Jesus Will Show Up

I believe Jesus is the answer to everything. I believe it’s that simple. I think we make it complex. The Bible is just like a book of Jesus. Old Testament, New Testament. I can’t remember the fellow that said this, but I liked what he said. You touch the Bible anywhere you touch Jesus somewhere. So I just believe he is the answer. It’ll never be a church. The church is a great organism.

It’s alive, but it’s alive because of Jesus. We have broken preachers. Even though Jesus is enough, I’ve lived my life on empty from the pulpit. I’ve faked a pile of messages over the years. I know you might hate to hear that first night of the revival, but I’m just as human as anybody sitting on a pew. So I just want to remind us of where our answers are met.

where you get soul stuff. God’s the only person that can put stuff in your soul. You can put stuff in your garage. You can stick stuff in a 401K. You can put stuff in your pocket. But only God can do stuff for your soul. And so what I want us to do tonight in Luke 24, and we’ll work our way through this passage to at least verse 35.

We’re just going to walk through the passage and then I’ll spend a majority of our time maybe looking at these two individuals, Cleopas and I think it was probably his wife. I think they were just going home. You know, things didn’t kind of pan out, you know. He’s dead. And what stories we’ve heard is the empty tomb. I don’t know why they weren’t excited. It was the third day, by the way.

And everybody’s looking for a body instead of looking for a living Lord. But before we get two pointed fingers at these people that kind of disbelieved maybe what an empty tomb should have expressed to them rather than disbelief, we’re a lot that way too. We got the whole book, you know, and we’ve got the Spirit of God living in our hearts and sometimes we struggle. So I just want us to see Jesus in this passage, and obviously we’re going to see some people in this passage too.

So first 12 verses, here’s what I’ll call the first 12 verses tonight. And I really don’t have a title for the message. If I had a title for the message, I guess this would be the title because this is kind of what I’ll sew it all up at the end and we’ll have some things to think about before we go to the house. Jesus will show up.

How about that? Is that a decent little theme maybe? Jesus will show up. So first 12 verses. I’m going to call these first 12 verses, the tomb is empty. Now, you would think tomb being empty, everybody would be excited, but it’s a pretty sad section of verses in these first 12. Everybody’s perplexed, troubled, discouraged, down. Even though it is day three, even though day three was kind of shared and the angels and Jesus himself will remind them of things they heard, but they just apparently didn’t really get it.

So let’s kind of dive into the passage. So Jesus is alive. He’s up, he’s out. First day of the week, very early in the morning, they came. They, we’ll find out in a minute, are some ladies. They came into the sepulcher bringing the spices which they had prepared and certain others with them. And they had started this process in the previous chapter, then Passover, and then so they’re waiting.

In verse 2, they found the stone rolled away from the sepulcher. Now, that would have been a great indication that something exciting has happened, right? And they entered in, and they found not the body of the Lord Jesus. Now, again, I don’t want to make them look so bad that we forget that our tendency is disbelief as well, but you would think that would be good news, right? You’d think that would be an exciting moment because they did see what happened.

They did see the crucifixion. They did see the horror of the crucifixion. They did see the lifeless body. They did see the burial process. So they knew he died. So the fact that the stone is gone and he is gone, that you would think would be an exciting moment. But in verse 4, and it came to pass, as they were much perplexed thereabout, behold, two men stood by them in shiny garments.

So you have these ladies. We find out who they were later in the passage in verse 10. They’d come. And if you read other narratives, you even know that Mary Magdalene had a conversation with Jesus and did not know who Jesus was. And I don’t know if he looked different. I mean, I can’t answer these questions. I just know that she knew him. She knew facial recognition, but she didn’t know who he was.

She thought she was talking to a gardener, and she was really sad. And remember the question she’s asking the gardener. Where’s his body? Not, he’s alive. And so nobody in these first few verses are excited, or they’re happy, or this is a glorious morning, or it is the third day. We should be waiting for a visible presence of Christ here at some point. But it tells us in the passage they’re much perplexed.

