Category: Devotions

These verses are the winding up of Luke’s history of our Lord’s ministry. They form a suitable conclusion to a Gospel, which in touching tenderness and full exhibition of Christ’s grace, stands first among the four records of the things which Jesus did and taught. (Acts 1:1)

Let us notice, firstly, in this passage, the remarkable manner in which our Lord left His disciples. We read that “He lifted up His hands and blessed them. And it came to pass, while He blessed them, He was parted from them.” In one word, He left them when in the very act of blessing.

We cannot for a moment doubt that there was a meaning in this circumstance. It was intended to remind the disciples of all that Jesus had brought with Him when He came into the world. It was intended to assure them of what He would yet do, after He left the world. He came on earth to bless and not to curse, and blessing He departed.–He came in love and not in anger, and in love He went away.–He came not as a condemning judge, but as a compassionate Friend, and as a Friend He returned to His Father.–He had been a Saviour full of blessings to His little flock while He had been with them. He would be a Saviour full of blessings to them, He would have them know, even after He was taken away.

Let us observe, firstly, in these verses, the gift which our Lord bestowed on His disciples immediately before He left the world. We read that He “opened their understandings that they might understand the Scriptures.”

We must not misapprehend these words. We are not to suppose that the disciples knew nothing about the Old Testament up to this time, and that the Bible is a book which no ordinary person can expect to comprehend. We are simply to understand that Jesus showed His disciples the full meaning of many passages which had hitherto been hidden from their eyes. Above all, He showed the true interpretation of many prophetical passages concerning the Messiah.

We should observe in this passage the singularly gracious words with which our Lord introduced Himself to His disciples after His resurrection. We read that He suddenly stood in the midst of them and said, “Peace be unto you.”

This was a wonderful saying when we consider the men to whom it was addressed. It was addressed to eleven disciples, who three days before had shamefully forsaken their Master and fled. They had broken their promises. They had forgotten their professions of readiness to die for their faith. They had been scattered, “every man to his own,” and left their Master to die alone. One of them had even denied Him three times. All of them had proved backsliders and cowards. And yet behold the return which their Master makes to His disciples! Not a word of rebuke is spoken. Not a single sharp saying falls from His lips. Calmly and quietly He appears in the midst of them, and begins by speaking of peace. “Peace be unto you!”

The history contained in these verses is not found in any other Gospel but that of Luke. Of all the eleven appearances of Christ after His resurrection, none perhaps is so interesting as the one described in this passage.

Let us mark, in these verses, what encouragement there is to believers to speak to one another about Christ. We are told of two disciples walking together to Emmaus, and talking of their Master’s crucifixion. And then come the remarkable words, “While they communed together and reasoned, Jesus Himself drew near, and went with them.”

The resurrection of Christ is one of the great foundation-stones of the Christian religion. In practical importance it is second only to the crucifixion. The chapter we have now begun directs our mind to the evidence of the resurrection. It contains unanswerable proof that Jesus not only died, but rose again.

We see, in the verses before us, the reality of Christ’s resurrection. We read, that upon “the first day of the week” certain women came to the sepulchre in which the body of Jesus had been laid, in order to anoint Him. But when they came to the place, “they found the stone rolled away. And they entered in and found not the body of the Lord Jesus.”

We see from these verses that Christ has some disciples of whom little is known. We are told of one Joseph, “a good man and a just,”–a man who “had not consented to the counsel” of those who condemned our Lord,–a man who “himself waited for the kingdom of God.” This man went boldly to Pilate after the crucifixion, begged the body of Jesus, “took it down” from the cross, and “laid it in a sepulchre.”

We know nothing of Joseph excepting what is here told us. In no part of the Acts or Epistles do we find any mention of his name. At no former period of our Lord’s ministry does he ever come forward. His reason for not openly joining the disciples before, we cannot explain. But here, at the eleventh hour, this man is not afraid to show himself one of our Lord’s friends. At the very time when the apostles had forsaken Jesus, Joseph is not ashamed to show his love and respect. Others had confessed Him while He was living and doing miracles. It was reserved for Joseph to confess Him when He was dead.

Let us observe in these verses, the miraculous signs which accompanied our Lord’s death on the cross. We are told that there was “a darkness over all the earth” for three hours. “The sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst.”

It was meet and right that the attention of all around Jerusalem should be arrested in a marked way, when the great sacrifice for sin was being offered, and the Son of God was dying. There were signs and wonders wrought in the sight of all Israel, when the law was given on Sinai. There were signs and wonders in like manner when the atoning blood of Christ was shed on Calvary. There was a sign for an unbelieving world. The darkness at mid-day was a miracle which would compel men to think.–There was a sign for the professing Church and the ministers of the temple. The rending of the veil which hung between the holy place and the holy of holies, was a miracle which would strike awe into the heart of every priest and Levite in Jewry.