Maundy Thursday: Duane W.H. Arnold
Maundy Thursday
The meal was done. The observance of Passover was complete. The week had started with triumph. As Jesus had come into the city, people had greeted him, laying palms in his path. He had turned his wrath upon the money changers and taught in the courtyard of the temple. Tonight, however, the mood had changed. No one could define the atmosphere – ominous, expectant or, perhaps, something unexpected would take place. As a small group in an upper room finished their meal, their leader, one Jesus of Nazareth, did something that placed all of us here in a direct line that takes us back to that room.
Then he took a loaf of bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” And he did the same with the cup after supper, saying, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood.”
On that first Maundy Thursday, Christ himself presided at the first eucharist. In the days before that evening, Christ had given himself to the world. He’d given himself as the messiah to the crowds waving palms. He had given himself as a judge to the money changers. He had given himself as a teacher to religious inquirers in the temple courtyard. Now, however, he gave himself to his own, to his followers, to his disciples. These were already marked by the baptism of John in the Jordan river, just as we are marked with baptism in the name of the Trinity. Here, in the seclusion of the upper room, hidden from the eyes of the world, he gives himself exclusively to the Church and to no one else.
“Given for you…” “Poured out for you…”
The following day, Good Friday, he would take upon himself the sin and suffering of the whole creation. He would offer himself for all, and to all, once again. Yet, even in his death and resurrection, he would provide for his followers. As St. Paul says, “don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.” Yet, while baptism is a once in a lifetime, at the altar, we may, again and again, as the Church, enter into his life, death and resurrection and find a foretaste of eternity.
“Given for you…” “Poured out for you…”
You see, through Christ the new age of eternity has come and is manifested in his Church. It is proclaimed through word and sacrament; through baptism and the eucharist. An while it is indeed true that the world with its suffering, and its death has not passed away, as another writer has said, “the new Kingdom has, nevertheless come, the promises are fulfilled, and life eternal is already given in an anticipatory manner to those who believe in Christ and live with him in his Church.” And tomorrow, Good Friday, we will liturgically encounter once more the turning point of history in that hour when Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was lifted on the cross and from that cross raised his triumphant cry to all nations and all ages and said, “It is finished…”
Seems likely that Jesus incorporated his supper into the seder, the cup after the supper was the cup of blessing, which Paul seems to confirm in I Co 10. His invitation to eat his body and drink his blood was consistent with his sermon in Jn 6 over the same matters.
Where is that quote from “the new kingdom has nevertheless come…” It does seem that his oath to not drink it again until the kingdom was possibly fulfilled when Jesus again presided at Clopas home signaling the new had been inaugurated.
I am not being dogmatic but adding to what might be interesting discussion. Jesus clearly was up to much when his “hour” came.
Alan,
I saw this sermon from Diane Butler Bass and almost sent it to you before other duties encroached..
“I’m often asked to preach on the Sunday after Easter. The traditional verses for that day are always the same in liturgical churches — John 20:19-31 — the story of Jesus’ first post-resurrection appearance, including the popular account known as “Doubting Thomas.”
One year, as I struggled to come up with a sermon on that perennial text, my attention drifted away from Thomas and back toward the first sentence of the story:
When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.”
“The house where the disciples had met” leaped from the page. What house? Of course! The house where, just a few days before they’d had the Passover meal. The house where Jesus had washed their feet and called them his friends. Where they had shared bread and wine — the house of the “upper room.” In the wake of Jesus’ execution and the strange reports from Mary Magdalene of Jesus in the garden, the frightened disciples had gone back to the upper room. Perhaps to grieve, perhaps to remember, perhaps to await what they thought would be their own arrest. But they had gone back to the room with the table, their last gathering place.
Thus, on the night of the resurrection, Jesus showed up there. With his friends. At the scene of the Last Supper. On Easter, Jesus goes from the tomb back to the table.
If you are writing a play about this, the scenes would be table, trial (with its various locations), cross, tomb (burial), tomb (resurrection), and table. The table is the first setting, and it is the final setting of the story. Indeed, when the disciples want to meet Jesus again the next week, they return again to the upper room to meet him at the table.
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?
