+ Maundy Thursday – March 29th,
2018 +
Exodus 12:1-14; 1 Corinthians 11:23-32; John 13:1-17, 31-35
Redeemer Lutheran, HB
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
Sometimes a meal is more than a meal, more than nutrition,
energy, and stomach-growling prevention. Sometimes the meal takes on a life of
its own. Thanksgiving, Christmas, or Sunday dinners with family or close
friends. The final meal of an inmate on death-row. A wedding reception and the
cake. Eating is often about far more than eating.
On their last night in Egypt, during their last hours of captivity,
the Israelites partook of a meal that was far more than a meal. It was a simple
menu. No garnish or flourish of culinary excellence. Nothing was chosen for its
nutritional content or its outstanding flavor pallet. In fact, one item was
chosen precisely because of its bad taste. The Israelites ate bitter herbs, for
the task-masters had embittered their lives for centuries, daily grinding them
in slavery. As cows chew their cud, the Israelites were to chew these herbs,
year after year, as an edible token of the bad taste left in their mouths from
the acidic years in bondage.
Unleavened bread was also on the menu. Unleavened because
Pharaoh would oust them from his land before the yeast had time to work its way
through the dough. It was the bread of affliction. Eaten in haste because they
left Egypt in haste, before Pharaoh changed his mind yet again. They ate the
unleavened bread on their feet. It was the original fast food, yet sacred.
Israel had to eat and run.
The bitter herbs were a dish of remembrance, and the unleavened
bread anticipated their hasty departure. So, too, the main course, the roasted
flesh of the sacrificial lamb. A meal that was more than a meal. The lamb was
for them now, but it also pointed them to something yet to come. The roasted Passover
lamb was a present, tangible sign that an innocent victim had been slaughtered
in their stead, only a few short hours before. The Angel of Death would pass
over their homes, sparing their firstborn sons, while passing into the homes of
unbelievers, leaving a trail of blood in his wake.
Above and around the entrance to the homes of the faithful was
painted the blood of the Passover lamb. It was a crimson hieroglyphic which
translated into one saving message: “Pass over, O angel. God’s child lives
here.” As the Israelites tasted the meat, they knew that neither they nor their
sons would taste death. Their Good Shepherd had prepared a table before them in
the presence of their enemies, a table that gave them light and life as they
walked through the valley of the shadow of Egypt.
The Passover lamb, the Paschal lamb was a meal that bestowed YHWH’s
present promise and blessing and, looked forward to his future blessing. The Passover
lamb proclaimed a message that extended well beyond that night, and beyond the
many Passover celebrations to come. Indeed, the whole meal – the bitter herbs,
unleavened bread, and roasted lamb – this entire meal was an edible prophecy.
This meal foretold a promise that they could sink their teeth into. It promised
that what the Israelites were eating was but an appetizer, a foretaste of the
feast to come.
Sometimes a meal is more than a meal. So it is tonight as well.
We have simple eating and drinking, but it is far more than eating and
drinking. Here is a table where the things of heaven are brought down into the
things of earth. Here is where God comes down to us in our bondage to sin, not
to kill his enemies, but to deliver us, to place his sacred body and blood into
our mouth.
Once again, God feeds us, his people, his new Israel. Only this
time, Jesus is the Passover Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Once
again, YHWH dwells with his people and spreads a table in the midst of our
enemies. Once again, YHWH uses the ordinary things of creation to make his New
and better Passover. Bread. Wine. Nothing to win you a Food Network Allstar
award.
Once again, God wraps himself in the disguise of utter simplicity
and ordinariness to save you. Water. Words. Bread. Wine. Suffering,
Crucifixion. For you.
Take, eat, this simple bread is his body. It is the body of
the Lamb who was not passed over but passed under the knife for you. Jesus passed
under the court of the Sanhedrin, the sentence of spineless Pilate, the soldiers’
whips. Jesus passed under the beams of his cross, our guilt, shame, and all the
evil this world could heap onto him. Jesus passed under the Father’s verdict
over our sin – guilty for you. He who knew no sin became sin for you. No knife slices
his throat open, as the Passover lambs of the Old Testament, but “nails, spear,
shall pierce him through, The cross he bore for me, for you.”
Behold, the Lamb of God skewered on the beams of that cruel
tree, all the flames of hell and God’s wrath, add to that the firewood of our
iniquities, leapt up beneath this perfect sacrifice. Take, eat. This is my body
given for you. Taste and see that the Lord. The Lamb of God, is good for you.
So good, in fact, that in eating this meal, you are what you eat. Forgiven.
Alive. Free.
Take, drink, this simple wine is his blood. It is the
lifeblood of the Lamb given and shed for you. He gave his blood for you when he
was already 8 days old. He gave his blood for you as he prayed in Gethsemane: Father,
if it be possible to let this cup pass from me, nevertheless, not my will but
yours be done.” He gave his blood for you as the whips tore into his muscles
and the thorns stabbed his brow, and finally when the spear breached the dam of
his flesh to spill his blood and water and fill every chalice and font of his
church with his life given for you.
Take, eat. This is the body of Christ. Take, drink. This is
the blood of Christ. Whoever
feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will
raise him up on the last day.
Sometimes a meal is more than a meal. For here is a meal that
takes on a life of its own, or, rather, that takes the life of its maker, and
gives it to you. And in taking this meal into yourself, you take on his life as
your own. You Passover from death to life.
A blessed Maundy Thursday to each
of you…
In the Name of the Father and of
the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment