Maundy Thursday (Fr. Guiliano)

“Jesus knew that his hour had come…” So often in John’s Gospel, we read that Christ’s hour had not yet come or only that it was coming at some point. In Chapter 2 of John,  the hour had not come. Jesus was at the Wedding in Cana of Galilee, and he reluctantly turned water into wine. The hour had not yet come in chapter 7 when his relatives exhorted him to show himself to the world at Sukkot, the Festival of Booths, in Jerusalem. The hour was com-ing when he spoke to the Samaritan Woman at the Well and he revealed himself as the Christ; similarly, the hour was com-ing when he healed the man at the pool of Siloam, and again revealed his identity as Savior and Messiah. 

The hour had not yet come, but it was coming, he said -- when the dead would hear the voice of the Son of God; when people everywhere would be summoned to worship in the Spirit; when it would be time for him to be revealed to the world? But when? When?

Now. Now is the hour: this night has come, the fateful night, the night of betrayal, the night of remembrance, the night of the Last Supper, the night when Jesus would be handed over to suffering and death. The hour has come. The Passion begins; the glory comes. 

On this night, Christ entered his sufferings. He also did three things which have marked Christian life ever since: he gave his disciples the communion of his Body and Blood; he washed their feet, giving an image of his death and of service; and thus he underlined and strengthened in as many ways as possible his new commandment, his Mandatum, that phrase which gives its name to this day, Maundy Thursday. Hear it: 

Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

Communion, washing, command; each takes place in the context of “his hour” coming, his night of betrayal. The hour has come.

In the Episcopal Church, we are used to thinking about Holy Communion in this context. Every time, we celebrate the Mass, the Eucharist, we hear a line that reinforces our sense of participation in this night. The priest prays these words: “in the night in which he was betrayed” (Prayer II), or “on the night he was handed over to suffering” (Prayer A). “On the night before he died for us” (Prayer B). Or even this: “when the hour had come” (Prayer D). As a church, we are always situating our remembrance and communion in this moment, during the Last Supper, on the night of the betrayal and pain, just before the death of the Son of Man.

It makes this meal a strange dinner to commemorate – not a gathering of friends and saints only, but an assembly of enemies. Jesus offered the bread and the wine, his Body and his Blood, to those who would betray him, abandon him, lose their faith in him. 

He said, “Take, eat” to Peter – who denied him. He said, “Drink this cup, which is the new Covenant in my blood” to Thomas – who doubted. He said, “This is my body, that is for you” to Judas – whose actions ensured that his physical body was broken and that his blood was shed. 

“The devil had already put it into the heart of Judas … to betray him,” but Judas didn’t leave to bring the crowds until after sharing the supper and, even it seems, until after Jesus washed his feet. Christ looked across the table at him all night; as one Gospel puts it, they dipped their bread in the same bowl; as another, John’s, says: the devil entered Judas right after Jesus handed him a piece of bread. A dinner of traitors.

Consider what love the Son of God lavished upon those who forsook him, upon the one who sold him! He gave his sacraments and commandments to weak and fragile people, whom he knew would sin and fail. 

We can only imagine the human emotions of Jesus at this time. St Thomas Aquinas suggested that the anticipation of the Passion was one of Christ’s primary difficulties: he knew he was going to the cross, and so the mental anguish began long before the physical pain. That might anticipation unravel a person.

Imagine also the anticipation of betrayal, not just of death, not just of physical suffering, but betrayal. Perhaps we have experienced something like it. We have known that someone would wrong us; we have known an unkind word was coming, a careless comment, a hurtful deed. Maybe the situation lasted for years, like the relationship of Judas and Jesus. Maybe our enemy was close to us, a friend, a colleague, a spouse, a member of our family. Let’s be honest: a parent, a child. The anticipation of each transgression makes life difficult. “How do I act?” we ask ourselves. “How do I speak? What can I say?” Life becomes exhausting.

But, surely, Jesus had a greater suffering than us: He knew that he was to die (yes, for the salvation of the world, yes, for all of us, but still to die). And he knew that his death would come because his inner circle of friends and students was broken. 

He knew also that it was to such as these that he would commend his Body and Blood. “Take, eat,” you traitor. Here: “Drink this,” my enemy, my friend. “This is the new covenant in my blood,” Peter, James, John, Thomas, Judas.