And you get it. I didn’t live those days watching Jesus die. I didn’t live through that process. We know the disciples. Me and Brother Harrison, Harrison Anders, one of the men in our church, came with me tonight. We were talking some about, you know, they were kind of thinking maybe Jesus was going to set up a throne, you know, set up a kingdom and get on that throne and kick Romans out of here, you know.

So we don’t know everything that was going through their brains at this moment. But it wasn’t, it’s the third day and we should be looking for a living Jesus instead of a dead body. So latter part of verse four, you get these two men stood by them in shining garments and as they were afraid and bowed down their faces to the earth, they said unto them, why seek ye the living among the dead?

And you get the question. Right? You get the question. Why are you looking for the body of a dead Savior? Why aren’t you looking for the living Savior? Ask me where he’s at. You know. He is not here, but is risen. So, I mean, that’s pretty obvious. Here’s angels, heavenly messengers. That should change the psyche of this. It should go from perplexed or sad or confused or broken to excitement.

Remember, verse 6, and we’ll come back to this. Remember how he spake unto you when he was yet in Galilee, saying, the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified, and the third day rise again. You heard his words. And we’ll talk about this later. But sometimes we are so sight motivated. Do you remember what Jesus said? Blessed are those that don’t see to believe but believe to see?

So I want to emphasize just here because we’ll come back to this when we do our takeaways at the end of this message. How much do I just believe the words of God? I don’t need the sight of it. I just trust the word of it. So the angels are just reminding Jesus is going to do the same thing in verse 25 and 26 when he’s talking to the two on the Emmaus road.

And they remembered his words. They remembered his words. So you got a correction. The living, not the dead. You got an announcement. He’s not here because he’s alive. And then you got a reminder. He’s reminding this group of ladies you remember what was saying. Now, let’s finish through this passage. Down to verse 12. And returned from the sepulcher, so they leave the sepulcher, and told all these things unto the eleven, and to all the rest.

So there’s eleven disciples, and there’s other people. So there’s a bunch of people meeting wherever they’re meeting, and they go back, and they share. Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and other women that were with them, which told these things unto the apostles, and their words, I mean, it’s in the Bible. Here it is, right? And their words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not.

Now, it’s not like, it’s not like the belief there, like it’s hard to believe. Do you remember when Peter was in prison and the church had a prayer meeting? You remember that? And I mean, they’re not praying for nothing but Peter, right? And Peter in prison. Now, y’all do remember when Peter came to the door, right? Were they all excited? No, they thought it was a ghost.

Just think on that for a minute. You’ve been all night in a prayer meeting praying for one man and for for God to do one thing and God does the one thing and they’re going, well, it’s almost like it can’t be Peter because he’s in prison. So it’s almost like the disciples that have followed Jesus, heard the same stuff that these angels had asked them to remember.

You remember his words. You remember what he said would happen. And this is the third day and you guys should not be all poochy-lipped and wondering where the body is. The tomb is empty. That means he’s out and he’s walking around somewhere and at some point he’s gonna show up. It’s almost time like for a revival. Let’s sit on the front porch and see when Jesus is going to show up.

He’s going to show up and he does in this passage at some point. You just see in these first 12 verses there’s an empty tomb and ain’t nobody happy. There’s an empty tomb. There’s nobody and it’s almost like where’s he at? Can we just have him so we can put him somewhere? Instead of it’s the third day. We know what the third day means. Jesus said he was coming out and so we just need to wait because Jesus is about to show up.

There’s no excitement in these first 12 verses. Just a lot of just look at verse 12. Then arose Peter. This is like the crescendo to this. Mr. Spokesman, and ran into the sepulcher, stooping down, beheld the linen clothes laid by themselves, and departed, wondering in himself at that which was come to pass. The word wondering there has the idea of he is unsure. Instead of just being, you know, he’s not here, he’s up.

We just gotta wait on him, he’s gonna show up. So again, you get where they’re at in these first 12 verses. Now verse 13, this is kind of where I wanna zero in just a little bit. And behold two of them. Behold two of them. And we’ll just call this 13 to 27 section, just real simple, the road to Emmaus. So you got two people. I’m thinking Cleopas and his wife.

