When news started to spread last Sunday night that Osama bin Laden had been killed, there was quite a reaction.  The immediate and overwhelming response was jubilation, dancing in the streets, and who can forget the college students in front of the White House chanting “U-S-A”.  Facebook exploded with reactions and clever comments, but as Monday came around, I noticed that more and more of the responses from my friends were reflective and considered the Christian response to a death.

Not surprisingly, this was a topic that people really got into during two of the small groups I started at my congregation here in St. Paul, Lutherans and Lattes and Theology on Tap.  The general opinion of the participants was relief that bin Laden could no longer respond with more terrorist attacks, but that the celebrating was a bit over-the-top—my favorite word used to express the collective feeling was “somber”—as this event brought some level of catharsis to the thousands of families of the victims, but that it can’t bring any of them back.

The gospel lesson for this Sunday was also one that I’ve been thinking a lot about.  The resurrected Jesus walks to Emmaus with two disciples who aren’t able to recognize him.  They tell him what happened, and then he interprets Scripture for them.  Then, they invite him to stay at their house and offer Jesus dinner.  Only when they break bread, do the disciples realize that this is Jesus—and then he vanishes.

I can’t help but wonder how the response to bin Laden’s death can be shaped by a response to the Road to Emmaus.

They are not directly related, therefore, they must be taken separately.  Thus, the starting point is how do we make relevant what happened to those two disciples that day—how does that experience of not recognizing Jesus compute?  The two men offered a stranger hospitality and shared the good news, then they started to feed him.

The beautiful thing about the story of the Road to Emmaus is that it does so readily resonate with Christians.  In many ways, the evangelist Luke’s telling of this encounter is very much like our encounters with the world around us.  As Christians, we cling to this belief that Jesus is all around us—he’s in our relationships with friends and families, but with complete strangers too.

Luther Seminary professor Sarah Heinrich wrote on workingpreacher.org that “It’s a text that takes people on the road, going home, back to ordinary life, who are saddened that their greatest hopes have not come to pass.  In spite of all they knew, all the stories they could rehearse, in spite of the witness of others, they simply had not seen Jesus–nor had anyone else they knew.  The prophecies of Jesus and hope of redemption grew cold and were not able to sustain them any longer.  They began to suspect that the whole thing had been a mistake, a worthy hope and one unlikely ever to be realized.”

Consider how Cleopas and the other disciple must’ve felt—that dejection and doubt.  I think about how fantastic and unreal their story must have sounded—no wonder so many people around the world have trouble believing that our Lord and Savior rose from the dead.  In the church, we hear about Doubting Thomas who put his fingers in the side of Christ.  We hear about these two disciples who meet Christ and then he vanishes—to be a Christian is to believe that Christ is with us, side by side, walking with us, even when we can’t see him.

Then how do we encounter Christ in the midst of bin Laden’s death?  If we celebrate the death of another, what does that say about us?  It seems un Christ-like to rejoice, even if that death carries such a strong emotion of eradicating evil from the world.

My bishop—the leader of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, has something to say about that.  Mark Hanson put out a statement which included this thought “In these 50 days of celebrating Christ’s resurrection, joy finds its fullest and deepest expression not over a human death but in God’s promise to unite all things in heaven and on earth, to reconcile the human family and to bring God’s reign of peace. Confident in what God has promised, we witness our resolve against any act of violence in the name of religion and our renewed commitment of service to the neighbors and world God so deeply loves.”

Strangely enough, the world has somehow united around the death of bin Laden—the Muslim community in America, Europeans, Republicans and Democrats, they all agree that this was what had to be done.  Ahmed Rehab really hits the point in saying that one of bin Laden’s goals was to try and destroy relationships between Americans and Muslims worldwide—eliminating bin Laden will hopefully restore that relationship.  Because of American Muslims like Rehab who’ve stood up against radical Islam, the bridge is already in place–he has been outspoken against Islamophobia and sees hope that bin Laden’s death will assuage some of the fear mongering in our American culture.

That’s why President Obama was so clear in saying that this is not a fight against Islam.  This is not an act of violence in the name of Christianity or any other religion.  As Lutherans, we find expression in God’s promise to unite all things in heaven and on earth.  We know that God deeply loves the world and the actions of bin Laden and the action of killing bin Laden are not ones that Christ would condone, but in our messed up world of sin and death, senseless killing happens.  Those of us left in the aftermath hold onto Christ even tighter in those moments.

A Lutheran is Christ-like in their response to social justice—Christ-like when they respond to their neighbor, and Christ-like in how they give of themselves, even those people they’ve never met. 

Who do we see on our Road?  The stranger on the side of the road with a sign asking for change, the burned out Christian who doesn’t go to church anymore, the unemployed friend with a mortgage and kids in school who isn’t used to asking for help.  These are the faces we see on our road to Emmaus—they each have a story, but we have one too.  Christians must continue to stand up for those around them and use the message of Christ to unite instead of condemn.  Use Christ to show hospitality, not resentment.  Use Christ to break bread with our neighbors, not horde what we have.

And when it comes to bin Laden, Christians must continue to use Christ to reconcile broken relationships and find common ground instead of finding new reasons to call someone an enemy.