Love. Maundy Thursday 2018

Maundy Thursday 2018

Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.  Tonight I want to focus on the all encompassing, over the top love of Jesus. Undeserved, extravagant, unconditional and unending love of Christ. 

And this love? It wasn’t the sentimental emotion we experience in early relationships, not romantic love, burning hot and fast. It’s more like a willingness to act, to serve or help the other. And with tonight’s reading, Jesus tells the disciples what they’re expected to do in loving service, shows them what they’re to do, and gives them the new commandment that undergirds his entire ministry.  

He loves them to the end. He loved them fully, perfectly.  He knows what’s going to happen, and how before too long, he’ll be denied, betrayed and abandoned – by his friends. And yet in the face of this, he loved them to the end.  

Jesus has been healing and preaching and teaching, and his disciples have followed. But tonight, Jesus once again tries to teach, this time by showing the disciples what he’s been talking about. During the meal, he tied a towel around himself and began to wash the disciples’ feet. 

Not only was this action of Jesus a visible in-person example of what the action of love looks like, it required immense humility. In Luke’s Gospel, during this last supper, the disciples are still arguing about who’s the greatest, who gets the best seat, who’s most special.  All along, Jesus has been telling them that the first will be last, that service and love of the other are important. And yet, on this night, they’re still quibbling.  None of the disciples would have dared stooped to perform this task, reserved for the lowest of lowly servants. That would have risked their perceived importance. Instead, Jesus their lord and teacher washed their feet, because still the disciples didn’t understand.  

To truly love and serve the other requires humility.  Not humility as in feeling embarrassed, but as not having any ego or agendas in the game. Jesus knew he had nothing to prove, and nothing to lose. And when it came to loving and serving others, that is what we wanted the disciples to know. They had nothing to prove, and nothing to lose.  If I your lord and teacher wash your feet, so you should wash each others. He told them, and he showed them.  Serve and love each other.  

And remember that this washing happened during the meal.  He washed all the disciples’ feet. Including all of those who abandoned him. Peter who denied him.  Judas who betrayed him.  He loved them until the end.  He loved Judas to the end. 

Madeline L’Engle, author of the “Wrinkle in Time”, and a great theologian, wrote a story that speaks to this perfect love. 

“After his death Judas found himself at the bottom of a deep and slimy pit. For thousands of years he wept his repentance, and when the tears were finally spent he looked up and saw, way, way up, a tiny glimmer of light. After he had contemplated it for another thousand years or so, he began to try to climb up towards it. The walls of the pit were dank and slimy, and he kept slipping back down. Finally, after great effort, he neared the top, and then he slipped and fell all the way back down. It took him many years to recover, all the time weeping bitter tears of grief and repentance, and then he started to climb up again. After many more falls and efforts and failures he reached the top and dragged himself into an upper room with twelve people seated around a table. "We've been waiting for you, Judas," Jesus said. "We couldn't begin till you came."

After loving them - and in great humility - serving them, he concluded with crystal clear direction.  I give you a new commandment. That you love one another, as I have loved you.

It’s hard for us to do – loving others with that kind of intimacy and humility. It’s much easier for us to distance ourselves from others, or to decide some don’t deserve our love, our service.  The addicted or undocumented. The prisoner or the mentally ill. The democrats, the republicans. We are so quick to excuse our inaction and our lack of love and concern, because of what we perceive as the actions or intentions of others.  As if their presence – their being – is somehow not worthy of our love and respect because of their life circumstances or choices.

But Jesus loved them all, including Judas and Peter, until the end.  He commanded them to love each other. No conditions. No exceptions. No limitations. No pride.  No judgment.   

Just as I have washed your feet, so you should wash each other’s feet.  

We are commanded to love each other. And it is hard.  Often it’s harder than fighting, or being proud, or ignoring.  

20th Century Priest & Theologian John McKenzie wrote:

Not by annihilating the wicked, not by forcibly eliminating evil from among humankind is righteousness to be realized;

the Lord wills to rehabilitate the world by turning sinners from evil ways that they may live.

And we must admit that this is more difficult than the use of force.

Jesus Christ, on the night he was handed over, commanded us to love.  The beauty of this night, and this weekend, is that we are invited to spend time in deep prayer with the God who loves us that much and who will strengthen us to love like that. And we are invited to get close to Christ who showed us how.  

How to share and show that Undeserved, extravagant, unconditional and unending love. The perfect love of Christ. 

Amen.