MAUNDY THURSDAY
It
is funny how the ceremony of foot washing seems to be kind of embarrassing to
us. It seems so intimate and personal. We are hesitant to bare our feet. And
yet in our current culture people bare their souls on television and their
torsos on the stage and on the beach.
A number of years ago I worked closely
with the manager of one of the Union Trust branches. She literally kept me
solvent while I was in business. She taught me to hoard my cash and to work the
interest rates, etc. One day she told me that she would be away for six weeks.
“How so?” “I asked. I am going to have my feet operated on,” she replied. She
then kicked off her shoes and showed me her feet. They were so misshapen that I
marveled that she could walk. Six weeks later she was back at her desk. “How
are the feet?” I asked. She kicked off her shoes and showed me the most
perfectly formed feet you could think of. “Now, I can really walk,” she
exclaimed.
You see, when your feet are in good
shape, you can walk.
Years later I started going to a
podiatrist. Every ten weeks I have a whirlpool bath and the nails clipped. I
leave with “happy feet.”
We think of Andronocles and the lion,
where the lad removes the thorn from the lion’s paw. For years I had to tend to
my Black Lab’s feet. Over the years I tended to my children’s feet and even to
my wife’s.
Several times during Lent we have read
passages in which Jesus’ feet are washed by one or more women. The act of foot
washing was at the time seen as an act of hospitality and civility. But there
is more to it than that. In the act of foot washing the host becomes the
servant. There is a certain humility (even if it is done by a servant) that is
intended. When Jesus’ feet are washed by the women, it is an act of devotion
and a foreshadowing of His kingship and His death.
When at the Passover meal Jesus washes
the feet of His disciples, He is taking upon Himself the role of servant hood.
The Lord becomes the servant. He admonishes His disciples to emulate His
behavior. Thus their role is to be one of servant hood and humility. Their
souls are to be tended to by such humility and service to one another and to
Christ.
You see, when your feet are in good
shape, you can walk. Or to put it differently, when your soul has humility and
is in good shape, you truly live.
We tend to our souls
through acts of genuine humility and devotion. They prepare our souls to walk
through the events of Good Friday and to approach the empty tomb, and later,
while walking, to meet the risen Lord.
Through the practice of humility, and
through emulating Christ’s washing of His disciples’ feet, you and I prepare to
have, perhaps, on the Day of Resurrection not “happy feet,” but “happy
souls.” - Amen-
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