The young man had finally hit rock bottom. Homeless, penniless, and jobless in a free-falling economy, he couldn’t even get a job at McDonald’s. Instead, he begged for spare change, shivered in the cold, and wondered whether he would starve to death. The worst part of it all was that this young man had no one to blame but himself. He had been raised in an affluent family with every privilege you could imagine. But on his 18th birthday, he stole his father’s debit card, withdrew a small fortune from the bank, and ran away from home. He recklessly spent money on wild parties, drinking, drugs, and sex, until the money ran out and he was left with nothing. Desperate, the young man decides to go home. He would get down on his knees and beg his wealthy father to let him work as a janitor in his company. He planned his speech. “Dad, you don’t have to look at me. You don’t have to talk to me. You don’t even have to think of me as your son anymore, but please just give me some kind of work so I don’t have to beg in the streets anymore.” To have closeness with his family seemed to be a hope that would never materialize. A bus drops the young man off in front of his parents’ house. His father, sitting on the porch, recognizes his son coming up the driveway and immediately runs to him as fast as possible. With tears in his eyes, he hugged his long-lost son as though he would never let him go. The young man didn’t even have a chance to begin his planned speech. His father pulls him inside the house, hands him a new suit, and tells him to shower and change. When the young man came back downstairs, he was shocked at what he saw. A house full of dinner guests, joyful music playing, T-bone steaks sizzling on the grill, expensive bottles of wine being brought up from the cellar. With a huge smile on his face, the young man’s father shouts to everyone in the house, “Let’s celebrate! My son was as good as dead, but he’s alive again. He was lost, but now is found.” This story of course is based on Jesus’ parable of the prodigal son. A story of closeness lost and regained. Yet is there not a part of you that is bothered that the father took him in so quickly? Restoring the closeness? Having a celebration? But the impact of his love drills you in the chest doesn’t it? It shows the common thread holding humanity together: The hope we have for closeness. But here’s the question: Are you looking for the right closeness?
We as people long for a connection past the small talk and superficiality. The first disciples of Jesus longed for that too. As they reclined at the table with Jesus on that Passover night, they knew something was going to change, but they didn’t know how. It’s what makes Mark’s writing so inviting. As we’ve seen throughout this series, Mark brings you right there into the disciples’ world, so you have the same opportunity to process it in real-time like them. Mark says, “Leave it to Matthew, Luke, and Paul to explain the event, I want you to simply be in that room like Peter was.” And that room was shocking. It was unheard of not to celebrate Passover with your immediate family, but here the disciples and Jesus were, communicating the truest definition of family that goes beyond biology. While they all longed for closeness with Jesus, there was one of them who had a different hope for closeness.
Judas. Judas’ hope for closeness jangled in the money bag. He had long been in charge of everything financial for Jesus, and he often helped himself to the gifts God’s people had given Jesus. He had witnessed all that Jesus had done. He had had personal conversations with Jesus, maybe even about his struggle with greed. He had experienced Jesus give of his time, his energy, his everything, because he loved Judas. Yet, it wasn’t enough for him. Closeness with Jesus didn’t seem to give Judas wholeness. Do you know what that’s like? You may without even realizing it.
Doesn’t it melt you how Jesus has given you everything, willing to give himself so you could be close with him and a family beyond all division? But are there not times when it feels like Jesus isn’t enough. He chooses to call you family. He, the Lamb of God, who shed his very blood not to wipe over your doorpost like the first Passover but to cover every aspect of who you are. To do all this for you and me, only for us in our sin to turn him aside and shove him away because we want to experience closeness through other things. I can’t help but picture my high school self, feeling trapped in a sin that shook me with shame, a dear friend saying to me, “Jesus is with you,” and my reply was, “He has a funny way of showing it.” So often like Judas, we’re quick to leave the table with Jesus and go back to the things that we convince ourselves will bring us “real” happiness, “real” wholeness, “real” closeness. Like Judas and that young man in the story, we turn to things like money, pleasure, and distraction, but the end of that road only leads to despair, the very opposite of hope. It’s there you realize what sin does. If we buy into sin, it’s replacing the Savior, and you can’t replace him. It’s this very moment that makes all of this so much more real. Because tomorrow, we’re going to face that cross, and there will be that part of us that will look at it, and many of you have said to me, “Good Friday is so hard because it’s so sad,” but that’s a half-truth. There is a reason it’s called “Good Friday” and not “Bad” Friday. Because it’s there we see how Jesus responds to people like you and me wired for closeness, but looking for it in all the wrong places.
