Unity

 If you were in the company of all your closest friends at the same time, and you knew it would never happen again, and you had just a minute to say something important, something you hoped they’d remember, what would you say?

Now, it’s Maundy Thursday, and there’s an obvious place our minds will take this little thought exercise. Straight to Jesus, and his passion and death. We read these chapters every year, we sing “Were You There?”, we undress the sanctuary, and we go home, and those of us who have young children engage in conversation with a certain bunny. 

I’m always going to invite us to slow down, and not go straight to the obvious. Because we need to see this moment the way Jesus’ disciples did. For just a moment, try not to think of Jesus as the guy you’ve seen depicted on Tiffany stained glass windows and portrayed in film by Jim Caviezel. Because it wasn’t that Jesus who invited himself over to someone else’s house, and then had dinner with his closest friends. It was a 33 year old man, and twelve other dudes just like him.

Gosh, how lucky Jesus was to even have such a big friend group. I don’t know any guy in his 30s who has a dozen friends, much less a dozen who will all get together on the same night for dinner. Most of the thirty-somethings I know have that one guy they chat with at work sometimes and then that one guy from high school, and then their college roommate, and they have an endless text loop of “bro, let’s hang soon” that rarely if ever comes to pass.

Jesus knew he was going to die. Not just because he always knew there would never be a return trip from Jerusalem, and not just because he knew how high the tension was mounting, and not even because he had a bad feeling about Judas over there. But because all people must. He’d spent the whole last year trying to teach these twelve men around him the most important lessons he could put into words–love your neighbor, learn from your ancestors and do better, welcome the little children, have faith, trust in God, be humble. And forgive. 

This is it. If we ever got all of our friends in the same room at once, we’d hope it wasn’t so, but we’d know–this is never going to happen again. For Jesus, this moment is that love and longing, combined with the enormous weight of God’s ticking clock over his head. And he may even know that he’ll see eleven of these men again, after his resurrection. 

But this is his very last moment in the company of one man in particular: Judas. The following weekend would be incredibly harrowing for the other eleven, but they’d survive it. Judas would not. Jesus knew his heart, and he knew–this was it.

Can you imagine? If you were sitting with the dozen people closest to you, including the person in your life who would hurt you more than anyone else? And you had one shot to say something? What would that moment be about for you?

Jesus had a golden moment to out Judas in front of the other eleven, but he didn’t take it. He could have gotten in a big fight with Judas, and Judas would have had it coming. Heck, he could have just made a run for it and tried to spare his life.

But Jesus didn’t do any of that. He was at peace with what was going to happen, and he wanted his closest companions to share in as much of that peace as they could absorb, because that was what he wanted them to remember. He wanted them to remember that they were all together. And he wanted Judas to know, above all else, that he was loved, and forgiven.

Jesus wanted to spend these last moments as a free man creating unity. A table where absolutely everyone was welcome, even the guy who screwed up. A table where no one was judged. And, to make sure they really remembered the experience, he made the most common dinner foods–bread and wine–about being in harmony with God and one another.

Let’s keep the feast.