Though there had been people reporting that Jesus was alive, his sudden appearance was unsettling.

That’s an understatement.

At least some of them were terrified that a ghost had appeared. I’m guessing that the two were saying, “How did you do that? We didn’t see you on the road.”

There was a hubbub. It wasn’t the peaceful, powerful, quieting moment that we might expect.

In the squealing and fainting and terror, Jesus talks.

Calmly, I’m guessing.

“Why are you so worked up,” he said. “Why all the doubts. It’s me.” And then he addressed their panicked assumption, “Ghosts don’t have skin and bones.” And he held out his hands toward them, nail holes visible. Not as proof of what he’d done for them, more as proof of who he was. Not some generic ghost, but somehow, the Jesus they’d seen the day before yesterday.

The hands didn’t help. Not exactly. They were excited and happy, but there must have been some sense of, “Maybe a ghost, but at least it’s OUR ghost.”

And so, Jesus asks for food. They hand him a piece of broiled fish. It’s what you’d expect in a group of fishermen, I suppose. I wonder how old it was, who was cooking things in the middle of all the grief of the previous day, how it got there. But that’s not the heart of the story.

After saying on Thursday night that he wasn’t going to eat that particular ceremonial meal with its accompanying wine until the fulfilment in the future, on this first day of the resurrection, he literally breaks bread for the two disciples on the road, and he eats a piece of fish with the disciples in the room.

The presence of God may be revealed not in a service but at a table.