“Unless I wash you, you have no part in me.” Those were the words of Jesus to Simon Peter, after Peter had said: "You shall never wash my feet." I imagine all the disciples felt as Peter did - Jesus was their rabbi, their teacher and master, so every one of the disciples must have been shamefaced, when they watched Jesus take bowl and towel to wash their feet. They’d had to meet in a secret place, so there wasn’t a servant at hand to wash their feet. That was a menial but very necessary task; no-one would want to sit and eat with the dust and grime of the city streets still clinging to them. And of course one of the disciples should have taken on the task; but none of them had thought to do it - every one of them had left it for someone else to do - ring any bells?
Peter must have felt really ashamed that his master was having to serve them, rather than they serving him. Yet again they'd let him down. As Peter saw it, they'd forced Jesus to demean himself, to behave like the lowest of servants. And that was wrong!
But the Last Supper is a place where worldly norms get turned upside down. By choosing to wash their feet Jesus welcomes Peter and the others into a new world, and in this new world greatness is measured not by how tall we stand or how deeply other folk bow before us, but by how deeply we love, and how willingly we serve. Later as they eat together they share the signs of this new world: bread and wine that are no longer just themselves. They still are bread and wine, but now they’re something more as well. Jesus breaks bread, and says: This is my body; do this to remember me. He blesses the cup, passes it round, and says: This is my blood.
And so begins the supper we share tonight. Broken bread and wine outpoured join us to the life and love of the man who declares himself as our Servant King. To Peter he says: “If I don’t wash you, you’re not in fellowship with me.” No-one else could or would perform this task; but in Jesus, despite ourselves, we’re made clean, our purity is restored.
Ahead lies the cross. Even as they share this last meal, the disciples still don’t understand what’s happening, and what Jesus is preparing to do. This is something no-one else could do. Jesus offers himself, the perfect priest presents the perfect sacrifice: the Lamb of God offered to free his people from their sin. This meal makes us part of that once and for all sacrifice, for Jesus says: This is my body, broken for you. Here at this table we’re joined to the life laid down, and to the life restored.
I was watching an old episode of Midsomer Murders the other night. I’m glad I don’t live there! Anyway, this episode had a church at the centre, and two clerics - the current vicar, and the previous vicar now retired. I assumed one of them would be the murderer, and I was right. But I did think there’d have been one good vicar and one bad one, and there I was wrong: neither of them was much good. The Church made an easy target, I suppose! It usually does, but why not? The Church can be as worldly as any other human organisation, with its divisions, arguments, hierarchies; with an outward show to mask who knows what bad stuff happening inside. Church is a human organisation, made up of people as weak and fallible as any other people. But that’s not the whole story - for we also share this meal.
Like Peter, we may promise more than we give; like James and John, we may try to grab the best seats. But the fact that Jesus breaks bread tonight with ordinary fallible folk helps rather than hinders my faith. On this night every year, I’m reminded that in Jesus the expected rules of the game of life no longer apply. The world is turned upside down. See how the world does things, says Jesus: but my friends are no longer in the world - among you, things need to be different. Share this bread, take this wine. Be like me, and allow me to be part of you. Excel in service, let the very greatest among you be the one who is servant of all. True greatness isn’t found in palaces and towers. Sorry, Mr Trump, but yours is fake greatness; true greatness involves washing feet; it’s shared in bread and wine. Here and only here will the world find true life and health and glory.
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