Jesus is always surprising. There are so many things that he says and does that surprise me and that surprised his audience. Like when he said "Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother. " He surprised us by redefining family. Or when the man asked for the greatest commandment and Jesus gave him two: love God and love your neighbor. He redefined what it means to love and serve God. Aside from redefining principal tenets of religion, Jesus just does things differently, surprising us with his unforeseen commentary and arresting us with his visceral humanity.
When Jesus appears to the disciples as a group after his resurrection, he has already appeared to two of them on the road to Emmaus. The disciples know that he has risen because the two who met him on the road have reported it to them. In fact, just as they are sharing about their encounter with Jesus, he shows up in the middle of the room. As they marvel that he has risen - and we must admit that this was surely an astounding moment - Jesus says something surprising. He says, "Have you anything to eat?" Now, I don't know about you, but this is the last thing I would expect the resurrected Messiah to ask three days after his death if he suddenly appeared among me and my friends. I'm not even sure I would expect that Jesus would need to eat, seeing as how he had, you know, risen from the dead rather miraculously. But there it is: "Have you anything to eat?"
I don't know how surprised the disciples were. They were probably so shocked by his sudden appearance that his asking for food didn't register as the least bit odd. And to their credit they quickly oblige with some broiled fish, and Jesus readily eats it. So whether or not it's surprising that he's hungry, it's evidently true that he is, which means that he is still the man Jesus - all God, yes, but also human - because this need to eat and the sensation of hunger have not disappeared.
Maybe this is one of the really surprising things about Jesus - that he really is human. In spite of the fact that this is the most important thing about him, that he is God incarnate, we find it difficult to truly grasp. Sure he may be a man, but he's also completely God (whatever that really means), so I can't possibly relate to him. I mean, look at the miracles he performed; no one else had ever done what he did, everybody recognized that, from his friends to his mortal enemies. But at the same time the scripture tells us that Jesus "was tempted in every way," so we know his experience matches our own. We want so desperately to let ourselves off the hook by taking away the humanity of Jesus, but each time we encounter him he reminds us of how human he is. "Have you anything to eat?" he says, and not only because he's hungry, but because he wants us to have the chance to offer him something he needs. He wants us to share in the surprising truth of his humanity.
What is so surprising about Jesus is that he wants or needs us at all. In that little room appeared the man who had fed four and five thousand people with a couple of fish asking if he could have supper. Surely he didn't need someone to give him a broiled fish. Or maybe he did. Maybe it wasn't the food that he needed so much as he needed to remind his friends that he too they could provide something necessary from time to time. And that this would always be the case, and that it would be just what he and his dad wanted. How is that for surprise, to know that God wants something from us? Because just as surely as Jesus the man wants our company, our friendship and our aid, so too does the Father want our part in His life. He wants us to be quick to offer up to Him what so satisfies His heart: praise and honor, love and mercy and glory and all of the beautiful things He's made that get so trampled in our hearts and on this earth.
I'll bet that if we knew Jesus better we wouldn't be surprised at all when he asks for a piece of fish. Or a cup of cold water. We shouldn't be surprised because he told us he would ask, and just as surely as we clothe the naked and visit the prisoners and feed the hungry, there he is in all of his humanity with his hand held up slightly, a surprise in the dark with the word "peace" on his breath.
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