{"id":1044,"date":"2013-03-29T09:39:55","date_gmt":"2013-03-29T13:39:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=1044"},"modified":"2013-03-29T09:39:55","modified_gmt":"2013-03-29T13:39:55","slug":"holy-thursday-homily","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/holy-thursday-homily\/","title":{"rendered":"Holy Thursday Homily"},"content":{"rendered":"

Holy Thursday 2013<\/a>
\nExodus 12:1-8, 11-14
\n1 Corinthians 11:23-26
\nJohn 13:1-15
\nMarch 28, 2013<\/p>\n

Tonight is a night like no other night but neither is a night that stands all by itself.<\/p>\n

It was the night of the Passover.\u00a0 The Passover is the greatest of the Israelite feasts that they celebrated as a perpetual institution at God\u2019s command.<\/p>\n

It was a memorial feast to celebrate a great moment, the Exodus, when the Israelites were set free from the Egyptians.\u00a0 It was celebrated with the sacrifice of a lamb and unleavened bread.<\/p>\n

Jesus would have grown up celebrated the Passover every year with Mary and Joseph.\u00a0 And it is no small coincidence that God chose the night of the Passover for what happens tonight.<\/p>\n

We call it the Last Supper.\u00a0 One of our school children asked me this week shouldn\u2019t it be the \u201cFirst Supper\u201d because it is the first time the Eucharist is celebrated.\u00a0 The Eucharist is a meal of spiritual food so the child had something there, they understood the significance of the Eucharist.<\/p>\n

We call it the Last Supper, of course, because it is the last earthly supper that Jesus shared with his disciples.<\/p>\n

But Jesus didn\u2019t just celebrate the Passover with his disciples and call it good.\u00a0 He took the Passover and made it something even better.<\/p>\n

It is at this meal where Jesus says \u2018this is my body\u2019 and \u2018this is my blood.\u2019\u00a0 He doesn\u2019t say \u201cpretend\u201d this is my body and blood.\u00a0 He says it is.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve got a big word for it, transubstantiation, changing of the substance.\u00a0 It still looks like bread.\u00a0 It still looks like wine but in a way we cannot understand God takes it and transforms it into the Body and Blood of Christ.<\/p>\n

It is His Body and Blood that is given up for us.\u00a0 When it is given up?\u00a0 The answer to that goes back to what I said about this not being a night all by itself.\u00a0 I already spoke of how it ties back to the Passover that had been celebrated for centuries.<\/p>\n

We also need to look forward from this night to understand the Eucharist.\u00a0 Tomorrow we celebrate the Crucifixion where Jesus gives up His Body and Blood but Jesus unites that sacrifice with the Eucharist.<\/p>\n

So as Paul says \u201cFor as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0 Every time we celebrate the Eucharist we remember how Jesus gave up His Body and Blood for us.\u00a0 It is not a new sacrifice we celebrate but making Jesus the sacrifice at Calvary.<\/p>\n

But as if that wasn\u2019t enough, that wasn\u2019t all that Jesus did that night.\u00a0 For us to eat the Body of Christ and to drink the cup is to want to become like Jesus.<\/p>\n

To become like Jesus is to serve the needs of others.\u00a0 Knowing the need to teach this, Jesus did something that would not be expected from a Messiah.\u00a0 As Messiah, he had every right to expect people to wait on him but he didn\u2019t.\u00a0 At the Last Supper, he took on the role of servant and washed the feet of his disciples.\u00a0 At first, Peter refused but Jesus told him it must be so.<\/p>\n

In washing the feet of his disciples, Jesus shows humility to others.\u00a0 We need to do the same.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Holy Thursday 2013 Exodus 12:1-8, 11-14 1 Corinthians 11:23-26 John 13:1-15 March 28, 2013 Tonight is a night like no other night but neither is a night that stands all by itself. It was the night of the Passover.\u00a0 The Passover is the greatest of the Israelite feasts that they celebrated as a perpetual institution …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘Holy Thursday Homily’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[29,82],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-gQ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1044"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1044"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1044\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1045,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1044\/revisions\/1045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1044"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1044"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1044"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}