What does Jesus do with people like you and me so often feel like God is distant from us? He doesn’t shun you, but he dines with you through the gift we call the Lord’s Supper. He offers himself to you again, and again, and again! It’s why this Lord’s Supper is so glorious. That before us by the power of the gospel is truly Jesus’ body and blood, not mere symbolism, not just a picture, this is the real thing miraculously connected to bread and wine! How can this be so? Because the Son of God said so. When you feel distant from God, thinking like Judas eventually did, that Jesus will have nothing to do with you anymore, because you’ve turned away from him in sin, Jesus comes to you again and says “Take and eat, here is my body, take and drink, here is my blood of the covenant, poured out for you, to forgive you. I gave my body, I shed my blood because I love you, and no matter how many times you turn your face away from me, I will never stop giving myself to you.” “I conquered your past. Look in the rearview mirror all you like. There’s nothing to harm you there. You are forgiven.”
Don't you see what this Lord’s Supper is? It’s for sinners like you and me when we are confronted by God’s law exposing how we so often trade closeness with Christ for friendship with Satan and the world, and he gives himself to you again. And he promises that this is but a taste of what it will be like when we’re in his presence completely. His body and blood, not just miraculously connected to bread and wine, but body and blood in front of our faces entirely. When we’re at the feast of feasts looking at people around that table that mean everything to us, that we’ve had to say goodbye to, and there we will be, experiencing a kind of closeness with God that we’ll spend all of eternity enjoying. When your Father and mine says, “Welcome home, my child, let’s celebrate!”
I can’t help but reminded of a quote from a mentor of mine, Pastor Mark Paustian, “He has conquered our future with promises unbreakable. Fears dissolve in that ocean of mercy. Beyond our dying there is a warm banquet, a glad feast, at which God, our God, will wait on us. God himself will tilt his head back to sing - so say the prophets - when he has us home.”
It’s why every Sunday when we have communion I smile at you, and I’m so excited to give it to you, because this is the closest we get to being with Jesus. This is a foretaste of what home will be like, complete closeness with the LORD and closeness with our eternal family in Christ with not more divisions or false doctrine, but one in faith forever. This is not just a nice little ceremony we do, it’s something he gave us so we could have closeness with him and closeness with other Christians, and just like those disciples came from all different families, backgrounds, and experiences, to look across that line and say, oh my goodness, Jesus, not just closeness with you, but in this world of loneliness you’ve given me a family to share you with. It’s this deep meaningfulness that leads us in love to take the time to share what the Lord’s Supper is before someone joins us, as we long for that day to share this Supper with them too, in genuine unity of faith and joy, in a world seeking division and tribalism.
That’s why this sacrament is so much more than just “I’m showing I’m committed to you Jesus,” or “Look at me, Jesus, I’m remembering you!” NO! This is Jesus saying, “I’m always committed to you. I will always remember you.” Remember with Judas, even though he betrayed Jesus, it wasn’t the unforgivable sin. In the Garden of Gethsemane that very night, Jesus purposely says to Judas, “Are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?” Why doesn’t he say, “Are you betraying me?” Because the Son of Man was very clearly and always associated with the promised Messiah of the Old Testament and Judas knew that. It’s who Jesus is, the God who came to save sinners of whom we are the worst. Even though in his perfect foreknowledge as true God he knew Judas wouldn’t turn back to him, Jesus still loved him. It sounds illogical, even ridiculous, why would Jesus even bother? If you’re asking those questions you’re starting to scratch the surface of grace.
Because are there not times you and I don’t look at ourselves and think, “Why would Jesus bother with me?” “Why would Jesus have anything to do with me?” Simple. His longing to be close to you. When we find ourselves exposed in our sin, broken in shame, he comes to you again and says, “This is my body. This is my blood. That I gave for you. I love you, and the greatest joy will be when you’re sitting next to me at my table where sadness is no more when you never feel alone again, when you will never choose anything that leads you away from me, and you’ll just be at my side.”
That’s what makes Holy Thursday, Maundy Thursday so incredible! That’s what makes every time we have communion so rich. This is a gift. If you’re searching for God’s presence in your life, here it is. Take and eat, marvel at the God who comes near you, your Jesus who is preparing your welcome home feast. Your Jesus who gives us you the answer to your hope for closeness. He’s always near you. Amen.
