Luke 24:41

‘And while they still disbelieved for joy, and wondered, he said to them, “Have you here anything to eat?”

Then because He was aware that they were still uncertain about His reality He determined to join them at their meal and asked them if they had anything that He could eat. But we must not just see His action as a bit of play acting. The eating of food with them, as He had been constantly doing for the last few years, was intended to be a sign of His continuing fellowship with them (compare John 21:9). As Peter said in Acts 10:41, ‘we who did eat and drink with Him after He rose from the dead'. This would suggest that now He both ate and drank with them. He had said that He would not again eat food until it was fulfilled in the Kingly Rule of God (Luke 22:16), and that He would not drink of the fruit of the vine until He drank it new with them in the Kingly Rule of His Father, but now He could sit at table with them, eating and drinking with them in His Kingly Rule (for He had already by now ascended to His Father - John 20:17) and appoint them to their responsibilities as rulers over ‘the twelve tribes of Israel' (Luke 22:30), as He did in John 20:22. It demonstrated that in a sense the old relationship still continued, even though He would not still be with them in the flesh (but He would be with them in spirit, see Matthew 28:20). And nothing would quieten their fears quicker than again to share a meal with Him.

But they were still not sure that they could believe that it really was Him. They were so overjoyed that they were afraid that it would turn out to be an illusion. It had been one thing for Peter, and the women, and Cleopas, to tell them that He was alive, it was quite another to see His beloved form for themselves, a form that they had never expected to see again, in spite of all His promises. But gradually it was sinking in, and they began to believe.