NARRATOR: On the first day of the week, two disciples were going their way to a village named Emmaus seven miles distant from Jerusalem. They were talking to one another about all that had happened. As they were talking and discussing, Jesus came near and began to travel with them. But they did not recognize him.
STRANGER: What are you discussing as you walk along so sadly?
CLEOPAS: Are you a stranger in Jerusalem that you do not know the things that happened these past few days?
STRANGER: What things?
CLEOPAS: The things to do with Jesus of Nazareth, a prophet powerful in word and deed in the eyes of God and all the people; how our chief priests and leaders delivered him up to be condemned to death and crucified him. We were hoping that he was the one who would set Israel free.
DISCIPLE: Besides all this, today, the third day since these things happened, some women of our group astonished us. After going to the tomb before dawn and not finding his body, they came back saying they had seen a vision of angels who declared he was alive. Some of those with us went to the tomb and found it empty just as the women said, but him they did not see.
STRANGER: How slow of heart you are to believe all the prophets have said. Did not the Messiah have to suffer these things to enter into his glory?
NARRATOR: Beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted for them every passage of scripture that referred to him. As they neared the village to which they were going, the stranger acted as if he were going farther. But they pressed him.
DISCIPLES: Stay with us, for it is nearly evening. The day is ending.
NARRATOR: So he went to stay with them. While he sat with them, he took bread, blessed it, broke it, and gave it to them. Their eyes were opened and they recognized him but he vanished from their sight. They said to each other—
DISCIPLES: Were not our hearts burning inside us as he talked to us on the road and opened the scriptures to us?
NARRATOR: They got up immediately and returned to Jerusalem, where they found the eleven and the rest of the company assembled.
COMPANY: The Lord has been raised! It is true! He has appeared to Simon.
NARRATOR: Then the two recounted what had happened on the road and how they knew him in the breaking of the bread.
Luke 24.13-35
Sunday Readings: Acts 2.14, 22-33 1 Peter 1.17-21 Luke 24.13-35