John 13:1-17, 31b-35
Maundy Thursday
You can smell the pot roast simmering as soon as you step through the door. The rolls baking in the oven instantly return you to the last time everyone showed up for dinner. The kitchen is slightly warm and humid from the potatoes boiling on the stove. Joe’s brought a fruit salad, and Sue her famous salted caramel bars. You quietly hope that Aunt Karin isn’t going to be the one to make the gravy.
Gathering for meals is something that we do to celebrate birthdays, retirement, Christmas, Easter or simply because. “Let’s do this again,” we say as people head out the door. Reflecting on the blessings of being together, we look at a calendar to find the next date. There’s always a next time. Until there isn’t.
Most of us don’t know when our last dinner together will be. Jesus knew that this night would be his last gathering to break bread with the twelve. They were the ones who had been his constant companions, who watched Jesus cry when Lazarus died, and stood in shock when, in anger, Jesus turned over tables in the temple. They prayed with him, and learned from him. Jesus had turned their lives upside down. Tonight would be memorable. Jesus knew.
Now before the festival of the Passover, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Well aware that his death was imminent, Jesus asked himself the questions that we also ask at significant points in our lives: Who am I? What am I here for? What matters most?[1] Then he composed his last will and testament. I don’t know what is sadder,–for Jesus to know that it would be his meal with his disciples, or for the disciples not to know that there would be no other supper together again.
Jesus’ last meal with these disciples,–what an opportunity! Can you imagine what you might say if you were Jesus? What is wrong with you guys? You just don’t get me! Especially you, Peter! Thomas, you do nothing but doubt me. Bartholomew, have you ever thought about changing barbers? And you, Judas! I know more than you think I do! Or Jesus could, like Pilate will do, wash his hands of them! But Jesus is not like us. According to John, here is what really happened….
And during supper, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him. The Father had given all things into Jesus’ hands, and with his hands full, he lovingly held people’s feet. With his hands, he washed the dirt out from between their toes, and washed their sins out from their hearts. Instead of exposing their sin, Jesus poured out his love.
If you know anything about Peter, it comes as no surprise that he struggled with this. Lord, are you going to wash my feet? You will never wash my feet! It was easier for Peter to help Jesus serve bread and fish than to let Jesus wash him. Unless I wash you, you have no share with me, Jesus answered. Unless you let me touch you in this intimate way, I cannot help you.
It was difficult, embarrassing, and way too humbling to receive this grace from Jesus. So, Peter put himself back in charge of the situation, telling Jesus in a way that showed his misunderstanding, what to do. Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head! Peter couldn’t see the Messiah in the form of a servant, or conceive of forgiveness contained in something so common as water and words. How hard it is to be totally dependent on something we can’t possess and we cannot control.
After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe and had returned to the table, he said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you? Do you know, do we know, what Jesus has done? Jesus has crossed the bounds of cultural animosity, healed little people and big people, gave sight to the blind, and asked, Do you want to be made well? He calmed the stormy seas and fed the hungry. Instead of demanding we serve him like a king, Jesus bends down and washes our filth away, and tells us to do the same. Wash not just the pedicured feet, but the calloused feet of the one who walks all day and night because there is no home to go to to lie down. Wash the dark skinned feet and the wrinkled feet. Wash the feet of those who misunderstand you. Wash the feet of those who betray you. Wash the wounded feet.
His forgiveness set us free from the garbage that stops us from loving each other with the kind of love that can only come from God. That’s the kind of love Jesus had for Peter, Bartholomew, Judas, and the love Christ has for you and for me.
For I have set for you and example, that you also should do as I have done to you, Jesus tells us. Ministry does not come from our own strength, but from God’s. We need to receive before we can give. Before we can be the face of Jesus to others, we need to receive from Jesus. In the cleansing waters, our self-reliance, our being in control, our paradoxical sense of both pride and unworthiness give way to God’s passionate love for us.
Look at my hands and my feet, Jesus will say, showing us his wounds from the nails driven through his flesh to fasten him to a wooden cross. This is my body given for you. As Jesus has taken our scarred feet into his hands, so now we take into ourselves his wounded body in the bread and his blood in the wine.
In this humble act, Jesus answers those questions that we all ask:
Who am I? I am the one who loves you, the one who saves you from sins.
What am I here for? To show you God.
What is most important? That you love others as I love you.
The truth of who we are is who we are in Christ, baptized and washed clean, loved, scars and all.
~Pastor Cheryl Ann Griffin
[1] These questions are found in a book I am currently reading: Kelly, Matthew. Resisting Happiness. Erlanger, KY, Beacon Publishing, 2016. 46.