On Approaching Easter Weekend

What was it like to sit at the table that Thursday of Passover?

Jesus eager to partake of this Passover meal. Peter and John having prepared the lamb to eat. Jesus, the Lamb, preparing Himself for what lie ahead by soaking up every last moment before He killed death itself.

Did the joy beyond the suffering fill the thoughts of His mind, or was He fixed on the moment? Enjoying His time, the meal, His best friends’ banter? Steadying Himself for the suffering He knew was only hours away?

Did He take deep breaths as He hung out with His disciples? No doubt He communed with the Father as well. Did He pray in His depths for the faithfulness and endurance He knew He would need in just a few hours?

When He passed the bread, did He hope to instill in 11 of His friends the truth of what they took so they’d remember it tomorrow as they lay His body in the tomb?

When He touched Judas’ feet, held the heels of His betrayer, did His heart catch a bit? Did He hesitate to touch Satan’s minister? To share the cup with the one whose pride would send Him to certain suffering unknown to any man?

I could’ve been Judas. I like to think I couldn’t.

But the truth about my pride is that is sent Jesus to suffer. Just like Judas.

If I’d been sitting at that table, would Jesus have taken pause before washing my feet? Before offering me His broken body? His spilt blood?

My faltered faith wants to say yes, He would have. Because I don’t deserve Him. I don’t deserve the serving or the washing or the bread of His body. Nothing in me deserves any part of Him.

But the faith He lets me have, the kind that’s rooted in what He says, tells me differently.

It says He washed Judas’ feet just like He washed John’s. And He would’ve taken mine up into His hands, too. Wiped them clean with the cloth. Rinsed them well with the water.

And then He would have walked that road into the Garden, handed Himself over to the soldiers, let Himself be beaten and ridiculed, all the while doing it for me.

All the while doing it for you.

How can I not take pause to soak in the amazing for all that He gave? How can we not celebrate from the deepest of our depths as we realize the truth that He did it for people like Judas? And me.

And so, as we approach the Easter weekend, I find a joy running deep through my veins. Because death is now dead. For me. For you. And the chains of the crap that holds me back from real living are gone. No more.

Happy Easter Weekend, my friends. Schones Wochenende.