Grace and Peace to you from God, our father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
It’s Holy Thursday and our scripture readings point us to two things: the supper and the servant who made it possible. The heart of this night is love and Jesus’ commandment to be like him – wash other people’s feet and take the lowest place because that is what love does. Then Jesus institutes the sacrament – it is sign, it is symbol, it is reality. Jesus wants to empower us to be servant people and reach out in love. The Lord’s Supper and the love that stands behind it is what empowers us. In the supper, we are made whole. We are healed. We are united to Christ and to one another. The body and blood we receive is the resurrected body of Jesus. Jesus is alive forever and as we eat and drink little pieces of him. His DNA, his eternal muscles and corpuscles invade and take over us. We unite with Jesus in this sacrament and become His body too. The themes of tonight are rich, wonderful and complex.
In our text from 1 Corinthians, we hear the actual words of the supper – “Our Lord Jesus in the night in which he was betrayed”. I always stumble or hesitate in my mind when I say those words. The Lord’s Supper was not given for perfect, whole, sweet innocent folk; it was instituted for Judas who betrayed him, Peter who denied knowing and associating with him, and for the other disciples who ran into the cover of darkness when he was arrested. It was a motley crew of first class sinners.
In the same way, the Corinthian church was being torn apart as well. All had heard the message of the Good News. All were radically equal in their baptism into Christ. Yet, the Lord’s Supper was celebrated in the context of an evening meal on a Sunday which in Corinth was a typical work day. About a third of Corinth congregation was slaves. Like the pot luck supper we’ve enjoyed, the worship and the enactment of the Lord’s Supper were preceded by a meal that they shared. The rich and the free, high status church members got there first and started the meal without the slave and servant class Christians. Some even drank too much wine and got inebriated. Paul was telling them in the passage before these words that this was wrong. Hear them; 1 Corinthians 11:17-22. “Now in the following instructions I do not commend you, because when you come together it is not for the better but for the worse. For, to begin with, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you; and to some extent I believe it. Indeed, there have to be factions among you, for only so will it become clear who among you are genuine. When you come together, it is not really to eat the Lord's supper. For when the time comes to eat, each of you goes ahead with your own supper, and one goes hungry and another becomes drunk. What! Do you not have homes to eat and drink in? Or do you show contempt for the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What should I say to you? Should I commend you? In this matter I do not commend you!”
What Paul is saying of course is that while you may have heard the Good News, been baptized and brought into Christ’s body the church – it hasn’t really changed you much. Paul reminds them “You are a new creation. The old self – the old you, the “World” the W O R L D with all its status systems, privileges based on money, power and prestige are gone to you. Being first class in God’s kingdom makes you “servant of all”. Of course, you do not like hearing that because you’ve still got one foot in the world and one foot in the Kingdom. The ‘world” is blocking your ears.
So, Paul points them back to the cross. The cross – accepting death to give life, or in Jesus words “hating your life in this world but winning it for eternal life by offering your life as a ransom for the others” is very hard to do. None of us by our own power can do it. It’s only “in the power of the Spirit” as God’s Spirit invades and takes over us that we can be servant people.
Then, Paul points them to the Supper, the Lord’s meal, the Lord’s gift of Himself – his body and blood poured out for us – both on Calvary’s cross and in the chalice and plate. It is the same body – his very self.
We need to be in awe of it, because this bread and wine is the Body and Blood of the resurrected Jesus. It is Himself. It is the new covenant – the new promise.
A few weeks ago in confirmation we were talking about what the Supper means and I was explaining to the youth that it was a “foretaste of the feast to come”. God promises that in the resurrection we will be physically, bodily present to one another. We will continue to eat. Eating is the ingesting of fuel. Fuel is power. Power is what we need to serve. Zach Huber said, “So it is like an appetizer – the Lord’s Supper. “ I said “Precisely”.
Maybe we should give everyone a whole loaf instead of a “cracker-sized” wafer. If you had to wolf down a loaf this size, it would be obvious that this food really is energy and life. But unlike in the movie Godzilla – “size doesn’t matter”. I got sick last week because of a microbe I could not even see got into my body. Imagine how much power is in this loaf because it is not just molecules of sugar and starch – God in Christ wraps his Holy Self around them to make us whole and bring us life.
The supper gives us the power to kneel down. Remember as we read Peter objects to the Lord Jesus washing his feet. Remember what Jesus says: “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.
The Greek word for share is “melos”, it means “a part of” or “a share in something” much like we use the word “shares” for having stock, or owning a percentage of a corporation. Jesus is saying “Unless you can learn to do this – take the form of a slave, empty yourself and do the demeaning work of cleansing others – you cannot understand or be a part of my Kingdom. Peter is right to be shocked because even the few Jewish slaves that existed in Palestine at this time were not required to wash people feet.
So what does this all mean?
Supper and service are related. Service and servanthood are central to the values of Jesus’ Kingdom. We are a part of the resurrection. Our destiny is to be permanent – like Jesus is permanent. We belong to a future world that is concrete, material and physical. God loves the world and intends to make it permanent. We are to live as though that future has already happened. So what are our tasks?
Well. The polar bears for one (Tyler Dix always has us pray for them at the end of confirmation). But he is right. The polar bears represent a crowning achievement of God. They can track a scent from almost 100 miles away. Their habitat is melting because of the global warming and climate change we humans are causing. God asks us to preserve them and we owe it to God.
Because all human beings will be resurrected there are no throw away ones. Baltimore has 60 thousand drug addicts who are wasting their lives. God calls us to intervene for them – they are precious to him.
We still have terrible problems with race relations in the USA in part as a result of slavery and its lasting consequences. While much has changed, much has not. God calls us to make love, not hate to one another in anticipation of the joy we will experience in the resurrection. The situation won’t get better until we are more pro-active. The Lord’s Supper is our “Sea Rations” in the war against an old evil.
Kids who reach age 18 and finish high school are dumped out of the foster care program and left on their own to finish the job of raising themselves. I don’t know many 18 year olds capable of this. The people who eat the bread and body of resurrection are empowered to adopt those kids and help them reach their potential. We are the people of God’s covenantal future and anything is possible with God’s spirit and help.
So, take and eat, it is a royal banquet. The Lord of Lord and King of Kings is host, appetizer and main course. Rise from the meal full of eternal life and sink to your feet to wash the trouble of the world.
In Jesus’ name, Amen.
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