Maundy Thursday 2025
Christ Church Cathedral

Prayer: Lord Jesus Christ, we thank you this night for the institution of the new covenant, for the Last Supper at which you shared your body and your blood. Just as you hungered and thirsted to bring about your kingdom, help us as we share communion together to hunger and thirst for the coming of your kingdom. We pray in your precious name. Amen.

Welcome to a day full of beginnings, beginnings that happened long ago and beginnings that are happening right now.
In our readings from Exodus, we hear of the beginning of the people Israel leaving slavery in Egypt. God had made Moses and the people Israel a promise. God said I have heard the groaning of the Israelites whom the Egyptians are holding as slaves, and I have remembered my covenant. Say therefore to the Israelites , I am the Lord and I will free you from the burdens of the Egyptians and deliver you from slavery…I will take you as my people and I will be your God. I will bring you into the land that I swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; I will give it to you …I am the Lord.

Yes, a new beginning out of slavery and going to the promised land.

To do this, God brings about 10 plagues on Egypt, and the 10th plague is the death of all the first born children in Egypt. However the Lord now tells Moses to celebrate this special day forever. The first and forever Passover. The Lord spares all his people who put the blood of the lamb on their doorposts and lintels. We read when I see the blood, I will pass over you and no plague will destroy you…this shall be a day of remembrance for you…

Can you even begin to imagine what Moses and his people were thinking at this first passover? The first passover over 3,000 years ago. I expect they were both frightened and rejoicing at the same time. A brand new beginning with God in charge. A brand new beginning with their God in charge.

Let us jump forward now to our Gospel where Jesus washes the feet of his disciples and gives them a new commandment. You have to realize first that foot washing was a central mideastern ritual in Jesus’ time. It was an act of hospitality, and always done by a servant. So the washing of feet was not a new beginning, but rather, the fact the Jesus himself took the role of a servant and washed the disciples feet was totally new. The disciples did not understand, but Jesus says You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand. And as a preface to what will be a new commandment, Jesus says I, your Lord and teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to do as I have done for you. Very truly I tell you, servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater that the one who sent them. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.

Then Jesus says; I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. The disciples will come to know that this is the real beginning of their discipleship. Discipleship as servants called to love. The key to everything. A brand new beginning with God in charge.

Finally in our reading from Corinthians we have the apostle Paul explain exactly the process of the very first communion at the Last Supper. Again, this first time communion must have been a bit strange to the disciples who did not yet understand that Jesus was to die. This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me…This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as oft you drink it, in remembrance of me. Words so familiar to us, but very shocking to the disciples. The very first communion. Another brand new beginning with God in charge.

So tonight we celebrate three new beginnings that change the world. Passover, a new commandment and communion. Wow. It is hard to imagine the incredible significance of these new beginnings and their effect over time.

Yet, here we are together tonight, celebrating Maundy Thursday, the last supper and communion. And I have a question for you.

At what time or place in the Bible do you feel that Jesus was the most hungry and thirsty? I expect you would think it was when Jesus was in the desert for forty days and nights without bread or water. Certainly he was physically famished then. However, I would argue that there was time that Jesus was even more hungry and thirsty than when he was in the desert. I would argue that at the institution of the Lord’s supper on Maundy Thursday Jesus was the most hungry and thirsty not only in body, but in mind and in soul. In the Gospel of Luke we read Jesus say

I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.

Eagerly desired. I think that that is a polite understatement. I think that Jesus was desperate to share that Last Supper with the disciples. Why was Jesus so desperate to share the bread and wine with the disciples this night? It is on this night that Jesus comes to the full realization that it is he who is to institute this new covenant. That it is his body and his blood that will usher in the new covenant. Jesus hungers and thirsts to fulfill his Father’s will that will bring about the coming of the Kingdom. His Father’s kingdom on earth. He hungers and thirsts on this night. Desperately. And he offers hos body and blood.. Thank you Jesus.

We as Jesus’ people, his disciples here on earth right now should not ever forget the hunger and thirst of our Lord on this night as he shared his body and his blood. For we too should have the same hunger and thirst to bring about his kingdom.

Later this night we will strip the altar. Everything will be taken away. What I want you to do this night is to think to yourself, and to know in your heart and soul, what is it that you will hunger and thirst for the most when it is no longer there? As things are taken away, what will you miss the most? The Bible? The word of God? Or the chalice which holds the wine, the blood of the new covenant that was shed for the forgiveness of sins? Or the paten, the plate that holds the wafer, the body of Christ broken for you? Or the Cross, the symbol of the passion that our Saviour endured so that we might gain the gift of eternal life? What will you hunger and thirst for most when it is gone?

Each of these things represent part of our Lord Jesus Christ. Each of them represent a slightly different way of bringing about the kingdom of God. The light of the word. The forgiveness of sins. The power of the Cross. We hunger and thirst for all of them, for in the end we hunger and thirst for Jesus himself and for the coming of his kingdom. Tonight let us continue to hunger and thirst together.

Amen.

Ralph Leavitt