Homily of the Rev. Dr. David A. Killian
Third Sunday of Easter
April 6, 2008
All Saints Parish
Brookline, Massachusetts
Luke 24:13-35
I
The two disciples in today's Gospel are very discouraged and downhearted as they walk along the road to Emmaus. They grieve because their leader and teacher, the one they had hoped would redeem Israel, had been stealthily arrested, unjustly convicted, and cruelly put to death. What could have been worse? They believed in this Jesus. They had put their hope in him. Now they were sorely disappointed, deep in grief, and confused about what would come next and what their own fate would be.
They meet a stranger who walks with them and interprets the Scriptures for them. What he says makes sense. The spirits of the disciples are lifted. "Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road?" they remark later. The stranger walks on with them and shares a meal, and the disciples recognize him in the breaking of the bread. Their grief is turned to gladness, their discouragement to hope.
Walk on with us, the disciples say to the stranger. The road to Emmaus is a metaphor for our own pilgrimage. Each of us is on a spiritual journey and, like the disciples, we get discouraged. A couple of weeks ago in Holy Week – the busiest week of the year for clergy – I came down with a horrible cold and was coughing and losing my voice. That's not what you want in Holy Week! I was discouraged because I had a sore throat, a cough, and an aching head. I didn't think my voice would be strong enough to preach on Easter Day. Fortunately, I asked my colleague Leslie Sterling to step in and she gave a marvelous Easter sermon. My discouragement was turned to joy.
II
Like the disciples on the road to Emmaus we may think we are alone as we carry our burdens of grief, illness or unemployment. Like the disciples we yearn for someone who can walk with us, listen to our tale, lift our spirits and give us hope.
On Friday we marked the 40th anniversary of the assassination of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He led the Montgomery bus boycott, when thousands of African-Americans stopped riding segregated buses and walked to work. His famous walk across the Selma bridge brought together blacks and whites to protest centuries of discrimination. On the night that he was killed, April 4, 1968, he was rallying garbage collectors in Memphis, Tennessee, in their struggle for fair wages and decent working conditions. In all of his efforts he felt supported by the power of God as he walked on the road to freedom and dignity.
Last Sunday we welcomed Mary McManus to our parish who talked about her walk with the Lord as a person afflicted with polio at age five and then when she was 53. Mary felt that God has been with her from the beginning helping her to bear her illness and to do things which are truly remarkable. In her poem, entitled, "The Gift of Polio," she writes:
Thank you, God, for the gift of polio which brought me so close to You
While paralyzed I saw your face no matter what I'd do.
Many wonderful people, You sent them to me at age 5
Perseverance and triumph life's lessons learned but my Spirit could not yet thrive.At age 53 the gift was sent to me a second time,
Having time to sit and feel, to heal I started to rhyme.
The second time more worse than the first yet Your love and wisdom I found
From pain and weakness and fatigue a remarkable Spirit rebound.
Reliving all the trauma of special shoes and such
I discovered so many incredible healers who brought a loving touch.
I had no clue I had such strength and the ability to grow
No matter what the outcome, deep gratitude I show.And from that place so dark and deep, my body could not move
I took the reins and gained control, this time with nothing to prove.
This gift so precious, I live a new life, gratitude flows from me.
My heart and soul are filled with Grace and each day's a gift from Thee.
Mary, a polio survivor, now is training to run in the Boston Marathon. She not only walks on, she runs, with God in her every step.
III
Those of you who were here on September 17th at our special service to welcome Dr. Yang Jianli back to our parish after his five year's captivity in Chinese prisons may remember what he said that day: "My thanks and praise be to God, our heavenly father. He and I trudged through these difficult years together with me on his back every moment."
On May 4, Dr. Yang is beginning a 500-mile walk to call people to remember the struggle of thousands of Chinese citizens now in prison for exercising their basic human rights. The walk will begin on Boston's Freedom Trail and will end in Washington, D.C. The loving God who supported Jianli during his five years in prison will now also be with him as he walks 500 miles so that others may be free. At a ceremony at the State House this past week honoring Dr. Yang and announcing his walk, our own Robert Honeysucker sang a song which is so appropriate to Jainli's walk and so appropriate to our reflection together on today's Gospel passage on the walk to Emmaus.
When you walk through the storm
Hold your head up high
And don't be afraid of the dark
At the end of the storm
There's a golden sky
And the sweet silver song of the lark
Walk on, through the wind
Walk on, through the rain
Though your dreams be tossed and blown
Walk on, walk on, with hope in your heart
And you'll never walk alone
You'll never walk alone
Walk on, walk on, with hope in your heart
And you'll never walk alone
You'll never walk alone
I asked Bob to sing that song today. The disciples on the road to Emmaus were deeply discouraged, but then their spirits were lifted by the risen Christ who took away their fears and gave them courage. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Mary McManus, and Dr. Yang Jianli had good reasons to be discouraged many times, yet they experienced the power of God carrying them to a more hopeful day. In our discouragement and disappointments, may we realize that God is with us as we walk on through the wind and rain with hope in our hearts.
Amen.