Going to and from the table and back again

That upper room, that table, is where worlds—universes! — meet!

Think about it. When these people, these followers of Jesus gathered in that upper room, these men and women were living in one kind of world—a world of tradition, under military occupation, living on a thread between poverty and getting by, always knowing one way of being faithful—and later on, in that same room they would encounter the Risen Jesus (twice!), and start the work of spreading Jesus’ message and healing to all the known world and beyond. In between, that same room would be their shelter and hiding place as they sat together in their fear, uncertainty, and grief.

That upper room, that table, will have seen it all.

Of all the settings for this great drama of God’s saving work, this simple room, this ordinary table, are almost forgotten backdrops. But everything happens here!

I actually had not thought about that very much until this week when I read a Lenten meditation written by Diana Butler Bass. After noting what I just said, that they came back to the upper room and that same table, she writes,

They never return to the cross. Jesus never takes them back to the site of the execution. He never gathers his followers at Calvary, never points to the blood-stained hill, and never instructs them to meets him there. He never valorizes the events of Friday. He never mentions them. Yes, wounds remain, but how he got them isn’t mentioned. Instead, almost all the post-resurrection appearances — which are joyful and celebratory and conversational — take place at the upper room table or at other tables and meals.

Table -> trial -> cross -> tomb/tomb -> table.

What if the table is the point?

This changes how I’ve tended to view Jesus’ washing of the disciples’ feet. It’s not just a lesson on servanthood and the particular kind of leadership that Jesus wants his followers to live… and it is that, but more! He is washing their feet because they entering into someplace new. A new way of living and being. A new kind of community. The new reign of God.

But her question is key: what if gathering God people around the table is, in fact, the point? What if the Upper Room isn’t just a convenient meeting room or even a hiding place? What if the Upper Room is in fact the Heavenly Banquet table on earth around which all of God’s people, all of God’s healed creation, gathers together?

And what if instead of a table in an Upper Room, this little table here functions the same way? What if we are in our own little Upper Room from which we disciples come, go, at times hide and other times empowered are sent out?

Those first disciples don’t know it yet, but after they meet the Risen Jesus in this very same room a few days hence, they will go into a whole new world on a whole new mission. For this, they need to be fed—and to feed—and they need to be ready to move, and to serve.

And something else… they need to be open to being served!

I am still new to this community and learning the ways you do stuff, but as I understand it the practice of this parish up until now has been for you to wash each other’s feet. The message was that you all each other’s servants and are also all served by each other, which is in fact a very good message, one that we echo at every Eucharist and also as we pass the peace every week. But listen again to this exchange between Simon Peter and Jesus in the Gospel of John:

[Jesus] 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….”

Peter would not fully understand what Jesus was up to until after the Cross, Resurrection, and Ascension. We are being ready to walk: walk to the cross, run to the empty tomb, go into all the world. We are going to leave the safety of that upper room, leave the table, and go into God’s world to meet, care for, and welcome all God’s people! For that, we need to walk. And for that Jesus washes his disciple’s feet.

It is important that you we do the vulnerable thing, and allow the one (or ones) in pastoral charge to wash your feet your feet, too. I know. It’s hard. And a little embarrassing. Peter resisted and, still, Jesus insisted. (And don’t worry… I’m not taking names and no one will force anyone else to do what they don’t want to do!)

But, whether come up or if you sit, look around and consider what’s going on.

If you think about it, Earth and Heaven really are meeting up in this Upper Room of ours. We are about to journey from our own Upper Room to the Cross and the Empty Tomb, back to our Upper Room where will meet the Risen Jesus, and from that Upper Room we will again go into the places where God has placed us to communicate Good News and bring healing to the people God has given to us, wherever there is brokenness, pain  to where people look for hope and for healing.

As we come and go from this table tonight, through this Triduum, and every week remember, we who are healed, are called to be healers. We who have been welcomed are being sent to invite. For this, we need to be fed and we need to have our feet washed so that we will be ready to walk. 

Washing up

Remember what you were told as kids just after dinner was announced? In my house it was "Wash up!"

And I am sure that you’ve seen the signs: "employees must wash hands before returning to work." We are getting more and more used to it. 

The other day, I heard a little boy washing his hands with his dad. I loved hearing them both sang “happy birthday to you” because evidently the little boy learned in school that he needed to scrub that long to wash away the germs.

Look around. Almost everywhere, including in this church, you see bottles of sanitizer so people can clean their hands. Why? Well, we want to be clean, and we want to be healthy. And we are trying to protect ourselves from things we can’t see. And we’ve gotten used to seeing them everywhere: at the entries to stores, restaurants, doctor’s offices, medical buildings, hospitals, convenience store counters, even at Church. These past two years, we’ve gotten used to hand washing and sanitizing.

