Maundy Thursday

['preached' on the internet]

Maundy Thursday • 5 April 2012

The dilemma of a person planning the liturgy for Maundy Thursday is choosing which thread to emphasise. The Maundy Thursday liturgy has way too many foci to do all of them well… yet this sermon is about to do just that — name them all without going into depth on any one theme.

Take your pick:

— The institution of the Holy Eucharist at the Last Supper: For those of a more sacramental bent, focusing on the breaking of bread and sharing of wine seems the logical choice. The reading from Corinthians gives us the words for it and if we choose the second gospel reading, we hear repeated the action of taking bread and wine, blessing them and sharing them.

— Foot washing: Many choose instead to go with this thread and, indeed, this is what the current prayer book supports, placing the gospel narrative of Jesus washing the disciples’ feet as the primary text for the evening, understanding that the commandment that Jesus gives on his last night of life in the here and now is that we love one another and manifest that love through washing one another’s feet, the most humble action one can do for another person.

Those two foci are the principle ones for this night.

But what about all the others? They tend to remind us of human frailty and, for that reason, are not primary. But they certainly are woven into the night and to ignore them is to turn away from that which resides within each one of us.

— Betrayal: Even Jesus of the Fourth Gospel, a Jesus who knows well what is unfolding and controls it to a certain extent, cannot stop Judas, one of his chosen, from betraying him. Jesus knows the betrayal has to happen… but does that make it any easier for him? Judas’ betrayal brings to mind the poignant words of Psalm 41.9: ‘Even my best friend, whom I trusted, who broke bread with me, * has lifted up his heel and turned against me.’ For Jesus, no one seems trustworthy.

— Abandonment: Jesus’ anguished words in the Garden of Gethsemane, paradoxically a place of tranquility not al that far from the hustle and bustle of Jerusalem, remind us that the Son of Man was not immune from a sense of incredible isolation and abandonment, a most human sentiment. Despite being with his trusted disciples, he is alone in his agony as he contemplates his death. Our ritual tonight concludes with two threads: the recitation of Psalm 22 which opens with the most awful words any human being can utter: ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’, and the narrative of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. He is abandoned not only by his Father in heaven, but also by the disciples who cannot stay awake with him as he prays. The narrative leaves us in a place of dereliction and desolation.

— Helplessness: Despite Jesus’ knowing what will unfold and seeming to be in charge, there has to be some sense of helplessness as the events of the night and the next day unfold. Once he reaches the walls of Jerusalem, with no pardon, there is no turning back. He can only make his way uphill through the streets of Jerusalem to its apex, Golgatha.

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Clearly the story we tell every year on Maundy Thursday does not intend to leave us in a state of betrayal, abandonment and helplessness, but it is important to name these emotions because what we do and what we pray tonight evokes them and we should not try to dance around them.

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So, if you were planning tonight’s liturgy, where would you put your attention? What part of this complex and rich liturgy speaks the most to you? Where does your heart find itself going? Even as you have listened to these words, where did you find your mind wandering? (To me, a sermon is a doorway through which one is invited to walk and if one misses a portion of the sermon because one has wandered off to a corner of one’s heart, the sermon has done its work.)

Is it the institution of the Holy Eucharist — the centre of our worship for the past fifty years, the manna from heaven that sustains us in our spiritual wilderness?

Is it the commandment to wash each other’s feet — an action that evokes a certain element of squeamishness for some, repulsion for others, indifference for others or deep meaning for still others?

Is it the mixture of recollections of abandonment, betrayal or helplessness at what life has thrown you?

Wherever your heart leads you tonight, go there. Rest in the moment of what has been raised up. Engage it. Wrestle with it. And, if it is the hard stuff, remember that God does not leave us hanging over the pit with no one to save us. God does not abandon us, betray us or play with us as a cat plays with a mouse. God goes with us to the depths and back up to heaven again.

And, remember that through all the services of these great three days, above all, we contemplate Christ’s victory over death and proclaim the resurrection. That is where we headed, step by step, in this liturgy we have just begun that will not end until Easter Even.