Every Holy Week, Christians move toward Good Friday as the most somber — and most significant — day of the year. Depending on your tradition, your may sit in silence, reverence a cross, listen to a sermon, recite the Seven Last Words, fast in quiet prayer. You may weep, sing mournful hymns, feel the weight of injustice. It is sobering business, keeping watch with the execution of an innocent man. For centuries, Christians have been told that everything changed that day, the cross was the bridge between the sinful world and the world of salvation. The cross is all that matters.
Somber, yes. The most somber day. Of course. But what if it isn’t the most significant? What if the most significant day was the day before — the day of foot washing and the supper, the day of conviviality and friendship, the day of Passover and God’s liberation? What if we’ve gotten the week’s emphasis wrong?
Christians mostly think of Maundy Thursday as the run-up to the real show on Friday. And, because the church has placed such emphasis on Friday, we interpret Thursday through the events of the cross. Thus, when Jesus shares bread and wine with his friends, it becomes a prefiguring of his broken body and the shedding of his blood for the forgiveness of sins. We return to the cross all the time. We see Thursday through Friday. From that angle, it becomes morbid. A doomed man’s final meal while the execution clock ticks.
But his friends didn’t experience it that way. They weren’t thinking about a cross or a blood sacrifice. They saw Friday through Thursday. They were celebrating Passover. They were in Jerusalem with friends and family (not just twelve guys at a long table — sorry Leonardo) at a big, busy, bustling holiday meal to commemorate God freeing their ancestors from slavery. Passover is a joyful meal, not a somber one. And, because Passover was about liberation from a hostile oppressor, it was fraught with political expectations and possibilities. Would God free them likewise from Rome? Was the promised kingdom at hand? They were thinking about their history and their future, and they were enjoying the supper together.
Jesus loved meals. They knew that. They’d shared so many. Go back through the gospels and see how many of the stories take place at tables, distributing food, or inviting people to supper. Indeed, some have suggested that Jesus primary work was organizing suppers as a way to embody the coming kingdom of God. Throughout his ministry, Jesus welcomed everyone — to the point of contention with his critics — to the table. Tax collectors, sinners, women, Gentiles, the poor, faithful Jews, and ones less so. Jesus was sloppy with supper invitations. He never thought about who would be seated next to whom. He made the disciples crazy with his lax ideas about dinner parties. All he wanted was for everybody to come, to be at the table, and share food and conversation.
“I think of Jesus,” wrote theologian Beatrice Bruteau, “setting up these Suppers somewhat on the order of the ‘base communities’ of liberation theology.” Gatherings of the Kingdom of God.
Bruteau continues by quoting Rabbi Kushner on Sabbath meals:
And the laughing. The sharing. And the singing. One melody is scarcely spent when another comes forward. We don’t even notice the racket of the children. There is a great holiness in this room. It grows with the sharing. [I take a large ceramic Kiddush cup, fill it with wine, offer it to my wife and then to the man next to me, who] hands it to his wife with the solemn instruction, “Here, keep it going.” And we do. From hand to hand. Drunk from and refilled. Time and time again.
Sabbath. A vision of the kingdom of God. The meal reminds us and continues the promise.
What if Maundy Thursday was that? The Last Supper of the Old World. The last meal under Rome, the last meal under any empire. And it is the First Feast of the Kingdom That Has Come. The first meal of the new age, the world of mutual service, reciprocity, equality, abundance, generosity, and unending thanksgiving. Pass the cup, keep it going, hand to hand, filled and refilled, time after time. This night is the final night of dominion, the end of slavery; and this night is the first night of communion, the beginning of true freedom: “I will no longer call you servants but friends.”
This table is the hinge of history. The table is the point. Thursday is the Last Supper and the First Feast. The Holy Thursday Revolution.
Pull up a chair. Bring a friend.
I think Diane Butler Bass makes some excellent observations. However, Paul in his preaching emphasizes the cross and the crucified Lord. So I think we need to consider that as well.
Thanks Michael, what a beautiful sermon that is. And to Jean’s point the table is exactly what Paul emphasized. The table is the consideration and proclamation of the crucifixion. The table is how the cross is administered to us daily. The table is the one who gave himself for us giving himself to us.
Yes what a beautiful message from Diane Butler Bass. What a beautiful day.
Alan
See Raymond Brown on this question… Death of the Messiah, volume two…