A Time of Preparation – April 1, 2021, Maundy Thursday

Deuteronomy 26:1-11, Luke 22:7-23
April 1, 2021, Maundy Thursday

As I said on Palm Sunday, it’s now 2,000 years later, and this story, the story of this week, is still important to us today!  And one of the big reasons for that is that the events of this week are what give us our identity as Christians.  These three days!

For the Jewish people it was the Exodus.  That’s what gave them their identity.  That was the story of how God chose to rescue them from bondage, give them their Law, their Torah, and, of course, their land.  That story gave them their identity.  I read this evening from Deuteronomy 26.  And there we find that famous line, “A wandering Aramean was my father.”  Notice, it was not, “Our ancestors were slaves in Egypt, and God rescued them.”  It was personal!  It was their story.  “A wandering Aramean was my father!  And he went down into Egypt and sojourned there, few in number.  And there we became a nation, great, mighty, and populace.  And the Egyptians treated us harshly, and afflicted us, and laid upon us harsh bondage!”  It was their story!

Well, this is our story.  This story gives us our “identity” as Christians.  In this story, Jesus has accomplished his mission.  He fulfilled his destiny in this time we now know as Holy Week.  And particularly, these three days.  If you think about it, we’re not Christians because of Christmas.  In other words, we’re not Christians because Jesus was born.  We’re Christians because of Easter!  We’re Christians because of this time, when Jesus accomplished our redemption!  And because of that, we choose to follow him!

So this is the start of those three days.  Tonight we celebrate the events of the Upper Room, the Last Supper.  It is Maundy Thursday.  It is the Thursday of the “Mandate,” the New Commandment.  Jesus said, “A New Commandment I give to you, that you love one another as I have loved you.”  We could talk a lot about what it meant to those good Jewish boys to be given a new commandment!

This is also the time Jesus chose to prepare his disciples for what was about to happen.  “I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.”  Luke is the only writer to record those particular words.  In sharing this Passover with his chosen disciples, Jesus was preparing them for the three days that were ahead of them, particularly the next 24 hours!  It was not going to be easy!

Maybe you remember me telling you before about the “Red Letter Bibles” we had in my church growing up.  Those are Bibles that have the words of Jesus printed in red.  And when I was young, I used to flip through and see which pages had the most red letters.  And the pages that had the most were in the Upper Room story in John’s Gospel.  There were two pages next to each other that had all red letters!

Jesus had a lot to say to his disciples that night, to prepare them for those next three days.  I’m sure he had long talks with them before.  But this is the longest ever recorded, and it was right here in the Upper Room.  Jesus “earnestly desired” to share that time with his disciples, because he knew what was coming!

Jesus also wanted to share the intimacy of a meal with them, one last time.  And he chose this Passover meal.  And it wasn’t just that it was that time of the year, and he wanted one last holiday with them.  He chose meal that represented the salvation story of the Old Testament, that story that gave the Jewish people their identity!  He chose that meal, that story, to tell them what was going to happen with him, and to give them their identity!

I believe this is something Jesus intended them to continue.  As Paul told the Corinthians – and us, “For as often as you eat this bread and drink of this cup, you do show forth the Lord’s death, until he comes again.” (I Corinthians 11)  And God’s people have shared that bread and that cup, and those words, countless times over the last 2,000 years!

And so we do this night!  This night, we eat the bread and drink the cup originally given to the disciples by the hands of Jesus himself!  Think about that when you hold in your hands the elements of this communion!  And think about this meal, and how it represents our identity as Christians.

Jesus said, “This bread represents my body broken for you.”  “This cup represents, not just my blood, but the new covenant through my blood poured out for you.”  And of course, that word “Covenant” was also a very important word for those good Jewish men!  I hope we can get a sense of that.  I hope we can remember the importance of their concept of “covenant.”

This night, through Jesus, God was making a new covenant with his people.  Through this sacrament, he has made a covenant, a “contract” with us.  “I will be your God and you will be my people.”  That was always the heart of any covenant God made.

And so, let us share in that new covenant now.  As we do, let us think about Jesus in the Upper Room with his disciples, sharing this meal, preparing them for what was ahead, and at the same time, giving them their identity as his people.  And so we receive our identity, too!

Prayer

Our Heavenly Father, as we share this meal this evening, may we truly feel you sharing it with us.  May we think of Jesus and his disciples in the upper room.  May we know that you are our God, and we are your people, through what he accomplished these three days, so long ago.  These things we pray in his name, Amen!