Reflections On Emmaus

SUN., JULY 9, 1995, 12:40 AM
FARM, STUDY

This is a strange time, certainly, for you to be coming to Me for enlightenment. It is more like the time that Andy typically comes, but one you haven’t utilized since your bout with back, leg, and foot pain last winter/spring. You couldn’t seem to go to sleep, and you knew I wanted to comment on this most recent “encounter” with the Emmaus community, so here you are. An early morning welcome!

You’re glad you went on the Walk, and I am, too. Yet it was not the life-changing experience that it has been for some. It is memorable, in some ways, but the reflections are not all positive. It was a spiritual experience, and it certainly was focused on Me, the Triune God, with a Christ emphasis. The singing was well led on the Walk, but it was not so last evening. The talk, by John, on piety and being pious, was somewhat like those in the “original,” as you remember… and there was time to discuss the theme in small groups, a welcome, though short, “reenactment” of the weekend format.

The communion experience as not as spirit-moving as those you remember on the Walk itself. It lacked the dynamic impact, even as you liked the remembered style of the sacrament. Though you recall a good sense of community in those on Walk #8 this hasn’t maintained, for you. You feel good being part of the group from your congregation who have had this organized journey, but you feel little sense of community with those from other churches and other denominations of the faith.

Why? The most important reason is the one you expressed to Lenore as you drove into the town…you didn’t perceive acceptance of the gift of My presence, and therefore this essential aspect of community was not there. You know that you didn’t truly “test this out”… and you certainly didn’t want a starring role… but you had a “feeling.” Though this was, in many ways, a different type of Christian community than your Presbyterian congregation, you felt equally “outside,” with this relationship of Ours not appreciated.

You sensed that several, perhaps many, of the “walkers” had a personal relationship with Me, as Jesus the Christ. Is this better than with Me, the Holy Spirit? Or is it even fundamentally different? You suspect that none had such a long and “tangible” relationship, but what they had seemed to be valued more than yours. This wasn’t really surprising to you, but it served to dampen your positive feelings about the Walk, and the subsequent 4th day activities. The gathering of those of you from your church who went on walks were good, but not enough to be truly missed when they ceased. Again, only some knew of your claim to communion with Me, and you feel little support from these… in regard to the supreme recurring experience in your spiritual journey, this time in the earth.

This “gift” of Mine certainly has its downside. It is, fundamentally, that these Teachings make you “odd.” The content and the experience itself combine with your personality to make you acceptable, even valued, by most of your fellow Christians… as long as you don’t try to claim that these are what I say they are – truth directly from the Holy Spirit, the only One there is. It is a downside, a negative, that you can accept, because the relationship is just too valuable and real to reject… for a modicum of comfort.