Meditation Moment in Easter Week ~ Thursday '23

Luke 24:33-48

    They got up and returned at once to Jerusalem. There they found the Eleven and those with them, assembled together and saying, “It is true! The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon.” Then the two told what had happened on the way, and how Jesus was recognized by them when he broke the bread. While they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.” They were startled and frightened, thinking they saw a ghost. He said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.” …And while they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them, “Do you have anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate it in their presence. He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.”

     Has it only been one week since our solemn Eucharist took us to the Upper Room? Each time we celebrate and participate in the Holy Eucharist we are again within those walls, listening to the words of Jesus. It was a week ago that our Eucharist seemed significantly more earnest, sacred, and portentous. We experienced it as The Last Supper in its own time when Jesus told the gathered disciples what was to come with the betrayal of Judas and the denial of Peter. We washed one another’s feet, stripped the altar, left in darkness and silence with some staying a while, waiting in vigil and prayer. Now 7 days later, we hear about You meeting with the disciples after Your resurrection. Let us sit with this for a while and imagine for what that first week was like and then that moment for them.

O Christ, Messiah of all Creation,
     Time goes so quickly I can barely keep track of it.  It doesn't seem possible that it has been a full week since we were reading about the Last Supper with all of its complexities. In reading about Your appearances to the disciples, I want to know what those moments were truly like for them in their time. It's hard for me to capture the essence of that immediacy of Your presence. I can imagine it, I can think about it, I can picture it, but I don't quite know how to experience it. Each day that passes takes my attention farther away from all that I felt just days ago in Holy Week. Of course I must pay attention to my every day life, but I also want to keep You as the focus in each day. Help me experience You. Keep me from being swept up in insignificant distractions in every day life, ignoring Your presence, being irritated or judging, or pathetically whining if things don't go my way.
    Dear Jesus, with You in my waking, in my walking, and in my sleeping, all that I am and all that I do will be a reflection of that experience. Give my soul the spiritual cleansing and health it needs to guide my heart toward Your perfect love. All this I ask through God as Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier. amen.

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