Christopher Snook: Sermon for Maundy Thursday

Christopher Snook, April 1 2021

“I will not forget you....,” says the Lord, “I have engraved you on the palms of my hands... “

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In 1642 the first significant battle of the English Civil War was fought as Royalist forces marched on London. The armies were composed, as has so often been historically true, of largely inexperienced soldiers – on one side they gathered in defense of the King, on the other in defense of Parliament and the Puritan cause. The Royalist infantry were under the command of Lord Jacob Astley, sometime tutor of royalty and determined supporter of King Charles I. Before the battle (known as the Battle of Edgehill) began, Lord Astley famously prayed: “Lord, thou knowest how busy I must be this day. If I forget Thee, do not forget me.” It is a simple and remarkably humble prayer. And yet for all of its simplicity, it nonetheless captures, I think, the mystery at the heart of Maundy Thursday.

On the one hand, our liturgy this evening is in large part about our remembrance of God. Not unlike the Passover custom of recollecting the mighty acts by which God delivered his people from slavery in Egypt, this evening we remember the consummate acts in history by which God delivers the world from bondage to death and fear, insecurity and hopelessness. Already this evening, for example, we have remembered the Lord’s washing of his disciples’ feet and his new commandment – his “maundy” – that we love one another as he as loves us. Just this night we remember that he called his disciples no longer servants but friends. It is on this night that the Lord institutes the Holy Communion, which the Church is to celebrate in perpetuity until he comes again: Do this, he says, in memory of me. These commemorations – all of these memories, as it were – are the reason for which this night begins as a festive celebration: we ring the bells, light the candles, put on white vestments.

And yet by the end of this evening’s liturgy we will discover that remembering the Lord, much less recalling his new commandment to love one another, is far more difficult than it seems – difficult in the first instance for Peter, James and John and all of the disciples; difficult in the second instance even for us. Think again of the events that we recall this evening: Jesus washes the feet of his disciples, to be sure, but these are the same disciples who will abandon him in his hour of need; Jesus institutes the Mystery of the Holy Communion, to be sure, but he shares that first communion with the friend who will betray him by a kiss. And of course we end the liturgy tonight in the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus asks his dearest friends to watch with him while he prays in agony for the cup of suffering to be taken away; but rather than watch and pray, the disciples sleep. That is, they forget him.

So much of this evening is about remembering, and yet so much of the story we remember reminds us paradoxically of the disciples’ propensity to forget. They fall asleep to love. And as it is with the disciples so, perhaps, it is with the world; and as it is with the world, so it may be with us…

To forget love or to fall asleep to love – surely these are workable definitions of evil and sin. The world falls asleep to love all the time -- it falls asleep to the poor; false asleep to the most vulnerable. And we ourselves, perhaps, fall asleep to friends and spouses and even to those enemies we are called to love.  In all of these ways and more, the world forgets love. We ourselves forget and we ourselves are forgotten. This evening is about remembering: Remember the new commandment, remember the Lord’s Body and Blood, remember that you are his friends and not simply his servants. And yet as soon as we try to remember Jesus we realize, as tonight, how many are the ways in which he is forgotten....

“Lord,” prayed Sir Astely, “thou knowest how busy I must be this day. If I forget Thee, do not forget me.”

The great good news of Maundy Thursday and Good Friday, of Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday, is simply this: that though we forget, the Lord in his mercy remembers. And so the Prophet Isaiah writes in the Hebrew Scriptures: “Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you.... I have engraved you on the palms of my hands... .” In the Book of Genesis we read that God remembers Noah and so dries up the flood waters. On Good Friday, the Lord remembers the penitent thief who prays: Lord, remember me when you come into your Kingdom. Indeed, from one perspective, the entirety of Christ’s ministry, from his birth to his death and rising again, is one great work of remembrance that is carried on in the life of the Church. What else is Holy Baptism if not God remembering us by name; what is the Holy Communion but the mystery of our Lord remembering us by his death?

To make sense of Holy Week, of this evening and tomorrow, of Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday, we must see that in every moment of his journey the Lord is remembering us. When betrayed, he is remembering us who have been betrayed. When falsely accused; when speaking from the Cross; when dying; when rising again – in each and every one of these moments, the Lord is at work remembering us. We are saved this Holy Week not because we remember Jesus, but because we are remembered...

This is already a great deal to have observed this evening. A better sermon would say less and more effectively, would better serve the silence that is the very heart of this evening’s liturgy. So let me conclude with just this thought “Will you not watch with me?,” the Lord asks tonight. Will you not, he might perhaps have said, remember me. No doubt we shall try. There will be a vigil here, there will be our private prayers in our homes, the communion just now. Yet there is still little doubt -- at least in my life -- that I shall forget the Lord at some point tonight. I will be sleepy like the disciples. I will be forgetful of love. Like Sir Astley on his way to the battle of Edgehill, we all of us go out to battle each and every day, we get busy with all the cares of life, and so forget.

And for that reason, the only thing we need recall this evening is simply this: that though we forget, he remembers. “I will not forget you....,” says the Lord, “I have engraved you on the palms of my hands... .” AMEN.