Remember: A Sermon for Maundy Thursday, April 13, 2006

At the end one of the Star Trek movies, Number 2 I think, Mr. Spock sacrifices himself to save the Enterprise and her crew. As he is dying from radiation exposure, he reaches up and touches Dr. McCoy’s face and in a variation of what Trekkies know as “the vulcan mind meld” he links his consciousness with McCoy’s and utters a single word, “Remember,” as he dies. It turns out that he has implanted into McCoy’s spirit a kernel of his own. It also turns out that because of something called “the Genesis device” he isn’t really dead and the next movie is all about recovering his body and getting that bid of his soul out of McCoy and back where it belongs.

That scene with Leonard Nimoy’s deep gravelly voice saying, “Remember” always comes back to me when I think about Maundy Thursday because all of our rituals and actions tonight are about exactly that, remembering. They are done because God instructs us to remember.

In our lesson from the Hebrew Scriptures, from Exodus 12, God tells Moses and Aaron, and through them all the People of Israel, how they are to remember and celebrate the feast of the Passover. For the Jews the Passover is a celebration of God's salvation. The name "Passover" came from a description of the events of that fateful night. A destroying angel literally passed over the Hebrews but brought judgment upon the Egyptians. God had sent nine plagues on Egypt to convince Pharaoh to let Israel go.

The tenth and last plague was on all the firstborn in the land. But before the plague, God instructed each Israelite families to sacrifice a lamb and place it's blood on the door posts as a sign on their faith in God. They were instructed to roast the lamb and eat it all by morning and also to eat unleavened bread and bitter herbs. And that night an angel came and slew the firstborn of the Egyptians but it passed over the houses of the Hebrews.

Each part of this holy meal had a special meaning. The bitter herbs were to remind them of the bitterness of slavery. The unleavened bread was to remind them that they had to leave Egypt so quickly that they didn't have time to leaven their bread. They were to eat this meal in their traveling clothes to remind them of the journey out of slavery. The lamb reminded them of the sacrifice that protected the people from the destroying angel.

Each year afterwards the Hebrews were to remember the Passover and to celebrate it in this meal. It became their major celebration of God's salvation. God had spared those who were under the blood of the Passover lamb. God had defeated the mighty Egyptian masters and proven that the Egyptian god's were powerless. And God had brought the Children of Israel out of slavery.

It's no accident that the Lord's Supper took place during the Passover festival. After all Passover was celebrated to remember that God had saved in the past and to affirm the belief that God continues to save in the present. When the disciples gathered for that Last Supper with Jesus before his death, the Passover was in their minds. It was in this context that Jesus took bread and blessed it and broke it and said, "This is my body." And the disciples must have had in mind the blood of Passover lamb when he took the cup and said, "This is my blood." And it was during the slaughter of the Passover lambs the next day that Jesus was sacrificed on the cross.

Like Passover, the Holy Eucharist is a celebration of God's salvation. It reminds us how God has saved us through the blood of the Lamb, Jesus Christ. Each part of this meal reminds us of that salvation. The bread that is broken reminds us that Christ's body was broken because of human sinfulness. The cup reminds of Jesus' blood shed for humankind..

This celebration and remembrance of God's saving act is not that different from the Passover. The Passover reminds us how God saved Israel from slavery to the Egyptians. The Lord's Supper reminds us how God has saved us from slavery to sin and death. At Passover those who put their faith in God were under the blood of the Passover lamb sprinkled on their door posts. Today those who believe in the Lord are under the blood of the lamb of God that washes away our sins.

But the Lord's Supper is more than a memorial of what God did in the past. It is a reminder that God still saves and that God will continue to save. When we celebrate this meal it is more than a reminder of the past. In this meal Christ is present in the here and now. Different churches have different ways of expressing that, but we Anglicans call it “real presence”. Christ is present with, blesses, and dwells in those who celebrate this meal in faith.

This is because God is saving people today. God is still leading people out of slavery. The blood of Christ is still washing the stain of sins from people's lives. Today God is leading people out of slavery to sin and out of slavery to addictions. God is leading people out of slavery to abusive relationships.

God will continue to deliver people from slavery. In fact the promise that God gives us is that Christ will come again. And when Christ comes again he will do away with every form of evil that oppresses the human being. And there will be a feast. A feast of victory to celebrate God's victory over evil.

Come! Celebrate the victory of our Lord. Remember how God led the children of Israel out of Egypt. Remember the bitterness of their slavery and the suddenness of their freedom. Remember how God protected those who in faith put the blood of the lamb on their door posts. And remember that God continues to free people from slavery to wicked masters.

Come! Celebrate how God, through the death and resurrection of his only-begotten Son, defeated death. Remember how Jesus handed over his body to be broken. Remember how his blood was shed. And remember that God continues to save and protect those who in faith have accepted the blood of the lamb to cleans their hearts.

Come! Celebrate the promise of the victory feast to come. Christ the Lamb of God will come again. And by the authority of his Father he will cleans creation of all wickedness and evil. Christ will destroy all wickedness but he will Passover those who have put themselves under his seal. And the faithful will sit at a table and share in the ultimate victory life and love.