Tuesday Prayer Room – 9am 

13 Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles[a] from Jerusalem. 14 They were talking with each other about everything that had happened. 15 As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; 16 but they were kept from recognizing him.

17 He asked them, “What are you discussing together as you walk along?”

They stood still, their faces downcast. 18 One of them, named Cleopas, asked him, “Are you the only one visiting Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?”

19 “What things?” he asked.

“About Jesus of Nazareth,” they replied. “He was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people. 20 The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; 21 but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel.  – Luke 24:13-20

PRAYER GUIDE

We continue to pray out of this scripture during Eastertide. 

The two disciples on the road to Emmaus had placed their hope in Jesus as the Messiah of Israel, the world’s one true King. They had hoped he would be the one to redeem Israel. They had hoped that the hundreds, even thousands of years of waiting, from Abraham to Moses to David to the Exile to John the Baptist, was going to result in the Messiah’s victory and the consolation of Israel. But on a hill outside Jerusalem, their hopes were dashed. Jesus was humiliated publicly, nailed to a Roman cross, and the kingdom he promised came to nothing (or so they thought). 

On Easter, the Risen Jesus meets his disciples after their hopes have died. But notice how he does it. He does not come in a hail of blazing glory but in disguise, in hiddenness. They do not recognize him on the road. He does not begin with answers, but with questions. “What are you talking about as you walk along the road?” “What things?” Jesus knew, more than anyone else, all that had happened in Jerusalem…because they happened to him. And yet he asks these disciples to tell him the story.

He doesn’t do it for himself, he does it for them. Before their lost hopes can be raised from the dead, they must be grieved and mourned. They need to tell Jesus all about it. Eventually, He will open the Scriptures and help them understand the larger picture of what is going on. But first, he wants them to talk and he wants to listen.

And so it is today. Jesus wants us to understand the meaning of his resurrection, but before we can take it on board, some of us need to talk to Jesus about our disappointments and lost hopes. 

PROMPTS FOR PRAYER

• Where have you experienced lost hope or disappointment? 
• Ask the Holy Spirit to bring to mind others who have lost hope or have been profoundly disappointed? Pray for them to have an encounter with Jesus’ love. Ask that they’d bring these disappointments to Jesus.
• Pray for for God to find lost people on their road of disillusionment and/or deconstruction. 
• Ask the Spirit how else he wants us to pray this scripture over ourselves, our families, our church and the region in this season. 

Tuesday Prayer Room – 9am 

13 Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles[a] from Jerusalem. 14 They were talking with each other about everything that had happened. 15 As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; 16 but they were kept from recognizing him.

17 He asked them, “What are you discussing together as you walk along?”

They stood still, their faces downcast. 18 One of them, named Cleopas, asked him, “Are you the only one visiting Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?”

19 “What things?” he asked.

“About Jesus of Nazareth,” they replied. “He was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people. 20 The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; 21 but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place. 22 In addition, some of our women amazed us. They went to the tomb early this morning 23 but didn’t find his body. They came and told us that they had seen a vision of angels, who said he was alive. 24 Then some of our companions went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but they did not see Jesus.”

25 He said to them, “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken! 26 Did not the Messiah have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?” 27 And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.

28 As they approached the village to which they were going, Jesus continued on as if he were going farther. 29 But they urged him strongly, “Stay with us, for it is nearly evening; the day is almost over.” So he went in to stay with them.

30 When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them. 31 Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight. 32 They asked each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?”

33 They got up and returned at once to Jerusalem. There they found the Eleven and those with them, assembled together 34 and saying, “It is true! The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon.” 35 Then the two told what had happened on the way, and how Jesus was recognized by them when he broke the bread. – Luke 24:13-35

PRAYER GUIDE:

Though many of us often think of Easter as a one-day event, replete with eggs, bunnies, and family get-togethers. Easter is actually an entire season, both in the liturgical calendar of the Church and in the original experience of the disciples. After Jesus rose from the dead, he didn’t ascend immediately to heaven, but hung around with his disciples, appearing to them a number of times in a number of different ways over the next forty days, until finally, he did ascend into Heaven. 

Why did Jesus hang around? Why did he keep showing up, surprising his disciples in the upper room, on the beach with a fish breakfast, or in this passage, on the road to Emmaus. There are probably many reasons, but one simple one is that it took time for the resurrection to sink in. the resurrection is the central truth of the Christian faith, and indeed, of human history. But it is not a truth we can actually grasp on one morning surrounded by bunnies and candy eggs and brunches. We need more time. We need to linger in it. The human mind requires time to process major surprises and shocks to the system – and the resurrection of Jesus certainly is one of those shocks to the system. 

