+John 13.1-15
Ma nishtana halayla hazeh mikol halleilot?
Why is this night different from all other nights?
This is the first question posed at the beginning of every Passover meal, the Seder. This opening question, asked by the youngest person sitting at the sacred table, begins a catechetical dialog that is interwoven throughout the shared meal. Much like our shared meal of holy remembrance in the Eucharist, Our Seder; the Jewish Seder is both nourishment for the body and teaches the next generation the story Israel’s Exodus out of Egypt and bondage, out of slavery into redeemed freedom; just like Our Lord’s Supper is our remembrance of our redemption from the slavery of sin in the life of Jesus the Christ. The purpose of the question as well as the unfolding answers is intended to preserve the faith, to relive (to the best of our modern abilities) that experience and to re-member why it is that we gather around our sacred tables feasting copiously on our symbolic foods.
So, as the youngest member of your parish Clergy staff, it is my job to ask you on this night, the first night of our Passover… “Why is this night different from all other nights?”
This night is different because on this night, gathered around our table, proclaiming the messianic truth of Christ’s anointed-ness, and assembled in Christian love, agape; we Proclaim the New Covenant of God revealed in Jesus of Nazareth even in the face of consternation EVEN with the looming shadow of the Cross awaiting on the morrows rising.
“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”(John 13.34-35).
That commandment is the real Maundy of Maundy Thursday. Jesus’ mandate/commandment/Maundy or Law was not that we go around washing everyone’s feet…although it’s a good place to start. The real mandatum, the new covenant of Christ is this: love one another. No small feat however simple a commandment, a major miracle in and of itself, is it not dear Church?
Perhaps on Tuesday morning, the first full day of the Jewish Passover, you were reading an article in the New York Times by Michael Slackman claiming that Egyptian archaeologists on a whole agree that the Plagues of God, the manumission of the Israelites, the parting of the Red Sea, and their Exodus from Egypt all never took place. There simply is no historical, geological, or archeological evidence to suggest the events of 1300BCE ever occurred.
And perhaps you remember on February 26, while you were groggily drinking you coffee and eating your cheerios (a sacred meal to many) with the ‘Today Show’ blaring in the background, Meredith Viera, along with movie producer James Cameron (of ‘Titanic’ fame) and Israeli-born investigative journalist Simcha Jacobovici with great typical journalistic gravitas and showmanship announced to the world that they have found and scientifically proven the existence of Jesus’ tomb, laying side-by-side with his wife, Mary Magdalene, and their supposed son, Judah. All the while raising the ears and hackle of billions of Christians, by saying that not only did the resurrection not happen…trying with all the might the media can bear to de-bunk our Christian miracle story of the bodily resurrection of Christ, but that Jesus was married and had a son. Of course the announcement and fanfare was all advance of the documentary debut on eth Discovery Channel on March 2. Is that another ‘miracle of our faith thrown ‘out the door’ for the sake of mass media?
What do we do with these sorts of things? I say so what! We’re still here as followers of Christ. Jesus teachings are still relevant to the furthering of God’s Kingdom no matter what. It doesn’t matter!
We gather here this night, different from all other nights, to remember a miracle: the miracle of Love. Tonight in stark contrast to all other protestations and exposés of the secular world we attest to Christ’s miraculous commandment even as he prepares for his death at the hands of the principalities and powers of his own day.
It is a miracle that in this day and age, in this society of ME and of self-interest, that we gather this evening to recognize a true miracle of Faith… that we stand and profess the power of Divine Humility; divine, self-sacrificing love.
The miracle of this type of love is one that is harder to swallow in today’s world than even our profession of Christ’ resurrection.
All around, our corporate and consumer-minded society over and over again tries to debunk the miraculous nature of self-sacrificing love. Yet, we stand here as the assembled body of Christ to say to a world that glorifies power at any cost, that accepts gluttonous consumption of natural resources, that inculcates a gospel of self-interested promotion; we feast at this table to say: in Christ there is a different way in this world, but not of it.
Our miraculous leap toward discipleship is our profession that Christ our King came in Great Humility. True Kingship in the Kingdom o Jesus of Nazareth commands you and me to take on the role servant, to be willing to perform the humbling ministry in service others, as exemplified by Jesus, God’s son, washing the feet of his disciples .
True leadership leads from behind; not out of weakness, but to ensure that everyone will make it to safety that all will feast at the Table so that not one person is left behind; afterall, a shepherd guides his flocks from the rear not from the front.
In a world of ravenous lions, rabid dogs, bullish-bears and bear-like bulls, Jesus came as a lamb. That is our miracle; that is our blessing. This night is different from all others because we choose to profess that true discipleship is rooted in Love, Humility, Charity, and service.
Discipleship of Christ is Love. “Love is patient, love is kind, it is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Cor. 13.4-7).
Keep this miracle alive. Show the world that by Christ’s Love, and with Christ’s Love, and in Christ’s Love; we are fit and able disciples. Remember this night, remember this feast, so that God’s kingdom of servants will forever in love.
Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us, therefore let us keep the feast.
