Maundy Thursday Sermon: "Where we'd rather not go" (Apr. 17, 2014)

            Throughout this Lenten season, we have been learning about different ways to pray. Those who have attended our midweek evening workshops have experienced prayer through breathing and body movement, through a labyrinth journey, through coloring and doodling, playing with clay, and through listening to music and looking at art. Who knew there could be so many ways to pray!

            But on the other hand, there are so many more ways to pray than what we could cover in just six weeks. Last week, I came across this wonderful quote from Henri Nouwen that says it well. He writes: “There are as many ways to pray as there are moments in life. Sometimes we seek out a quiet spot and want to be alone, sometimes we look for a friend and want to be together. Sometimes we like

a book, sometimes we prefer music. Sometimes we want to sing out with hundreds, sometimes only whisper to a few. Sometimes we want to say it with words, sometimes with a deep silence. In all these moments, we gradually make our lives more of a prayer and we open our hands to be led by God even to a place we would rather not go.”

            I was initially drawn into this quote by Nouwen’s descriptions of all the different ways we may find to pray. But the part that made me think of Holy Week, and the story we tell during these three days before Christ’s resurrection on Sunday, is that last part of the quote. “We open our hands to be led by God even to a place we would rather not go.” It is, after all, on this Thursday of Holy Week, following the Passover meal, that Jesus goes with his disciples into the Garden of Gethsemane to pray, and in a deeply human moment, Jesus prays that God would let this cup pass from him. He prays that he wouldn’t have to go through what he is about to do, and he ends the prayer with, “If this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.” In Jesus’ prayer on that night in which he was betrayed and arrested, he gave himself completely to the will of the Father, agreeing to go to a place he would rather not go, with those words we still so often pray: “Thy will be done.”

            Prayer has that power, doesn’t it? The power to bring us into places we would rather not go? An answer to prayer may come in the form of us needing to take action in a way we didn’t anticipate. It may come in the form of us needing to give something up that is important to us. An answer may come in the form of an ending to something instead of the fixing that we had imagined. “Thy will be done” involves a lot of relinquishing of control, for it puts us completely in the hands of God.

            Perhaps the hardest answer to prayer and the hardest relinquishing of control that we have to experience is that of asking forgiveness. To ask someone else to forgive you means first of all acknowledging that you’ve done something wrong. How much easier it is to simply explain ourselves than to admit fault; to apologize, and then add a “but…” with an explanation about why what we’ve done is really justified. You might say to your spouse, “I’m sorry I didn’t do this for you, but I’ve been really busy.” To your kids, “I’m sorry I missed your game, but something came up at work.” Even to God, “I’m sorry I’ve been more or less ignoring the people around me who are in need, but, there are just so many of them, I don’t know where to start.” When we include a but like that, we’re not really ready to ask for forgiveness, are we, because we aren’t ready to admit that we need it.

            But we do need it. And in the church year there is not a time when we realize this more poignantly than during Lent, and especially during these three days, when we hear about how sinless Jesus took on our sins without apology and gave himself over to death for us: even those of us who would deny him repeatedly, who would betray him for our own self interest, who would flee from his side in his hour of need, who would watch from a distance while he is unjustly condemned and sentenced to die, all so that we can watch our own backs. It is remarkable that it is the people who were closest to Jesus, who did all these things and more, whose feet Jesus bends down to wash. Knowing exactly who they are and what they’ve done, and what they will do, he still comes face-to-face with their dirty, stinky feet.

            During our brief glimpse of spring this week, many dirty, stinky feet that have been hidden for months of winter came out. The first day I wore sandals and saw the state of my feet, I grimaced a bit. They’re gross, feet. We can pretend they aren’t by getting pedicures and scrubbing and wearing clean socks, or never showing anyone our feet in the first place, but the fact remains, they are dirty. But Jesus faces the grime – on our feet and in our hearts – and bends down to wash them, to wash us with his love… to forgive us with his grace.

            And it doesn’t stop there – Jesus doesn’t only wash our feet, but also has a meal with us bunch of sinners who sometimes won’t even admit that sinners is what we are. Jesus blesses bread and wine and gives thanks and says, “This is my body and my blood, given for you for the forgiveness of sins. Do this in remembrance of me.” Just as we can try to hide our feet, we can try to hide our hunger, even try to fill it with food we make ourselves, but in the end we all hunger and thirst for what only God can provide.

            And then later still that same night, after he has washed the feet of sinners, eaten with betrayers, loved deniers, prayed with deserters, he is arrested. And he doesn’t think, “I can’t believe I spent so much love and energy on those deadbeats, and they haven’t even stuck around for me.” Because he already knew all that. He knew as he had eaten with them and washed their feet what they would do and what they would leave undone – and he did what was needed to forgive them anyway. He saw them for all their hunger and all their dirtiness and the griminess of their hearts, and he loved them anyway. And he continued to love them, continued toward the cross for them, continued to pray, “Thy will be done,” even though it would take him somewhere he would rather not go.

            As we enter these Three Days, let us also pray that we might be led with courage into a place we would rather not go. Perhaps that is a place where we find forgiveness for another whom we have struggled to forgive, or, seek forgiveness for ourselves; or perhaps it is a place where we must face the grime in other people, and love them in spite of it; or a place where we must give up something dear to us for the benefit of another. Let us pray and go to that place we would rather not go – for this is often the place where we experience the most selfless love, the most unexpected forgiveness, the most profound grace.

            And let us begin toward that place right now, as we enter together into a time of prayer, a time of confession, a time of going where we would rather not go, in which we bare our hearts to a God who promises to love us in spite of our faults and our shortcomings, who would go to every length to show us that love, and who forgives us and promises to make all things new.

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