Maundy Thursday

Maundy[1] Thursday  April 9, 2020

 Dear Friends, 

At the beginning of the Passover seder, the youngest child present asks the question: ‘why is this night different from all other nights?’… and so begins the telling again of the story of God’s rescue of his people, bringing them out of slavery in Egypt and beginning their journey over into the promised land.

We might well ask the same question, as we begin our remembering of the great fulfilment of the Exodus promise, in the ‘exodus’ Jesus has accomplished in his death and resurrection, when he ‘rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins’ Colossians 1:13f 

Tonight we remember Jesus washing the feet of his disciples as a sign of the most humble service, and ultimately what he was about to do for them.

Tonight we remember Jesus gift of himself in the meal he gave us as a meal of remembrance and participation in his gift of himself for us, his blessed body broken, his blood poured out.  

Tonight we remember, and we are ‘re-membered’—  our parts in some way re-assembled in terms of the scattered self, the shattered frightened self, brought back to square one: the love of God for us in Christ Jesus.  

May our remembering this weekend, though it is different yet again in that we cannot gather in the ways we are used to, be a healing, restorative remembering.

My prayer for us all is that we are deeply met by the truth of the love of God which holds us all — the arms of Jesus spread wide for you and for me, and for us all.  

—   under God’s mercy, always,

Sarah

[1] Note that the name Maundy Thursday comes from the ‘mandate’ or ‘commandment’ Jesus gave his disciples as he share this last supper with them. See John 13: 34