What are we doing here?

Maundy Thursday, 2018, John 13:34-35 I give you a new commandment, 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.

What are we doing here? This night, when we celebrate the origins of our weekly Eucharistic celebration, is the perfect night to ask that question. What are we doing here? It’s appropriate that we ask it of ourselves, because I guarantee you it’s a question more and more people, especially the growing percentage of our population who are “nones” and don’t have any affiliation or experience with a church, are asking themselves about us. I once read an analogy by someone who said we Christians are in grave danger of being like an old boating club. Visitors walk into the club…At first they are engaged by the interesting stories about boating they hear, and the fascinating boating artifacts and antiques they find sitting around the club, but these newcomers soon find that the club members just sit around talking about boating—they never actually get out on the water any more—and they haven’t for years. The visitors walk away, confused and sad and frustrated, never to come back, wondering if they should take up soccer instead.

You can tell this story must be an old one, because it quaintly talks about visitors “walking in.” The truth is, today, the story would have to go something more like this: Boat clubs everywhere are shutting their doors, because no newcomers just “walk into” the clubs to join. Fewer and fewer people think boating is a worthwhile activity, because the actions of the boating clubs that actually do get out on the water remind them of that scene from the movie Titanic when most all of the lifeboats pull away from the huge ship half-empty—because the passengers in them don’t want to mix with the wrong type of people. Rather than throwing the drowning people lifesavers, the folks in these boats actually push people away. It’s so bad the very name “boating” is being looked on by many with scorn…

What are we doing here?

Tonight, on our Maundy Thursday, I think back on another group of boaters--those disciples gathered around the table with Jesus on that first Maundy Thursday. I imagine them asking that same question—"What we doing here? We thought we were here to start a revolution—didn’t we just arrive in Jerusalem with Jesus in a triumphal parade, to the sounds of the people shouting “Hosanna to the King, the son of David?” But now, Jesus is saying and doing very confusing things: Jesus is trying to wash our feet; Jesus is saying that, just as he washes our feet, we should follow his servant-example and wash the feet of others. And Jesus is talking about going away, saying he will only be with us a little longer…What are we doing here?”

I give you a new commandment, 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.

What are we doing here? What should we be doing here? This past week, our Presiding Bishop Michael Curry joined with other denominational leaders—Episcopal, Baptist, Methodist, Reformed, and Evangelical—and issued a joint letter, a statement and call to action, that urges us to think about that question. The letter can be found at the website ReclaimingJesus.org. Let me read a bit of the beginning of this letter for you:

We are living through perilous and polarizing times as a nation, with a dangerous crisis of moral and political leadership at the highest levels of our government and in our churches. We believe the soul of the nation and the integrity of faith are now at stake…The question we face is this: Who is Jesus Christ for us today? What does our loyalty to Christ, as disciples, require at this moment in our history?

This brief letter goes on with just a few simple statements that crystalize what we as disciples of Jesus believe, and what the implications of those beliefs are. Here is my paraphrase and comment on them:

• We believe that every single human being is made in God’s image and likeness, and is equally loved by God, and is freely offered grace through Jesus. Therefore, everyone, everyone, should be given dignity, and respect, and care. There can be no second- or third-class people who don’t make it to the lifeboats. We are all one body; there can be no oppression based on race, gender, identity, class, or anything else that falsely divides and segregates us. We must speak up and reach out to ensure this.
• We believe that the ways we treat the hungry, the thirsty, the naked, the stranger, the sick, and the prisoner are how we treat Christ himself. God calls us to protect and seek justice for all those, all those, who are poor and vulnerable. Our treatment of people who are “oppressed,” “strangers,” “outsiders,” or otherwise considered “marginal” is a test of our relationship to God.
• We believe that truth is morally central to our personal and public lives. Truth-telling is fundamental to the prophetic biblical tradition, and our vocation as the priesthood of all believers includes speaking the Word of God in our societies and speaking the truth to power. We always see only in part, through a glass darkly—yet working to recognize our biases, and searching diligently and openly for truth, and respecting truth, is crucial to anyone who follows Christ.
• We believe that Christ’s way of leadership is servanthood, not domination. In today’s reading at the foot washing we heard Jesus say, “So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you.” Disrespect for the rule of law, replacing civility with dehumanizing hostility toward opponents, neglecting the ethic of public service and accountability in favor of personal recognition and gain—bolstered by offensive arrogance—are not just political issues. They raise deeper concerns about idolatry of power and wealth, and the very nature of authority as a God-given, sacred covenant and trust.

My friends, Jesus sent his disciples out into the world, he sends you and me out into the world, to love and heal and reconcile, to bring the Good News of the Kingdom of God. We must answer the question, “What are we doing here?” We are not manning half-empty lifeboats, abandoning a sinking ship of a world—we are the world’s first responders, like the Red Cross, speeding towards what might have been a disaster—but is not—because there is ultimately hope for us and hope for the world—hope for the world that God created and Jesus redeemed and the Holy Spirit sanctifies—hope for the world that God so loves—because there is salvation—because—Jesus. What are we doing here? We are confessing that we believe the crazy way of self-giving love Jesus shows us throughout the Triduum of Holy Week is the way of God’s abundant life. What are we doing here? We are refusing to let go of resurrection hope, even though we each pass through Good Friday. What are we doing here? We are experiencing, in this brief time together, ancient things becoming new as music and poetry and incense and scripture and prayer give us a foretaste of God’s heavenly banquet. What are we doing here? We are meeting Jesus in sacrament and in the faces of each other, being forgiven, being renewed, and being equipped to serve a broken world.

What are we doing here?

We are following Jesus, on the way of the cross, to resurrection hope.

I give you a new commandment, 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.