Show & Tell

Focus: Jesus comes to show and tell us about the great love God has for us!

Function: that the hearers may be witnesses of this great show and telling to the world

Intro: Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Most of us have one thing in common and that is most of us here this morning have all gone to school. Our schools may be in different states, we may have had different teachers but most of us have gone to school. And this means that most of us have memories from going to school. Some of these memories may be good and other other memories may be not so good. But one memory I have from school is the fun common activity, called show and tell. I’m sure most of you know what I’m talking about, some of you may have even done show and tell, yourself, when you were in school. But if you don’t, show and tell is when a student picks an object from home and stands up in front of the room to show it off to all of his classmates. And then he begins to tell the class what it is, why it’s important to him, and why he chose this object instead of something else? Well, Jesus in our text from Luke chapter 24, participates in the fun activity of show and tell with His disciples. And I want you to imagine with me what that would have been like for that small group of His disciples this morning.

Story: The disciples were all gathered together and they were feeling discouraged, they were grieving the lost of a man who they had followed for 3 years and had grown to love, and they were feeling disappointed that they couldn’t do anything to stop His death. You see just three days ago, the disciples saw Jesus be betrayed and arrested by Romans, they saw as Jesus was ridiculed and mocked as He carried the cross. They saw as Jesus hung there in pain and died and they could do nothing about it. They were uncertain what their lives were going to look like now because their leader wasn’t there to guide them anymore. But as they were together grieving, they heard a knock on their door and it was two of their friends. And these friends claimed that they had seen Jesus. They said to the disciples, “We saw this man on the road to Emmaus and we began to talk to Him about Jesus and since it was late we invited Him to break bread with us. And as He was breaking bread, we recognized who it was! It was Jesus who was with us! But before we could anything else, He vanished from our sight! Jesus is alive!” And after hearing their friends tell this story, the disciples weren’t sure what to believe. Did their friends actually see Jesus or did they see a ghost? What their friends were telling them, was it true or were they hallucinating? The disciples didn’t know how to take this news. But as they were debating and talking among themselves, Jesus appeared to them! And He said, “Peace be to you!” The disciples were so scared, was it actually Jesus or was it a ghost? They thought to themselves, this couldn’t be Jesus could it? We just saw Him die two days ago! But Jesus knowing that His disciples were doubting, He showed them His pierced hands and His pierced feet and He said to them “Come and touch, see it that it is Me.” The disciples touched His hands and His feet, but still thought this was too good to be true! So Jesus then asked, “Do you have anything to eat?” And the disciples gave Him a piece of fish and He sat and ate with them! In the midst of uncertainty Jesus came to His disciples and showed them that He was real! He showed them that He had really risen from the dead! Jesus showed them the truth!

Excursus: But the disciples were unable to see the truth. They had heard all the eye witness accounts from the women who went to the tomb that Easter morning, they had heard the eye witness accounts from their friends who were on the road to Emmaus, and all of these accounts said that Jesus was alive, that Jesus had risen from the dead! But despite all the proof that had been given to the disciples, despite all the eye witness accounts, and despite all the unexplainable events that had taken place in their lives the last couple of days, the disciples were still unable to see the truth. They needed Jesus to come and show them the truth! They needed Jesus to come and show Himself to them! We’re a lot like the disciples in this text this morning, we are unable to see God’s truth in the world and in our lives no matter how hard we look for proof. When we look out in the world, we see numbers declining in churches and people searching out other things. In our world we see still see people we love struggle and battle with sickness and death. And when we look at our own lives we are reminded of the times we have failed to live up to God’s standard and the times we turned our back on God to do our own thing. When we look at the world and our own lives we can’t see God’s truth, our vision has been distorted by sin. Just like the disciples, we need Jesus to come and show us the truth and show us Himself. Jesus has come and risen from the dead! And through His rising, He shows us that God’s power is greater than death and sickness. Through His rising, He shows us after He bore all our sins, that His forgiveness is stronger than our failures and mistakes. Jesus has come and showed Himself, He has to come to the world and risen from the dead to show you God’s great love for you! He shows you the truth that you are a saved and forgiven child of God!

Story: But Jesus didn’t just show Himself to His disciples, but it says that He did something else in our text. It’s says that Jesus taught them too. I wonder what that would have been like for the disciples. They had seen their friend and person that they had loved, risen from the dead. The disciples touched Him, they conversed with Him and they even sat down to eat some broiled fish with Him at the dinner table. But they still had questions: How could this be? How did Jesus raise Himself from the dead? This isn’t supposed to happen! And Jesus could still see the doubts that His close followers had, so then He began to teach them. He taught them that all the Scriptures were about Him. He taught them that the books of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms were all fulfilled by Him. What amazing Sunday Bible class that would have been! And as He was teaching it all finally made sense for the disciples, everything clicked! The lightbulb finally went off. All of those weird things that Jesus had said, all of the interesting stuff that Jesus had done. They finally fully understood who Jesus was and what His mission was in the world. The disciples were excited and overjoyed! And Jesus after teaching His disciples told them that He was going to use them as witnesses in the world to tell others about Him and He wanted them to wait until they were clothed with the power from on high! Jesus didn’t just show His disciples His wounds and His risen body and let them figure the rest out, but He showed them and then He told them!

Excursus: Just like the disciples were are called to be witnesses in the world too. We called by Jesus to share this great news of salvation with people in our families, communities, and in our world. And just like the disciples we aren’t called to do this alone, just like the disciples we are clothed with the power of the most high, we are filled with the power of the Holy Spirit! Now you may be thinking to yourself, I want to be a witness for Jesus, but I just don’t know what that looks like? Well, Jesus actually gives us a great example of witnessing in our text today from Luke 24. Jesus, first, He showed Himself to His disciples and then He told them. Jesus participated in Show and Tell. And Show and Tell is a great model for being a witness for Jesus in our world today. First, we are called to Show Jesus in our actions. And Showing Jesus can take many different forms, in many different situations. It could look like having patience with someone when the normal worldly reaction would be to snap back with anger. It could look like having grace at a restaurant even when the service is subpar because the waitresses is new. It could even look like loving someone else even if you have a different political affiliation then them. Showing Jesus is really all about reflecting the love that Jesus has given us through our actions toward others in the world. Then after Showing Jesus, we are encouraged to Tell about Him too! Just like Jesus did with His disciples. He knew they weren’t going to be able to figure it out all by themselves; Jesus knew that He needed to explain and tell them about the implications that were not happening since He had risen from the dead. The world isn’t going to be able to figure out who Jesus is and He did for them simply by your actions. Just like the disciples, the world has to hear and be told too. Jesus empowers us by His Spirit to be witnesses to others in this world for Him, by Showing and Telling. Jesus invites to participate in show and tell with the world!

Conclusion: My friends Jesus has come and showed Himself to the world revealing God’s great love. Jesus came for you! After rising for the dead, He has shown you that He is stronger than dead, He has shown you that God’s promise of forgiveness is stronger than any sin of yours that held Him to that cross. Jesus has come and shown your new reality of a saved and forgiven child of God.

Now may the peace of God which passes all understanding, may it guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord as you are strengthened and encouraged by His Spirit to be His witness in the world. Amen.