Holy Wednesday Reflection: Nourishing Christ's Body

On the first three weekdays of Holy Week when the Chapel is not holding online services, Chapel ministers are writing one reflection for each day. Reflections are being posted by 7:00 p.m. each day. The reflection for today, Wednesday, April 8, is from the Rev. Kathryn Lester-Bacon and is based on John 13:21-32.

His feet are clean. He is gathered with his closest colleagues. The company is familiar. The food is prepared. The night is dark.

And then, Judas leaves.

He leaves the warmth and connections of his chosen community. He goes out into the night, preparing to betray his teacher and leader. Nobody other than Jesus knows what is happening. They just know that their fellow disciple, one of their closest traveling companions over the last couple years, is inexplicably leaving them.

Why did Judas do this? Stories, poems, songs, movie scenes have been written about Judas’s motivation. What makes someone betray his friends and teacher in such an intimate way towards such a violent end? This question haunts human history. It is a question that fills our screens and pages with anti-hero characters and dark twisty plotlines.

But here, the writer of John doesn’t want us to travel through the recesses of Judas’s mind or explore the maze of human motivation.

The gospel writer wants us to stay focused on the gathered community, the one where people are being washed, taught, and fed for the journey right now. He wants us to stay focused on the One who is sustaining life and sharing a meal, no matter what it costs.

For the writer of John, it is important that, before Judas leaves, Jesus gives him bread. 

“I am the bread of life,” Jesus says throughout his ministry. On this fateful night, he breaks bread and passes some to Judas.

Jesus has so much more to share with his gathered community. He knows Judas is preparing to betray him, yet still, Jesus chooses not to act first in fear. He doesn’t decide to go into hiding. He chooses to continue teaching, feeding, washing, witnessing, challenging, and comforting, all those who remain together for the time being. He chooses to keep loving this gathered community in the flesh for as long as he can.

Jesus ensures that even Judas himself will not leave the gathering empty-handed. Remarkably, in receiving the bread, Judas receives what Jesus has claimed as his own body. Judas carries a piece of Christ’s body out into the night, out into the world, as all the other disciples will do, as we do now whenever we gather for communion at the Lord’s Supper. We are given a piece of Christ’s body, which, by the power of the Spirit, has been broken and changed for us. We take and eat, broken and changed people ourselves.

This is where glorification happens—in a darkening upper room, within a diminished gathering, in the moment when Christ refuses to let impending death keep him from sustaining the body of believers with the nourishing love that they need.

Jesus refuses to let Judas leave the gathering empty-handed. Before Judas makes a move, Christ breaks his body for Judas. Christ breaks his body and hands it over to his betrayer.

Christ breaks his body and offers it to his disciples.

Christ breaks his body and offers it to us.

See how Christ loves us. Take and eat.