Leaning Into The Basin | Maundy Thursday (4-3-26)

On Maundy Thursday, Dr. Woods Lisenby preaches on the subject, "Leaning Into The Basin."

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Can I offer you a theological conundrum that no one has ever given me a satisfactory answer to? Maybe you can help. I've had people try to explain it to me, but never in a way that I've been able to fully accept. In the Methodist Church, um, like in many churches, we believe in sacraments. Uh in our tradition, we have two sacraments. We have communion, which we'll have later on tonight, and we believe in baptism. A sacrament is an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace. And if you want to know more about what that means, and if you want to know uh more details, the nitty-gritty of sacrament, I'm gonna point you back to one of the very first sermons of the year. The sermon's called Outward Invisible. You can find it on our podcast feed, you can find it on our website. It'll tell you everything that we know about sacraments. But really quick tonight, uh something we didn't cover in that sermon uh is the reason we Protestants only have two sacraments. Um it's because we believe that the basis for something to be a sacrament uh depends upon Jesus having done a thing and then telling us to go do it as well. That is what it has to have been instituted by Christ, is the way we say that. Um, so with baptism, uh Jesus says, Go make disciples of the world, baptizing them in my name. All right, so Jesus sends people to go baptize. Likewise, with communion, he says, Do this as often as you drink it and eat it in remembrance of me. But did you know in the Bible, there's actually one other time that the base set standards for sacramental sacramental institution are invoked. There's one other time that those rules apply. Uh, there's another act that merits that we ascribe uh the same things that what we ascribe to sacraments, should include this. It's what we just read about. It's foot washing. In the Gospel of John, Jesus washes the disciples' feet, and then he says, You also should do as I have done for you. So if we're being consistent with our theology, I think reading this should make us pause a little bit. Uh, because by our own logic disqualifies at that base level, which leads me to believe that somewhere along the way, even our wisest and brightest theologians, they looked at this and they said, Yeah, we're not doing that. I mean, because if we're being honest, feet are gross and they stink. And no one is lining up at church saying, you know what we could add to the liturgy? A little bit of us taking our socks off once a month. I mean, we're cool with the bread, we'll even substitute juice for wine. A little sprinkling of water on our head, I'll get away at a church. But feet, that's where we draw the line. But here's the thing: I don't actually think the church left foot washing out of our sacramental rites uh just because feet are gross, or even because we couldn't make a good theological argument to include it. I understand the arguments against it, but I think we left it out because it asks more of us. Because communion, you get to receive. It's given to you. Baptism is something that we witness, we watch, and that we experience once in our life. So we don't have to get wet once. But foot washing that requires you to kneel. It requires you to touch, it requires you to be uncomfortable, it requires you to serve someone in a way that is humbling and deeply personal. And I think that might be the real conundrum. Not whether or not it should qualify as a sacrament, but why the thing Jesus explicitly told us to do is the very thing we are most likely to avoid. So maybe uh the question shouldn't be why why didn't we include uh put washing at sacrament? Maybe it's why are we so afraid of being so personal with somebody else? Because this isn't abstract, it's not theological theory, it's a form of caring for somebody else. That's what Jesus is instructing his disciples to do, to care for somebody else. And John does something that he doesn't have to do. Before the foot washing begins, John he introduces Judas, right? In verse 2, right at the beginning, he says, the devil has already prompted Judas to betray Jesus. And then a few verses later, he says it again. Jesus knew who would betray him. John is being deliberate. He wants us to hold on to that information while we watch what happens next. Because what happens next is that Jesus gets up from the table, he he puts uh uh uh he takes off his outer robe, he he puts a towel around his waist, he pours water into a basin, and then he begins washing their feet. All of them, including Judas. That detail, more than anything else in this passage, is what opens this text up for us. And as we consider uh this story, it's helpful to know what's happening in the background, to have a little understanding of setting the scene, right? Jerusalem is at the fever pitch. Uh, the Passover was not a quiet time in town. The population had swelled by tens of thousands of people who had traveled all across Israel to be there for the festival. And so the streets were loud, and underneath all that noise, there was something building. There is this energy. And by this point in John's Gospels, the religious authorities are no longer debating if they're gonna act against Jesus. That question's already been answered. The question now is when are they gonna do it? So the city uh is a room full of tension, uh, waiting for a spark, right? And Jesus is in the upper room with the basin. He knows all of this, he knows what's going on. John makes sure that we understand that Jesus is aware that the hour has come. He knows that the Father has put all things into his hands, and he knows uh where he came from, and he knows where he is going, so he's not confused with what is approaching. He's not buying time or looking for an exit. He's knowing all that's gonna happen and all that's going on, and he says, Having loved his own, who were with him in the world, he loved them to the end. He loved them to the end. And that word to the end, uh, it's the same word that John uses translating Greek uh at the when Jesus hanging on the cross when he says, It is finished. This ending, this finished, it's a word about completion. It's about love that has a destination and presses towards it no matter what the road costs. This isn't like uh uh love when you've got like uh the feeling that like I'm in a lovey mood, right? This isn't like I love pizza or I love the braves. No, this love is a direction that is going somewhere and cannot be stopped. It journeys all the way to and through the cross. But before it gets there, it travels to an upper room where