In Remembrance of Me

Maundy Thursday, March 28, 2024 – Mark 14: 17-31 Mark 14: 32-50 Also Psalm 116: 1-2, 12-19, 1 Corinthians 11:23-26

When Jesus and his followers gathered the night before he was crucified, they weren’t just meeting up for a friendly meal. They were marking the feast of the Passover, the Jewish commemoration of their ancestors’ liberation by God from slavery in Egypt.

Jesus was born into an area of the Galilee that had been under Roman occupation since its conquering about 60 years before. The Jews in that area could not determine their own future, and they had to pay oppressive taxes to the Empire. There was a lot of unrest.

We can only imagine how eager the people were for a Messiah to deliver them again from bondage as they knew God had delivered their ancestors.

Every year they would gather to remember the powerful way in which God delivered them from Pharaoh. They would retell how God brought plague after plague upon the nation of Egypt, finally bringing about the deaths of the first born children of every household. The only thing that kept the Hebrews safe was the blood of the sacrificial lambs that were painted on their doorways. Then of course they heard of the Red Sea being parted to allow the Hebrews to cross safely while all of Egypt’s soldiers were drowned.

It’s said that in ancient times, kings would hold great feasts after their victories in battle. They’d lift up a cup of wine and drink deeply from it “as a symbol of deliverance and thanksgiving.” This is the reason the psalmist says, “I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord.” Lifting the cup of salvation is a way of giving thanks for the victory, for the saving acts of God that have already been accomplished.

It may have been easy and exhilarating to join up with Moses and God to fight the good fight after such impressive displays of power. But it seems like it wasn’t so easy for the disciples to stick with Jesus when his pathway seemed headed for disaster rather than victory.

In the portion of the gospel text that you’ve heard so far in the service, we see Jesus predict that he will be betrayed by someone at the table, that Peter will deny him three times before morning, and that all his followers will desert him.

“No, no,” they all say. “Even if we have to die alongside you, we will never deny you.” But it’s not easy to stay the course when everything is falling apart.

As we’ll hear toward the end of this service, Jesus knows what he’s facing, and he becomes very distressed and agitated. He asks his three closest friends, Peter, James, and John, to stay with him, to keep him company, and to keep watch with him.

In the garden, he throws himself on the ground in desperation, begging for God to rescue him from what is about to come. Through all of this, his friends have fallen asleep. Think about that, Jesus is at his most troubled, the place where he needs his friends the most, and they can’t keep their eyes open. It’s easy for us to pass judgment, but I think this text shows us how hard it is for us to face our deepest fears. We can’t even bear to look at them.

But Jesus faces his fears head on. He prays, “Abba, Father, for you all things are possible; remove this cup; yet, not what I want, but what you want.” Let’s break this down into four different actions.

First, Jesus acknowledges his intimacy with God. The Aramaic word “abba” can basically be understood as meaning “Daddy.” Then he acknowledges God’s power. Notice that the power doesn’t come first. It’s the intimacy and relationship that come first. Does that tell us that God’s power comes through relationship?

Third, Jesus asks for the cup to be removed, for him to be relieved of this heavy and deadly burden. Finally, he accepts what is before him and gives his consent to his path. I have to believe that Jesus could have walked away if he’d really wanted to. He could have avoided Jerusalem at the most volatile time of the year. He could have avoided confrontation with the authorities. He could have avoided the garden where Judas betrayed him. But he did none of those things.

That’s how committed Jesus was to embodying the truth he knew about our relationship with God. This truth was so powerful that even in the face of betrayal, denials, and complete abandonment by his closest friends, Jesus would not betray the truth of his experience of the Love of God.

One of the things that has always amazed me about this Passover meal, this last supper Jesus eats with his friends, is that he shares the bread and wine even with Judas and with the ones who would all deny him and desert him.

As Nic Burleson suggests, and Sharon Vanati further conveys on Instagram, “Jesus fed Judas too. Jesus washed Judas’ feet too. I struggle to fathom what kind of love this is…a love that would feed the mouth that deceived you. A love that would wash the feet of the traitor. A love that could forgive even the vilest of betrayals.” And then, she says, “I realize that I’m Judas too! And in that moment, I’m so thankful and altogether overwhelmed that Judas ate too.”

Judas ate and we can eat. No matter what we did yesterday or what we will do tomorrow.

This meal that we celebrate today and every Sunday is bigger than any one person. There is something happening here at both a cosmic and fundamental level that has nothing to do with our individual actions or responses. And that’s why Jesus could lift the cup of salvation, even though he knew the horrible death he was facing at the hands of the Roman empire. He could lift the cup of salvation because he knew the victory was already assured. He knew that the physical world and all of its deadly powers and principalities can never defeat the spiritual world and the Love of God. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness does not overcome it.

Our eucharist re-enacts a cosmic story of resurrection and new life, and we repeat that ritual today and every Sunday. Why do we do this? Why do we believe in the presence of Christ in these simple elements before us? We do it because when we see Christ in these simple elements and take them into our bodies, we are claiming our identity in God.

We are strengthened by this ritual, this remembrance, because it brings into our current time the force field of Jesus, his followers, and all the saints and witnesses who have gone before us.

We receive faith from their faith, we receive hope from their hope, we receive love and compassion from their love and compassion. This is the ever-flowing process of life – the past flows forward into the present, we bring it to life in this moment, and then we send it forward with our energy to grace the next moment, and the next gathering of Jesus followers. We do this in remembrance of Jesus, of the one who comes to set us free from anything and everything that holds us captive and keeps us from the life and the love of God.