Good morning on Good Friday…

As we drove our fourteen year old to a sleepover last night, we passed a tiny church with its door cracked open. Inside, we saw a pastor leading a Maundy Thursday service, and my son asked, “Dad, what is Maundy Thursday?” I must tell you, I love being married to a minister at times like this because my answer to my son would have been, “I have no idea.” My husband explained that Maundy means “command” and that Maundy Thursday commemorates the experience of Jesus washing his disciples’ feet at the Last Supper, commanding them to love one another as he had loved them.

Of course, I woke this morning and googled the word and, sure enough, I learned that maudy is “mande” in Old French, meaning “something commanded,” “mandatum” in Latin means “commandment,” and from the words of Christ “Mandatum novum do vobis,” we receive the familiar words of encouragement, “A new commandment I give unto you.”

John 13:4-34 gives an account of Jesus washing the feet of his disciples at their final meal together. In verses 4 through 7 in the Contemporary English Version we read: So during the meal Jesus got up, removed his outer garment, and wrapped a towel around his waist. He put some water into a large bowl. Then he began washing his disciples’ feet and drying them with the towel he was wearing. But when he came to Simon Peter, that disciple asked, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?” Jesus answered, “You don’t really know what I am doing, but later you will understand.”

Then we pick up the story in verses 12 through 17 as we read: After Jesus had washed his disciples’ feet and had put his outer garment back on, he sat down again. Then he said: Do you understand what I have done? You call me your teacher and Lord, and you should, because that is who I am. And if your Lord and teacher has washed your feet, you should do the same for each other. I have set the example, and you should do for each other exactly what I have done for you…. You know these things, and God will bless you, if you do them.

The story ends in verse 34 with “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.”

In reading these verses this morning, I am struck by spiritual transformation recorded in three sentences. “You don’t really know what I am doing, but later you will understand.” “Do you understand what I have done? …if your Lord and teacher has washed your feet, you should do the same for each other.” “You know these things, and God will bless you, if you do them.”

Jesus is giving a demonstration speech, leading his friends from a state of not really knowing what he his doing, through an intimate experience of tender touch into a warm bowl of water, and eventually sparking in them knowledge, truly knowing the blessing God is inviting. Jesus shows by example what it looks like to love in a tangible, hand-to-feet way, commanding us to love one another as he loves us, mutually, up close, skin to skin.

This Good Friday morning, we are each encouraged to to know these things, to do these things, and to be blessed by God to bless one another,

Sue