josephholubsermons


 

April 21, 2011   -   Maundy Thursday
John 13:1-14

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WHAT  IF?

"So if I, your Lord and teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.”  (John 13:14)

John’s gospel stimulates me to wonder!  In John’s gospel there is no account of the Last Supper.  The Last Supper comes to us through Matthew, Mark and Luke and “passed on” by the apostle Paul in his letter to the Corinthians.  In John, instead of the Last Supper, we have this story of Jesus washing the disciples’ feet.

What I wonder is simply this.  What if the church down through history would have placed equal emphasis on foot washing as on holy communion as a part of our ritual worship?    What if when we came to worship, alongside communion we practiced a ritual of foot washing?   What if, after we received communion we had a section with benches where you would sit down to have your feet washed by a leader from the church council, and then in turn you washed the feet of another?   What if?  One thing I am pretty sure about.  It is already hard enough to get people to serve on the church council, let alone if we added that to the job description.  What if?  Would very many of us actually participate, or would we skip that part of our ritual worship? 

I will tell you what got me thinking about this.  Yesterday, I had medical diagnostic tests on my spine in Denver.  The test was technically a surgical procedure, so I had to go through pre-op and then into interventional radiology.  I was especially impressed by the wonderful care I received from literally every person that attended to me: from check in, to the medical assistants, to the nurses, to the doctor.  I am not merely referring to the physical care and medical expertise I received, which was excellent.   But because this procedure was potentially quite painful, the comfort I was offered, the words of assurance I was given, the encouragement shared with me, when it did become painful, was astounding!   Everybody went out of their way to serve me in a most gracious, hospitable and dignified manner that affirmed me as human being.    

Because I had been thinking about this passage anyway, it occurred to me how Christlike I was being treated; that what these people were doing was metaphorically washing my feet.  I know they are getting paid for this, and they are obviously well trained in their profession.  But even still, isn’t that what Jesus was doing in this foot-washing, mentoring his disciples and training them in the work of the Kingdom of God when he said,  "So if I, your Lord and teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet?”   What is discipleship about but bending low and taking into your embrace the soiled, tired, and vulnerable life of another and embracing that one in profoundly beautiful actions of hospitality and affirmation – and doing it without pay - for free!

Jesus took a towel, and he washed their dusty feet!  In those days foot-washing was a household act of hospitality.  It was an action that carried with it the affirming message of a warm and open welcome.  But it was an act that was meant to be performed, not by the master of the house, but rather by the subservient members of the house.  It was a menial act to be accomplished by one who was accustomed to being on bended knees; by one expected to do such a lowly and humbling thing.  

But Jesus took a towel, and he washed their feet!  While their feet were being soothed and refreshed by Jesus from a day's weary and heated journey, great turmoil was going on in the hearts and minds of those proud disciples. They were  trapped inside of their own egos, seeing their master and teacher kneeling before them, and literally feeling him take their feet gently into his hands, each in turn, serving them as a household servant?

"Someone else should be doing this!" the disciples were silently protesting, except for Peter who could not stay silent!  Verbalizing what everyone was thinking and feeling, Peter protested openly!

Put yourself in the place of the disciples and gaze down, and see Jesus there bent low at your feet.  Can you recognize and perceive that it is in such a simple, humble, gentle, beautiful act as this that the Divine is revealed and emerges into our presence.

He then said, "…you also ought to wash one another’s feet."  He didn’t even say that about the Last Supper.  Read Mark 14, Matthew 26 and Luke 22, and see that he didn’t command them to do this every day or every week.  I am certainly not saying that we should not celebrate communion often and regularly.  Of course we should!   But my point is, the one thing John’s gospel tells us he did say is, "…you also ought to wash one another’s feet.”   We rarely or never practice  it ritually. Of course, the more crucial question is, “Do we make it a part of our praxis in everyday life?”        

