Colour Supplement

Articles by Christians around the world

Sunday 25 March 2007

 

Setting an example: a sermon for Maundy Thursday

by Katharine Smith

 

Gospel: John 13.1–17, 31b–35

Now before the festival of the Passover, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father.  Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

 

The devil had already put it into the heart of Judas son of Simon Iscariot to betray him. 

 

And during supper Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself.  Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him.

 

He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, ‘Lord, are you going to wash my feet?’  Jesus answered, ‘You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand.’  Peter said to him, ‘You will never wash my feet.’  Jesus answered, ‘Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.’

 

Simon Peter said to him, ‘Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!’

 

Jesus said to him, ‘One who has bathed does not need to wash, except for the feet, but is entirely clean.  And you are clean, though not all of you.’

 

For he knew who was to betray him; for this reason he said, ‘Not all of you are clean.’

 

After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, ‘Do you know what I have done to you?  You call me Teacher and Lord and you are right, for that is what I am.  So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.  For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you.

 

Very truly, I tell you, servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them.  If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.

 

Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him.  If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once.  Little children, I am with you only a little longer.  You will look for me; and as I said to the Jews so now I say to you, “Where I am going, you cannot come.”

 

I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.  By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.’

 

Thaddeus watches as Jesus kneels before him.  Like Peter, he wants to back away saying “Lord, you will never wash my feet” but he knows Jesus would reply to him as he did to Peter, “unless I wash you, you have no share with me” and he so wants to share life with Jesus.

 

Before Jesus called him to join his group of friends Thaddeus, a young man with no family or wealth of his own, was the servant of a land owner in Galilee.  His had been an inferior position and it regularly fell to him to wash the feet of visitors to the house.  How he hated that task and how much he longed for freedom from the humiliation of it.

 

Now Jesus smiles up at him and Thaddeus, embarrassed and afraid, finds the courage to look into the eyes of this man who knows him so well in all his weakness, sadness and insecurity.  He sees only love, acceptance and reassurance as he feels also the gentle cleansing touch of loving hands soothing the rough and painful places on his hot, tired feet and in his aching heart. 

 

There is a great difference between something that is done by a servant out of duty and something that is done by a friend out of love.  That difference is what Thaddeus and the other disciples experience so dramatically at this supper with Jesus.

 

John describes a meal taking place before the Passover festival and his account contains no reference to Jesus giving bread and wine to his disciples.  Instead we have a vivid and dramatic account of Jesus once again doing the unexpected and astounding his followers.

 

The menial task of washing the feet of guests to a house would normally be carried out by the lowliest of servants or slaves.  It was a sign of hospitality which was both necessary and welcome after a walk on the hot and dusty roads which coated sweaty feet in dirt.  We can imagine that men arriving at a friend’s house for a meal would be greeting each other, talking, laughing, certainly not paying attention to whoever it was who cleaned their feet.  They probably took very little notice of the washing – it was just a familiar routine with nothing to notice about it.

 

Until now.  Suddenly Jesus, as he has done so often before, transforms an ordinary everyday event into something significant, something that is symbolic of life in the kingdom of God.

 

The disciples can only watch as their Lord and Teacher takes on the role of the servant and washes their feet in a way that means they have to take notice and think about what is being done to them and what difference that will make in their lives.   

 

Perhaps they know that from tonight whenever their feet are washed they will see their Lord in the servant who washes and if they themselves have to offer that service they will do so as they would offer it to Jesus, in love and with humility.

 

Jesus resumes his place as Lord and Teacher saying, “I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you”. He also gives his great new commandment to his disciples, and to us:  “Love one another just as I have loved you.”  It’s not an easy commandment to obey but it does give us a “golden rule” for our discipleship.

 

In experiencing the washing of his feet by Jesus, his Lord, Thaddeus received healing for his bruised heart and soul.  Love and gratitude would lead him to offer that love to others so that they too might experience that healing. 

 

Once we have known what it is to receive the love of Christ and to be ministered to in His name surely we will know that the only adequate way in which to respond is by loving.  His love and service are offered freely and graciously with no demand for payment or reward.  In the light of that generous love can we do anything else but pass that love and service on to others so that they too will experience it for themselves?

 

However Jesus has touched us, healed us and restored us his prayer for us is that in love and gratitude we too will reach out in a similar way to those in similar need and bring his love into their lives too.

 

Katharine Smith is a Reader at St. Andrew's Church Taunton. She is a regular contributor to Sunday Link and Common Worship, Living Word.  Katharine's first book "The Way of the Cross", with original artworks by her brother George Boxley, was recently published by Redemptorist Publications.

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