Where is Emmaus and what is in Emmaus that would lead someone to go there?
Nowhere and nothing. That is just the point. The disciples were going to Emmaus just to get the hell out — just to forget. Frederick Buechner says there is not one of us who has gone to Emmaus with them. Emmaus can be the book we read or the movie we watch. Emmaus can be idle chatter or one glass of wine more than we should. Emmaus is where we go to get away – to forget that the world doesn’t care much about us. We, like the best and the brightest, will die. And if the world cares little for us, it cares even less for our ideas. Even the noblest ideas, ideas about love and freedom and justice, have been twisted out of shape by selfish people for selfish ends. And so the disciples headed for Emmaus. But along the way something happened. The disciples encountered Jesus. He was going to Emmaus, too. Why? Because the disciples, his disciples, were going there, too, and where God’s people are, there God is, too. On the road to Emmaus, or in a hospital room in Philadelphia, there Jesus is.
