April 17: Maundy Thursday

When Lent began this year, I had good intentions. I had a good question in front of me: Who is it that I want to become this Lent? Who might God be calling me to be as I try to learn from Jesus again this season?

I’d love to tell you that as I enter into these most sacred series of holy days, I have a clear vision. But that would mean I am lying like a rug to you.

What have I become? Have I become something, developed something within myself that feels worthy?

Well, if I’m honest, the becoming endeavor of this Lent for me looks more like I am a cross of a 15-year-old golden retriever and a rabid racoon. There have been times of devoted earnestness and there have been feral sidetracks and rages. Just telling the truth here.

Maybe your Lent was one of profound growth and introspection and you have had moments of clarity about being a disciple of Jesus. Maybe you set off with good intentions only to find yourself foraging in the garbage can of your monkey brain. Whatever your Lent has looked like up until this point, we are here now. Together on this night. The night we remember Jesus gathering his disciples around. Feeding them. Washing their feet. Explaining to them one last time what becoming one of his disciples looked like.

I love Peter. I love him in part because he was so utterly devoted to Jesus. And I love him in part because he shows us that being devoted to Jesus doesn’t always mean that our love for Jesus and our imagination about the wideness of God’s love and mercy are necessarily proportional.

Peter was with Jesus at the Transfiguration. And Peter got it. He saw Jesus in glory and knew. Peter heard the voice… This is my son. The chosen one. Listen to him. And Peter did. Peter followed and listened and learned from Jesus. But tonight, Peter struggles with where Jesus is leading him. Tonight’s story isn’t the first time Peter doesn’t quite understand Jesus’ teaching. This isn’t the first time he has tried to take the wheel from Jesus and steer things in a direction he sees as more appropriate.

Earlier we read in Matthew and Mark, Jesus explains what being God’s son, the chosen one, is going to look like. Peter has a hard time hearing what Jesus is saying. Peter pushes back at Jesus when he learns that as the Messiah, Jesus will suffer and die. Jesus tells him “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”

And on this night that Jesus has gathered his disciples together, the cross is not some distant possibility, it is just hours away. Knowing this, the nearness of the cross, Jesus takes off his robe. Puts on an apron. Pours water into a basin. Gets on the floor and begins washing the feet of the disciples and drying them with his apron.

When Jesus gets to Peter, Peter loses it. No way! Not acceptable, says Peter. To which Jesus says, “If I don’t wash you, you can’t be part of what I’m doing.”

Blessed, devoted Peter, then pivots. Well then wash all of me. My hands. My head too.

As paraphrased in The Message, Jesus says, “If you’ve had a bath in the morning, you only need your feet washed now and you’re clean from head to toe. My concern, you understand, is holiness, not hygiene.”

This foot-washing isn’t about ritual purity. It isn’t about hospitality. Jesus is teaching them one last time. And the teaching is clearly making an impact. Jesus has their attention. Peter’s for certain. This is what love looks like. A master who in love puts on an apron, gets on his knees and washes the feet of those who serve. This is what the kingdom of God looks like. A place where LOVE is power, a place where humble service shows strength.

Jesus has given the clearest example he can give about who the disciples are to become, how he wants them to carry on. Love one another. Just as I have loved you, love each other like THAT. Like a master who kneels down and washes a servant’s feet. When you love like this in the world, then, then people will know who taught you. Who you’ve been learning from. Who you are called to be. They will know this through your service, your love.

Poor Peter, with his heart full of love and devotion for Jesus. With his feet washed. We know what happens just after this story ends. Peter begs Jesus, let me follow you and Jesus tells him that before the rooster crows three times in the morning, that Peter will deny him.

And Peter does. Standing in a courtyard, around a fire pit, Peter who loves Jesus with his whole heart, three times denies knowing him at all.

I recently heard John Ohmer point out that when Peter sees Jesus again after the resurrection it is also by a fire. John beautifully noted that the smell of a fire pit must have stayed with Peter in those days. A reminder of such great shame. And what a gift that Jesus speaks to him again in love, resurrected, by a fire. Redeeming what is most shameful. Three times by that fire Jesus asks Peter.

Do you love me? And Peter says Yes lord yes. You know me. You know I do.

Do you love me? Feed my sheep.

Do you love me? Feed my lambs.

Do you love me? Feed my sheep.

THIS is where Jesus calls Peter to take his washed feet. And thankfully Peter does. Loving others as Jesus loved. Teaching generations of disciples to come.

We come here tonight knowing what Peter and the disciples could not know that night. We come here knowing that the next few days hold dark, cold reminders of how we as God’s people fail to love the way Jesus has taught us to love.

If we try to forget how we got here, we will never be able to know or understand where we are going. If we skip over the pain and suffering of the next few days, we will not be able to understand who we are asked as disciples to become.

As this service ends, everything from this table, this altar area will be stripped bare. We cannot forget how we got here. We cannot forget that to love like Jesus, that will cost us everything, we will be stripped bare too.

And here we will sit, fed, with washed feet in the empty quiet.

Maybe the sting of shame, like Peter at the fire pit, will sit heavy on your heart, knowing the ways you have denied knowing who Jesus is. Maybe the weight of a love that is willing to turn the whole world upside down will press in on you and you struggle to stretch yourself, your heart wider to understand such power.

Who is Jesus calling us to become in HIS LOVE? That is not just a Lenten question to ponder, but a question to ponder always. Where are we being called to go with our washed feet?

Maybe you are called to sit across a table from someone you disagree with… Or to a hospital bed to tend to someone ill… Or to a meeting in a church basement… To a therapist’s office to tend to your own heart… To a classroom filled to the brim with young learners… To a boardroom whose members could learn something from you… To a shelter struggling to feed the many clients it has… To a food bank whose shelves are running low… To your desk to write that letter that you’ve been meaning to write… To the house next door of the neighbor you sort of know… To a stranger’s home across town of a neighbor you do not yet know… Maybe to your own kitchen table reaching out to one you sit with every day.

Where are we called to FEED JESUS’ SHEEP, to serve, loving others as Jesus has loved us?

Tonight, we have the opportunity to sit. To sit in the love and loss that comes as we enter these holiest of times. To sit and wonder how, wonder where.

After standing at the cross tomorrow, after waiting in the unimaginable sorrow and silence of Saturday, and after celebrating the mystery and redemption of the empty tomb, how will we follow, where will our washed feet take us as we become disciples of the one who commands…

Love one another. In the same way I loved you, you love one another. This is how everyone will know you are with me—when they see the love you have for each other.

Amelia McDaniel