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Maundy Thursday
Brian Mashburn
March 14, 2010
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The Passion Week
We are four weeks out from Easter Sunday and I want to break away from our study of 1 John. This will allow us to focus on the last 4 days of what some Christian movements refer to as “Holy Week”. That is, the week that Jesus was crucified, buried, and raised.
It should be no surprise to anyone who follows Christ that Christians throughout the centuries have paused and taken great interest in each and every day of Christ’s life. But they have given special attention to Christ’s behavior, demeanor, actions, and teachings on these particularly intense days leading to the dramatic climax of his mission on earth.
Today we will look at Maundy Thursday, the day of the Last Supper, the washing of the disciple’s feet, the betrayal of a friend. It was the day of Jesus’ discourse about who he was, what was coming next, and what he wanted from those disciples.
Next week we will look at Good Friday, an ironic name to be sure, for it is a day of blood, a day of murder, a day of tears, a day of death. It is the day of the cross.
Then we will look at Holy Saturday. It was the thought of this day that inspired me to do this series. It stands as the only day in the history of mankind where Christ’s followers had the dilemma of trying to find hope and value in Jesus after he was killed and before he was resurrected.
And finally, we will make our annual visit to Resurrection Sunday, arguably humanity’s best day ever.
Let us leave our comparably trivial lives for a moment, and join Jesus in his last few days on earth, praying that by doing so…by fixing our eyes and minds on Jesus during these most impactful of days…our trivial lives will be transformed to looking a little bit more like his.