Maundy Thursday
“Mandatum novum.” “I give you
a new commandment.”
That’s where we get the
name for this day - “Maundy Thursday”.
It comes from the Latin, mandatum
novum - “I give you a new commandment.”
Today marks a shift. During most of Lent we are engaged in a recreation
of Jesus’ wandering in the wilderness before he begins his earthly
ministry. We submit ourselves to an
annual season of spiritual wandering – examining those ways in which we have
grown separate from God, and hopefully marking those separations with occasions
of repentance, turning ourselves ever more God-ward. It’s in the context of that repentance and
reconciliation that we can enter fully into the joy of the Resurrection.
But today, our focus
shifts. We enter the Triduum – the final
days of preparation for Easter. Where we
had been wandering, we now press forward – toward a certain goal. And with a new commandment to lead our way.
It’s remarkable that our
first stop along the way is what it is: the institution of the Lord’s Supper.
On the night before Jesus
was to be betrayed, and beaten, and humiliated, and eventually killed - before
all of that, he took one final moment of personal privilege. He gathered around a table for fellowship
with his friends - the people whom he had called on this strange journey with
him, and the ones who had left everything behind to follow him. In one final act of private, intimate love,
he shared a meal with them, and his final words of advice.
“Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you should also love
one another.”
After the miracles
surrounding his birth… After his
childhood wandering away from his parents in the temple… After the teachings… After the feeding and the healing… After all the signs and wonders… It all comes down to this.
“Love one another.”
That’s what it’s all been
about.
In the dark days ahead,
that’s what it will be about then, too.
I think it sometimes gets
lost on us - in the ritual and the familiarity of Sunday after Sunday - but
that’s what it’s about each time we gather around this table, too. It’s about remembering that we are one body.
We come from our various
lives and positions and experiences. We
all have our own joys and traumas and sadnesses and concerns. There is so much that makes us seem
dis-membered.
But the bread breaks, and
the wine is poured out, and as we all take our own little piece of it, we
become united in the bread and in the cup.
We remember the new commandment, and we are re-membered into the Body of
Christ we were called to be.
This is the sacrifice to
which Jesus called us.
This is the sacrifice
that Jesus modeled for us.
The sacrifice of praise
and thanksgiving.
Taking what was
dismembered and re-membering it.
That’s the new
commandment. Remember how I have loved
you, and love each other just that lavishly.
Just that recklessly. Love one
another in risky and sacrificial ways.
Just love.
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