Hands, okay. But washing feet? 

Every year, I've heard the same thing when Holy Week rolls around. Whenever we invite people to have their feet washed, they often say “ugh” or “eww” or “no thank you!” But it was once part of everyday life but even in Biblical times, people got weird about washing feet.

There are three stories of foot washing in the Gospels, and each time someone is unhappy. In two of these, women wash Jesus feet. In Luke, a woman comes into a dinner party where Jesus was eating with both his disciples and with Pharisees and scribes, and washes his feet with her tears and dries them with her hair. In the Gospel of John, Mary of Bethany washes Jesus’ feet and anoints them with expensive perfume and also dries his feet with her hair.

In these cases, people were scandalized. In Luke, when Jesus allowed a woman to touch him and while she was at it took a typical ritual of hospitality and went overboard, the people in the room were scandalized. In John, Judas sniffs that expensive perfume used on his feet was wasted.

Tonight, we heard that Simon Peter protested, “You will never wash my feet.”  Not Jesus.  Not his master.  Not ever.  Still, there was Jesus with his wash basin and his towel.  He knelt in front of them one by one and washed their feet, calluses and all.

In all of these accounts, no one is upset that foot-washing per se is, well, yucky. It’s just that it should be done by someone else, preferably a servant, and whatever happens, no one should talk about it too much. In all three Gospel accounts, though, the person washing the feet draws attention to both the status of the washer and the status of the one being washed.

When Jesus was done washing his disciples feet, he told them why he did it.  “I’m setting an example for you,” he said.  “You also should do what I have done to you.” 

If we look at the precedents set, at least in the Gospel of John, look at what Jesus did. He reduced himself not only to the status of a slave, worse than that he is now at the level of women.

Shocking, yes, but it is at the heart of Jesus’ ministry and the reason he is heading to the cross. In Jesus’ action, he has flipped everything upside down. Servants are now at the heart of the Gospel. Those who are being served…the humble, the sick, the incarcerated, the poor, the outcast…are the head of the line in God’s reign.

The word “Maundy” for “Maundy Thursday” comes from the Latin for the new command that Jesus gives his disciples. We are no longer to settle for merely practicing the golden rule of treating others in the way we would like to be treated. To follow Jesus is more than simply being “nice.”

No. Jesus’ new commandment is to love one another as he has loved us. This new command is one where our love is to be love for it’s own sake, with no expectation for anything in return.

Jesus is sending his disciples—and us-- out into the world, into those crowds of people with all kinds of needs, fears, hopes, possibilities and foibles.. And what are we to do? We are to wash their feet. We are to share Jesus’ body and blood in broken bread and poured out wine. We are to baptize, washing people in water and the Holy Spirit so that they may be a part of God’s family, the Church. Jesus’ washing of feet teaches us that at the heart of the Gospel is to actively, practically love them because in the act of loving, both the lover and the loved is changed.

This Lent, I read a book called Priests de la Resistance!: The Loose Canons Who Fought Fascism in the Twentieth Century by a priest in the Church of England named The Rev. Fergus Butler-Gallie. In it, he describes the many clergy, nuns, monks, and Christian laity of several traditions who fought fascism, often resulting in death. It was a useful meditation on the sacrificial nature of Christian discipleship. But one does not have to experience martyrdom to understand and live the practical love of Jesus every day.

Mother Teresa of Calcutta once talked about the enormous job of being Christ’s people in a broken world. She said:

“People are unreasonable, illogical and self-centered. Love them anyway.

People are often unreasonable and self-centered. Forgive them anyway. 

If you are kind, people may accuse you of ulterior motives. Be kind anyway. 

If you are honest, people may cheat you. Be honest anyway. 

If you find happiness, people may be jealous. Be happy anyway. 

The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway. 

Give the world the best you have and it may never be enough. Give your best anyway. 

For you see, in the end, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.” 

Jesus demonstrates his new commandment to love one another as he loves us when he stoops to wash his disciples feet. He becomes the slave so that we can learn about the primacy of service. He will demonstrate it again when he will willingly give himself to the cross so that none of us have to face death with the same terror again. He lives, he dies, he serves so that we might have life and live in in service to others.

Now that we have been given this new commandment, just what are we to do now? Jesus’ answers when he takes up a towel and some water and gets down on his knees to serve: His answer: Love them anyway.

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Here is the bulletin for Maundy Thursday at St. John's Episcopal Church, Clearwater, FL

Here is a video of the liturgy.

Here is a video of the sermon.