Maundy Thursday

 

In the name of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen. 

Why is so hard to let God love us?  Why is it so hard, to let Jesus kneel down and wash our feet?  St John says- having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. He loved them to the end. So when Jesus knew that his hour had come, when he knew that he was near the end, what did he choose to do? 

He chose to let his disciples know in the most domestic way, in the most intimate way, that they were loved. What was about to happen, was all for love. 

He first sat down and ate with them. They ate the roasted lamb, the bitter herbs, they tore the unleavened bread and poured the wine, it was a Passover feast as every other, marking their freedom from slavery, their liberation from oppression. For the disciples at the end of long day of walking through the sand, through the market places, mile upon mile, it was good to sit and eat together. They sang a hymn, they gave thanks. All was just as it should be, on the surface at least, though betrayal swirled in the undercurrents. 

And then Jesus stood up. Was he going to make a speech? Was he going to tell them a parable? Was he going to tell them off for their lack of understanding as usual? He just stood for a moment and looked at them. He beheld them. It was as if he saw everything, all that they were, all that they would be-no secrets could be hidden from this one. 

Did they draw back from his quick-eyed gaze? Did they look on him with something like the fear of God?   And then, without saying anything he knelt down and washed their feet. Their tired, guilty of dust and sin feet, feet which would in a day or two, would walk with him to the Cross. This was what Jesus wanted to say to them, almost his last word was to show them love. Don’t we sing in the hymn: My Saviours love to me, Love to the loveless shown, that they might lovely be?

Have you ever washed someone elses feet? Would you ever let someone else wash your feet? Would you let a priest kneel down and pour water over your feet on Maundy Thursday? Even this symbolic act many try to avoid through embarrassment, through shame? Who knows what! 

I once had to persuade twelve people to have their feet-washed during the liturgy of Maundy Thursday, and I confess I had to resort to tins of biscuits and bottles of wine to coax them. But often people were touched and humbled and moved to be asked. Who me? They would say. I can’t be holy enough surely? 

Are we ready to let God look upon us in love? We can probably identify with Peter as he says to Jesus, Lord are you really going to wash my feet?

The best way to teach, is always by example. If I have washed your feet, Jesus says, you also ought to wash one anothers feet. Does he know what he is asking? Could we even contemplate washing each others’ feet if we find it so hard to accept that Jesus might want to wash ours? 

Why is so hard to let God love us? Perhaps because we cannot even love ourselves. Again and again we draw back from God’s love.  And we perhaps thought that the problem might be sin– perhaps God is trying to tell us that the problem is love, our resistance to it, our hesitation about it, our fear of it. 

Why? We might ask. How?  We might wonder, can the Lord of heaven and earth stoop so low as to love us? To love me? What have we done to deserve this? Surely, there is some mistake? Surely we are not even worthy to gather the crumbs from under the table? We, the unkind, the ungrateful-we have surely marred loves image in us? 

No wonder Peter questioned Jesus when he put on his robe, took the basin and began to wash the disciples feet. Does love really do this kind of thing? 

Should we not be serving the Lord of heaven and earth? Should it not be us on our knees? I came not to be served but to serve, says the Lord. 

St John will not dissociate the act of love from the act of service, for where they meet, there is God. John does not separate the great thanksgiving feast of the church, from the simple act of washing feet, nor from the simple command to love one another and serve others in the name of Christ. All things are united here, at this table. Water and wine and bread, heaven and earth, life and death, sacrifice and service, love and loss. 

We are invited to sit and eat- in remembrance of all this- We are invited to sit and eat in the power of this love. We are invited to sit and eat in solidarity with those whom Jesus loved when the world had long forgotten them: the excluded, the weak, the poor, the oppressed, the silent, the foreigner, the widow, the fearful, tax-collectors and sinners. And as he washed the disciples feet he was washing their feet as well. Washing our feet as well. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

Why is so hard to let God love us? Why do we find it so hard to love each other?  Are we afraid of the love which Christ calls us to bear? 

We hide away, we draw back, but Christ will have none of that. I see you. He says. And he draws nearer to us, sweetly questioning- will you let me love you? And despite our shame, our reluctance, our embarrassment, despite the fact we may deny him, he still kneels down and washes our feet. There is no hiding from him. 

We have to assume that Jesus washed the feet of Judas Iscarriot that night, he knew what was going to happen, but still he knelt down in love, and washes his feet. 

By this we know there is nowhere love will not go to welcome home the sinner, in a few days the disciples will learn that love will be spat on, and mocked and tortured, but love will still cry out – Father forgive, them, for they know not what they do. Love will even go down to the depths of hell, even the dead are loved back into life.  

Christ in his love, seeks to become part of us, and we part of him, so beyond the act of washing feet, Christ gives everything of  himself in this ritual of sharing food together- This is my body, this is my blood, take, eat, do this in remembrance of me. In this love feast-we commune with him in the most profound way- he dwells in us, and through us and we dwell in him. 

It is by this act of love that he subverts every kind of human authority, and creates a community of equals- a community made in the light of his kingdom, where the last shall be first and the first shall be last, a community where love always wins. That is what the Church is called to be- so why are so many people in todays’ world afraid of coming in? Why do so many people think they are not good enough to be part of the body of Christ? The problem is, if we don’t believe that we are loved in here- why should anyone believe it out there? 

This love is on its knees washing the feet of stranger as well as friend, loving enemies as well as family. This love is letting Christ dwell in us, so that we may remember him, through our words and our actions in the world he came to save. This love is letting Christ dwell in us, so that we can embody him in the world, and love our neighbour as our self, and love God, with all of our heart, mind, soul and strength. 

The realisation that we are loved can liberate us to love. The realisation we are loved, could even transform the church and enliven it. The example that Christ offers those who follow him, is clear and unambiguous really, kneel down and wash one anothers feet- love one another as I have loved you, do this in remembrance of me. It is only by this love that we can endure the way of the cross, it is only by this love that we can see his passion through the glory of the resurrection.  

Love bids us all welcome, so let us sit down and eat- 

and, for the sake of Christ, please can we let God love us.