My God, my God, it gets more difficult because Christ then washed their feet. They certainly understood on one level how shocking it was for him to do this. This is just not something that your Lord, your Master, your Teacher should do, the person you have called the Holy One of God. 

The demons were subject to him; he had fed the thousands; he had walked on water; he had spoken with Elijah and Moses in glory on the holy mountain. No wonder Peter said initially “You will never wash my feet.” 

Who wants to share their dirty feet with a saint, or even just a person they respect, let alone the Messiah, the Son of God? They had slaves for that in the ancient world. We ourselves guard our feet; how hard it is every year to gather volunteers for the ceremony of footwashing we will experience tonight! We may take our feet to a professional, a pedicurist, but even today, let’s not forget, it is an open secret how many nail salons employ trafficked people. We also have slaves.

Jesus washed their feet. In a few hours, when the soldiers came to the Garde of Gethsemane, they’d be running away in fear on feet that were so clean and cared for and loved. In a few hours, Peter would swear and call down curses at Jesus’ name, saying “I do not know the man.” But Jesus knew him, from the sole of his foot to the top of his head, which he wanted washed, too. 

In a few hours, Judas would be counting his silver, feeling its weight on his belts, as he stood on clean feet among a crowd with swords and clubs, as he prepared a kiss of betrayal. Had the Lord kissed his feet, as he washed them? When Judas despaired, he knew: he had been washed by Jesus outwardly, though he had not let him clean him inwardly.

What love is this! Here is the kind of love that Christ commands us to embody in the world. “Love one another, just as I have loved you…. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
The love of Jesus has a real character to it. It was not just a love for the world or for sinners in the abstract, people as a general category. Jesus died for us, and for love of his specific, disappointing disciples. The offer to us is tied to them.

This is a love that is so hard to embody. It gives and gives to those who respond and to those who do not give back. It is a love that offers treasures to those grateful to receive, and it offers the same treasures to those who stand with their hands closed, not just rejecting grace, but attacking with hands balled up as fists to strike. The love of Jesus is a love for enemies – not just enemies “out there” somewhere, hypothetical, not really real – no, a love for the enemy across the table, the enemy sharing the meal, the enemy shaking your hand at the church door, the enemy smiling at you and lying, that enemy whose feet you must approach and wash. 

“I have set you an example,” Jesus said. “If I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s.”

Have you been washed by Jesus? If you confess his name and are baptized, and you’re here tonight, saying your prayers and receiving the Holy Communion, I’ve got to tell you the answer is Yes. You are among the forgiven, you are one of the failures and traitors whom God’s grace has cherished and lifted up. You are like Judas and Peter and Thomas and the others at the meal, at the table, and Christ knows what it means to offer you cleansing and refreshment in the sacraments and the Spirit. Nearly everyone here has been washed.

So then: Whose feet are you washing? Who is the enemy you are called to love? Let’s make it individual and specific. 

• Who is the person here you cannot stand? (Some of you don’t like that question.) 
  
• Who is the neighbor on your street or the family member you cannot trust? 

Think of them and remember these words: “You ought to wash one another’s feet.” “By this, everyone will know that you are my disciples.” “Servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.”

I know that may feel unbearable. And let me admit it isn’t easy to follow the example of Jesus in our day. It’s far easier to claim the name of Christian than to act like one in the tangible ways our Lord has named. It’s far easier to be weak like Peter, doubting like Thomas, a traitor like Judas, physically inside the circle, but spiritually alienated.

But, as I often say, we are not called to do this in our own power. When you look in your heart and say, “I couldn’t do that, even if I wanted to,” you’re probably right! There are deep changes that must take place. You must be born again and continually renewed by the Spirit’s grace. You must be washed in baptism, and again washed by daily penitence and prayer. (Our feet get dirty walking through this world -- though the body has been cleaned.) And, as we remember above all on this night, you must be strengthened by the grace Christ offers you in the Sacraments. Jesus says, “This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” Eat this bread, drink this cup, receive this broken body and this blood outpoured, which is for you. Receive the love of God the crucified, the love that forgives and transforms, the love that calls us to powerful deeds of service that we can hardly imagine.

“Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this, everyone will know you are my disciples…”