St. Paul & St. Andrew's Sermon and Prayercast
St. Paul & St. Andrew's Sermon and Prayercast
K Karpen: "Left Behind?" (Sermon for April 26, 2026)
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
"Then Cleopas and his friend told what had happened on the road, and how Christ had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread." - Luke 24:35
Luke’s tale of the encounter of two disciples with the risen Jesus on the road to Emmaus is a powerful reminder that Easter is not a 'one and done' event, but an ongoing experience that impacts each of us. Those disciples, one of whom is named Cleopas and the other who has lost his nametag, are not the ones we usually read about. Their presence in the story is a reminder that Jesus comes not primarily for the prominent, but for the marginalized and disregarded. Jesus leaves no one out, and no one is left behind.
A painting I love by the 17th Century Spanish master Diego Velázquez, ‘La cena de Emaus (La mulata)’ centers a young black woman in the kitchen preparing the supper at Emmaus. As the scholar Jimmy Hoke points out in his ‘Full Lectionary Queerness’, she seems to be the first one to recognize Jesus – perhaps by his voice – while the other two disciples remain oblivious for the moment. As the song we've been singing goes, no one is getting left behind!
K