It’s important to remember that the two disciples who fled Jerusalem toward Emmaus, were two disciples who were discipled by Jesus himself. These two no doubt healed and cast out demons just like all the other 70 did. They heard all of Jesus’ training just like every other disciple did, and they were sufficiently strong in their faith to follow Jesus into the lion’s den, to go into Jerusalem with him. But despite all Jesus’ many warnings, they just weren’t prepared for his death, and it shattered their hope in a way they hadn’t anticipated. After such an onslaught their souls were deeply wounded and where the text says their “faces were downcast” it’s no stretch to guess that they were severely depressed, anxious, and mentally shattered.

Perhaps Luke left the identity of the one of these disciples vague on purpose, because at some point in our walk with Jesus, most of us will be hit by a barrage so overwhelming that it decimates all our hopes and dreams and we too will duck our head down and go running for cover.

Still, Luke portrays the scene with a comedic air as these two past warriors for their messiah are now so distracted by their soul wounds, that they can’t even recognize Jesus walking right beside them.

They only see a friendly stranger who keeps jabbing at them, coaxing them to remember the word.

To the credit of these two wounded warriors, they don’t resist the word of the stranger or try to argue. No, for hours upon end, they walk and listen to all His words. And all of His words are taken from the Word. The stranger is so conversant in the Word, that he can instantly adapt all of its truth to this circumstance and pour it over these two men’s soul wounds for hours upon hours.

They listen, and pay a certain amount of attention. But they’re not quite getting it. Not yet. And that’s okay, because this encouraging stranger is also very patient. He is willing to literally walk the extra mile to encourage, to restore and to revive His two wounded warriors.

But eventually the path diverges. The stranger was never going to Emmaus. No, He has an ongoing mission; a path of His father’s choosing that He’s still walking to this day.

And yet, the stranger gladly paused to eat and further encourage His two wounded disciples (but only after He was asked and invited).

Jesus knows how the soul heals: we must absorb and take in, repeatedly, over and over, letting the healing process work until that point where something suddenly clicks, and we realize who has been with us the entire time.

And then, and only then, are we ready to put our gear back on and get back on the road, back into the fight.

Luke makes sure to tell us the end of the story: These two disciples, who had been encouraged for hours by Jesus, they rushed back to Jerusalem to encourage the rest of their band of brothers. 

Because at that point, all the disciples were suffering from soul wounds, those who stayed needed just as much encouragement as those who left. And as the two encouraged their brothers, as they poured out the Word just as it had been poured out for them, and they revived, just as they had been revived, then at some point something suddenly clicked.

And Jesus did it again, making Himself known suddenly, even though He’d been there unrecognized the whole time, just like on the road to Emmaus. Jesus then completed the interrupted meal at Emmaus, and just as He had done with His two disciples on the road, He now did with the rest of His band of brothers. He poured out the Word over their wounded souls, poured it out over and over until it cleaned out the depression, the anxiety, the paranoia.

Then, and only then, He gave His healing warriors a new mission, a new fight to win. Their faces were no longer downcast, they were fixed on Him.