May the words of my mouth and the mediations of my heart be pleasing to you, O Lord.
“Lord, are you going to wash my feet?” Peter asks as Jesus knelt before him. I can’t help but wonder if Peter, like me was confused and awestruck when he watched his rabbi and Lord get up during supper, take off his outer robe, and like a servant tie a towel around his waist, and starts washing his disciples’ feet.
I am all willing to help others and give what I can, when I can. Yet, when it comes to either having my own feet washed or washing a guests’ feet, I feel vulnerable. Like Peter, I would have stopped Jesus and said, “Lord, I am fine. Please do not wash my feet.” Here Peter is hesitant in receiving this act of kindness and love. I too hesitate when offered gifts or any act of love, gratitude, and kindness. So here Jesus is offering his love to us, are we hesitating? Let us explore today’s Gospel reading together on this Maundy Thursday.
The Triduum (trid.yoo.uhm) is this evening (Maundy Thursday), Good Friday, Holy Saturday and the first part of Easter Sunday. We now know that these days are connected. We also know the significance of our Lord’s death and resurrection is to restore us to God by defeating death and sin. But here we are with the disciples, who Jesus himself said are not aware of why and what Jesus is doing. Jesus does add that he will explain it all later to them. Sound familiar? We find throughout the Gospels Jesus privately explaining to his disciples the meaning of a parable. I wonder what explanation we are hearing tonight.
Now Peter moves from the question of “are you going to” to “you will never.” I can understand asking Jesus why, but to stop Jesus all together? It is one thing to be hesitant, and it is a different matter to tell God, no. It makes me reflect on my own life. Have I ever said no to Jesus whenever he would reach out to me and remind me that I am loved and I am to love others. I can only speak of myself, and my own struggles with accepting that I am loved no matter what. I struggle with vulnerability. Perhaps the disciples do too, especially when they have heard Jesus mention his death and resurrection. So how does Jesus respond to us and our struggles?
He says to Peter, “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.” What did Jesus mean? Amy-Jill Levine and Marc Ziv Brettler’s The Jewish Annotated New Testament points out that the act of washing the disciples’ feet was not about hygiene but purification. Priest and Theologian Fleming Rutledge in her book The Undoing of Death, states that Maundy Thursday is when “the Son of God is stooping down from his heavenly throne to wash us clean from our transgressions.” Here Jesus in all his glory and divinity steps down before us to wash us with water. The physical act of washing our feet with water does make sense. Especially for the disciples who would walk in simple sandals, but what is the spiritual significance? Fleming Rutledge notes: “The cleansing of the feet represents the cleansing by the blood and water to come on Good Friday.”
Fact humans are 50%-60% water, which is contained in our lungs, brain, heart, bones etc., and so is our blood.
The washing of our feet by water and the washing of us by Christ’s blood is the emptying of God’s unyielding love that flows to us and through us. It overwhelms us, and we are unable to contain it. So, like Christ, we stoop low and wash one another’s feet, and in doing so we lift up Christ. In doing this we are accepting God’s love, and we are taking on what Christ has done for us and sharing it to the world.
As we move into Jesus’ commandment for his disciples, we hear him say in verse 33, “Little children, I am with you only for a little longer.” We know that Jesus is referring to his ascension into heaven. The gift he gives, is the church and this call to love as he loved us. So how can we do that? I came across Rachel Held Evan’s blog “Christ has no body,” where she reflects on her trip to Bolivia where she saw the Cristo de la Concordia, the second largest statue of Christ in the world. Here she cites one of my favourite poems by St. Theresa of Avila:
Christ has no body but yours
No hands, no feet on earth but yours,
Yours are the eyes with which he looks
Compassion on this world
Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good.
Yours are the hands, which he blesses all the world
Yours are the hands, yours are the feet,
Yours are the eyes, you are his body,
Christ has no body but yours,
No hands, no feet on earth but yours,
Yours are the eyes with which he looks
Compassion on the world
Christ has no body now on earth but yours
After citing the poem, Rachel writes this “A statue cannot be Christ in this world because a statue cannot be animated by the Holy Spirit. But people can.”
As we read the Gospel, we can see Jesus is talking about washing each other’s feet and loving one another. We can’t have “compassion on the world” if we do not show compassion to one another. The disciples are not just disciples; they are Jesus’ family, as we are. God’s commandment to Moses was for us to first love God and then love your neighbour. Jesus expands on that by showing us what that love looks like. When he washes his disciple’s feet as a servant, he is not showing us enslavement but an act of love in humility, willingness, and reverence.
So, if you are like me, and you tell others, “O please do not wash my feet,” just remember when Jesus washed your feet it was with his blood and water. And if you ever doubt that you are valued and loved, remind yourself of who you are and whose you are. You are Christ’s beloved. So, I urge you, my family, to remind yourself of this truth. And when you wash the feet of the person beside you, remind them that they are also Christ’s beloved. It is okay to feel vulnerable; it is okay to hesitate. Just love as Christ has loved us. Amen.
Sources
Fleming Rutledge, The Undoing of Death (Grand Rapids Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2002.)
Christ Has No Body Rachel Held Evans (August 17, 2011)
Psalm 19:14
Jimm Akin 6 things you need to know about Triduum. Nation Catholic Register. 2013.
Photo credit: Dudubangbang Travel