April 17 -- Maundy Thursday

Listen to this sermon HERE.

I’m thinking about your feet this holy evening.

I’m wondering where your feet have taken you.  

Think about your feet with me for a moment.  Where have they gone?

Perhaps your feet have walked life’s bumpy road.  Valleys and hills, dark streets and maybe even gutters.  I wonder if your feet have been exposed through the years -- cut up by sharp edges, burned and hardened over time...

Or perhaps your feet have always travelled well.  Perhaps they toddled along on a soft nursery carpet when you were little, ran on a padded track in high school, and walked a gentle meandering suburban path into adulthood.   And now pedicured, massaged and slipped into comfortable, even expensive, shoes.

Maybe your feet have trudged through the mud of battle, laced up tightly in combat boots.  Maybe your feet have flattened out after years of wearing sandals in warm climates.  
Maybe your feet have never really been comfortable because someone told you that shoes say too much about you, so you best not go it sloppy.  Or maybe your feet never worked or looked quite like everyone else’s, so you’ve been hiding them and hiding from so many things.  I’m thinking about your feet this evening.

And I’m wondering if Jesus knows these things about your feet.  Does he know the roads you’ve walked?  The battles you’ve fought?  Does he know the steps you haven’t taken and wrong turns you have?  Does he know the pain that your feet have been through?  And does he care?  They’re good questions, very real questions:  Does Jesus care about what I’ve gone through, what I’m going through now, and what is before me? [pause]

We come to the end of our Lenten journey and we ask these questions.

And here’s where we stop wondering:  When Jesus pulls out a towel and kneels before us with a basin.  And takes your foot -- with all its imperfections and irregularities and sores and smells -- takes your tired foot in one hand and pours water over it with the other.  Here’s where we stop wondering if God knows our sorrows:  When that cool water rushes over your foot and you feel the shock of God’s presence, the surprise of God’s love, the refreshment of God’s forgiveness.  Here’s where we stop wondering:  When Jesus uses that towel to wipe our feet dry, with a tickle and a tingle.    

Even if Jesus doesn’t kneel before us in the same bodily form as he did those many years ago, but sisters and brothers in Christ, know that Jesus kneels before us still in a bodily form -- in the form of our bodies, as we kneel before one another and wash each others feet.

You may or may not choose to have your feet washed here tonight.  At the least, you will have a visual of this tonight.  And you will see Jesus tonight!  Don’t be mistaken: God is still here.  

I was reading about how they’ve done this in the Vatican, how the pope will wash top cardinals feet.  And they represent the 12 apostles.  Last year, Pope Francis rocked the boat in the Roman Catholic world by washing criminals’ and women’s feet.  Here in San Diego, they make a big deal about our Lutheran and Episcopalian bishops washing the feet of homeless people in Point Loma.  And while this is all wonderful and make for great photo ops, I’m concerned about such a narrow view of this practice...as if only popes and bishops can be the ones in the role of Christ.  

Jesus says in our Gospel tonight:  “I give you a new commandment [Maundy Thursday = Mandate Thursday] that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”  It’s not about the super saintly people bending down and washing the feet of the sinners; it’s saints washing sinners and sinners washing saints and us realizing that we’re both, and that we’re called to help each other and care for each other, not because we’re going get prizes for it, but simple because Jesus told us to.  [unpack - be washed first and then turn and wash, off to the side]

Jesus Christ is our commander as Christ-ian people.  And our superior officer just commanded us to wash one another’s feet, to share one another’s burdens, forgive one another’s sins and wrong turns and imperfections and odors.

Jesus knows what’s about to happen to him, that he’s about to undergo tremendous suffering and be hoisted up onto on a cross to die.  And yet, he spends these final hours telling his disciples what’s most important: That we love one another...and this is what that loves looks like.  

Let us wash one another’s feet, tonight literally...and in our lives figuratively.  What does it mean to you to wash one another’s feet?  To swallow our selfish pride, to go the extra mile, to forgive those who have wronged us, to do the right thing, even if it means letting ourselves be ridiculed.  

The brother or sister who will wash your feet tonight is the face of Christ, the very body of Christ, knelt down before you, Don’t be fooled.  Look on one another this evening and remember, we are the face of Christ for this world.  They will know Christ only through our loving deeds...and here’s what that looks like.  Sisters and brothers in Christ, you are seeing Jesus before you tonight.  Don’t be like Peter, don’t be above it; let Jesus wash your feet here and now.  This is real, this us being the church of Jesus Christ, this is loving one another as he commanded.  

Christ takes our feet, no matter where they’ve been -- and our whole lives, no matter what we’ve done, into his hands -- lovingly holds us, washes us, forgives us, and commands us to do the same.  AMEN.