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Let us continue in worship by giving attention to the reading of God's Word as it is recorded in the Gospel of Luke, the 24th chapter. I begin the reading at the verse which is number 13. "That very day two of them were going to a village named Emmaus about seven miles from Jerusalem and talking with each other

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about all these things that had happened. While they were talking and discussing together Jesus himself drew near and went with them but their eyes were kept from recognizing him and he said to them what is this conversation which you are holding with each other as you walk and they stood still looking sad. Then one of

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them named Cleopas answered him are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days and he said to them what things and they said to him concerning Jesus of Nazareth who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people and how our chief

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priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death and crucified him but we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel yes and besides all this it is now the third day since this happened moreover some women of our company amazed us they were at the tomb early in the morning and did not find

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his body and they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the woman had said but him they did not see and he said to them oh foolish men and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have

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spoken was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory and beginning with Moses and all the prophets he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself so they drew near to the village to which they were going he appeared to be

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going further but they constrained him saying stay with us for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent so he went in to stay with them when he was at table with them he took the bread and blessed and broke it and gave it to them and their eyes were opened and they recognized him and he vanished out of

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their sight and may God bless to us and to our understanding this reading from his word. Amen. Pray with me. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen. I'm convinced that the loveliest things in the world are the things that are not

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there. For a decade before coming to Pittsburgh I lived in a city north of Pittsburgh, Grove City, Pennsylvania and there I lived in a house which was reputed to be the oldest house in the town and beside that house there was an elm tree which was even older and low down on that tree there was a stunted

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branch which I never really paid any attention to until one day a beautiful cardinal lighted upon it. Now he was an ostentatious bird. He wanted to display the full glitter and glory of his scarlet plumage. Now ordinarily when I see somebody showing off I turn away to try to suggest to them that they are

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being immodest but I pampered this bird because he was beautiful to see. He adopted just about every pose you can imagine. He gave me a right profile and a left profile and he spread his wings and he pulled them in close and while he was doing this I took a whole series of mental photographs. Well the branch is

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still there and the bird of course is long gone but every time I look at that branch I see the loveliness of that bird. Some of the loveliest things in the world are the things that are not there. I suppose insofar as stadia go the Three Rivers Stadium over here is alright but when I go out to Oakland I

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try always to drive down behind the law library of the very fine law school there at the University to see that little bit of the wall that is left from Forbes Field. Do you remember it? The tall green girders and the green wooden seats and all the little shops gathered around it where you could buy good hot dogs and

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you parked in people's backyards and there'd be mothers and grandmothers out there waving the traffic in and you remember the little black man who always sat at the center gate selling peanuts and always wore a derby hat and of course there was Greenberg Gardens and there was the scoreboard not one like we

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have today but one where they put the score in each time and they would the men who operated the scoreboard look through the vacant holes until the innings were played out and do you remember Rip Sewell's blooper pitch and how Jimmy Russell always caught fly balls in his mitt right here like he was

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going to drop them and how Ralph Kiner would pull them into Shenley Park and Johnny Hopps scampering around the bases with one of his triples and you looked over to the radio booth and there was Rosie Rosewell thinking about Aunt Minnie and giving away quarts of sealed test ice cream and the magnificent Roberto

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Clemente who could throw a ball a clean strike all the way to home plate and then of course there was little Vic Lombardi fighting with the umpires who were twice as big and the way Bing Crosby always came on the opening day and the Steelers played there too and the night that Mickelson's Steelers

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scored 34 points in six minutes to beat the Los Angeles Rams. Oh I suppose I go looking for ghosts but that place has many happy memories for me and when I stand there and look just at the part of the fence that remains I'm reminded that some of the loveliest things in life are the things that are not there. Oh I

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suppose this is a bit much in the way of old Langsign and that I'm not paying sufficient attention to the passing pageant of the years but it seems to me that there's something sacramental about that branch or about that baseball field and I feel that I would be very poor if I did not have them. You ever watch the

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mother sewing baby clothes for the baby that hasn't come yet? Little pink and white things and she's doing it with incredible detail. Now notice please the baby is not there yet but it's the loveliest thing in the world to her. Or what about when the baby has grown and flown and the nest is empty now and

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mother goes aside into those sanctified moments of remembering when she gets out some handy work from grade school or a letter or two written from college or maybe the bronzed baby shoes. The child is gone but no amount of wealth could buy from that mother these memories. Loveliest thing, the child not there but

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the memory so sweet. It can be unhealthy of course there are people who are fixated on the past the individual for example who loses a loved one and then will not change the room or leaves all the clothes hanging in the cupboard in the vain hope that the deceased one will somehow miraculously return. One can

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become a captive of time and it can be a hurtful thing but it can also be a very treasured joy. I feel sorry for the people who walk the streets of this old city and who never shopped in the Jenkins arcade or never had lunch at McCain's or Donahue's, never tasted the turtle soup with Kramer's and never left

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the Pennsylvania Railroad Station in a real steam engine. Some of the loveliest things in life are just not there. Now faith learns this it learns that the loveliest things are not there. I remember for example the night that I gave myself to Jesus Christ. It was in a consecration service at a youth

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convention being held on the campus of Westminster College. The name of the preacher for the evening was Dr. Frank Lawrence. I've come to know him well across the years though I probably haven't seen him now for at least a dozen years. I don't remember the title of his sermon or the text or anything

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that he said in the course of it but I know that that night by the Spirit's power moving through him my life was claimed by Christ and turned around and every time I walk into that chapel either to speak there or just to visit on that campus I see it all again. A lovely thing that isn't there. My two

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grandmothers. One of them liked what she called story sermons. Sermons which focused on biblical stories. We would call them today expositions. My other grandmother came from a Baptist persuasion and all her life lamented the fact that I had not been immersed. In fact the last time I was with her when

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she was 89 years of age she was still trying to talk me into it. Well they've both been gone for 27 years now and I don't remember a lot of things about them but every time I sit down in my desk and I study to write some exposition of some biblical story or every time I stand in this place and

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perform the sacrament of baptism they become very very real to me. Lovely but not there. I read about a man who loved his mother very much. Now I don't mean to imply that he was fixated upon her. Not at all. He was just very grateful and properly so for all the things that she had done for him. He could remember for

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example the night that he had prepared to go to college the next day and his little mother had come into him and her work-worn hands in them she had four crumpled ten dollar bills and she gave them to him all she had and she said be the kind of man I want you to be and he went off and gave himself to his

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schooling and and then after some years she died and he was very bitter about her death because she died at just that time when he reached a level of success where he could begin to give to her the things that she had never been able to enjoy before. He would visit her grave quite frequently and one day standing

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there in wintertime all the ground white about the soft outlines of the hills no wind just very still he felt a deep sense of the serenity of the place and felt inside of him a voice that was saying to him it's just not fair that you should be this way for your mother loved the Lord Jesus Christ and looked

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forward to reunion with him and to all the victory which heaven is and her victory now is being shadowed by your self-pity. You remember how she used to sing "there is a land of pure delight" and as he thought about this and and listened to this inner voice he began to respond and he said right out loud

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there in the middle of that place "mother I'm going to let you go the kingdom of heaven is yours by the grace of God you've looked forward to it with joy and anticipation enjoy it to the full and I will see you soon" and instantly he felt within his life in his heart in his very core of his self a peace that he hadn't

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known before. He didn't hear a voice but it was as if some voice said to him "my son I'm glad you understand and I will be waiting for you when you come and never far from you so long as you live." Now what happened to that man on that occasion could not be measured it could not be counted there are no scientific

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calibrations that we could apply to that kind of experience it was a demonstration of his faith of his confidence in Christ of his expectation of heavenly reward of his knowledge of his mother's dependence upon the grace of God and you can't measure or count or enumerate these things in any way his

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dependence you see was on something that couldn't be seen on something that wasn't there or look at it from the opposite perspective James Davidson Ross wrote a book some years ago called Margaret story of a little girl who died of a brain tumor when she was 12 years old it's a very very moving story

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your heart would have to be made of brass not to be touched by it. At one point in the story he relates that Margaret wrote her last will and testament a simple document she left her locket to her sister and some of her toys to her younger nieces and her prayer book to her brother and she wrote

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to everybody who has been so wonderful I leave my love my trust and my faith in Christ there's testimony there you see to the fact that no life is ever wasted and some of the longest lessons that God teaches he teaches in very short lives at the end of the last will and testament she wrote and to Jim he's the

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fellow who later went on to write the book and to Jim I leave my saving certificates and myself lo I am with you always even unto the end of the world now you might think it a bit arrogant for a little girl to presume to take those words of Jesus and utter them as if they were her own but I don't see

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anything arrogant about it when Jesus said what he said to the disciples lo I am with you always even unto the end of the world he was saying to them that he missed them and that he loved them and that his spirit would be with them and that's what this girl was saying this little girl now mind you there was in

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her no theological profundity she could not define or interpret or deliberate the niceties of faith her whole confidence rested on things which she had not seen and yet there was a magnificent beauty about her faithfulness the loveliest things in the world are not there for us to see look at this

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table the loveliest one who will be at this table tonight will be unseen we come here to Jesus Christ to love us and to strengthen us to encourage us to comfort us to chide and convict us if that is necessary to absolve us of our sin this this table has a quite invisible host and yet he's very real

