Faith is About Action

On the last night Jesus spent with his disciples the Gospels record two different scenes.

You, Too, Must by Lisle Gwynn Garrity, A Sanctified Art

Matthew, Mark, and Luke record that while they were seated around the table, Jesus took bread and gave it to them and then took the cup and gave that to them too. Afterwards he said to them, “Do this in remembrance of me.”

The Gospel of John though records a very different scene. When they arrived in the Upper Room, after they had all sat down, Jesus rose and began to wash the disciples’ feet. He said them, “You also ought to wash one another’s feet.”

Of course, the two scenes aren’t mutually exclusive. It’s likely both events happened.

Both occasions have made their way into Christian practice. Communion typically occurs more regularly (in the Presbyterian tradition, often once a month). Foot-washing, on the other hand, is usually reserved for Holy Week, specifically Maundy Thursday (the night that we remember Jesus’ final meal with his disciples).

But speaking of that last night with the disciples, Barbara Brown Taylor writes, “With all the conceptual truths in the universe at his disposal, he did not give them something to think about together when he was gone. Instead, he gave them concrete things to do – specific ways of being together in their bodies – that would go on teaching them what they needed to know when he was no longer around to teach them himself.”

She goes on, “After he was gone, they would still have God’s Word, but that Word was going to need some new flesh…so Jesus gave them things they could get their hands on, things that would require them to get close enough to touch one another. In the case of the meal, he gave them things they could smell and taste and swallow. In the case of the feet, he gave them things to wash that were attached to real human beings, so that they could not bend over them without being drawn into one another’s lives.”

On the last night before his arrest and crucifixion, Jesus’ words to them are, “Do this.” Not believe this but do this – “in remembrance of me.”

Often, I think, we want to make faith about a set of beliefs. As long as we believe the right things, then we can call ourselves Christians. But ethicist Stanley Hauerwas reminds us, “Christianity is to have one’s body shaped, one’s habits determined, in such a way that the worship of God is unavoidable.”

In other words, faith isn’t just about believing the right thing, but it is about living and practicing. Faith is about action; it is tied to behavior and practice. Its tied to our humanness.

Grace and peace,

Kimmy