Just before the Passover feast, Jesus knew that the
time had come to leave this world to go to the father. Having loved
his dear companions, he continued to love them right to the end. It was
suppertime. Jesus got up from the supper table, set aside his robe,
and put on an apron. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash
the feet of his friends, drying them with his apron.
In this fourth gospel, we hear the story that takes
place during the last meal that Jesus spends with his friends before his
death. Jesus washes the feet of his friends, and asks them to do
likewise. In this fourth gospel, John, the gospel writer points us to
two central activities that show us who we are. Washing one another's
feet, and eating together. God provides for God's people and God's people
serve one another. So it is significant that this is what we do as we
participate in these final days of Jesus' life. We eat this meal together,
and we wash one another's feet.
Imagine having been at this particular passover meal. Hoards
of people have arrived in Jerusalem for the festival. All clamoring for a
place to eat the meal. You, being a friend of Jesus, are in this
room, with these people, reclining at this table. Bartholomew, James,
Andrew, Judas, Peter, John, Mary, Thomas, James, Joanna, Philip, Matthew,
Susanna, Thaddeus, Simon, and all the other men and women and children who were
gathered that night. The meal is spread before you, the unleavened bread, the
roasted lamb, and the bitter herbs. And in the middle of the meal, Jesus gets
up, he takes off his robe and ties a towel around himself.
How odd, how extraordinary. He pours water into a basin and begins
to wash everyone's feet. They surely needed washing, there are no clean feet in
all of Jerusalem after a day of walking about, gathering supplies for the meal,
visiting friends and relatives. But who does he think he is? That job is not
his, Peter insists, it is the servant's work. We call Jesus King. A King, who
does servant's work? Something here is astoundingly different. Something here
shows us what it means to be a follower of Jesus. Wash one another's feet. Love
one another by serving each other.
One of the people I really miss in our world is Fred Rogers.
Mr. Rogers taught us about being a neighbor. Fred Rogers invited a friend of
his, in fact someone he had heard singing in church, to be his neighbor on his
television show. Francois Clemmons joined the cast of the show in 1968,
becoming the first African-American to have a recurring role on a kids TV series.
Mr. Clemmons played the police officer on the show. He said he wasn’t really
interested in this role initially, because growing up where he did, he did not
have a good opinion of police officers. On one episode, Mr. Rogers was resting
his hot feet in a plastic pool, and asked Mr. Clemmons, playing a police
officer, to join him in resting his own hot, weary, feet. They sat and chatted,
as Mr. Rogers did, and eventually the police officer got up to leave and get on
with his day, and Mr. Rogers got down on his knees, and wiped dry the feet of
his friend. In one fell swoop, Mr. Rogers shows all those watching, who is our
neighbor, and how we serve one another.
So that is entirely related to sacrament. You remember, the
outward sign of an inward grace. And I've been thinking about those outward
signs. Water...oil...flame....bread.....wine..... But other things too, wind...
dirt.... seeds....
Sometimes life's events feel so big, and wide, and broad,
and overwhelming. The pain and the joy of life bring us soaring to the
mountaintops and to the depths of despair. And much of life is lived
somewhere in between, in the mundane sacramental moments of making dinner for
those we love, or driving our children to dance and music class, or doing our
taxes, or taking a bath, washing feet or dreaming dreams. It is in the ordinary
Jesus shows us sacred. In the muck and mess that is washed from our feet.
In the ordinary meal, our cracks are filled, our fissures
healed, we are made whole. In the mundane washing, we overflow with mercy and
compassion. Jesus seeps into our very being, washes us, feeds us, heals us. Jesus
shows us who God is, and Jesus teaches us who we are.
Let me wash your feet, take this bread, and you will be
healed. Jesus offers love, and forgiveness, healing and compassion. And Jesus
shows us how to do what we are called to do.
On this night, the night Jesus is handed over to be
tortured, betrayed by his friend, Love really does win.
The violence perpetrated on Jesus is hard to hear, hard to
watch, because you and I are implicated in it. We have not been perfect. We
have judged, we have bullied, we have missed the mark. We have offered ridicule
when mercy was called for. We have fallen asleep when we should have paid
attention. But, we are loved perfectly. Love still wins.
The gift we are given this night, mercy and compassion, foot
washing and food, washes over us, nourishes us, puts us back together. We are
re-membered. Come and receive the gift. Come, and remember who you are. Jesus,
is here, in our midst, walking with us. Come, be filled with the love that
gives everything and takes nothing. And you will know what love looks like.
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