A long time ago a man in China who was very downhearted and discouraged was one day travelling through the mountains near his home. He cried out to God and felt he heard a voice telling him to take a picture. In those days you didn’t print a photo on a computer but had to develop the picture using special paper, acid and a dark room. The man did this at his house. When the man looked at the picture forming on the paper, he was amazed at what he saw. Have a look at the picture. Can you see it?
A few days after Jesus had died on the cross, 2 of his friends were walking a long way to their home about 11km down the road. They were very sad and discouraged, you can imagine their heads being down as they walked along, talking quietly, with their tears dropping on the dusty road.
Soon another man came down the road walking towards the town where they lived and walked beside them, asking them what they were talking about. The friends didn’t really look at him, only the long dusty road ahead but were very surprised when the man asked them this. The man didn’t seem to have heard that Jesus had died even though it was the top news story of the time. Everyone knew and was talking about it. Everyone could even say where they were when they heard the news of Jesus’ death. The friends told the man how Jesus has been murdered by the religious leaders and the government of the day. There had been a conspiracy to kill their friend even though all he had ever done was good. It was the end of their hopes and dreams and they were sad because they felt God had abandoned them. They were going home to have a drink and work out what to do with the rest of their lives.
The man began talking to them as they walked along. He was good to listen to, very knowledgeable, he was a good storyteller maybe a journalist or an author they thought. The man was talking to them from the bible, some of the passages they recognised, but mostly they were parts they’d never read. The man showed them how the bible had predicted long before that Jesus would die but that was not the end of the story. That would be only the beginning of something much better God had planned. Even though they kept looking at the road as they walked, by the time they reached their home, they felt encouraged and their heads were lifted a bit. When the man told them he going to go on, the 2 friends didn’t want him to leave and since it was getting dark, they invited him in for dinner and the night. They secretly hoped he would talk to them some more as he was making them feel so much better.They started preparing the dinner, the man stayed with them in the kitchen, helping a bit but mainly talking so they just listened, sometimes asking questions, but mostly listening as he talked. They were still quite focussed on getting the meal ready and asking the kids to set the table a couple of times at least. Finally when everything was ready, they called the family to the table.
As they sat down to eat, they introduced their new friend to the family and invited the man to say Grace which he did. As they sat down face to face, and as he took the loaf of bread and broke it and gave it to them, suddenly they recognised to their astonishment that the man was Jesus. He was alive again! But just as they recognised him he disappeared before their eyes! Their faces lit up, they just stared at each other for a few moments and then they all started talking at once! There had never been so much energy, so much talk and laughter as there was that night. They just couldn’t stop talking about it!
Can you see the picture yet?
