Look down | A Maundy Thursday reflection
Yesterday, our nation collectively looked up as four people left Earth’s orbit aboard Artemis II. At my house, my family gathered around our tv. My whispered prayers during lift off gave way to cheers and eyes brimming with tears. My kids’ jumping and shouting as the rocket powered through Earth’s atmosphere gave way to awed silence when the first images from the spacecraft came on our screen, showing the curve of our planet below, and the Sun shining through the blackness beyond.
“The heavens declare the glory of God.” That soul-deep sense of wonder we experienced yesterday as we looked up together bears witness to this ancient truth from Psalm 19.
But today, if we would see his glory, we must look down.
On Maundy Thursday, Jesus kneels before us, towel around his waist, basin at his side, washing our soiled feet. This scene from the night before Jesus was crucified, told vividly in John 13, is humiliating (Peter certainly thought so), uncomfortable, and confounding. This is a job for the lowliest servant; it is not what kings do. But therein is the glory. The King over all Creation does not demand that we clean ourselves up and rise to his level to prove ourselves worthy of his love. Instead, he lowers himself—even lower than the most undesirable, shame-filled parts of us—to show us the extent of his self-giving love, to cleanse and renew us, to enable us to join him in that low place that loves demands.
“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth…For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace” (John 1:14, 16).
We are right to look up to the heavens and be in awe of his glory displayed in his mighty acts of Creation. We are made to know him in this way!
But a fuller picture of his glory is here for the receiving. A glory that is not only utterly beyond us, but a glory that comes near. A glory that is not only wholly divine, but that takes on flesh. A glory that not only raises up, but that lowers itself in love. The glory we see kneeling at our feet looks at first glance like weakness rather than strength, losing rather than victory. But if we keep our eyes on Jesus as we journey toward Easter, we will see one of the most profound mysteries of our faith: In the Story of Redemption that God is telling, the way down is the way up.
By washing our feet, Jesus is revealing his glory, just as truly as do the heavens above. But to notice this glory, to be transformed by it, we must look down.