Luke 24:13-31

Behold, two of them were going that very day to a village named Emmaus, which was sixty stadia from Jerusalem. They talked with each other about all of these things which had happened. It happened, while they talked and questioned together, that Jesus himself came near, and went with them. But their eyes were kept from recognizing him. He said to them, “What are you talking about as you walk, and are sad?”

One of them, named Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who doesn’t know the things which have happened there in these days?”

He said to them, “What things?”

They said to him, “The things concerning Jesus, the Nazarene, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people; and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him. But we were hoping that it was he who would redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things happened. Also, certain women of our company amazed us, having arrived early at the tomb; and when they didn’t find his body, they came saying that they had also seen a vision of angels, who said that he was alive. Some of us went to the tomb, and found it just like the women had said, but they didn’t see him.”

He said to them, “Foolish men, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken! Didn’t the Christ have to suffer these things and to enter into his glory?” Beginning from Moses and from all the prophets, he explained to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself. They drew near to the village, where they were going, and he acted like he would go further.

They urged him, saying, “Stay with us, for it is almost evening, and the day is almost over.”

He went in to stay with them. It happened, that when he had sat down at the table with them, he took the bread and gave thanks. Breaking it, he gave to them. Their eyes were opened, and they recognized him, and he vanished out of their sight.

When I read this passage I can see that this is when the New Testament really begins to unfold. The old is now old and the new is beginning. Instead of speaking in mysteries and stories as Jesus had done during His ministry before His death, now He took the time to detail “from Moses and from all the prophets… the Scriptures… concerning himself.”

Notice the nature of the new body that Jesus had. It was clearly physical or it would not have been able to break bread or walk, but it was capable of vanishing in an instant. Someday we will also have bodies like this.

Just as the eyes of these two men were opened, so it was to be that the message of what Jesus had done would effect the whole world so that the eyes of many would be opened to the realization that God had visited mankind and had overcome death and sin.