And they’re just going back home. And it’s seven miles. And they, and they’re not taking an Uber, so it’s walking. So that’s gonna take a while, right? Now, I just want y’all to climb into this story with me. Now, I don’t know what Jesus has been doing, and we’re not gonna get into theology and all the New Testament passages it talks about or alludes to what might’ve been going on between dying moment and resurrection moment.

What Jesus was doing, where he was at and what he was doing. We’re not going to talk about that but I’m just telling you he’s been up to stuff. Right? Supernatural stuff. Stuff that we can only peer into in books, write about and nobody knows what he’s doing. But I want you to look what he does in real time on planet Earth for two people. It’s hurting and broken and discouraged, maybe a little ticked.

I don’t even know if they’re saved. I can’t be definitive. I’m not gonna be definitive if I can’t be definitive. Maybe they are and they just need some assurance. Maybe they aren’t and they just need a revelation. I don’t know, but I’m telling you, after this moment, it all got fixed because Jesus showed up. So these two individuals in verse 13 head off from Jerusalem to Emmaus and they talked together of all these things which had happened.

Man, can you imagine the machine gun of words that would come? Maybe from her, no offense to the ladies, maybe from her more than Cleopas. You know us guys, we don’t talk much, but whatever. They’re just back and forth talking about what’s happened. And he came to pass it while they communed together and reasoned. Jesus himself drew near and went with him. Now, I don’t know if he popped in to this conversation on the front end of this seven-mile trip or three miles in.

And we know Jesus don’t have to walk. If he don’t’t want to he can just kind of pop in. Right? We all know that. So he shows up. But their eyes were holding that they should not know him. Now you can ask me all night what’s going on here? I don’t know. The words seem to indicate it was a God thing. But it’s also, they’re so grieved.

They’re so broken. They’re so he’s dead that it could be both. It could be either or. But these were so broken, dejected, confused, disappointed. Because we’re gonna hear their testimony. Jesus asked probing questions. You know how Jesus likes to do? Pull you out. So you’ll hear yourself. Right? So you’ll see yourself. Remember the woman at the well? Where’s your husband? He likes probing questions. Why? So he can make you feel guilty?

No, so he can get you some help. So he can show you the answer. The one who knows everything about you but will not kick you to the curb will invite you close. That’s what I love about Jesus. That’s what will refresh your soul. You know people talk about all kinds of hurt. And I know it’s real. I’ve been hurt by my wife and I hurt her.

You know, now big things church hurt. You know. Can I just remind you of where help comes from? Where healing comes from? Jesus. So, whatever is the barrier that they can’t see the man that they maybe saw before crucifixion, because they’re in that room when Mary and them came back. They’ve been in the mix of the gospel. They’ve been in the mix of this is the Messiah.

They’ve heard the stories. They’ve seen the miracles. And they’re excited that he’s dead and there’s no body. But they can’t see him. And he’s said unto them. I love this part because it’s almost like they’re looking at him after he asks these questions. Like, where have you been? Look at the question. What manner of communications are these that ye have one to another? What are you talking about?

Why are you sad? And one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answering said unto him, art thou only a stranger? Where you been? Has not known the things which are come to pass there in these days? Here’s Jesus. Now, remember, this is the man from the cross, right? This is the man from the tomb. This is the man from whatever he’s been doing in the last 36 hours or whatever.

And now he’s with two men or a man and his wife. And he’s asking probe, probe and claim, what things? And they said, and here he gets them to just confess concerning Jesus of Nazareth, which was a prophet mighty indeed in word before God and all the people. And now the chief priests and our rulers delivered him to be condemned to death and crucified him. We trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel.

And beside all this, today is the third day since these things were done. They even know it’s the right day and they should be. Isn’t it just cool they’re talking to the resurrected Jesus. It’s the third day. He should be around here somewhere. And certain women also of our company made us astonished which were early at the sepulcher and when they found not his body they came saying that they had also seen a vision of angels so they got no body and they saw angels which said that he was alive and certain of them which were, not probing questions, but kind of a demonstrative statement.

