bread.

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You see, when you are awakened in the spirit, baptised in the spirit, you no longer have to run
away, you go back to carrying your Cross; you go back to the trials and tribulation that is
Jerusalem and you know however the world despises you or you despise the world, you no longer
have fear of the death of your mortal body, for you have found eternal life. Now you will
understand what Jesus was saying in his Last Prayer to God in the Garden of Gethsemane - @
John 17:14-16 - I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them because they are not
of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not pray that You should take them out of the world,
but You should keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the
world. Guess who the evil one is? You probably think, ha ha, Satan of course! No, it is the false
EgoSelf of the son of man, the evil spirit incarnate (refer earlier reference to Matthew 12:43-45),
the proverbial goat! And the entity that is not of the world, yes, it is our eternal spirit son of God
(the proverbial lost sheep).
Love and God Bless!
Chuan
4/5/14