July 9, 2001

Lesson for July 22


FAMILY BIBLE STUDY:
Even when nothing makes sense, Jesus is there
___ Luke 24: 13-35
___By Bobby Dagnel
___First Baptist Church, Nederland
___Now what?
___The text opens with two disciples making their way to Emmaus, a village seven miles northwest of Jerusalem. They are discussing the events of the weekend that began with the brutal execution of their spiritual mentor who was supposed to be the savior of the world and concluded with the unsettling report that Jesus was alive. As wonderful as this news is, it is received with cautious optimism. If Jesus is really alive, where is he? If he has been resurrected, why is Israel still under Roman oppression? Why is everything as it was? At best, Sunday has been upgraded to a questionable future following the dashed hopes of Friday.
___What these disciples faced was the transition from where they have been to where they are going, from what was expected to new understandings.
___Many of life's transitions are predictable and can be anticipated--the completion of formal education, marriage, the death of a parent and, eventually, a spouse. It is, however, the unexpected changes that test and forge the character of our faith--job loss, economic uncertainty, relocation, divorce. Life is a combination of the predictable and the unpredictable. How we respond to and manage these periods of transition is the difference between a meaningful life and a meaningless life.
___In his book "Transitions: Making Sense of Life's Changes," psychologist William Bridges identifies three stages of transition--endings, beginnings and a neutral zone in between. As we grow older, we realize much of life is a flux between endings and beginnings, loss and new opportunities. Understanding this truth does not make the hardships of life any easier, but they do become more bearable, knowing that "unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds" (John 12:24). Every ending prepares the way for new beginnings.
___One of the most profound expressions of this certainty came during a conversation I had with a lady in my previous pastorate who lost her husband of more than 50 years. I called a few months after the funeral to check on her and offer some words of encouragement. Instead, she offered to me one of the most heartened testimonies of resilience and Christian hope I have encountered and will never forget. She said: "Oh, it has been difficult, and if I allowed myself to sit around and think about Paul's death, I could easily become depressed. The way I look at it, though, Paul was one chapter in my life; granted, the biggest and most rewarding chapter to date. But the Lord has seen fit to bring that chapter to a close and open another. Because I trust him, I know there is more of the story remaining to be told."
___Loss and transition are always difficult. That is why, in the midst of the neutral zone, we find ourselves longing for what was, the comfortable, the familiar. Even so, if there is to be any growth for our souls, we must embrace our present circumstance with all of its questions and uncertainties and find our way through.
___As teachers prepare this lesson, they can be certain their classes will include those facing transitions--in family, at work, with God--who will readily identify with the two disciples on the way to Emmaus who said, "we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel" (v. 21). As we identify with their neutral zone, their time of uncertainty between endings and beginnings, perhaps we also may learn from the realities they experienced. For instance, during times of change and uncertainty, the Lord often works in ways that are imperceptible.
___On the road to Emmaus, which in light of the weekend's events was a road to an uncertain future, the Lord appeared to these two disciples as a stranger (vv. 15-16). They did not realize it was the Lord himself who stood in their midst and traveled the road with them.
___We sometimes miss out on the presence of the risen Christ because we look for him in the wrong places and in the wrong way. Our journey in the life of faith is doomed to a life of frustration if we buy into the idea that God is always "out there" on a mountaintop retreat, a deserted island or anywhere other than where we are right now. If we, in our faulty sense of direction, limit an encounter with God to some exotic, isolated "spiritual hotspot," we run the very real risk of missing him altogether.
___An examination of the biblical record reveals Jesus spent the bulk of his spiritual journey and ministry in the highways and byways of everyday life. Sometimes our encounters with the living Christ may be obvious, powerful and awe-inspiring, but most often they take place in the usual, the mundane, the most unobtrusive of ways. His presence may come as a deacon praying over the phone. Perhaps he comes in a conversation with a neighbor over the backyard fence, in the grocery store, a living room. In the most unexpected of ways, he fulfills his promise, "And surely I will be with you always, to the very end of the age" (Matthew 28:20).

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