Dear Brothers and sisters in Christ,

Have you ever gone back and visited the house where you grew up? I grew up in Owosso, MI, not too far from here. We lived on Mohican Trail. I've been inside the house once since we moved in 1992. It's a different color now, and the trees are so much bigger! They put an addition on the house and they took down my old basketball hoop. The inside looks much different too. Have you ever done that? Gone back to the place where you grew up?

Time has a way of changing our perspectives on places we've been, even important places and memorable places like the houses we grew up in. The place seems smaller or maybe it seems bigger. The place brings back good memories or maybe bad memories. We go back to those important places, and we come away with a different understanding of our roots. Going back helps us remember what we were like back then and how we're different now.

Over the span of the next six weeks, you and I are going to visit some places where most of us have been before. Well, we haven't exactly been at these places, but we've heard about them so many times we can close our eyes and almost see them. If you looked in the bulletin, you know the places I'm talking about. We're going to visit the places where our Lord Jesus spent the most important 72 hours of his life on earth, the places he was on a Thursday we call Maundy, a Friday we call Good, a Saturday we call Holy, and a Sunday we call Easter. We're going to some streets inside Jerusalem and a hill outside Jerusalem. We'll be visiting a courtroom and a cemetery. We're going to call these places "Places of the Passion." Every place we visit will have a memory and a meaning for us, and every place will make a difference for what we are now and what we hope to be after we die.

1. Where Jesus urges us to imitate him

The first place we're going to visit is a house located in the old city of Jerusalem. Actually, we're going to visit a room in that house. The Bible calls it an upper room. We don't know exactly where in Jerusalem the upper room was, but wherever it was, Jesus made some miraculous arrangements to reserve it. Jesus intended to celebrate the Passover, the most important religious holiday the Jews had. The room turned out to be large, and it was furnished; there were tables and couches in it, so Jesus and his followers could lean on their elbows and eat the meal. It was Thursday. By the time everyone arrived, it was night.

"Jesus knew that the time had come for him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he now showed them the full extent of his love" (vs. 1). Jesus did love these 12 men, but sometimes they were so hard to love. All the men sitting around the table were sinners. Judas was the worst of them, but the rest weren't much better. Jesus had been training them to carry on his work after he left, but even after three years, they just didn't get it. Jesus was all about serving people, and they were all about being served. Just that night they'd been arguing about who was going to sit where at the table. "I get to sit next to him." "No, I get to sit next to him." All they cared about was their own egos and their own needs, and they didn't give a hoot about anybody else. These were the men who were supposed to go and make disciples of all nations after Jesus was gone.

The evening meal was being served. Maybe Jesus waited a few minutes to see if any of them would make the first move, but nobody moved. "So he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist. After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples' feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him" (vv. 4,5). It was a servant's job, really a slave's job. He unlaced the sandals and washed the dust off. The job only took a few minutes; there were only 12 people there. When Jesus had finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place. "Do you understand what I have done for you?" he asked them. "You call me 'Teacher' and 'Lord,' and rightly so, for that is what I am. Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you" (vv. 12-15).

Did they really understand what Jesus had done? Not that night they didn't. Judas never understood. And it took the rest of them awhile. Eventually they did, and when they finally understood that life with Jesus meant imitating Jesus and caring more about others than about themselves, they gave themselves up so they could tell everyone about Jesus. They all wore out the odometer on their sandals walking from one city to the next. They all spoke up when speaking up wasn't the thing to do. They all did prison time, and they all died as martyrs-except one, and he died as an exile. They did what they did so that people could hear about Jesus' forgiveness and love. They did what they did not because they wanted to get something for themselves, but because they wanted to give something away. They did what they did to serve people-and Jesus had showed them how.

Brothers and sisters, do you understand what Jesus did in that upper room? I have a sneaking suspicion you do know, and I know too. We know how Jesus wants us to treat the people who live and work around us. St. Paul wrote to the Christians in Philippi: "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: . . . he humbled himself and became obedient to death-even death on a cross!" (Php 2:3-5,8). I feel pretty bad when I read those words because too many times my attitude isn't like that of Christ Jesus. Do you know what I mean? Do you sometimes wonder how Jesus wants you to treat other people? Do you catch yourself being so involved with your own life and your own troubles that you really don't think too much about the people around you? If that's a problem for you, then watch Jesus wash the feet of his followers. Come and visit the upper room. It's a place of service where Jesus urges us to imitate him.

2. Where Jesus shows us the full extent of his love

Sitting at that table in the upper room was someone most of you know. His name was Peter. His real name was Simon, but Jesus gave him the name Peter because he was like a rock. Peter, or Petra, means "rock." Jesus was thinking of Peter's faith when he gave him that name-his faith was like a rock. But sometimes Peter acted like he had rocks in his head. This is one of those times. "[Jesus] came to Simon Peter, who said to him, 'Lord, are you going to wash my feet?' Jesus replied, 'You do not realize now what I am doing, but later you will understand.' 'No,' said Peter, 'you shall never wash my feet' " (vv.6-8). I suppose Peter meant well, but this was just such a boneheaded thing to say. Here Jesus was trying to teach Peter and the other disciples a lesson on humility, and Peter-who had once said to Jesus, "We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God" (Jn 6:69)-decides that he knows better than Jesus. He wanted to come off sounding humble, but he was arrogant.

Jesus decided right then and there to take Peter to the bottom line of his relationship with his Savior. It was time to change the subject from dirty feet to filthy sins. It was time to remind Peter just how much he really needed Jesus. Any slave could have washed Peter's feet, but only Jesus could wash Peter's sins away. If Peter wanted to be let out from under the penalty God had attached to sin, if he wanted to get back into God's good graces, if he wanted to live his life without being afraid of going to hell, he had to put his trust in Jesus. There was no other way. It was Jesus' way, or it was the highway-and the highway led to hell. That's what Jesus meant when he said to Peter, "Unless I wash you, you have no part with me" (vs. 8).

Peter wasn't done disagreeing. " 'Then, Lord,' [he] replied, 'not just my feet but my hands and my head as well!' " (vs. 9). Jesus must have been really frustrated! He had one last reply, and then the lesson would be over. Peter wasn't getting it. "A person who has had a bath needs only to wash his feet; his whole body is clean. And you are clean, though not every one of you" (vs. 10).

Jesus has never offered to wash our feet, but he proclaims to us in his Word and sacraments that he has indeed washed our sins away. And there are plenty to wash away. I don't need to make a list in the pulpit tonight; I know about my sins without having to hear them counted, and you know your sins too. We all know that sin covers us with a layer of dirt that makes us unacceptable to God. But Jesus came to wash the dirt away. When Jesus bled and died on the cross, his blood was a flood that swept away the sins of the world. When we were baptized, it was as though Jesus took us to the cleaners and washed us from head to toe so we could be pure in God's sight.

Brothers and sisters, don't be a rock like Peter. Don't debate with Jesus about his love. Don't argue over the way to eternal life with God. Don't look for something you can contribute so you can keep your self-respect. Confess your sins. Admit your guilt. Not just on Ash Wednesday, but every day. And then every day kneel in faith at the foot of the cross and lay those sins on Jesus. And the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, cleanses us from all sin. That's the Savior's way.

The upper room is a place of service, a place where Jesus shows us the full extent of his love. Imitate that love in your life with one another. Submit to that love in your life with God. And then listen to the words of Jesus: "Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them" (vs. 17). Amen.