It’s very accurate, but it’s very kind. Then he said unto them, O fools, slow of heart to believe. All the prophets have spoken. Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his glory? And so he just kind of reprimands them the same way the angels reprimanded. You guys have heard Jesus. You know the prophets. Old Testament have talked about Jesus. Jesus talked about Jesus and what was going to happen.

And y’all have missed it all. He’s reminding them of the same. And then in verse 27, and man, wouldn’t you love to have heard this message? Why ain’t this in the Bible, right? Give us the whole message Jesus preached here. And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. You know, here’s a little thing I wrote down the other night when I was rereading some of these past, he came to them, he walked with them, he revealed truth about him.

I love the way verse 27 says, the things concerning himself. The whole Bible, the whole story, it’s all, it’s all about Jesus. That’s kind of, you know, I have a prayer anytime I go to a revival meeting and it’s not always the same. There’s some things that are the same. But what I’ve been praying about this week and I prayed just a few minutes ago and we had a little prayer time after I prayed for Samuel, a couple of other things, mom and a couple of other things.

If I can leave anything from tonight to Thursday night, a little preview is I got nothing. I got a Bible. I got truth. And it’s a great truth. But I can only help you so far. I’m just a preacher man. But if I through these nights can remind you that there is help in Jesus. There is help at the foot of the cross. And I’m not selling Sundays.

Sundays the Lord’s day and I’m’m gonna be in God’s house somewhere. If I wasn’t preaching, I’ll be singing and worshiping with some other people and I’ll be listening to somebody else preach. But Monday, I’m gonna be at his feet. Tuesday, I’m gonna be at his feet. Because I don’t do life, can’t do life. There’s no hat I wear. There’s no need I have. There’s no weakness he can’t feel.

There’s no strength in me. I’ve got to have Jesus. So if there’s anything I leave while we’re here these days is for you to hunger, for your soul to be refreshed at the only place that it happens. Church is a supplement. Good people, good men, good preachers, good family, good parents, good fellowship are supplements. But they’re weak, they’re broken. But he is enough. He is way more than enough.

And what he was reminding them is all the Bible is about me. And he preaches to them. Now in verse 28, down to verse 35. And I’m just going to call this Jesus revealed. And we’ll stop at verse 35. Jesus revealed. And they drew nigh unto the village. So remember, real time, real story here. I don’t know how many miles Jesus walked with them, but he’s been walking for a while.

I don’t know how long it took to walk seven miles. I read some stuff, but it doesn’t really matter, right? But it took a while, okay? So they’re almost there. He made as though he would have gone further. Isn’t that just an interesting little statement? Now I don’t know where he was going, you know. Not that he was walking to another town. I mean, this is Jesus, right? I don’t know what was else on his agenda.

We’re still in that time frame where eventually he’s going to meet the rest of his disciples. And again, he don’t have to walk back. They do. They will. In just a few minutes, they walk back. They did 14miles, right? In X amount of minutes or hours or whatever it took to get back to Jerusalem after they find out it’s him. Did he want to be invited to their house?

I can’t be definitive. I’ve stretched everything I can get out of them words. It’s in that verse. Was he literally just like going to move on and he was like wanting to be, would you come to the house? That’s the way I’m leaning. It says they constrained him. That means to urge him. So if he were like gonna move on, they constrained him, urged him, abide with us.

Abide don’t mean stay like forever. It just means come and dwell with us for a while. For it is toward evening. And the day is far spent and he went into tarry with them. So I just want you to think about this passage. Here’s Jesus. He’s just died on the cross. It’s been the three days, three nights. It’s day three, resurrection day. He’s walking with a couple of people, whether they’re saved, lost, whatever. He’s gonna meet their need.

Clock’s ticking. A lot of stuff happening in the supernatural realm, in the theological realm. But he goes. He goes to their house. Look at verse 30. And it came to pass as he sat at me with them. Now he’s at their house. But you tell me what it says in verse 30. He took bread and blessed it and break and gave to them. Who goes to somebody else’s house as a stranger and gets in their cupboards and gets the stuff, breaks the meal together and feeds them.

