Yesterday was Maundy Thursday, the first of the three holy days leading to Easter morning and the empty tomb. It was a day of Maundy mishaps for me.
Let’s start at the beginning. Mabel, being ridiculous and putting her whole 90 pounds into trying to get out the door first, shoved me and the door yesterday morning. The door went right over the big toe. Toe nail bent back. Ouch.
I go to the office. As I walk across the parking lot, a mysterious woman wearing bunny ears is going to her car. [It’s not a joke. I did, however, figure out who she is – a friend of my admin assistant. She brought us Easter treats … as an Easter bunny does.] I polish my Thursday night message, Marilyn and I have coffee, and the Easter bulletins are printed. Good, productive stuff.
I changed the sign boards at the church – the first time since I arrived seven months ago. I stare at the south one every time I walk across the parking lot and was so ready for it to not say, “Pray always” about six and a half months ago but never changed it. I did yesterday … to “God loves his peeps.” [With a clarifying statement of “his people” to amend the “peeps” for those who do not speak slang fluently, ie most of my congregation.] [I also try to be as gender neutral as I can while referring to God but, well, God loves God’s peeps just didn’t have the same ring, and writing God loves her peeps might not have gone over so well with my peeps here.] I changed one side and then went to the other to take down the command to “Be joyful!” [Seriously. The sign would yell at you to be joyful. Not a great way to make friends, sign.] But then I ran out of Ps. “God loves his … pees?” We altered an R to a P and all was well with the world.
Then I set to line a bulletin board in the hallway with fabric. [Why, on the Thursday before Easter, was I worried about a bulletin board? