*This blog post contains my sermons for the Paschal Triduum, as well as the Feast of the Resurrection (April 13-16, 2017 @ The Episcopal Church of the Good Shepherd, Asheboro, NC)*
Maundy Thursday: Washed Feet & Broken Hearts
I once served alongside a 90 year old retired priest named
Joe Weaver. One Sunday at our evening mass., I was the acolyte, and when he was
done setting the table for communion I went to wash his hands, as is the
custom. When he dried his hands he told
me to set the pitcher of water on the altar.
He then took the bowl from my hand and said, “What you do matters! And you matter! And I want you to know that!” And he washed my hands. A priest washed the hands of his acolyte, his
altar server. I nearly cried right then
and there.
Father Joe got what Jesus meant when he said, “I give you a
new commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” Because this is what Jesus’ brand of love
looks like. It looks like taking the
position of one who serves. As a matter
of fact, I think he would have washed my feet had the opportunity presented
itself that night! Because Father Joe
got it!
There’s a fancy Greek word for this called kenosis.
It means to empty oneself.
When Jesus takes the position of a servant he empties himself, and he
tells us that, if he, our Lord and teacher has done this, we ought to do the
same. My friend Father Joe emptied himself of any air of pomposity or “holier
than thou”-ness when he washed me. Ever
since that day I have tried to be like him.
I try to help every person who calls the church needing assistance,
emptying myself of the temptation to pass judgments. And I’ve seen you, my brothers and sisters,
empty yourselves in those moments when you volunteer at the soup kitchen, work
on a habitat house, or visit someone in prison.
There are examples all around me on a daily basis of folks giving of
themselves on behalf of someone else, and it is holy and beautiful to see.
But the emptying is not just about us stooping down and
taking that servant’s posture on behalf of someone else. There is another kind of emptying that Jesus
offers. When Jesus moves to wash the
disciples’ feet, Peter rebukes him—typical Peter. He resists, telling Jesus, “You will NEVER
wash my feet!” Why does he so fiercely
push back? Is it his pride? Does he not feel worthy? Is he ticklish? Whatever it is, Peter can’t
seem to empty himself of it.
I can honestly say
that I have a really hard time emptying myself of it, too. When Father Joe washed my hands I felt
bad. He shouldn’t do this, I
thought. Who was I? I felt embarrassed. It was way too vulnerable. After the service, though he told me something
that has stuck: “There’s grace in receiving,,” he said, “as well as
giving.”
On this night we have the opportunity to empty
ourselves of every kind of pride that is in us. Not only
the kind of pride that says “I’m above washing someone’s feet” but the kind
that says “I’m not worthy to have someone wash my feet.” Maybe when you come up here you will be able
to let go of all that has held you back from both giving and receiving such a
gift. Maybe you will have the chance to
show love in a way you never have before.
Maybe you will allow someone else to love you in a way you have never
experienced. Maybe you---and I—will
realize that we needn’t hang on to our pride because it’s not really about us,
anyway. It’s about the grace and the
love that freely flows from God and comes to us in the one who takes the
servant’s posture and says, “You matter!”
All may. Some should. None must.
Love one another, as I have loved you, Jesus says.. That is the new commandment. That is the mandate—the "Maundy" in Maundy
Thursday. And this night we see what
love looks like. The vulnerability of
the one allowing her feet to be washed.
The willingness of the one washing to let go of himself. For in this moment, as you hold each other’s
feet, love flows. The love of Jesus for
us. The love of us for him. The love we have for each other. It is the nature of love to flow, as Marcus
Borg said. Let love
flow tonight, brothers and sisters, and maybe it will flow when you leave this
place. Flow in such a way that you can
give Jesus’ gift to others, as well as receive it. Even if you do not know what
is happening, later you will understand. We all will.
Good Friday: Pain & Glory
Everything is
lost. Friends have fled. Those who sang songs of praise at the
beginning of the week have turned their voices to shouts of ‘Crucify him!’ And the broken, lifeless body of Jesus hangs
from the cross.
The cross. A fate that awaited a very particular kind of
criminal: an insurrectionist. Murderers were not crucified, no. That was reserved for the ones who spoke out
against the government, who challenged the power of Rome. Murderers got quick ends, but not those who
were crucified. It was long. It was agonizing. And perhaps worst of all, it was public. Those who were crucified hung there in a
public place where folks walked by throughout the day. Those folks spat on the crucified ones. Mocked them.
Taunted them. And when it was all
over, they weren’t even given the dignity of being buried within the city
walls. The cross. As shameful an end as one could imagine. A symbol of pain, of hopelessness, of defeat.
Why did he do it
so willingly, take up his cross? Why not
fight back, run away, hide in the caves behind Mary & Martha’s house? Perhaps he did it to prove a point, that this
is not a symbol of defeat but of life.
In his wonderful book The Last
Week, which takes a day-by-day account of Holy Week, Marcus Borg answers this very question by suggesting that the
cross was Jesus’ way of proving once and for all that God has the final
authority, not Rome, not any human being or human institution, not the lure of
death that permeates so many areas of our lives. So Jesus takes up the cross, that instrument
of death, and God transforms it into a symbol of life. When Jesus calls out, “It is finished!” it is
not just his earthly life that ends, but the man-made systems of power and
fear, which had previously held the world in the grip of sin, are destroyed. It’s finished. God wins.
We know what
comes next. We want desperately to get
there, to avoid the bad feelings. But
life doesn’t work that way, does it? We
cannot avoid the bad, but we must sit with it.
So today we sit in this moment of pain and grief. Because the cross reminds us not only that
Jesus conquered death while on it, but that God resides in the spaces of pain,
hopelessness, and defeat in our regular day-to-day lives. When we lose our jobs. When a loved one dies. When we are diagnosed with a terminal disease. When relationships end. When we are beaten, tormented, and denied our
basic human rights and liberties. When we are humiliated, mocked, and told we
don’t matter. These are the moments of crucifixion that we experience everyday. These are the crosses to which we have been
nailed. Hanging there we look around and
we see no friends standing by. We hear
the taunts and the jeers of those passing by.
And we utter those words: “ My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?!”
We don’t like
this pain, and for good reason. Yet these are the very places where Jesus
reigns. As he does from the hard wood of
his own cross, Jesus is there with us, whether we know it or not, whether we
feel him or not, he is there.
Crying. Bleeding, Agonizing. Somehow allowing us to hang on to life, to
hang on to hope, even in the face of unspeakable pain. There has never been a greater throne, never
been a more beautiful crown, than those that Jesus bears. For God has been broken. We have been broken. Sharing the brokenness we also share the
promise of what awaits us.
What is the
cross to you? We wear them around our
necks and on our fingers. We decorate
them and admire them. That is why we
call this day Good, for an instrument of shame and death has been turned into
the symbol of hope and life, and we bear it proudly, But as much as we want to celebrate the
cross’s life-giving power, we need this day, this moment, too. After all, there
can be no resurrection without death. So
on this day we call Good, we sit with death, with pain and suffering, with loss
and humiliation. We dare to embrace
them. For it is in them that we find our
God. And it is through them that we are
born to newness of life.
As you approach
the cross of Christ, I wonder what pain you will bring? What burdens will you lay down? What will you nail to its hard, cold
wood? What will new life look like for
you, once you have been to the cross?
We adore you, O Christ, and we
bless you. Because by your holy cross
you have redeemed the world.
Holy Saturday: Darkness & Light
Darkness. All around us. And in the middle of it all, a light. Tiny.
Flickering. But it’s
there. The light of Christ, waiting to
be poured out over all of us, waiting for the moment of resurrection glory. This is the night, brothers and sisters. This is the night around which our entire
faith revolves.
We
begin this liturgy in the dark, recalling how God brought light out of
darkness, brought life out of nothing.
We hear the story of God’s redemptive power
working in the world, freeing the children of Israel from their bondage,
reminding us that the God we worship this night is not a passive one, but
instead is active and moving in human history, and on this night God is about
to move in a way that the world has never seen, a way the world cannot
comprehend. For as the God’s
words spoken through the prophet Ezekiel brought together the dry bones and
gave them life, God’s Word with a capital W is about to
bring life out of death. A new creation
ex nihilo, creation from nothing.
This
is what our faith is all about, light coming from dark, hope coming from
despair, life coming from death. I’ve
been telling y’all for the past few weeks that if
you could only make it to one service this week, THIS was it. This is the Christian experience right
here! There is no other day of the year—not
Christmas, not Pentecost, not even Easter Sunday—that sums it all up
like tonight. This is the night.
This
is the night that Christ broke the bonds of death and hell. He has done his duty and observed his own
Sabbath rest. He has gone to hell, to
Sheol, to Tartarus, to the dead people place.
He has locked the doors from the inside and because of those actions we
are free. Sin no longer holds us
back. Our own shortcomings, failings,
and fears mean nothing. Even death
itself is mocked and shamed on this great night. As we sit here in the dark, we sit with
Jesus, waiting for the moment of Easter’s dawn, inching
closer and closer, stretching ever single moment of this Holy Week out until
Christ is ready to burst forth with resurrection light. But we’re not quite there
yet.
This
night personifies our faith not only in the real experience of being in the
dark, and then moving into the light, but also because tonight we will welcome three new members to the Body of Christ through the oldest, most sacred of all
Christian practices, the sacrament of Baptism.
Michael, Julie, and Don you have been preparing for this moment
during the season of Lent, studying the catechism of the faith, praying in new
ways, wrestling with Holy Scripture. But
really your whole lives have been preparing you for this moment. The waters of baptism are the waters of a new
birth. The person you are now will not
be the person who lives this sanctuary at the end of our liturgy. That isn’t to say your old
lives mean nothing anymore—far from it. But after tonight your old lives will have
new meaning. After tonight you will be able to look back on all you have done and all you have been with a new sense
of purpose and clarity—we all will. Jesus knew each of you before you made the
decision to come to these waters. And
each of you served him in your own unique way in that before-time. Now he calls you to know him even more
intimately. It doesn’t
mean you’ll never ask another question or that
all the secrets of God will be known to you.
This night is not the end of your journey, but it is the beginning. And as you start your new journey I want you to remember something: as you are washed in those waters and take
your vows, you don’t do it alone. Your sponsors, your families, and this
community of faith will stand with you and make those promises once again. And so, in a very real sense, neither your
lives, nor our lives, will ever be the same after this night.
In these last moments, brothers and sisters, let the
darkness wash over you….now gaze upon that marvelous and holy flame. Flickering with a light that cannot ever be
extinguished. Our hope lies in that
flame, in the light of the world, which burned at the beginning of creation,
which led the way for the children of Israel, which could not be snuffed out,
even by the darkness of the tomb. This
is our hope, Easter hope, that new meaning and new life can come from the death
of our old lives. And this is the night
when that hope is realized.
The Feast of the Resurrection: Death Conquered & Humanity Freed
You wanna know who reminds me of Easter? Darth Vader.
Yeah, that’s right! The Dark Lord
of the Sith, the guy voted by the American Film Institute as the number 1
villain in the history of cinema. He
reminds me of Easter, and I’ll tell you why.
Darth Vader—or Annie as his friends called him—lived a life of devotion
to a religious practice that did a lot of good.
He was a peacekeeper, a healer, a defender of those who could not defend
themselves. The corruption of his
day—both religious and political--eventually led to him falling into darkness,
into a kind of living hell, but eventually the love of his son brought him back
into the light. Love saved Darth Vader
and gave him new life. Yeah, Star Wars
has lots of blows-em-upsies and sweet laser sword fights, but watch the first
six movies again—heck, watch Clone Wars and Rebels while you’re at it—and
you’ll see it: the original Star Wars,
the story of rising, falling, and rising again of Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader,
is the story of Easter.
Love is what brings Darth Vader back from the darkness, love
saves him, and love is what saved Jesus.
The corruption and sin of his world nailed Jesus to the cross and drove
him into the darkness of hell. We sat
there with him last night and let that darkness wash over us in the moments
before Easter’s dawn broke. It was cold
and frightening. And then light, warmth,
the love of God poured out over us. That
love brought Jesus out from the darkness of death and gave him new life. Jesus may not have had a sweet laser sword,
but he knew what it was like to be held in the grip of death, to live in the
darkness of hell and to be brought back into the light of life. That’s Easter, folks.
Life. Death. Resurrection.
It’s a kind of endless waltz that we all participate in. We’re all born, we all die, and we are all
raised. This is the Christian promise,
after all, but resurrection is something we can find everywhere. We can see it in film—Darth Vader. Comic books—Superman. Or tv—practically every character that has
ever appeared in a daytime soap opera. Still,
this isn’t just some cool, popular culture storytelling technique, no. This is real!
And not just for Jesus. This is
real for you and for me! Resurrection is
all around us, if we have eyes to see.
The heavenly being told the women to “Go to Galilee! There you will see him!” Galilee?
How’s that possible, we can’t just hope on over to the northern region
of modern-day Israel and go find Jesus!
So what does that mean for us?
I’d like the think she meant for us to go to the places where Jesus is
most alive; after all, it was Galilee where he did most of his ministry among
those vulnerable folks. So that’s where
we should go, if we want to see Jesus, if we want to know what resurrection looks
like all we gotta do is go to Galilee.
That’s the place where life is flourishing, even when death is all
around, where love refuses to compromise in the face of fear and despair. Galilee is the hospice room where a nurse
just sits with someone who is dying. It’s
the playground where a kid has the courage to stand up to a bully on behalf of
someone who is being picked on. It’s the
rehab facility where the man who has struggled with addiction his whole life
breaks down in tears asking for help.
It’s the steps of the legislative building where those who have been
denied equal rights hold one another’s hands and proclaim that they matter
too. It’s the little town where pink bows can still be
found, showing love and support for a family who has suffered a tragedy. That’s Galilee! That’s where you’ll find Jesus most alive,
where love is alive, saving the world! That’s
where folks are practicing resurrection, as the poet Wendell Berry says.
You can practice resurrection, too, when you remember that
God can and will take the worst set of circumstances and use them to bring life
and grace, when you choose love and life
over despair and death. That’s what
Jesus did. After his followers met him
in Galilee, that’s what they did. It’s
there for all of us to do on this happy morning.
In case I don’t see y’all for a while, I want you to
hang on to this one little suggestion:
practice resurrection. Go to the
Galilees. Go meet Jesus there. Let love, crazy, makes you giggle with glee,
unbelievable, love bubble up inside you.
Look for resurrection. Find it in
the movies you watch or the books you read, because the more you notice it in
those places, the most attune you’ll be to it, the more you’ll see it in the
real world, and the more eager you’ll be to practice it yourself, to share the message
that love is what saves us, as it saved Jesus.
It’s right there on your bulletin cover.
Love is what is pulling Adam and Eve out of those graves. It’s love that pours from Jesus, that says,
‘Come on, my brother! Come on my
sister! You are free!” Because love always wins. That’s resurrection! Go to Galilee, brothers and sisters, seek out
and share that love, and practice resurrection.