That’s what Jesus did. I don’t know if they recognize something different about him, but I know in this passage, they’re sitting and Jesus is serving them fresh off the cross, fresh from death to life. With all that’s going on in the supernatural realm, the son of the living God takes time and said, have another piece of bread. Now at some point, at some point, their eyes are opened.

Those words have the tendency of an outside force. It’s opening their eyes and they knew him. And he vanished. I’d love to have an answer to that one. Other than he was done, you know, and had other stuff to do. We’ve already talked about that. I love 32. And they said one to another. Hear this. You know what verse 32 is? This is souls talking. Souls. Inner man conversations.

This ain’t the weather. You know, this ain’t a ball team conversation. This ain’t what we have for supper. This is souls talking to people that have been with Jesus. And they’ve heard and they’ve seen and they’ve tasted. Do you see it? Did not our heart, not the blood pumping thing, but us, the real us, did it burn within us when he taught and while he opened the scriptures.

Can I tell y’all something tonight? Jesus is still in the business of that. Way better than what we’re doing here. I’m not against this. I’m farthest in the Bible is commanded. But I’m telling you, I’m broken. I don’t have all the everything going on that I need to have going on. I’m just like you. But I’m telling you, Jesus Christ will privately show up in your life and break truth with you, reveal truth, teach truth.

As long as you’re hungry, as long as you’re thirsty. I don’t care what your IQ is. I don’t care if he was raised in church or not. I don’t care if you got saved 30 years ago or 10minutes ago. You hunger, thirst after righteousness and Jesus Christ the righteous will show up and he will feed your soul. That’s what he did to them and they knew it.

Listen, when you start tasting from him, they ain’t no preacher that’ll be the best thing since sliced bread. There’s nobody like Jesus. Nobody like Jesus. Your pastor would remember Dr. Russell Rice. I mean, I don’t know of any man that I loved more. I could mention other names of individuals, but they’re really mute points because the closer I got to him, Pastor, the more I realized he was just as broken as me.

And it reminded me, I need as much time as I can get with a man that can burn into my heart truth. Burn into my heart change. To where I get to know him.

Remember when Jesus said, you know, take my yoke upon you. He talks about it being easy light and all that kind of stuff. But it says you’ll learn how to preach. No. You’ll learn how to be a good father. No. You’ll learn of me who fixes all that other peripheral stuff. You’ll learn me. 33, they rose up. You’d think they’d be wore out. Of course, they did give them a little snack.

But off they go. Back to Jerusalem. They might have been a little faster paced. Right? I think they might be excited now. Right? Now that they’ve seen him, touched him, got a meal from him, I think they might be a little excited now. They found the eleven, verse 33, gathered together and them that were with him saying, the Lord is risen indeed and hath appeared to Simon.

And they told what things were done in the way and how he was known of them in the breaking of bread. Maybe there was something in the way he broke bread with them that just had an impact on them. Close your Bibles. I’ve got one, two, three, four, five things I want to share with you. And they don’t have a lot of dissertations. So just stay calm.

Here’s the five things. What do I need to get out of this? Great story. Great truth. One, if I’m going to be refreshed in my soul, I need to start believing his words. I need to be a person that takes God’s word at face value. Two times, by angels and by Jesus, he reminded them, I told you all this stuff. You should have been, everybody should have been up.

You should have cooked a big old breakfast, right? And just been sitting out in the yard wondering, okay, wondering when Jesus is coming. Because it’s day three and he’s coming up and we’re going to be ready to see him. We’ll shoot the flares. Let him know where we’re at. Not that he needs to know where they are. You get it. They should have been ready. They should have been anticipated.

How much have I missed in my life because I just can’t take God at his word. The Bible’s full of promises and it’s not just black ink on paper. It’s a divine God making a promise because he can’t break it because he can’t lie. Believe his words. I’ve got a lady in my church. A little over a year ago, on a Tuesday, she found out that her son, 56 years old, died of a heart attack.

