In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

     There are some things we're just not supposed to understand. I'm not sure men are supposed to ever understand women. Are we supposed to understand teenager's fashions and clothing choices? How about the piercing and tatoo-ing fad? Middle-aged accountants with pony-tails and earrings, putting on leather chaps and vests and riding Harleys. I know these may sound flippant and light-hearted, but there seem to be other things we're not supposed to understand as well. Like a 22 year old young woman being killed by a run-away dump truck with bad brakes. Babies being born with defects requiring surgery after surgery. A national media frenzy over whether or not a woman who is brain damaged should have her feeding tube removed. Don't expect me to try to explain these things this evening. As the Lord says in Isaiah 55, "My ways are not your ways"-there are some things it seems we're not supposed to understand in life.

     Tonight, we're commemorating, observing, should we say celebrating, several things we don't really understand-but we celebrate them anyway.

     The first is the Lord's Supper, which was instituted at the Last Supper, on the night of Jesus' betrayal and arrest. Jesus met with his disciples in an Upper Room, reclined with them at table, and shared with them, the Passover meal-he, himself, taking his place at the head of the table, as the head of the household, offering up the Eucharistic Prayer-the prayer of thanksgiving, then taking bread and wine, holding them in his own hands, saying, "This is my body-this is my blood, given for you for the forgiveness of sins. Do this in remembrance, in 'anamnesis' of me. And from that point on, until the schism of the sixteenth century, Christians with one accord, did this in remembrance, in anamnesis of Jesus-every Lord's Day-every Sunday without fail, because when they did this, Jesus presence was re-actualized, re-presented among them, in the bread and wine that become His body and blood, bringing forgiveness of sins, and so, eternal life and salvation. And Christians still do this. Disciples still gather together for the Holy Communion, even though we don't now, and we never have, "understood", just how this works, and how it is that Jesus becomes present. His first disciples gathered around that table didn't understand, nor do we understand, how in simply "doing this", Jesus, the crucified and resurrected one, the Eternal Word, becomes present among us, enfleshed now, in, with and under, the bread and wine-so that His presence in these earthly elements, bring redemption and release. Were they not His body and blood, how could they effect eternal life and salvation? Were they merely bread and wine, symbols of some heavenly reality, how could they forgive sins? Bread and wine can't do that. But the bread and wine do not remain bread and wine. The reality Jesus instituted at the Last Supper, was a new reality-that what appears to be bread and wine, together with the Word of God and the power of the Holy Spirit, are in fact, no longer bread and wine, but the very incarnate presence of our Lord-His body and blood, broken and poured out, for us and for our salvation. We believe it, and we come to receive it-but we do not understand it. No, I can't explain it. I try...I teach others about it...we discuss the meaning of the Lord's Supper-but do we really explain it? Can anyone really understand it-and how it happens, and how it works? Some things we are not meant to understand, in this life. That's why one of the earliest names for the Lord's Supper- in Greek is "musterion"-mystery, from which we get our word, "sacrament".

     And yet, that's not all we don't understand, tonight. We also have an equally hard time understanding, Jesus, the Eternal Son, present at the creation of the universe; Jesus, the very Son of God, Jesus, the King of kings and Lord of lords, taking a towel, tying it around himself, kneeling at the feet of his disciples, washing them. In his book God with a Human Face, John C. Purdy writes, "This is scandalous, of course. The soul does not want to be face to face with a God who is less than all-powerful. The spectacle of a kneeling God is devastating. No! Let God be seated on a throne, holding all the symbols of power; let us be the ones to kneel. No wonder Peter is horrified when he sees Emmanuel: God-with-us, kneeling at his feet."

     This has been the human reaction from the very beginning, when Peter, himself, first refused to let Jesus kneel and wash his feet. It wasn't that Peter didn't want to be, as Purdy said, "face to face" with Jesus-Peter didn't want Jesus holding his feet, washing his toes, drying the crusty, road-weary skin; Jesus kneeling, while Peter sat in the honored position. Is it any wonder many throughout the ages have rejected this kneeling, humble, loving Jesus, turning instead, to all sorts of false gods and goddesses who appear more ready and willing to, well, act godly? What can you get from a god who kneels and washes your feet? That's the stumbling block for most people. Because truly, with Jesus, what you see, is what you get. The one who humbles himself and washes his own disciple's feet-is the same one who said, "I came not to be served, but to serve, and to give my life as a ransom for many." The same one who kneels down, and in love, cleanses his disciples feet, is also the one who humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross, cleansing his disciples, not with water and a bowl and a towel, but with his own blood, pouring from hands and side, flowing from his body, down from the cross, washing us in a cleansing tide, the blood of the sacrificed Lamb of God, purifying the flock. Because, as Jesus himself says, "If I do not wash you, you have no part of me." As John Wesley said, "in a more general sense, it means, 'if I do not wash thee in my blood, and purify thee by my Spirit, thou canst have no communion with me, nor any share in the blessings of my kingdom'." To receive Jesus-to be in communion with Jesus-to have a share in His heavenly inheritance, one must be washed-cleansed, and this, Jesus does for us, himself, as he washes feet, and dies on the cross for the sins of the world. And though we do not understand it, we receive it. Though we can't explain it, we are the blessed recipients of this cleansing, and this Holy Communion. And thankfully, Jesus does not require us to understand it, or to explain it. Thankfully, it is a gift that in it's fullness, is pure mystery-because it is God's work, and God's doing, and God's action on our behalf, that we receive, not with understanding, but with faith, with trust, that God does what He says He does. That's what faith is-and why we are not to understand all of God's ways. Then, it wouldn't require trust. Then, it wouldn't be faith. Rather, we are to live by faith, believing in the unseen, trusting in what we don't understand and what we can't explain.

     And we, are simply to come, and to let Jesus serve us, to let Jesus feed us, to let Jesus wash us in His blood-so that forgiven, restored, renewed, redeemed, we can go, to do what is our proper work...to love one another, as He has loved us. Jesus, at His Last Supper, doesn't give us a new commandment, to understand everything, or to be able to explain everything-nor does He command us to now, be God and Lord. He commands us to love one another, as He loves us. To love the lowest and the least. To love those who are, to us, un-lovable. To love the poor and the homeless and the persecuted. To love our irritating and hard-to-love spouse; our disobedient and disruptive teenagers; our nauseating in-laws. We are commanded to love, as Jesus loves-self-lessly, and humbly and unconditionally. We are to love one another, without asking or always understanding why. We are to love, as an act of faith and trust, in the one who loves us, and gave himself up for us, a perfect sacrifice, for the salvation of the world. Tonight, though there is much in life we do not, and dare not understand-still, let us love our Lord, and let us love one another. Let us leave here tonight, cleansed and nourished, and ready, again, to love, as Christ loves us!

     In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.