As we begin the Easter Triduum I have spent my time in quiet reflection. Rather than writing a new homily, I am posting a homily I gave ten years ago. It is in the archives under Feasts and Holy Days.

A Cycle – Holy Thursday 14

Jn. 13: 1-15

For them it was going to be a jubilant Passover supper.  Jesus earlier that week was greeted by shouts of Hosanna’s. The Passover meal was ready and in every Jewish home that night the Passover began with the question.  “What makes this night different than any other night?”  Then the elder told the story of how the blood of the sacrificial Lamb saved them from death and set them free from bondage.  But on this night, Jesus began the meal not by repeating that ancient question; it started with Jesus washing the feet of his disciples.  The master became the servant.  Peter was appalled and balks at Jesus washing his feet and when Jesus said if I do not then you have no part with me.  Peter understands and goes all in by saying “then my head and hands as well” (Jn.13:9).

Christ was preparing to become the sacrifice for our sins, and he begins by a humble act of cleansing the dirt off the feet of his followers.  Later as Jesus hung on that cross it still did not make sense to them.  How can His death clean achieve anything that is good.  What did the disciples on the road to Emmaus say – “we had hoped.” Is that it, all we have is hope?  If we are going to understand that night in the upper room, it is important for us to see and to hear all Jesus said in that room. 

I invite you to take time this week to read from the Gospel of John chapters 13 through 17.  In these chapters we will discover Christ revealing to us how we are to respond to his life, death, and resurrection.  It is in His works and words where we will discover that we were more than redeemed by Him; in addition to salvation, we have been transformed, changed, restored to our former glory God intended us to have at creation.       

The accounts of the upper room in Matthew, Mark, and Luke have some minor differences in what they record of that evening but for the most part they are the same. They all describe the breaking of bread and drinking of the cup of the covenant. They all include the account of Jesus knowing one of His disciples would betray Him.  In those gospels the description of the upper room experience recounted in about 20 verses, and they move on to Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. 

John’s gospel reveals much more. In five chapters and about 150 verses we will find why that night was a night we should remember as our Passover story.  John starts his account with Christ washing the feet of the disciples and He does not even mention the institution of the Eucharist. What John focused on is what Christ is revealing to His disciples and to us who would come to believe. 

Why is John so much more focused on what Jesus said rather than what He did?  The answer to that question is in the words of Christ as He spoke to the disciples in that upper room.  It is in the words spoken that evening that we will discover how God desired not only to redeem us but to have His love transform us.   

As Christians we tend to always be seeking to please God. By spending out time trying to please God we miss leaning what all disciples must learn.  Before we do any work, we need to embrace the reality of His life’s mission – to die for the penalty of our sin.  When we embrace the reality that His death on the cross was for us, we release ourselves from trying to please God to feel the embrace of the Fathers forgiveness.  At that moment we will experience love, mercy, welcome and restoration.  Jesus’s sacrificial act needs to be personal in our minds and hearts by acknowledging Jesus died for me. For if we only think of Jesus death in the context of saving the world it is easy of us to overlook the personal significance of Christ saving act.

Jesus in His own words that night was preparing them for His death and what would be accomplished by His death.  In the same way those same words of Christ are preparing us.  Preparing us to act on what we profess to believe – Jesus was sent by God to remove the barrier of sin between us and God.  Do we really believe?  If we believe, then we must respond to the saving act of Jesus Christ.  We must like Peter say, “You are the messiah!” Not by an intellectual response of knowing but one of acceptance from our hearts.       

On that night Christ showed us that the way to live out our faith is not by our own plan of what is acceptable to God. Instead, we must recognize that apart from Christ we can do nothing – “I am the vine, and you are the branches apart from me you can do nothing” (Jn. 15:5).  It is in allowing the Spirit to clothe us with power from on high that we can go out and “do the things Christ did and even greater than Christ did because he is gone to the Father” (Jn. 14:12).  Yes, on this night we are told that we will no longer be what we once were; for we will be changed by His death and by the Spirits coming.

On this night, the power of sin was broken in our lives and in the lives of every generation by the saving act of the Lamb of God.

“What makes this night different than any other night” is that on this night Jesus submitted to God’s plan for our redemption. Can we do any less than Jesus did?  The death of Jesus totally changed who we are because God’s mercy came in the form of the most horrific punishment ever devised by man.     

We are obligated this night to go forth and be visible and focal in telling the story of our Passover- that because of Christ’s death and resurrection we have been freed from the power of sin.  We are truly the reflection of God’s glory; so, let us let our light shine.