Over the season of Easter – the next seven weeks until Pentecost – let’s join the disciples in lingering with Jesus, as these two do on the road to Emmaus. Let’s allow the reality of the resurrection to slowly crack open our minds and hearts. Let’s ask God to open the scriptures to us, and to help us understand that we are living in a post-resurrection world. A world in which death has been defeated and new creation has sprouted. A world in which Jesus’ glorified body is the first crocus through the snow – the sign that spring is coming and the whole world will be made new.

PRAYER PROMPTS:

• Let’s ask God to open our minds and hearts to believe that Jesus has risen from the dead. And to reshape our view of the world and what is possible in it. 
• Let’s pray for those who have lost all hope to be interrupted by the Risen Jesus, as these two on the road were.
• Let’s pray for God to help his people understand the Law, the Prophets, and the Scriptures – how they were pointing to Jesus…to his death and resurrection.
• Let’s pray for those who do not know Jesus to be drawn to him this season. Pray for seekers and skeptics who visited church on Sunday to continue to be drawn to Jesus and engage with him with their fears, doubts, and disappointments. 
• Let’s pray that we, like these two on the road, having encountered the Risen Jesus, will boldly tell our friends about Him.
• Let’s pray for resurrected hope in our hearts. 

Tuesday Prayer Room – 9am 

6 Your boasting is not good. Don’t you know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough? 7 Get rid of the old yeast, so that you may be a new unleavened batch—as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. 8 Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old bread leavened with malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

• 1 Corinthians 5:6-8

PRAYER GUIDE

Every Holy Week I ‘religiously’ watch one of the greatest cinematic masterpieces of all time… The Prince of Egypt. This film follows the Exodus story of God’s deliverance of the Hebrew people out of brutal slavery and exploitation in Egypt into the Promised Land. The Passover and Exodus is easily one of the most recounted moments in the Old Testament and to this day it is a strict Jewish law to observe the Passover and remember the miraculous work of God. 

One way Jewish people reenact the Passover is by prohibiting the possession of any leavened products. This is done in memory of those who were rushed out of Egypt to the point where they did not have time to allow their bread to rise properly. Therefore the unleavened bread baked on their shoulders under the hot sun as they escaped. (Exodus 12:33-34)

In preparation for Passover, observant Jews perform a thorough cleansing and elimination of chametz (any grain product that has been leavened) from one’s possession. This means investigating all of their belongings from their cupboards, to their coat pockets, to the goldfish crackers their children spilled on the floor of the car last summer, to remove all products of leavened grain from their possession. 

In addition to searching their homes for literal chametz, this practice has been modified to also include a rigorous examination for any internal, spiritual chametz that had accumulated over the last year in one’s heart. This same chametz or corrupting influence spreads quickly, puffs us up, fills us with the hot air of self-importance, makes us ignore good inclinations, and turns us from the path of life to freely follow our own.

The apostle Paul uses this imagery of chametz (leaven) in 1 Corinthians 5:6-7 in which he argues that “a little leaven works through and leavens the whole lump” and then instructs us to “clean out the old leaven that you may be a new lump. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sanctified”.  This is a powerful example for us as passionately engaged followers of Jesus to emulate as we lean deeper into this season of congregational consecration.

What’s interesting to rememberis that matzah, the unleavened and sanctified bread for Passover, is actually made from the same grain as chametz, which is forbidden during Passover. 

This leads us to the question… What makes the same thing holy or profane? 

Simply put… It is what we do with it, how we treat it, what we make of it. As with wheat, so we do with our lives. 

Jesus embodies this in the most powerful of ways. He takes the most profane, humiliating and excruciating execution device known to mankind and lowers himself, becoming obedient to the point of death on a cross, turning it into a symbol of our liberation. (Philippians 2:8) 

PRAYER PROMPTS

• For a moment, consider the crucifixion. A profane and humiliating execution device and how Jesus redeemed it as a symbol of our liberation from sin. Praise him for his willingness to become cursed so that we could receive blessing and cleansing. Praise Jesus for your personal salvation story and recount the ways he has delivered you from darkness to light. 
• Let’s pray for the Church to behold Christ, our Passover Lamb, whose blood saves us from sin and death.
• Is there any internal chametz that has accumulated in your heart? Confess it and receive the assurance of the sanctifying and redeeming work of Jesus on the cross. Let’s also pray for the church to be rid of all leavening influences, and to worship the Lord in sincerity and truth.
• Consider anything in your life that you have allowed to become corrupted and offer it freely back to the Lord. 
• Consider any areas of pain in your life that you have withheld from the Lord and give Jesus the permission to touch it with his resurrection power.