Monday Thursday

John 13:34, Matthew 26:26-28, 1 Corinthians 11:25

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When I was a kid. I remember thinking about that evening when Jesus gathered with his disciples in the upper room before his crucifixion, thinking that the name for that day was Monday, Thursday. And I always wondered to myself, why in the world would somebody take two names of weekdays and put them together into Monday Thursday? It didn’t make a whole lot of sense.

As I grew older, I came to understand that people weren’t saying Monday Thursday, they were saying Maundy Thursday. Well, I can’t say that helped a whole lot. After all, what does maundy mean? Well, the word maundy really comes from the Latin term mondatum, which means command or law. In fact, we have an English word that’s very similar, mandate, that we use today. So maybe we can think of that Thursday as Command Thursday or Mandate Thursday.

But if that’s the case, what command did Jesus give that night in the upper room? Well, in John Chapter 13, it says this. Jesus spoke to his disciples.

A new commandment I give you: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, so also you are to love one another. (John 13:34)

Jesus showed the love that he wanted His disciples to have for each other that very night, as he himself knelt down to wash his disciples feet. He wanted them to be self-sacrificing. To put each other’s needs before their own. Well, how have you done when it comes to loving your fellow Christian? I know it’s one thing to love your enemies, Jesus also tells us to do that, but it seems like it would be easier to love fellow Christians yet, do we do that? Are there people in our own lives that are Christians and yet we hold grudges against them? We don’t desire to show any sort of love or kindness to them.

Often we fail at that command that Jesus gave his disciples Maundy Thursday evening. But thanks be to God, that’s not all Jesus gave that night. That same night, Jesus also gave another command or perhaps we want to say He instituted something. He set up or instituted what we often refer to as the Lord’s Supper. Matthew, Chapter 26. We hear this

While they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to the disciples. He said, “Take, eat, this is my body.” Then he took the cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it all of you, for this is my blood of the new[a] testament,[b] which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. (Matthew 26:26-28)

Later, Saint Paul tells us Jesus also said,

Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me. (1 Corinthians 11:25)

So Jesus gave his disciples a special meal that night. He gave them his very body and blood for the forgiveness of sins. And he commanded them, he encouraged them to do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. It wasn’t a command as something that you better do it or else. But he was inviting them to come and receive my true body and blood. Come and know that all of your sins are forgiven, especially those sins of your failures to show love for each other.

What comfort we find that on Maundy Thursday, as Jesus gives us a very precious meal, a meal through which he gives us his very self, his body and blood, to assure us that all of our sins are forgiven in him. Amen.