2016 Belmont University Lenten GuideSample

The last supper was a meal. It was not waiting in line for a hunk of bread and a sip of grape juice. It was not a soup kitchen for the poor and weary hearted waiting for their share of scrappy slops. Rather the last supper was a feast, with family, tradition and ritual reverence. It was a communion. Imagine as the host of blesses the meal saying it was His blood and body…you’d think he’d gone crazy or eaten too much. Yet here we are reminded of Christ’s humanity, and how others look at Jesus (being human at the time) within a very fleshly context. This Lenten season it is easier for us to acknowledge Jesus as God because we were not sitting next to Him at the table that night; we were not one of the apostles that knew Him in those 33 years He spent in a flesh and blood body. No, the last supper was not a soup kitchen. Yet we see this picture of redemption where the homeless are able to come, broken, starving, downtrodden and He welcomes us at His table, as children, as heirs, a family coming together remembering our provider, His redeeming death, and the resurrection of new and everlasting life. Christ, the Master of the Universe, served us at the meal, the waiter breaking bread, the servant washing the feet. And yes, we are servants to the Kingdom as well, as Psalm 116:16 states. Yet we are not slaves, we are waiters and waitress, and Jesus is the busboy picking up the muck of the messes we leave behind. God, on His last night humbles Himself to a position of ultimate service, selfless sacrifice and pure love. Christ came to foster the Kingdom of Heaven through this divine communion. He did not come to feed the starving, poor and hungry masses with a hunk of bread and water, rather He offers us a cup of salvation. Nor did Christ come to be served as King, but instead washes our feet with the same hands that were nailed to the cross. “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34–35) MARY JANE MEIROSE Sophomore Corporate Communications and Religious Studies