Through the decades, the amphitheater outside our Church School Building has hosted all kinds of memorable moments. Once upon a time, Emory had its commencement ceremonies there, along with other special campus-wide (!) events. We’ve had worship services, baptisms, and memorial services there. It’s been the site of concerts and petting zoos, dunking booths and sack races. That’s truly some multi-purpose grass out there.

Tonight, friends will gather for a meal. As they settle into their places, they probably won’t understand the significance of the moment, but that’s often the case in life, isn’t it? Soon enough, it will dawn on them. This is no ordinary meal, but a strange moment of oneness with the Lord they’ve followed from Galilee. It will be a last supper together and the first step toward the cross and Easter, an end and a beginning that leads to an end and a beginning.

“Do this in remembrance of me,” he will say, and they will, as do we.

“Love one another,” he commands, and they will, with a few lapses, as do we.

Bread and wine, words and blessings, flesh and Spirit, memory and hope. It’s hard to imagine a more tender gathering, a more holy moment.

We will join those friends tonight, al fresco, on the well-worn grass of the amphitheater, and with them, we’ll look at the people around us and give thanks, and with them, we’ll consider all that has brought us to that place, and we’ll have a moment like no other, a moment with those disciples of old and each other, all strangely, beautifully one with the Christ who meets us in the meal.

In Christ,

Mark

Maundy Service at Glenn: A Service of Holy Communion

7 p.m. in the Amphitheater

Sermon by the Rev. Brent Huckaby

Music by the Gathering Band