Mary mistook him to be the gardener.
Why couldn't these devote followers recognize him??
A little girl, whose mother had suffered severe burns and resulted scaring, would get teased at school each day. She was embarrassed and frustrated. One day, after a particularly rough bout from kids teasing her about her mom, she ran home crying and finally confided to her mother what the children had been taunting her about.
The mother proceeded to tell her the story of how she had received such disfiguring scars: When the girl was a baby there had been a fire in the house. In order to save her daughter, the mother put herself between the flames and the baby. It was a willing sacrifice to insure her child would be saved.
Never again did the taunting of her school mates bother her.
When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight.
I pray you might recognize Jesus with me... not let the world taunt you for what they perceive is the ugliness of Christ and what we can see is the beauty of true sacrifice.