MAUNDY THURSDAY Sermon
Text: John 13:1-17, 31b-35 – loving by
example
Children are really good at watching
their parents and imitating them.
So as parents we always need to be
careful about what we say and do around young impressionable children so we
teach them right.
When you see a child misbehave or use
swear words in public you actually look at the parents and blame them rather
than the child.
Today, as God’s children, Jesus is
leaving us an example that he wants us to follow as well.
And it comes as an object lesson and
a verbal lesson.
The object lesson is he washes his
disciples’ feet.
The lesson here is one of
servanthood.
Jesus had turned things around so
much that Peter objected to what he was doing – I need to wash YOUR feet and
yet you wash mine.
As Christians we are sent into the
world to serve one another and turn things around in the world.
We are called to look for ways that
we can help one another which goes against the view of looking after yourself
first.
We are sent to look for ways that we
can build one another up rather than tearing down others to build ourselves up.
So Jesus gets down on his hands and
knees and washes his disciples’ feet.
Totally unheard of for a master to
lower themselves below their servant.
But that’s what Jesus did – he came
as a servant – not to be served but to serve.
It’s an object lesson on how we are
to treat one another – to look for opportunities to help others in need and
sometimes that means lowering ourselves and putting ourselves out.
But at the foundation of this object
lesson is a verbal lesson – a command –
Love one another as I have loved you.
Previously Jesus had said – love your
neighbour as yourself.
Now the command to love has been
further defined.
A love where in serving one another
our love may require sacrifice which is what Jesus’ love for us meant as he
sacrificed his life for ours.
It’s not always easy to love one
another and that’s when we have to look beyond our own feelings and be prepared
to extend the love of God even to those one might consider unlovable.
To extend love to those we don’t
like.
And that’s exactly what Jesus did for
us –it is what God did for us when it was while we were yet sinners – unlovable
– that he sent Jesus to die for us.
So with that as an example – to love
as Jesus loves us – I can’t think of an example where I can ever be right in
not extending love to someone.
That’s what Jesus meant when he said:
servants are not greater than their master.
If Jesus, our Master, made that
sacrifice, then we, God’s servants, are to show the same sacrifice.
At the centre of this object lesson
and command, Jesus institutes what we know as The Lord’s Supper.
Here servanthood, love and sacrifice
are brought together in Jesus’ Body and Blood.
This is the same Body and Blood that
while on the cross continued to show his love for us by crying out – forgive
them Father.
As our Father, God has set us an
example in much the same way that parents are asked to set examples to their
children to teach them the correct way.
And as we example God’s love for us
by loving others – not only will our children see what we are doing and copy it
– but others who experience God’s love through us will also learn and begin to
extend that love to others.
It’s not always easy to love others
as Christ loves us but as we receive his Body and Blood in this sacrament we
remember that Jesus went to great sacrifice in extending God’s love to us.
And that is what Jesus’ life and
death are:
For God loved the world so much that
he gave his one and only Son so that whoever believes in him shall not perish
but receive eternal life.
So may God grant you the strength to
show that same love to one another that he has shown to us and if you love one
another as Christ loves you – then all people will know that you are his
disciples – that you are God’s children.
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