Maundy Thursday April 13, 2006 “Series B”
Grace be unto you and peace, from God our Father and from our Lord, Jesus Christ. Amen.
Let us pray: Dear Heavenly Father, we come before your altar as your people, baptized into the death and resurrection of your Son, Jesus the Christ. Yet we come before you with humble hearts, for it is not that we have claimed you as our God, but that you have claimed us as your own children, through the torn flesh and spilt blood of Christ. Through the power of your Holy Spirit, enable us to gain a greater appreciation for you for your redeeming grace, and grant us increased faith, that we might live our lives more fully reflecting your love to those around us. This we ask in Christ’s holy name. Amen.
[Note: The following sermon is my edited thoughts from a sermon that came in a Lenten drama series that was entitled “God’s Own Sacrifice Complete,” written over twenty years ago. The author and publisher I have long forgotten.]
It was a bad night in Egypt. After years of hearing the people of Israel cry to be set free from the tyranny of bondage, after months of warnings issued to the pharaoh, God was about to act decisively to set his people free. This was the night of the first Passover. It was a bad night in Egypt, because the air was heavy – filled with the thought of imminent death.
It was a bad night in Jerusalem, some twenty centuries ago, as a small group of persons gathered in an upper room to celebrate the anniversary of the Passover. Once again, God was about to act decisively to set his people free – this time, to free from their bondage to sin and death. And once again, the air with heavy – filled with the thought of imminent death – our Lord’s death.
It should be a bad night in [Greenville]. The world has not changed that much over the centuries that have gone by – nor have we. On this Thursday night, in this week we call “Holy,” with patient love, our Lord calls to our generation as he has called to hundreds before us, urging us to repent, to believe and to live.
Once again the air should be heavy – filled with the thought of imminent death – our death! For if we truly wish to grasp the significance of what God has done for us and for our redemption, the thought of death needs to be heavy in the air. For it is only when we think about our own death, our life ending on this planet we call earth, that the true significance of what God has done for our salvation, can truly be grasped and lived!
Interestingly, on these bad nights, it has historically been the custom of those who are the children of God, to gather together in the presence of their Lord, and in one another’s company, to share a meal. That almost sounds a little bit strange. On a night in which death is heavy in the air, God’s people gather to eat! Of course, we don’t do it in order to be silly, or foolish, or to diminish the significance of the night, or of the situation. Rather, we gather to eat in appreciation for God’s grace.
One of the reasons that we do this, is in obedience. Even though we may feel that there are other things we might rather do on a night like this, we come to our Lord’s table because he has commanded it. For example, God gave Moses specific instructions about the meal they were to eat as they gathered in their homes, on that night in Egypt, when death was heavy in the air. They were to eat the Paschal lamb, with unleavened bread, bitter herbs, as they sang psalms and drank wine.
And on that bad night in Jerusalem, Jesus also gave us a command to eat, saying, “Do this, in remembrance of me.” Of course, Jesus shortened the menu, making the elements much easier to prepare – just bread and wine. But still, it is a meal in which we eat, in obedience to his command.
Of course, throughout history, God’s people of faith have gathered to eat these sacred meals, not just because they were commanded to do so, but more specifically, to remember! God commanded Moses: “This day shall be for you a memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord.” And to this day, the people of the Jewish faith celebrate the Passover, eating that seder meal, remembering how God redeemed them from bondage, as the angel of death passed over their homes, setting them free. They remember the blood of the lamb on the doorposts, God’s guarantee that he would pass over their homes, as cries of death filled the air from their neighboring Egyptian families. They remember that on that bad night, God freed them from slavery and made them a free people again.
And as Jesus celebrated his last Passover meal with his disciples, he also asked them to eat the bread and drink the wine in remembrance of him! And it didn’t take long for the disciples of Christ to incorporate this meal of bread and wine as a part of their daily worship, as a means of remembering as a means of celebrating Christ’s life, offered to God on their behalf.
For the disciples of Christ came to realize that the death that hung heavy in the air that night, would be our Lord’s death, for our redemption. Jesus, the Son of God, was about to offer himself in place of the Paschal lamb of the Passover, that he might atone for our sins, and redeem us from death.
What Jesus offered in this meal, was himself, a means by which we might not only remember him, but also a means by which our crucified Lord might be present to us, and through which, we can receive the benefits of God’s redeeming grace. It is a meal in which we are nourished in faith through his body and blood, which was given for us.
And so, even though it is a bad night, even though the thought of death is in the air as we think of the lessons set before us this night in the context of our own death, still, we gather to eat in peace.
It must have been a strange feeling for the children of Israel to gather around their tables in peace, singing Psalms of praise to God, while in the homes of their Egyptian neighbors the wail of death was being heard. And yet, peace is what they experienced that night, the peace of knowing that through their faith in God, the angel of death had passed over their homes, delivering them from bondage.
In the same way, we also are invited to come to our Lord’s table this night, to eat and drink in peace. For the meal itself was instituted by our Lord for this very reason, to inform us in this sacramental way that our sins are forgiven – that for the sake of Jesus the Christ, the Lamb of God, God has passed over our iniquity; that death need not be feared; for God has embraced us as his own, and promised us life everlasting.
But the meal is not an end in itself. The Israelites were instructed to eat the Passover dressed for travel. They had a mission to accomplish. The meal was to give them strength and encouragement of faith for the days that lay before them, even though many failed to grasp its significance.
Nor is the eating and drinking of our Lord’s body and blood in communion an end in itself. This is but a means in which we might receive strength and courage of faith, for the mission that lies ahead of us. The disciples on that first Maundy Thursday evening were soon to learn how much they needed the forgiveness and strength the Lord had given them in his holy meal. It was a bad night, but they would live through it. Even their sins of that night would be passed over, as they, too, failed to grasp the significance of what Jesus was doing for them.
But following our Lord’s resurrection, the disciples came to gather again and again, to eat this meal in obedience, in remembrance and in the peace of knowing the grace of God’s redemption in Christ’s death. And as a result, they were strengthened in faith to witness to others of the redeeming grace of God, and came to face their own death in the hope of the resurrection.
Amen.