Slunked over on his couch, died right there. Boom, gone. That was Tuesday. Thursday morning, she woke up with severe pain in her back. And long story short, she had a cerebral hemorrhage that went down her spine. And she’s been paralyzed from the waist down since that day, Thursday, two days after her son died. All things work together for good to them that love God and are called according to his purpose.

Map that out from a bed that you hadn’t walked. It’s been about a year and three months now. I go see her about every couple weeks. And I’ve watched that gal lay in that bed and her husband feeding her and doing all that stuff, you know. And I keep seeing them trusting and worshiping and believing. You want your soul refreshed? Ask God to help you believe. What were the disciples struggling with in this passage?

Believing. They saw him die. And the empty tomb did not immediately mean he was alive. It meant his body was someplace. We all struggle. Believe his words. Number two, it’s all about him. You want to go overboard with something? Go overboard with Jesus. Get lost in the love of Christ. Read the Gospels once a month. Read his story. Dive into the Gospels. Why? Because my life needs to be absorbed with Jesus.

My wife will never be Jesus. Your husband will never be Jesus. Your job will never be Jesus. This church, that pastor, this preacher man, nobody will ever be Jesus. There’s nobody like Jesus. God spent great efforts in the Old Testament making sure his people knew there was nobody like their God. That’s why he dried up a Red Sea and he would tell them, there’s nobody like me.

He’s not a narcissist. He loves his people and he wants them to run to him first and foremost and a priority and believe everything that drips from his mouth. It’s all about Jesus. Jesus preached a little message to these two people In all the Old Testament, he talked of himself. Number three. And here’s, like I said, might be the little theme of this whole little message tonight.

He will show up somewhere on the road. Now, it won’t be like he did to them. You know, we will see him one day. Hug his neck. See what it looks like. And I look forward to that. But the Bible seems to indicate we got it better than they did because it lives in me. Wherever I’m at, He is, right? But what I want to remind you of is He will show up.

If Jesus Christ the righteous, the Son of the living God, the God that stood out on the precipice of zip nothing and created everything and it’s all been working specifically. Right? Ain’t nobody ever had to take a wrench and tweak something in the universe to keep it moving. God’s just done that. No problem. That God showed up to two people who were struggling and broken and disappointed and he walked with them and he talked with them and he ate with them and he revealed himself to them.

He’ll do that for you. Fourth thing. He will open his word. Now I want you to believe me. I, I’m a preacher. I’ve been to Bible college. Whoopie doo. I’m not saying I shouldn’t. I’m for it. But no Bible college doesn’t mean I can’t dive in to the deep things of God. Everybody in this room can dive into the deep things of God. Why? Because God will show up.

I’ll remind you of something. Ephesians chapter 1, about verse 3 down to verse 14 is one big old long verse. Not in English. You can’t do that in English without putting apostasy or something in there. Right? It a bum big old long verse. And there’s a lot of theology in them verses. And you know what Paul does? About verse 15 or so, he prays for God. And I’m just going to put it like in our terms.

He prays for God. Hear me? Cut the line out. That’s all he’s praying for. Cut the line. They were pagans. The Ephesians were the worst of the worst. But he knew as redeemed believers that God would not just show up. He would show them him. That’s what I need. Every day I need a dose of him. I need to see him, taste him, enjoy him, worship him.

He will reveal himself. Last part of these verses we didn’t deal with. When he shows up in the room, you know, to everybody, basically tells them, now look, you take this story and you make me known. That’s what I’m supposed to be doing. Guy Roberts, my wife loves me. My kids do, grandkids. I know Wade does, my grandbaby. I’m a nobody. Just a dot on a blank piece of paper.

But the God of heaven loves me and lets me love him back. Let’s me preach his Bible. Make much of Jesus. Because he saves. He touches. He reveals. He shows up. He helps. Make much of Christ. Heads are bowed. Eyes are closed. Pastor, you come. Close as you see. Thank you for your attention tonight.