May 1st, 2022

The season of Easter continues with the Third Sunday of Easter, and the following words continue to be both appropriate and well-liked during the Easter season: ‘Alleluia! Christ is risen. He is risen indeed. Alleluia!’

This is the last Sunday in the Easter season where the Gospel reading is a resurrection appearance [John 21:1-14 (15-19)], but that is certainly fine. The Christian Church will survive. Jesus is still the Lord over sin, death, and hell.

In the Gospel according to Luke, the writer is calling Jesus ‘the Lord’ a long time before his resurrection [see, for example, Luke 7:13]. The readings from Acts—and this book may be called ‘the Acts of the Risen Lord through the Acts of the Apostles’—those readings certainly continue throughout this season. And these words continue to strengthen the post-resurrection Church after a span of almost two millennia.

The First Reading for this Sunday is from Acts 9[:1-22] and focuses primarily on the conversion of Saul/Paul. Many weeks ago, we were looking at how, in the Book of Acts, Christianity was described as being ‘spoken against everywhere’ (28:22b). Most recently we have been looking at how Christianity was very much supported in the Book of Acts.

Both of these perspectives may be seen in the life of Saul/Paul at different times. At first, he was bent on ridding the world of Christianity, and then, suddenly, he is supporting it wholeheartedly with his speech.

There is a significant and interesting contrast that is tied to these two perspectives and is also somewhat hidden within the last verse of the text from Acts 9. And here is a somewhat-literal translation of it, with an attempt to bring that contrast out more clearly:

And Saul more was empowered and poured together [or ‘tied into knots’?] Jews, the ones dwelling in Damascus, putting together that this one is the Christ.

Things can be POURED together, and that is when things can get a little messy. On the other hand, things can also be PUT together, in a way that they were meant to be. And something significant can certainly come from it.

There is also another supportive thought in the text, and this support is seen in just one little word, but it is a significant one. In Acts 9:2, for the first time, Christianity is called ‘The Way’.

To connect Jesus to ‘The Way’ is certainly NOT a new thing. We could look at the use of the word ‘way’ both before and after this verse in Acts. Some significant things happen ‘on the way’, and the conversion of Saul is one of them (see Acts 9:17, 27; 26:13). In the Gospel according to John, Jesus calls himself ‘The Way’ (14:6).

To talk about a ‘way’ is also a very Jewish way of talking, and this idea is prominent in Jewish writings and the Qumran texts. Their view of the faithful Jewish following is one of walking, and the Jewish word for that is ‘halakah’. That was a way in which they understood and treated the scriptures very seriously. Other religions also use this important picture of a ‘way’.

I think it is important to give the last appearances of the word ‘way’ in the Gospel according to Luke. There, while Jesus is traveling with his followers to Emmaus, important things are happening, and those things are similar to what continues to happen in the Lord’s Church (and this is, again, in a somewhat-literal translation):

Luke 24:32 And they said to each other: The heart of us was burning in us, was it not, as he spoke to us in the way, as he opened up to us the scriptures?

Luke 24:35 And they [the two] exegeted the things in the way and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread.

Everyone is on a way, going somewhere, doing something. Many people have used this illustration in many ways. Jesus is THE WAY. He went somewhere for us and for our salvation. Those who are HIS people continue on HIS WAY.

He says words that make our hearts burn. He opens to us the scriptures. And he makes himself known to us in the breaking of the bread.