CONVERSATION STARTERS

1. Read Luke 24:13-35.

2. When you hear the disciples in verse 21 say, “We were hoping…,” what is one hope in your own life that has felt delayed, discouraged, or unexpectedly changed?

3. The disciples walked with Jesus for miles without recognizing Him. Where are you struggling to acknowledge that Jesus is walking with you?

4.The two disciples were so discouraged they literally walked away from the place of their pain. When life feels overwhelming, what are the ways you tend to “walk away,” shut down, or distance yourself — how might Jesus be gently seeking to address that pattern?

5. The disciples said that their “hearts were burning” within them when Jesus was explaining the Scriptures to them. Have there been any lessons the Lord has been teaching you as we have been studying the story of scripture in 2026? How has studying the Story of Scripture been forming you this year?

6. After recognizing Jesus, the disciples immediately returned to Jerusalem to tell others. What is one concrete step you can take this week to live as a witness to the risen Christ — whether through hospitality, conversation, prayer, or inviting someone into your spiritual journey?

Title: The Full Story
Reference: Luke 24:1–17
Speaker: Jonathan Neef, JonathanN@cckc.church

Go to Him when your need is desperate, when all other help is vain, and what do you find? A door slammed in your face, and a sound of bolting and double bolting on the inside. After that, silence. - C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

– The risen Jesus walks with us in our grief.

– The risen Jesus reveals Himself through the Word and the Table.

In Jesus we see qualities and virtues we would ordinarily consider incompatible in the same person. We would never think they could be combined but, because they are, they are strikingly beautiful. Jesus combines high majesty with the greatest humility, he joins the strongest commitment to justice with astonishing mercy and grace, and he reveals a transcendent self-sufficiency and yet entire trust in and reliance upon his heavenly Father. We are surprised to see tenderness without any weakness, boldness without harshness, humility without any uncertainty, indeed, accompanied by a towering confidence. Readers can discover for themselves his unbending convictions but complete approachability, his insistence on truth but always bathed in love, his power without insensitivity, integrity without rigidity, and passion without prejudice. - Tim Keller, Making Sense of God

• Let your burning heart lead you to the risen Jesus.
• Let your cooling heart return to the risen Jesus.
• Let your burning heart fuel your story of the risen Jesus.