Exodus 12:1-14a
1 Corinthians 11:23--32
John 13:1-15
When I was pregnant with my first child, my mother gave me a very precious gift.
Wanting to be well prepared, I had read every book I could find on pregnancy and newborns. I was going to do this parenting thing RIGHT. But still, as my library and my hopes and my belly expanded, my self-confidence shrank.
And my mother said, "As a mother you are going to make a lot of mistakes. But if the child knows you love them, it will be okay."
Hearing that is a gift that I have treasured. It has got me through many a difficult time. It is a gift that I hope one day to give to my own children or to other young, frightened, expectant parents.
I received from my mother what I also will hand on .... Those things we receive that are most important to us we want to hand on, to make a tradition, just as the Apostle Paul did with the tradition of the breaking of the bread.
I think that's what Jesus did at the Last Supper. He knew he was leaving the people he loved, and he wanted to hand on the gift he himself had received.
There was the breaking of the bread and sharing of the cup. These are things to remember him by. But there's more that is handed on. John, writing about the Last Supper, doesn't tell us about the bread and the cup, instead he hands on the story of the foot-washing.
Jesus, Lord and Teacher, kneels like a slave to wash his friends' feet. He makes them clean – even his friend Judas, the one he knows will betray him. This is real, hands-on loving. He washes away the sin; he forgives them. "Having loved his own, he loved them to the end."
Jesus is handing on something important on to his friends. And he asks us also to hand on what we have received: the gift of loving and forgiving touch.
We all make a lot of mistakes. But a loving and forgiving touch can make it okay. ........... Hand it on.