Part of Jesus

John 13:1-17, 31-35; 1 Corinthians 11:23-26

This is the week when everything turns upside down.

Inside out and backwards.

 

Because God is not supposed to die.

Dead people are not supposed to open their own graves and walk out looking shinier than before. Not supposed to walk right up to you on the road and say “Oh, hi!”

But all that is just about to happen.

 

And it starts here.

 

Okay, really it starts days or weeks or months before, as Jesus starts preaching topsy-turvy “last will be first” stuff, and eating with ritually unclean sinners, and winning religious debates and doing miracles and generally making the local religious and political leaders uncomfortable and suggesting things might not be as in control as everyone thought.

Or maybe it starts thirty-something years before, in human time, when God decides to be human, which already turns things upside down.

Or even maybe in the time before time, as God is becoming God.

 

But it also starts here, tonight, at this table.

When Jesus – the teacher, leader, rabbi everyone looks up to and depends on – takes a towel and starts washing the feet of his followers.  Something the servants are supposed to do, not the leader (and they were supposed to do it when we all came in to dinner, not in the middle of the meal. Good grief.)

 

Everybody’s uncomfortable with it. And as usual, we leave it to Peter to say something about it. So when Peter objects that this is upside down, that this is Not The Way It’s Supposed To Be, we all hear Jesus say “unless I wash you, you don’t belong with me”. And that’s a loss Peter (and everyone else at the table then and now) can’t tolerate.

 

So Jesus pushes Peter, and us, into our Uncomfortable Zone.

Which most of the disciples around that table – and many of us gathered here and contemplating an invitation to take our own shoes off and get washed – hope will all be over and back to normal in the morning.

 

Which it won’t be.

Not for Peter and those earliest friends and followers of Jesus, anyway.

Maybe not for us.

 

Because what Jesus is doing is not just turning the hierarchy of power upside down for one evening, to make a point.

He’s turning it upside down more globally. More permanently.

He’s about to pick up and turn over the entire fact and power of death. The one thing (besides taxes) that we can all be sure of. He’s about to hollow out all the power of every political and religious official in town, turning their power of ordering the death – and daily life – of others inside out.

 

And I suspect that when Jesus says to Peter, “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me,” he’s not talking about getting kicked off the Friends of Jesus softball team.

He’s talking about having a real, effective share in the power, purpose, actions, and even personhood of Jesus.

Talking about Peter – and the others around the table, and listening through the centuries, down to you and me – becoming part of Jesus.

Part of spreading God’s story, and God’s presence, and God’s miraculous power through the world.

Part of carrying God’s justice and mercy into the world where humans and human systems fail.

Part of carrying God’s joy and creativity into the world where humans and human systems are ignoring or smothering it.

Part of standing up to the power of death, overturning the power of those who kill, or who order death, and even becoming more powerful than death itself.

 

That is a lot more leadership and responsibility in our faith than many of us want.

I don’t blame Peter one bit for trying to yank his feet out of Jesus’ tub, when he got a little tickle of what Jesus might be turning upside down and inside out tonight.

 

Now, you and I are probably not going to wake up tomorrow to find ourselves actually in Jesus’ place with a tight schedule of miracles, arguing with the powers-that-be, and teaching the masses booked in our phone calendars, just because we wash each other’s feet tonight.

Probably not, anyway.

 

But Jesus is still inviting us, challenging us, with Peter, to have our own share in Jesus. To be part of Jesus, in all the ways that matter.

Inviting us to say yes again and again when Jesus offers to turn our expectations, our world, our comfort zone upside down.

Because that’s what it means to follow Jesus, to be Christian: to be part of the Body of Christ, here, in the world we live in now.

 

So it might be important, tonight, for you and me to notice, with Peter, that none of us is supposed to do this alone. As an individual.

 

Once we accept that first invitation to let Jesus wash our feet – to let Jesus turn our expectations upside down and recruit us into the bizarre, inside out, miraculous work of being Christ – Jesus commands us to wash each other’s feet. 

 

Peter is not the one who is appointed to become Jesus, to be The Leader, The One, and to wash everyone else’s feet. Nor is any other one disciple supposed to take that role.

 

We’re all commanded to keep exchanging service and leadership with one another. To become a whole Christ together: the whole Body of Christ, greater than the sum of our parts. Constantly giving and receiving love and leadership, service and strength.

Commanded to love one another as Jesus loves us, so that the love of Christ is always flowing back and forth among us, strengthening and uniting us.

(And gently, firmly, constantly turning our world inside out over and over again.)

 

Which is why we come to the table here, in the first place.

 

We come to be nurtured with the bread that Jesus breaks for us, and to become the Body of Christ that we share. Preaching centuries ago about Paul’s story that we read tonight – of Jesus breaking bread and saying “this is my body” – Saint Augustine said that when we gather at Jesus’ table we must “be what we see; become what we receive.”

 

As Jesus feeds and nourishes us, we must become, be the bread that nourishes the world. Become the whole and holy Body of Christ, pour out the Blood of Christ, in the real and present world – not as individuals, but as part of a whole, together. 

Whether we take off our shoes tonight and let Jesus handle our feet, or open our mouths and let Jesus feed us, tonight you and I, together with Peter and all the others at this table through the centuries, become part of Jesus’ own self.

Become the Body of Christ, carrying God’s presence where ever we go.

 

Together, we enter the story.

Together we are cleansed and nourished and invited to unite with Jesus as we walk through the days when everything turns upside down. Inside out and backwards. Until death itself is overturned into life beyond imagining.