Sermon Tone Analysis
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INTRODUCTION
I wonder out loud this morning how many in this room feel like they are discouraged this morning.
Not even because the world is bad.
It’s always bad out there.
It’s in the mirror.
You are tired of feeling far from God. Tired of feeling cold in your prayers.
Tired of the niggling little doubts that won’t go away.
You are worn down by sin that pops up everyday and you keep saying you will fight it tomorrow, but tomorrow becomes today.
You wonder sometimes if living like your unbelieving friends might yield more joy.
Maybe you are even disappointed with Jesus.
I think a lot of people feel like this a lot of the time but they don’t want to say it because it feels like something you aren’t supposed to say.
“How you doing today, Tom?”
“I’m drowning in discouragement and doubting God.
I am wondering if Jesus is who I thought He was, but hey—maybe the Panthers will win today!”
That just feels like a direction most people do not like taking conversations
If I were asked to hazard an opinion as to what is the most prevailing disease in the Church today I would suggest that it is discouragement.
The Christian Warfare, 302
David Martyn Lloyd-Jones
The Christian’s chief occupational hazards are depression and discouragement.
John Stott
If Satan’s arsenal of weapons were restricted to a single one, it would be discouragement.
C. S. Lewis
Clearly men of God throughout the last century, from preachers to philosophers, understood that discouragement is a relentless, never-going away, Philistine-like enemy to the Christian
Well, this morning, we have two disciples who are just like the discouraged among us in Luke 24.
Two disciples on the brink of despair—disappointed with who Jesus turned out to be
And by the end of the passage, they are joyful witnesses
How can we get there?
How can we go from doubting and discouraged, to being joyful witnesses for Christ?
Let’s look at the text and see
THE DISCIPLES ON THE ROAD (v.
13-16)
We have two of Jesus’ followers walking on the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus.
This is a day’s hike.
It was about a 7 mile journey, as Luke tells us and it would about 2-4 hours depending on your pace.
Verse 18 tells us that one of the disciples is named Cleopas.
Some believe this is the same person mentioned in John 19:25
We have no way of knowing and we don’t need to make much of it.
But some, like commentator Kent Hughes, argues the two disciples on the Emmaus Road are actually Cleopas and Mary, Jesus’ aunt and uncle.
Again—no need to make much of it either way, but I won’t refer to these two disciples as men in this sermon just in case one of them wasn’t.
It might be Aunt Mary.
I don’t want to call Jesus’ aunt a man.
As they are on this journey, they are talking about what has taken place in Jerusalem that week.
Jesus’ Triumphal Entry on Monday, as He rode into Jerusalem on a donkey with the people shouting, “Hosanna!”
Jesus flipping the temple on its head on Tuesday and then teaching the people there on Wednesday and Thursday
His arrest and His trial
Barabbas’ release and Jesus’ condemnation
The horror of the crucifixion on Good Friday
The confusion over where His body is on that Easter morning
During this conversation, they are joined by a stranger.
At this point, Luke’s writing is filled with this great irony because you as the reader are in on the secret
The stranger is Jesus
Luke knows.
We know.
But the two disciples do not know.
So all of the rest of the conversation that we see between Jesus and these two disciples carries this ironic tension because they are telling Him all about HIM.
But they have no idea.
You see in verse 16 that they do not recognize Him because they are prevented from it.
God is keeping these two from being able to see that they are entertaining Jesus
Why?
Maybe God wanted these two to believe the words of Christ before they knew the identity of Christ.
He wanted them to put their faith in God’s promises before they realized they were seeing the Amen to those promises right before their very eyes.
CONFUSED AND DOUBTING (v.
17-24)
In verse 17, He asks them what they are talking about as they are walking on the road and Cleopas is almost dumbfounded.
How could this man not know what they are talking about?
They are talking about the same thing the rest of Jerusalem in talking about—what happened to Jesus.
He even incredulously asks, “Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?”
Jesus plays along and says, “What things?”
(v.
19)
And they begin to tell Him about … Him.
About how Jesus was recognized by many in Israel as a prophet (v.
19)
And they recognized Him as such because His teaching and His miracles
That is what they are referring to when they say He was a “prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people”
But the chief priests and rulers delivered Him up to death and crucified Him (v.
20)
And this has broken the hearts of these two disciples because they believed that He might be the one to redeem Israel...
Meaning, they hoped He was the Messiah.
But now, He is dead, and it is late in the third day since His death and they simply have no reason to believe He was the Promised Christ after all.
This shows us how the Jewish people truly had no room in their theology for a crucified and buried Messiah.
They expected the Messiah to redeem Israel and that expectation was much more physical than spiritual.
They were concerned with a Messiah who would come and redeem Israel by liberating them from Roman oppression and forever establish the kingdom that was promised to David in the land that was promised to Abraham.
The Passover has just been celebrated.
They have just recalled the reality that in order for redemption to take place, there has to be a payment.
The Lamb had to die, if there was going to be deliverance from judgment.
But they were not connecting the dots.
They did not understand that the Messiah would have to die as a substitute.
That He would be the payment.
And seeing Him crucified broke their hope that He was the Anointed One.
But in verses 22-24, the two disciples condemn themselves a bit.
There are witnesses saying that angels told them Jesus was resurrected.
But those women are not being believed.
Their news was amazing (v.
22), but it is ultimately being dismissed.
They are not believing in the earliest proclamations regarding Jesus’ resurrection
THE CORRECTING TEACHER (v.
25-27)
At this point, Jesus is going to correct them.
It is gentle and loving, but it is correction.
They are failing to understand and believe in God’s Word.
They are failing to believe in the Gospel witness of the women who spoke to the angels at the tomb
Jesus is going to use His words to shepherd them to faith
They are discouraged and doubting.
Seeing Him crucified has shattered their Messianic hope, but it doesn’t need to be this way
He calls the “foolish” and “slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken.”
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