Much earlier in the day, the Rabbi sent two of his students ahead of him to prepare the Passover meal. When they inquired how they could know the place in which to make preparations, he responded that–
"When you have entered the city, a man will meet you carrying a pitcher of water; follow him into the house that he enters." This was the location of a large upper room in which they would observe the traditions handed down by dozens of generations of their fathers.
The two men followed their Master's instructions, and finding everything exactly as he had told them, they completed their preparations. The large room had been previously furnished for the dinner party of thirteen men, and the two made certain that all of the required special foods and wine were ready. The pitcher of water that had earlier guided their efforts rested on a side table, awaiting its destiny.
Before the sun had kissed the horizon toward the great sea, the rest of the men, and the Rabbi, arrived for the memorial feast. With the last man entering the room, they closed the door behind him. Amid much conversation and anticipation of the evening's events, the men began taking their places around the festival table. The dozen jockeyed for position, hoping to secure a seat as close to their Master as possible. Once they had all reclined, and the animated voices diminished, in silence they waited for him to begin his direction of the night's pageantry. However, the order of events was about to take an unexpected and bizarre turn.
The distinguished leader of this motley band did not start the Seder meal in the traditional and expected way they had all celebrated previously, dozens of times each. The man stood up from the table and stripped off his outer garments, down to his humble underclothes– hardly appropriate wear for such an august occasion and barely preserving his modesty. He stood there, looking like a common servant– no, a slave. With no precedent to numb the shock, the men sat dumbfounded.
The rabbi-now-slave stepped over to the side table, wrapped a coarse towel around his waist, and grasped the pitcher of water. As he poured out its contents, the water musically splashed and tinkled into a pottery basin. Nary a drop fell to the floor. He placed a sponge in the basin of water and returned to the table. What transpired next nearly took their breath away. Like the slave he appeared to be, the man knelt before each of them and began washing away the grime of the streets from their filthy feet. He used the towel to dry them. As he finished, he asked them if they knew what he had done to them. Of course they did not– how could they? Nothing in their experience prepared them to understand such a remarkable thing.
Later, during the more traditional celebrations of the evening, the Rabbi again threw astonishing twists into the festivities. He revealed to them that his betrayal by one of their number lay at the threshold, his enemies would soon kill him, and the twelve men would fall away. On top of these strange pronouncements, he said he would pour out his blood on their behalf, and further, it was necessary they participate in and partake intimately of that spilled blood. Now, we remember the events of this dinner and the next day's conclusion, as a deep sacramental observance.
So often, as we solemnly memorialize these events, we think of this blood, dripping down from the wounds of the Master, running down the rough wood of the cross, dropping onto and soaking into the earth below it– His life leaking out of Him with His blood. And all this is true. But I think we frequently miss the larger and grander picture.
Before the dinner as He poured out the water from the pitcher, He didn't simply pour it out, letting it splash upon the floor, for the water was destined, as He intended it, for a greater purpose. He poured it out of the pitcher, but into the basin, for the express purpose of serving His friends through washing their feet. This simple, but unexpected act still touches our hearts twenty centuries later.
Paul, in his letters to the believers at Philippi and to his young protégé Timothy, said he was "being poured out like a drink offering." The Levitical prescription for a drink offering included pouring out a goodly measure of quality wine on a choice animal, and sacrificing them both to God by fire. It appears a pointless exercise. God certainly needed no food or drink (especially from unrighteous men). And as the fire consumed the sacrifice, the wine merely burned and boiled off as well, its vapors rising into the atmosphere with the smoke of the burning animal. Surely, this was the waste of a good animal, and a waste of good wine. Although Leviticus states that the sacrifice rises as a "sweet aroma" to the nostrils of God, the smell of burning flesh and burnt wine hardly supports that position.
If Paul was, indeed, being poured out like a drink offering, what was the point– either for the literal wine of the sacrifice, or for the man, Paul? The crux of the matter is that, just like the water that was not only poured out, but poured into the basin, the wine was not merely poured out, but poured into the desires and commands of God. These sacrifices, commanded by God, and obediently followed by His people, were the outward sign of their hearts' inner inclination toward Him. As they poured out their best wine, with the rich, red fluid running over the dead animal and billowing up as clouds of steam, they were pouring their own hearts and lives into the hands and heart of their God. As Paul's life neared the end, he knew he was pouring his life out, and into the presence of God– with none of it spilling aimlessly to the ground, or churning up haphazard into the sky.
Dr. Paul Brand, a distinguished physician and pioneering surgeon of the twentieth century recalls, in his marvelous book "In His Image," an event significant to him during his very early years as a medical student. He describes the pre-World War II scene in London of his peripheral participation in the resuscitation of a young, beautiful accident victim. She arrived at the hospital unconscious, bled-out, and apparently lifeless. Her body, totally pallid from the extreme loss of blood, exhibited not the hint of a pulse. As Paul mostly watched, a nurse rushed in a glass bottle of whole blood and the attending physician initiated a blood transfusion, a fairly new technique at the time. Paul relates the extraordinary events he witnessed as they poured a second bottle of blood into the victim's veins:
"A spot of pink appeared like a drop of watercolor on her cheek. It began to spread in a beautiful flush. Her lips darkened pink, then red, and her body quivered with a kind of sighing breath. Then her eyelids fluttered lightly and parted. She squinted at first, and her pupils constricted, reacting to the bright lights of the room. At last she looked directly at me." *
Of course, we often associate the accidental loss of blood, the pouring out of blood, with death. But there is another loss of blood, another pouring out of blood that speaks of life– shared life. The one who intentionally pours out their blood for the purpose of transfusion into another human being enters into a life-giving enterprise. As the donor's blood enters the lifeless body of a recipient, not only blood, but life re-enters the person. The victim passes from death to life.
So it was with the Lord Jesus on His cross. He poured out His blood, His life, for the sole intent and purpose of pouring His blood and life into us. His blood did not merely flow randomly and uselessly onto the ground beneath, but deliberately and significantly into the spiritual veins of billions of the living dead, yet in the future. The pouring out of His blood, as we observe it in the Eucharist, signifies not only His death, but it is a high and joyous celebration of His life, poured into our lifeless flesh.
Let us remember His death, but may we also celebrate His life– now our life!
"And in the same way He took the cup after they had eaten, saying, 'This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in My blood.'" (Luke 22:20 NASB)
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* – In His Image, Dr. Paul Brand and Philip Yancey, copyright 1984, Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids MI, pp. 53-54.
>>> Except for quotations, all text and images are Copyright, Bill Brockmeier, 2015. All rights reserved.
>>> Except for quotations, all text and images are Copyright, Bill Brockmeier, 2015. All rights reserved.
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