The following is an excerpt from Seasons of Worship: A Spiritual Calendar for the Church Today.
Maundy Thursday (maundy meaning “mandate” or “command”) remembers the time Jesus spent with his disciples in the upper room. It was there Jesus gave the ultimate example of being a servant as he washed the disciples’ feet:
“Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him”
Jesus gave a new command when he said,
“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you”
Now, this command wasn’t new to the disciples in the sense that they had never heard these words before. This is a command found in the Old Testament Law (Lev 19:18), which would have been familiar to them. They would have known these words well. Yet it was new to them because Jesus was showing them how to love one another—through acts of service.
Jesus also gave new meaning to the Passover when he took the bread and called it his body and took the cup of wine and called it his blood (Matt 26:26–29; Mark 14:22–25; Luke 22:14–20), instituting what we now know as the Lord’s Supper, or communion. Maundy Thursday worship naturally features the Lord’s Supper with its rich theological elements, including its attention to communal love and its clear eschatological orientation (its focus on hopeful anticipation of the coming kingdom).
©2024 Steven D. Brooks, Wipf and Stock Publishers
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If you would like to read more about Maundy Thursday and the Christian year, and it’s spiritual impact upon the lives of worshipers, you can find more in Seasons of Worship: A Spiritual Calendar for the Church Today by Dr. Steven D. Brooks.