Luke 24:36-49--Jesus Appears to His Disciples

Luke 24:36-49
English Standard Version

Jesus Appears to His Disciples
36 As they were talking about these things, Jesus himself stood among them, and said to them, “Peace to you!” 37 But they were startled and frightened and thought they saw a spirit. 38 And he said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? 39 See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” 40 And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. 41 And while they still disbelieved for joy and were marveling, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” 42 They gave him a piece of broiled fish, 43 and he took it and ate before them.

​44 Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” 45 Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, 46 and said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, 47 and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. 48 You are witnesses of these things. 49 And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.”

---

We're nearly done with Luke's gospel as next time there will be a short passage about the ascension that overlaps a bit with how Luke will start the book of Acts, as the book of Acts (what I plan to study with you here next) starts with the giving of The Great Commission and quickly moves into Pentecost and the history of the Early Church that follows that pattern that Jesus gave in The Great Commission, "You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and Judea and Samaria, and to the uttermost ends of the earth."  Before this happens though, the eyes of the disciples need to be opened, and there are some loose ends to tie up, like Peter needing to be restored.

Luke moves very quickly through these last 40 days that Jesus is on earth and it's a little hard to place this event as Luke never tells us that the disciples left Jerusalem, but when we cross-reference with the other gospels we see that the angels at the tomb told the women to tell the disciples to go to Galilee and wait for Jesus there.  It would seem since we're seeing broiled fish in this story that we're probably talking about the same event recorded in John 21:1-14 where Jesus appears to seven of the disciples who were out on the Sea of Galilee fishing (Simon Peter, Thomas (called the Twin), Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples were together).  John specifically says that this was the third time that Jesus appeared to His disciples which squares with where we would be in the story--twice in Jerusalem first to all the disciples without Thomas there, and then to all Eleven eight days later when Thomas was present.  It seems after that second appearance they finally went to Galilee like they were told to do in Matthew 28:10.

This is likely the event where Peter was restored to Jesus, but Luke doesn't go into that.  It is interesting though that Luke tells us that the disciples at first thought they had seen a ghost, yet in John we see that Jesus repeated the miracle of the miraculous catch for them so that they could identify Him and Peter then recognizes that it is Jesus with the statement, "It is the Lord."  Peter doesn't even bother to help bring in the miraculous catch of fish and he jumps out of the boat and swims to shore to get there first (much like how Peter had to run past John to get into the tomb first).  Yet, when Peter gets there, he has nothing to say because He knows that He has hurt Jesus and Jesus will have to pull Him aside to restore Him.  Again, you can read about that in John 21.

One of the great ways to show fellowship though in any culture, but especially this culture would be to have a meal together.  If I'm correct about this event lining up with John 21, the disciples that are there have been fishing all night and not caught anything, but Jesus allows them a miraculous catch of 153 fish, and He told them to bring some of the fish they caught and they broiled them on a fire to have breakfast.  No one had to ask Him who He was, they knew it was the Lord, but He once again showed them His hands and feet and He once again ate food in front of them to prove to them that He was alive with a real body and was not a ghost (a disembodied spirit).

After this, He gave the same kind of seminary intensive that He gave to the disciples on the Road to Emmaus, teaching them how everything in the Law and the Prophets and the Psalms needed to be fulfilled.  Much of that was fulfilled already by Jesus during His first coming, some of that is being fulfilled through the Holy Spirit living in and through the Church.  I love what verse 45 says, "Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures."  While I believe the words God chose to convey His message are clear, I also believe that we don't understand, believe and know how to apply the Scripture correctly without God opening our eyes and without the help of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.  How can it be true that the meaning of Scripture is clear and yet the Scriptures can't be understood by the world?  I've heard it described as if someone else were trying to read your mail--the meaning of the message is clear to the intended recipient, but it's nonsense to those it wasn't intended for because they don't have the context to understand it.  However, we do see places in the Bible where God allows people who don't believe to understand His word and they don't believe so that they will be under condemnation in the last day for they heard, and understood, yet did not respond with repentance that comes by grace through faith.  Just think of the Pharisees and how they clearly perceived what Jesus said and did when they said, and when Jesus challenged them, "Have you not read, and have you not understood the Scriptures?"  There was an assumption that they could read and understand the Old Testament enough to know who Jesus was.  Now Jesus has opened the eyes of the disciples to understand that which had been hidden from them--the mystery of the gospel--so that they might truly understand and believe that Jesus was the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.  This passage ends with a summary statement of everything He told them.

“Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, 47 and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. 48 You are witnesses of these things. 49 And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.”

That's about where we are going to pick things up in Acts 1.  Jesus has sent them back to Jerusalem, and they will be in the Upper Room waiting for the Holy Spirit to come.  Before that though, we'll see the ascension of Jesus in the last couple of verses of the book of Luke, and we'll look at them next time.  Then we'll be looking at the book of Acts where we start to see this Great Commission statement from Luke's gospel being fulfilled and we'll see him give it again more clearly in Acts 1:8, "​8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth."