"A Paradox" Maundy Thursday 2018

John 13: 1-17, 31-35 So much of Religion seems to be about ritual and tradition. Our every worship service begins with a Call, a Confession of sin, Assurance of Pardon, before hearing the Bible. But, all of this is counter-cultural! The world says “I am okay, you’re okay”, and everything is measured by our wants and values and price, but faith requires that we confess we are not okay, we are broken and wounded, needing healing. We have to maintain the context of each part of Today in relationship to the whole. Holy Week must begin with the Crowds crying “Hosanna, Have Mercy” 4 days ago, overcast tomorrow by the Shadow of the Cross with the same people “Crucify Him”; and if there is a shadow, we know there will be a rising of The Son. But, this is only ritual of bread and cup, without betrayal, abandonment, isolation, death for others. When Jesus names an11th Commandment this adds to/compliments Moses’ Commandments, but also undercuts and provides a new foundation for the 10. This is the reason we gather this night, “Maundy” comes from the Latin word MANDATUM meaning A NEW COMMAND. Our purpose tonight is not to celebrate Communion, not to prepare for Easter, but to receive and think through Jesus’ COMMAND to LOVE ONE ANOTHER AS JESUS LOVED. When Jesus instructs that we love one another, this is not a Hallmark-type of love, but sitting across the Table with those whom you have devoted your life to serve, those whom you trust, those you love, all the while knowing one will hand you over and everyone else at the table will abandon you, as cut-off, to die, in shame, alone. This is preparation of Passover, where we remember Moses who gave us the 10 Commandments, leading the people to freedom and new relationship with God. But was Moses: Our Savior, Prophet, Law Giver, High Priest, or was he A Servant of God? The Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper can only be fully appreciated as a paradox. “A Paradox” is what the translators of the Revised Standard Version of the Holy Bible described here as “GLORIFIED”. How different the verse feels… “Now is the Son of Man a Paradox, and in Him God is a Paradox; and if God is a Paradox, God will also resolve the Paradox in God’s self, for you, at once.” This Paradox begins with Jesus washing the feet of the Disciples as a Servant. Jesus whom we know is the Christ, whom the Disciples knew as a Holy Man, a Rabbi their Teacher, whom Simon Peter had declared is the Messiah, took off his Robes. In the Temple at Jerusalem, the Robes of the High Priest were His uniform of Authority and Office. But under the Roman occupation of Pontius Pilate, those robes were locked away in the garrison of the Roman soldiers, only taken out with the permission of Pilate, for Passover. And instead of acting as Priestly Authority making a sacrifice in blood by the killing of an animal to atone for sins, Jesus stripped down, and washed the feet if all, by pouring water. This at the start of the meal, when Peter and Judas were there. This is like our every worship service, an out-pouring of everything that has clung to the soles of our feet, clung to our souls, kneeling in submission, letting go control of all the hurts and wounds and sins, dirt of life. This night, I begin, by confessing to you my wrong, that this week, I broke the blue glass bowl we have used since 2004, so replaced it myself with a less breakable bowl made of hardwood. There is a tradition I started many years ago, that someone requested for tonight of a Reverse Offering. A reverse offering is instead of our contributing, we each receive. I hope you will each take one of these square cut nails and hold it in your palm, the point of our faith is not to relive Jesus’ suffering, but to be reminded of the depths of his love, even for us. For God so loved the world, that God gave God’s only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him, shall not perish but have everlasting life. Personally, what I love about celebrating the Sacrament this way this night, is not only sitting in the form of the Cross; not only making a time out of our routine to prepare for the resurrection of Easter; not only describing the Sacrament as Love; BUT each of us serving the other. Such a simple act, to pass the bread, to hold the cup for another, and yet in this sacramental act of love we serve as Christ to one another.