Instead, history shows that the church seize upon Holy Communion and claimed a monopoly on it,  and has used it in powerful ways to control and mediate the grace of God.  In many instances the church has built barriers, lines and walls around it controlling and defining exactly who are acceptable, eligible and deserving of  Divine grace, including some and excluding many others, carefully  distributing grace in eyedropper allotments as if it were in short supply; practices starkly in contrast to Jesus who lavishly and wastefully spread grace around as if there was an infinite quantity upon which to draw from – and of course there is. 

In the tenth chapter of John Jesus says, “I came that they may have life, and have it more abundantly.”  (10:10)  Sadly , some have twisted that passage around to say that Jesus meant abundance in material things,  and hence have created various self-indulgent theologies of material prosperity around it.  But in the context of John’s gospel and Jesus’ life, I do not think that is what it means at all.

We live with a world view that perceives that “abundance” as something outside of us that we must acquire, accumulate, attain or gain in some way.   We say that is what life is ultimately all about – gaining abundance.  So we establish life values and strategies that are designed to seize and take possession of the abundance that is outside of us in order to get it inside of us (into our hearts, minds, lives, possession, control).  Of course, the problem is that we  never have enough, and we embark on life-long quests of vanity to gain more and more and more – but more is  never enough, and so we live with a hungry void in our lives for which we humans have devised various coping and denial mechanisms.

But Jesus is saying something very much different and calling upon us to trust him.  When Jesus took off his robe, grabbed a towel and assumed the posture of a servant, he was affirming that the “abundance” for which we long is not something outside of us to be acquired, but something already inside of us to be shared.  It is a part of who we are, and the role of Jesus is to call it forth from within us to be shared with others.  Jesus awakens the dormant abundance that lies within us, so that it can flow out to others. 

Can we accept, in the sense of integrating into our daily consciousness, this amazing gesture from Jesus that calls forth the abundance that lies within us?   That's the question and challenge for this Maundy Thursday.  "Maundy", from the Latin "mandatum” meaning mandate,  this night we commemorate that he "mandated" his disciples to do likewise!   Maundy-foot-washing Thursday!  Can we accept this gesture of affirming servitude directed towards us personally - and the challenge that comes with it to embody that same expression of servant love in our lives; in our community;  with one another?   How is it for us?   Are we a congregation that is willing to serve one another, serve our community, our world in a such a humble and profoundly human manner?

But how hard is it?   The human ego can be a road block in letting that inner abundance flow outward to others.  The ego can be the single biggest obstacle to the expression of genuine love in this world.

This foot-washing gesture of humility is indicative of the thrust and focus of Jesus’ entire life. He had been washing the feet of others his entire ministry; touching people with affirming love at their most vulnerable places; lifting up those that power, culture and religion had marginalized and excluded;  setting free those who had been crushed by a legion of external and internal oppressive forces; empowering people to return home to Divine love who had lived in various expressions of exile;  connecting and linking unlikely people who had never known one another or had little in common.    

John’s gospel portrays Jesus as one who was deeply anchored and centered in his relationship with God, and as a result was perhaps the most comprehensively healthy person who's ever lived.  Everything he did emanated from his centeredness in God as the source of his life and being.  Jesus was a human being, centered in God, who was so whole, so free and so loving that he transcended the limits of love that we set around ourselves every day. From his centeredness in God, he calls and beckons from us abundant life which surpasses the limits and boundaries of love that we draw around ourselves. 

I began by asking you to imagine what if the church down through history would have placed equal emphasis on foot washing as on Holy Communion. 
Perhaps the church:

•  would have fewer  imperial characteristics and look a lot more like Jesus who enhanced life wherever he went and walked and never diminished it;    

• would be less into control and manipulation and more into empowerment and setting free;

• would be a more effective agent for equality among culturally fostered inequalities, instead of using religion to sanction inequities that fracture humanity and dehumanize; 

• would be less about preserving institutional religion and more about  a spirituality that resembles the great prayer of Francis of Assisi, “that we not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love.”

Jesus took a towel and He washed their dusty feet!  And he said, “you also ought to wash one another’s feet.”