“The Servant Community, Gathered to Share a Meal” Maundy Thursday, 2009 April 9, 2009

(First, read the passage for this sermon: John 13:1-17, 31b-35)

We are a servant community. We are gathered to share a meal.

It’s a simple meal: bread and wine. And it’s not even our own meal. It’s the Lord’s supper. Our Lord is our host. But this is a meal to which our risen Lord invites anyone. There is no barrier due to family or gender or race or sexuality or class. No one gets more than another. No one has more privilege at the table than another.

What we are doing this evening, around this table, makes the church what it is! We are centered in Christ. We are gathered in thanksgiving. We welcome anyone.

And so, there is nothing private, in what we are doing at this table. We are participating in each other. God the Holy Spirit forms us into the body of Christ, when the Spirit assembles us at this time and in this place. We are a spiritual community. But we are a physical gathering. “God’s love is not an abstraction. It has a body.” (Bryan Stone, Evangelism After Christendom, page 207) Gathered here, around the table, the body of Christ, we embody salvation.

This is a very different perspective from at least several popular, but non-Biblical traditions (small “t”). One of those traditions has it that salvation is something entirely reserved for the future. And so, the life of faith is to follow the rules while we are in this vale of tears; to do what you need to do so you’ll get into heaven, which will be in the great beyond, by and by. In the Bible, though, salvation comes now, with faith in Jesus the Christ, which produces the life of joyful servanthood! Salvation is seen then, in the way we live!

Here’s another tradition (small “t”): that salvation is individualistic. That again, is not Biblical. But our culture that worships individualism encourages us to think in individualistic terms: “me ‘n God.” “Are you right with God?” the fire and brimstone preacher will thunder, looking each individual in the eye. Instead, our concern has to be whether we (plural, community) are living in righteousness. That’s a Biblical world-view.

It could be that even something we have done this evening may encourage us to think that it’s one-on-one, “me ‘n God.” A few minutes ago, many came up to the rail and knelt while an ordained pastor placed his hands on each individual head and said, “In obedience to the command of our Lord, Jesus Christ, I forgive you all your sins.” Obviously, those are words spoken to each individual, words carrying extraordinary power and grace. But we did this as a community. As the assembled body of Christ. Elbow-to-elbow; shoulder-to-shoulder; together; the community of salvation.

That’s what we are: a community of salvation. We gather around a table, to share the Lord’s Supper, which perhaps has special poignancy on this evening, entering as we are into the experience of Jesus’ last supper with his closest followers. In this meal tonight, we embody what salvation looks like. No one of us has more privilege over another. There is no barrier due to family or gender or race or sexuality or class in the community of salvation. That is because God took on human flesh to be a servant in particular to those who were excluded in his culture! That is all through the gospel stories.

Listen again to this stunning description of Jesus’ servanthood, in John’s account of the Last Supper. And during supper Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him.

I’m afraid this has lost its shock value for you and me.

Jesus has dressed as a servant! He is performing an act of hospitality that was usually delegated by the host to his servant!

Jesus’ action is shocking because of what his role is supposed to be, in that time, in that culture. His followers call him “Teacher.” A teacher enjoyed a high position. A teacher gathered a cluster of disciples who literally sat at his feet while he imparted his wisdom. (Remember the story of Jesus’ visit to the sisters, Martha and Mary? He’s there for dinner, and Martha is frantically trying to pull the meal together. She complains to Jesus because her sister, Mary, isn’t helping! Instead, Mary is sitting at Jesus’ feet, listening to him teach. Well … That’s what Mary is supposed to be doing, according to the rules of the culture. She’s giving honor to the teacher!)

In the story from John, Jesus says to his disciples: You call me Teacher and Lord -- and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you. Well, good Lord! If a teacher was honored in Roman culture, a Lord was honored even more so! And Jesus is acting as a servant to those guests at his table? Jesus’ actions would have been incomprehensible to those at the table.

And so, Peter reacts as any one of us would have! [Jesus] came to Simon Peter, who said to him, "Lord, are you going to wash my feet?" (Peter’s face must be revealing his incredulity and shock!) Jesus answered, "You do not know now what I am doing, (boy, that’s for sure!) but later you will understand." Peter said to him, "You will never wash my feet." Jesus answered, "Unless I wash you, you have no share with me." Simon Peter said to him, "Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!"

Peter’s bewilderment and protests are entirely natural, because Jesus is acting so entirely counter to the culture.

Indeed, even today, whenever the church acts as a triumphant, hierarchical community, Peter’s misunderstandings persist.

Instead, we are a servant community. We are gathered to share a meal – with our Lord, Jesus the Christ, in the center of our gathering, present in the bread and the wine.

God the Holy Spirit has formed us as a salvation community in this place and at this time. We gather in thanksgiving for our salvation. We eat and drink salvation. We embody salvation. Salvation comes to us in community, the body of Christ. We are participating in each other. No one of us has more privilege over another. Family or gender or race or sexuality or class presents no barrier. The Spirit forms us in community to be servants to one another.

And then the Spirit sends us out from our gathering, to be the body of Christ in the world, to be servants in the world.

“God’s love is not an abstraction. It has a body.”

Through the body of Christ – us! – salvation is given for the world, through our servanthood, imitating our Lord, Jesus Christ.

In the name of God, who is Father and Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Pastor Andy Ballentine
St. Stephen Lutheran Church
Williamsburg, Virginia