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Sermon - Maundy Thursday - 20th March 2008
St Alban's West Epping 7:45pm
Readings: Exodus 12:1-2; 11-14 Psalm 116:1-2, 11-18; 1 Corinthians 11:23-26; John 13:1-17, 31b-35
The idea of memory and remem bering in Christianity has roots that reach back into Israel and are a part of Paul's Jewish heritage. What is involved in "remembering" in Israel's traditions may be seen, in the first reading this evening. It is the story of the Passover According to the Book of Exodus, "passover" refers to God passing through the land of the Egyptians whose first-born were struck dead while the Israelites, who had sprinkled their doorways with the blood of a lamb, were spared. The Egyptians were so stricken that they let the Israelites go free.
The event of the Passover occurred on the 14th of Nisan, the first month of the year which then began with Spring. Ever afterwards, the Israelites have commemorated on the 14th of Nisan their liberation from slavery by eating the lamb of the Passover. In the course of time, the Passover became a pilgrimage feast which the Jews went up to Jerusalem to celebrate. The time for Jesus "to pass from this world to the Father" coincided with the Passover which he celebrated with his apostles in the upper room. However, he substituted his own body and blood, soon to be sacrificed on the cross, as the sacrificial victim. During the meal he said over the bread "This is my body ... " and over the chalice of wine, "This is my blood." Thus he stood revealed as the Lamb of God, the sacrifice of the new and eternal Covenant. Thus we as Christians were delivered from the slavery of sin and death and enabled to pass over with Christ "from this world to the Father."
The Exodus story becomes the tellers' story; liturgy unites the old story with our story. What happened back then is retold to incorporate us as a part of the narrative, as participants in the old and ongoing story. So it is with Paul's understanding of the Lord's Supper. When the Corinthians tell the story, it becomes their story; they "remember" the story in a way that ties their own lives into it in a trans forming and illuminating way. Paul employs precisely this kind of "remembering" when he recounts the exodus to his Corinthian readers, when he describes the original exodus travellers as "our ancestors" and when he invites the Corinthians and us to picture ourselves as part of the story.
In eating the bread and drinking the cup, "you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes" he says. What is meant by "proclaim"? Although the word can mean, "preach," it has a much wider sense in Paul's use of it. When people live fully the new life in Christ, their faith makes itself known; their living of their faith shows itself to others and has an impact upon them. That is why Paul, in writing to the Thessalonians, remarks: "For the word of the Lord has sounded forth from you not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere so that we have no need to say anything" (1 Thess 1:8). The Thessalonians have not sent missionaries; they have lived their faith with profound zeal and that has been so effective a testimony, a proclamation, that Paul has he no need to preach. Their story becomes infectious. In the same way, Paul thinks that taking part in the supper is itself a "proclamation." Paul's particular description of what is proclaimed "Christ's death until he comes" fits Paul's purposes at hand and also affirms his basic convictions.
The horizons of Paul's vision, indeed,the story he thinks the supper "remembers", extend from Christ's death, on the one side, to Christ's ultimate return at the end of the ages on the other. In between are Christ's resurrection and the association of the members of Christ's body who live in Christ until his return at the end. So Paul thinks that the supper, by what it remembers and proclaims, scans the whole story of redemption in Christ and rehearses for the believers the true scope and setting of the life they are called to live together. Every time believers take part in the sup per, we rehearse God's story, who we are and where we are in God's story. If we live it, as we should, our very lives will become a fitting proclamation of the gospel to the world.
As I have said in the August/September edition of the Parish Magazine, in this Diocese, the general philosophical and theological position that is held regarding the Eucharist, is the one held by the followers of the Swiss reformer Zwingli. Zwingli said that the bread and wine in the Eucharist were nothing more than mere symbols. His position stood against the Roman Catholic theory of Transubstantiation, the Lutheran theory of Consubstantiation, and what I believe what the Anglican Church has fostered it ever since the Reformation, a theology of the Eucharist holding in tension both Protestant and Catholic understandings, the theory of the Real Presence. Real presence is expressed in the “Prayer of Approach”.
“We do not presume to come to your table, merciful Lord, trusting in our own righteousness, but in your manifold and great mercies. We are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under your table. But you are the same Lord whose nature is always to have mercy. Grant us, therefore, gracious Lord, so to eat the flesh of your dear Son Jesus Christ, and to drink his blood, that we may evermore dwell in him, and he in us. Amen.”
Jesus said that whenever we meet together we should eat the bread and drink the wine of the Eucharist as if we were doing it in his presence. Not re-enacting the Last Supper but as if we were an actual participant of the original meal. This is more than remembering. He did not tell his followers to say Morning or Evening Prayer or attend a prayer meeting, as good as such may be. Each time we gather we are to celebrate the Lord’s Death until he comes. It is reassuring to be partaking of the Eucharist. It is the New Covenant’s manna from heaven. It strengthens us with the very presence of Jesus so that we can remain faithful and committed until he returns or we go to be with him at the end of our age.
In John Macquarrie’s book, “Path’s in Spirituality” Macquarrie wrote of going into a Anglo-Catholic church in London on the eve of being sent off to war and he happened upon a service of Evensong that was followed by “Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament”. He had never been to Benediction before. He was previously a Presbyterian minister. At Benediction the Sacrament is exposed and the congregation gaze upon it. While he was uncertain of the ceremony, he said,
“While I did not know what lay ahead of me or when I might come back to these shores again, but (by participating in Benediction) I had been reassured of our Lord’s presence and had received a sacramental blessing, … I had been made aware of God’s presence among his people, gathered to worship him”
It was this statement that really cemented in my understanding that Jesus is “really present” in the Eucharistic elements, present to reassure all of us. It does not exclude the concept of God being with us at other times and in the words of Scripture and the words of the preacher. Word and Sacrament must be held in tension. Both are important. None-the-less, I believe that I am truly fed and reassured by the eating and drinking the elements. It assures me that as the manna fed the wandering Israelites coming out of their captivity after the first Passover, the Eucharist, the Holy Communion, the Lord’s Supper, the Mass, the Holy Mysteries, whatever the name you give the Sacrament, it feeds us for our daily wanderings in the uncharted regions of our life pilgrimage.
Every time we believers take part in the sup per, we rehearse God's story no matter whoever we are and wherever we are in God's story. If we live the Lord’s Supper, as we should, then our very lives will become a fitting proclamation of the gospel to the world.