expectations

In his clever telling of The Great Divorce, C.S. Lewis describes a place called the "Afterworld"   by means of a narrator who is on a bus ride through heaven and hell. Along the way, he meets a multitude of supernatural beings. Observing several conversations, the narrator is staggered to  find those who are so insistent about what the love of God looks like that their expectations  forbid them from recognizing it as it truly is. 

The Gospel of Luke similarly recounts a story about two men with real hopes and real expectations

walking along the road to Emmaus. As the men were walking, they talked about recent events hat

both deeply troubled and genuinely puzzled them. Jesus of Nazareth, whom they had hoped to be the one God promised, the deliverer Israel, had been crucified just three days earlier. And complicating matters, that very morning some women came and told them that the tomb was  empty and that Jesus was alive. As they walked, their heads bowed heavily with grief, their hearts and minds  tangled with confusion, Jesus himself joined them on their journey. But they did not recognize him. 

There are certain hopes in each of our lives that shape our worldview, orient our feet, and  provide   that sense of coherence for life's most plaguing questions. But if we come to a place where that  hope seems to let us down, it may have been a hope that was not intended to hold such authority. Or, the hope is worthy but our expectations have taken precedence. In any case, reality must be our goal and truth our path, for the lure of expectation and predisposition is profound. 

The disciples' passionate hope in Christ was visibly deflated because they allowed their expectations to act as thorns. They did not expect that the one who would deliver Israel would fall in   any way. Moreover, not only was Jesus betrayed and sentenced to suffer at the hands of men, he was crucified--a death reserved for criminals--a death which symbolized the curse of God. And while they believed in Christ's work and word, they believed that death had the final word. How often I have reacted similarly, finding the law of nature, the law of returns, the law of unintended

  consequences more authoritative than the laws of God. 

The disciples' expectations so ordered their sense of reality, that they were even blinded from the reality of Christ in their midst even as they philosophized together. Their hope in Christ was accurate; it was their expectation of that hope that blurred their vision and left them in the murky waters of an incoherent mess. 

When the disciples reached their destination, they sat down with their fellow traveler and broke

  bread together. And Luke reports, at that moment, their eyes were opened and they recognized the one among them. 

Even today many travel along countless roads of life, discussing hope and disappointment, points of insight and confusion. But hope in Christ is recognizing the reality of his presence even when we may least expect him. Perhaps one day we, too, will ask as the disciples did that day:

  "Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking with us on the road?" 

-jill carattini