Day 7: Maundy Thursday

And we come to Thursday, the Thursday which in the history of Christian literature and liturgy has come to be known as Maundy Thursday, from the Latin word mandatum—or the commandment, the commandments that Jesus gave His disciples that Thursday night in the upper room.

Last Supper

The Last Supper occupies a central role in all four Gospels, although, as we pointed out in an earlier lesson, the actual account of Jesus’ words over the meal, the Passover ceremony around which this last supper was built, are absent from John. They are found only in the other three gospels, even while John gives a much fuller account of Jesus’ teaching for His disciples after the meal. That meal, which indeed was originally the Passover celebration, following the commandments of the book of Exodus to commemorate the Israelites’ liberation by God from the land of Egypt, is given new significance by Jesus as He celebrates this meal with His twelve disciples as the head of the household would typically celebrate the meal with family members.

On this occasion He takes the customary bread and wine and He says, “This is my body, which is given for you. This is my blood.” He says, “It is my blood of the new covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” In the original context of a Jewish man holding up a loaf of bread and cups into which wine was poured and drunk, there would have been no misunderstanding His statement as somehow claiming that these elements of food and drink were supernaturally transformed into molecules or portions of His physical flesh, as some later church controversies have seemed to suggest.

Rather, this is a vivid way of symbolizing the significance of His death, just as Jesus has been using symbolism in parables—symbolic, prophetic-like actions—all throughout the days and weeks leading up to His crucifixion. He is pointing out in a very graphic way the saving or atoning significance, the substitutionary nature, of His death—paying the penalty for sins—for the sins of all humanity, for those who will come to Him and trust in Him. Therefore, the church has rightly, in all its diverse forms, almost always ever since celebrated Communion, the Eucharist, the Lord’s Supper—it goes by many names—but some form of reenactment of taking of bread and wine, both to memorialize the significance of Christ’s death for us and also to point forward to His return and to the Messianic banquet yet to come when He does return—even as His words on that initial night were spoken: “I tell you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it anew with you in my Father’s kingdom.”

Farewell Discourse

After the supper, Jesus predicts Peter’s denial. He has already alluded to Judas’ upcoming betrayal, though cryptically enough that all of the disciples do not yet understand. John’s gospel adds considerable amounts of additional teaching, what is often referred to as Jesus’ farewell discourse. John, in John 13, has already included the unique segment of Jesus taking a towel and washing His disciples’ feet to teach them about servant leadership.

Then in chapters 14-17, He teaches them about His need to go away and His promise to return and an even more precious guarantee that He will send the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, the Comforter, the Exhorter, the Encourager, to empower His disciples for the ministry that they will carry on—a ministry that can expect to receive hostility and tribulation, and yet He promises that in Him they have overcome the world. These chapters also contain, as we noted in our introduction to John’s gospel, some of the clearest teachings that form the seeds for the later, more full-orbed Trinitarian doctrine of the church, as Jesus talks about His oneness with the Father and with the Spirit.

Particularly in chapter 17— what has been called Jesus’ high priestly prayer (perhaps the more true candidate for the title the Lord’s Prayer, the one the Lord actually prayed) we see glimpses not only into His unity with His Father and His completion of all the tasks that the Father has sent Him to perform, but also His prayers for His disciples and strikingly for those who had become disciples through their testimony, which by extrapolation include all Christians of all ages in all times and places. Fundamentally, His prayer for them centers on the theme of unity. It is undoubtedly a disgrace in our contemporary world how many hundreds, if not thousands, of Christian denominations have emerged, making a mockery of this call to Christian unity.

There have, no doubt, been key times in the history of the church when its teaching has moved so far from the fundamentals of the New Testament that reformation and division and starting afresh have been necessary. But it is difficult to claim that this has been the case in more than just a handful of key periods throughout church history.

It is interesting, too, to see in John 17 that the primary reason for Jesus’ call to unity and prayer for unity among His disciples are an evangelistic one that the world might see and might know that they are in Christ and He is in them.

The unity of the church can have a powerful evangelistic function in every culture, in every time and age, and as one Christians today should take far more seriously. After these final teachings and prayers in the upper room, Jesus then departs for the Garden of Gethsemane.

Garden of Gethsemane

Along the way He continues to teach His disciples, and when He arrives on the slopes of the Mount of Olives He calls Peter, James, and John, the inner core of the three closest to Him, to come with Him while He goes ahead to pray. Then He leaves them at a certain place and goes off to a further distance and begins to pray one of the most marvelous and incredible prayers of Scripture, a prayer, on the one hand, that demonstrates absolutely Jesus’ complete humanity. He does not wish to go through the agony of crucifixion any more than any other natural mortal would want to. “If it be your will, if there is any way possible,” He prays, “Lord let this cup pass from Me.” But at the same time He also recognizes His utter dependence on His Father and His utter submission to the will of God. If it must be His will, then He is prepared to undergo this ordeal. What a contrast with the disciples’ inability even to keep awake, much less to pray, just a short distance further afield.

Betrayal and Arrest

At the end of this time in the Garden of Gethsemane, Judas, who has already left the little troupe of disciples and gone after the soldiers, who may well be a combination of the Jewish temple police and Roman soldiers, comes leading this arresting party into the garden. He kisses Jesus as his sign in the dark as to who the ringleader of this small sect is; and Jesus, putting up no defense— indeed rebuking Peter who pulls a sword and tries to start a slight revolt and healing the servant’s ear whom Peter has cut off. Defenseless by choice, Jesus is led away for captivity and for trial. Meanwhile the disciples flee, providing another ignominious contrast between those who had recently boasted they would follow Jesus even unto death if necessary and Jesus’ own exemplary response. We are now well into nighttime on Thursday night, and the events which proceed do so throughout the night that ultimately turns into Friday morning.

Part of lesson 1 from the course Acts: Crucifixion, Resurrection and Proclamation by Craig L. Blomberg, PhD
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