there are a bunch of men with dirty feet. And you know, in the ancient world, foot washing was not like a ritual that everybody did, right? They weren't like all going around washing each other's feet. It was dirty work. It was uh uh you've been walking on unpaved roads and sandals, and it was the lowest servants in the household who had the job to be assigned to the basin. Nobody fought for this job. Nobody's like, ooh, I want that one. But it's the job that Jesus chose, that he took upon himself. Peter's reaction, it's immediate and it's honest. He'd spent three years walking around with Jesus. He'd seen this man raise people from the dead, he'd heard him teach, he'd seen the miracles, and now Jesus is in front of him, kneeling down, and he's like, Lord, what are you doing? You're gonna wash my feet? What Peter calls reverence, right? What he thinks is him trying to be respectful, Jesus sees it as a barrier. Jesus says, Unless I wash you, you have no part with me. And I think that verse is actually a lot harder than it sounds. And I bet if you'll sit with it for a minute, it strikes a lot of people in this room deeper than you would care to admit. Because I can think of uh uh plenty of people like Peter. Peter would have been happy to wash Jesus' feet. That's clear. Peter is fine being the servant. What Peter cannot accept is being put in the other position. He cannot accept that he needs something that he cannot provide for himself. A lot of us really get Peter. We understand what he is saying and what he is feeling. I can think of plenty of people in my life that are happy to serve, but they convey an exterior posture of discomfort at the notion of being served. That's a kind of pride that dresses itself up as humility. It says, uh, I will serve, I will sacrifice, but I don't need anything from you. I can handle it myself. I can handle my own. The self-sufficient person would always rather be in a position of helping rather than in a position of being helped. And Jesus looks at that posture, and you know what he says? That's a barrier. You cannot follow me if you don't let me serve you. And the way Jesus serves us oftentimes is through other people. I think that he says that that's a barrier, that he knows that what Peter's doing is putting up this because he knows deep down that the barriers we put up, they're not real. They're often insecurities, they are often facades of self-sufficiency. It's an illusion that we have convinced ourselves is a part of who we are. We're just tough. We don't need somebody. I'm just gonna keep pouring out. You know, we've spent this whole season of Lent leaning into the things that we would rather avoid. We've leaned into hope when we couldn't see the future. We've sat with that man who was born blind and asked, what is it that we are refusing to see? We stood at the well and we let Jesus cross the line so we had carefully drawn in our lives. Every week, it's been the same invitation. Lean in rather than pull back. Tonight, the invitation is on the floor. Literally. Let him wash your feet. Stop insisting that you've got it all covered and figured out. Quit pretending that you have to be the boss all the time. I mean, Jesus washes the feet of the man who's about to hand him over to be killed. He doesn't make exceptions about who is worthy and who is not. He doesn't pull back when he gets to Judas's corner of the room. He knows. John's already told us twice that he knows, and he does it anyway. Jesus' actions are a word for us about who deserves to receive grace, and about how we should offer it. It's a word for us who are slow to receive it, who put up those facades, and it's a reminder what it looks like for us to share it. In verse 34, right after Judas has left what he came to do, Jesus says to those who are there, he says, Love one another as I've loved you. He doesn't say, Love people as you feel so inclined. He doesn't say, uh, love people when they return love to you. He doesn't say, love people so you'll feel better about yourself, as I have loved you. Which is to say, with a towel around your waist in the direction of somebody who does not deserve it, pressing yourself all the way through the hard things to give the best things. The disciples, when they heard this commandment, uh, you know, these are the people, they're about to scatter. They're hearing this from Jesus, and Peter is gonna deny him before the night is out. They're all gonna fail in ways they cannot yet imagine. Jesus is not uh setting his standard for a group of people who all have it together, right? This isn't the conference where, oh, we're all gonna take this last step and then we're gonna be perfect. He's setting it for people who know that they need the basin and who are learning slowly and imperfectly what it means to love the way that they have been loved. The standard is not a sentiment or a feeling, it's the basin, it's it's the the floor, it's the it's the humility, it's the cross where Jesus died. That's the kind of love Jesus shows. It's the kind of love that is willed and directional and stubborn but complete that says I will give of myself for others, that'll also let God be God. You know, we we've carried a lot through the season on each or just about any individual Sunday. I've seen it on your faces, or I've heard your stories the next day. When we sat with those dry bones, they were waiting for breath to be breathed into them, when we named blind spots that we would uh prefer to walk around in our lives. We have brought this kind of unpolished, honest version of ourselves every time that we've encountered the scriptures, and the Bible doesn't look away from us. It it helps us to see ourselves as God sees us. People who are not yet perfect, but who in Christ are on our way. We can be sanctified with Jesus, and this table is a really nice place to land all this. Because uh we come here not because we've earned the place, but because Jesus set it for us, because Jesus is serving us, Jesus prepares the table, the same Jesus who wrapped the towel, who served Judas, who told Peter, hey, you need this more than you think that you do. He is the one who breaks the bread and pours the cup and says, Remember me, because you need me to. The basin, the table, they belong together. You cannot fully understand what happens here at the table without seeing what happened on the floor. This is the love that we lean into tonight. Not because it's comfortable. Monday, Thursday, and Good Friday aren't meant to be comfortable, and definitely not because we deserve it. Because the Lord knows we don't, but because it's the truest thing in this room, because it's what God offers each of us in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.