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now it's not the form or the ceremony that makes for the reality I often think that coming to communion is much like shaking hands suppose you were to see two people shaking hands now the shaking of hands indicate some kind of agreement or some kind of welcome let's suppose that they have entered into an agreement

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but let's suppose also that one of these two women shaking hands over this agreement one of them knows in her heart that she's not going to keep the terms of the agreement she knows that from the very start it is her intention to be duplicitous now the outward sign of the handshake is there but there is in

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reality no agreement because she has already purposed in her heart to deny what she has promised so people come here to this table and they go through all of the outward form the handshake is there but that's all that there it may look good but it's essentially meaningless it's only when the reality

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of our heart touches the reality of the heart of the invisible host that communion takes place not the form but our fellowship with this one whom we cannot see the loveliest things in life are not there for us to see as we approach this table in the new year I'd ask you to remember that when I was a

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teenager I was privileged one summer to be a part of a camp run by a man named CA Howard he called it camp Claude it was named after Claude Benidim who was the youngest son of the great oil wildcatter Mike Benidim Claude Benidim was killed in the first world war and Mike Benidim established this camp in

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his son's memory and did other things as well and I remember at this camp at the table where we all ate the head of the table was always empty now it was completely set freshly washed dishes and silverware and napkin and a vase of flowers but no one sat there for it was our understanding that there Jesus was

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it was a very beautiful lesson to impart to a group of high school boys that the loveliest one was always at the head of the table as I got older I began to think of that in terms of the Emmaus experience which I read to you just a few minutes ago these two who are on their way to Emmaus their hearts broken

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because they believe that Jesus is gone they cannot understand the mystery he joins them they do not recognize him and then when they get to the home they invite him in and he sits at table with them and he breaks the bread and he pours the wine and they recognize him and the scriptures say he vanished out

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of their sight now the reality of the resurrection glory and the reality of the Easter truth had been brought home to them by him so much so that they jumped up and ran all the way back to Jerusalem to tell about it but he had vanished out of their sight we don't come here tonight for moral maxims we

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don't come here for suggestions on how to live an ethically acceptable life if that was all that constituted this table then this table and every other table like it would have been in a museum a long time ago we come here to share the presence of Jesus morals mean nothing to us if we do not have Christ to empower

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us to live up to them and to forgive us when we fail if there is no Jesus then morality itself becomes a mockery we come here to this table saying I ought and I must but we go away from this table saying I can and I will and what makes the difference that we meet this host we cannot see he is vanished from

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our sight and still is here let me confess something to you I probably shouldn't but if I could cause one him in all of the hymnody and all of the music literature of the church if I could cause one him to disappear and never be hummed or heard or whistled or

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sung again I know instantly which one it would be would be in the garden written by C Austin Miles set to a waltz beat six eight time secular in its orientation with that selfishness which is so common to fundamentalism and he walks with me and he talks with me and he tells me that I am his own not much concern for

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other people but you know if I could do that if I could make that him disappear as if it never were I wouldn't and the reason that I wouldn't is this the theophanic experience that it describes the impinging of Jesus on our lives so that he walks with us and talks with us and tells us that we are his own that is

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true and though our eyes may not see it our hearts know it so don't come here tonight as a pious exercise yes there's beautiful form here and there is some aesthetic reality and some ceremony but don't worry about if anybody's going to be missed or someone's going to drop a tray or the elders or the musicians will

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not be on cue so what think about Christ think about how this one has mastered lives how he's inspired deeds of magnificent courage how he has started the noblest institutions of history think about the power of his name when it's said in a hospital by a bed or in a cemetery by a grave or in a prison in a

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cell or at a marriage ceremony or a baptism think about the effects of his presence how he makes the weak strong and how he makes the proud humble and how he makes the greedy generous and how he makes the stiffly upright into lovers think about the claim of his name to be the friend of sinners to be the man of

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sorrows to be the only begotten Son of God to be the Alpha and the Omega to be the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world to be the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords see here all the loveliness of Christ and if you do there'll be a new you for this new year I heard about a man who picked up his

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morning newspaper and read his own obituary in it so he called the newspaper and complained and they said we'll take care of the whole thing we'll run a correction tomorrow and not only that we will also list your name under the birth so you'll have a whole new start well it can't happen you can't tonight have a

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whole new start if you will just see with your spirit this loveliest of ones whom the world says is not here thanks be to God for his unspeakable grace let us pray

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and now as we approach thy table Oh risen and reigning Jesus Christ by the power of thy Holy Spirit and in a way that unbelief cannot understand make thy presence known to every believing heart we pray it in your name amen

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