Putting the Easter Puzzle Together

The Third Sunday of Easter
April 19, 2026
Luke 24:13-35 

“Putting the Easter Puzzle Together”

Are you a person who enjoys working on puzzles? Myself, not so much, but my wife really likes doing this. We have a puzzle table set up at home and that is where there’s almost always a puzzle in process of being put together. For some, working on a puzzle is best done by yourself, but for others, it’s great fun in doing this as a joint effort. For puzzlers, there is nothing more annoying than getting near to the end and finding that there is a piece or two missing. Where is it? Did the cat knock it onto the floor? Is it still in the box? But when the puzzle is finally finished, that is cause for rejoicing. There is a real sense of accomplishment that goes with this. All of those individual puzzle pieces come together to make this wonderfully complete picture. The Easter season has lots of individual puzzle pieces, if you will, as the risen Lord Jesus Christ appears to individuals and groups of believers, assuring them that he has truly risen from the dead. Today’s Gospel lesson is one of these individual puzzle pieces. The two disciples on the road to Emmaus are met by Jesus as he walks with them, listening to them, reminding them of God’s promises in Scripture, and finally makes himself known to them in the breaking of the bread. When we put this together with the other puzzle pieces of Easter, we see this wonderfully complete picture of the risen Savior. The message for today, based on the Gospel reading, is entitled “Putting the Easter Puzzle Together.” May the Lord’s rich and abundant blessing rest upon the preaching, the hearing, and the living of his Word for Jesus’ sake.

We’ve already heard of some of the other Easter puzzle pieces. On Easter Sunday, we heard about the women who went to the tomb on that first Easter morning, received the news from the angel that Jesus had risen, and then saw Jesus himself (Matthew 28:1-10). Last Sunday, we heard about Thomas who refused to believe that Jesus had risen from the dead. He said that unless he could physically see and touch Jesus’ wounds, he would never believe. Jesus came to him and the other disciples, revealing that he truly had risen from the dead, but also said: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (John 20:19-31).  And now today, there is yet another Easter puzzle piece on the road to Emmaus. But why were they going to Emmaus? As one Biblical scholar has written: “There was nothing left to do that [Easter] afternoon but get out of town. And where did they go? They went to Emmaus. And where was Emmaus and why did they go there? It was no place in particular really, and the only reason that they went there was that it was some seven miles from a situation that had become unbearable… Emmaus is where we go, where these two went, to try and forget about Jesus…” (The Magnificent Defeat, by Frederick Buechner. New York: Harper & Row, 1966). Though the two disciples may have been trying to escape Jesus and all that had happened, Jesus came in search of them, and met them in all their defeat and discouragement. The risen Savior comes to us as well. He comes in search of us when we are feeling defeated and discouraged. He meets us on our own road to Emmaus.

This account of Jesus’ appearing to the disciples at Emmaus is unique to Luke’s Gospel. Each one of the accounts of Jesus’ resurrection appearances in all four Gospels is like an individual puzzle piece. Each is its own unique witness to the risen Lord Jesus Christ. As those disciples talk with this stranger who has come alongside them on the road to Emmaus, they share with him different pieces of the puzzle: the chief priests and rulers who condemned Jesus to death and crucified him; the women who saw a vision of angels and reported that Jesus was alive; some of the disciples who went to the tomb but didn’t see Jesus. How will all of these pieces fit together? They didn’t have the puzzle box with the picture on it to see how everything was going to come together. Living this side of Jesus’ resurrection, we see all of this now, but in that moment it was very different. Notice that Jesus patiently listens to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus as they share their sorrow and confusion. This is summed up in what they said to the stranger walking with them: “But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel” (Luke 24:21a). “Had hoped” – past tense. In their minds, it’s all over. The whole Jesus thing has come crashing down around them. Their hopes and dreams have been shattered. Is that the impression we sometimes give to others? Living this side of Easter, knowing how the puzzle pieces fit together, yet we are sometimes filled with confusion and sorrow. We walk that road to Emmaus dejected and downcast, thinking that hope is gone.  

Jesus had to remind the two then, and he reminds us today as well: “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” (Luke 24:26-27). Jesus’ suffering and death was not some accidental happenstance occurrence. No, this was according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God (Acts 2:23). All of this was for our sake; to rescue and redeem us from sin and death; to give us a future and a hope that even death itself cannot undo or defeat. The two disciples had to be reminded of God’s promises in his Word, and we do also. It is those promises of God found in Scripture that point us to eternal truth and lasting joy that come from God to us through the suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus.  As the apostle Peter reminds us in today’s Epistle lesson (1 Peter 1:17-25): “You were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold,  but with the precious blood of Christ,  like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God” (1 Peter 1:18-21).

Even with all this, the eyes of the two disciples were still closed. They still didn’t know that it was Jesus. It wasn’t until Jesus broke bread that their eyes were opened and they recognized him in the breaking of the bread. Suddenly, all of the missing puzzle pieces came together and they said those beautiful words of faith: “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?” (Luke 24:32). They immediately returned to walk those seven miles back to Jerusalem in order to share this good news with the other disciples. The risen Savior comes to break bread with us today in his holy Supper. He comes to open our eyes to see and rejoice in him and his living presence in, with and under bread and wine. And so we are sustained in our journey of faith. Even when all the pieces of the puzzle in this life don’t come together in a way that makes sense to us, we know the One who holds all of these pieces in his nail-pierced hands. This is the One who died and rose again for us, Jesus.

Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia! Amen.