Sermon - Maundy Thursday 2018 - John 13:1-15,33-35

For many centuries the church has gathered together on Maundy Thursday, the night when Jesus instituted the Lord’s Supper, the night when Jesus was betrayed by Judas, to hear the gospel account from St. John of Jesus washing His disciples’ feet. Interestingly enough, nowhere in John’s Gospel does Jesus institute the Lord’s Supper. That account is present in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and 1 Corinthians, but not John. Nevertheless, we do learn something about the Lord’s Supper in John’s Gospel as well. John’s not instituting a new sacrament of foot washing, He’s teaching us about the Lord’s Supper by teaching us about Jesus’ humility. For when we learn about Jesus we also learn about His supper. Tonight we learn that Christ loves us by His humble service through cleansing us of our sins.

Tonight’s Gospel is framed within the context of the crucifixion: “When Jesus knew that His hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father.” Not only that, but more specifically it’s framed within the context of Him being betrayed by Judas: “the devil had already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon’s Son, to betray Him.” Within the context of His betrayal and eventual crucifixion, this is when it says that “Jesus loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.” In response to betrayal, He shows love and compassion. 

Jesus, in great humility, “rose from supper. He laid aside his outer garments, and taking a towel, tied it around his waist. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him.” It was customary in those days that a servant would wash people’s feet of all of the muck and grime from the road. As they were already through with the meal, it was obvious that there was no servant coming to wash their feet. So Jesus, their Lord and Master, knelt down and washed His apostles’ feet.

This wasn’t a glamorous job or task. People travelled everywhere on foot, often times with animals, and it wouldn’t have been uncommon to walk through excrement from various animals. These feet were dirty, to say the least. This was a job fit for a servant, which is why Peter exclaims with incredulity “Lord, do you wash my feet? You shall never wash my feet!” This is a job for a servant, not Jesus who is their Teacher and Lord. 

Yet Jesus is their, and our, Teacher and Lord who has come to serve. “Do you understand what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet.” Jesus, who is not only our Teacher and Lord, but our Creator and our God, the Father has sent Him as a servant who humbles Himself for us in order to serve us.  This is the kind of love that Jesus has for His people who are in the world. 

This self-sacrificial love is what Jesus does and embodies so that we might partake in Him. He says “If I do not wash you, you have no share with Me.” So Peter, who most certainly doesn’t want to be cut off from Jesus, asks that his hands and head would be washed as well. But he’s still missing the point, it’s not the amount of water but it’s about Jesus who's doing the washing. Jesus is the one who has to serve us by cleansing us from all of our sin to make us wholly and completely clean. 

Baptism and the Lord’s Supper therefore are made valid because it is Jesus who serves us. When you were baptized, it was Christ who humbled Himself to wash you from your guilt and iniquity. When you received the absolution this evening, it was Christ who became your servant and forgave you. Though you saw only a minister, it was Christ who did it. When you receive the Lord’s Supper, you may see and taste and smell only bread and wine, but it is Jesus’ body and blood because He says that it is. 

Christ is He who takes the place of our servant, and He washes not only our feet and our hands and our head, but He completely cleanses us from within as He is betrayed and crucified on account of our sins against Him. Jesus is the servant who has been betrayed not by Judas alone, but by our sinful hands. Yet on the cross He served the death penalty for even your sin against Him. He washes your feet by forgiving your sins.

So as Christ’s followers, He teaches us a new commandment this evening, that as He has served us so we ought to serve our neighbor. We, like Him, ought to humble ourselves before our neighbor and wash their feet by forgiving their sins. Though they insult us, defame us, and mistreat us, so we forgive them as Christ has done for us. We let go of grudges, we forsake the way of hatred, and we forgive. 

Christ forgives you and in this Holy Sacrament He has given you His body and blood which contains pure forgiveness. Here you are cleansed wholly and completely. Here our betrayed and crucified God reveals Himself to you as a servant in the humble form of bread and wine. Dear Christian, here is God’s humble servant to you, who loves you to the end, even to the cross.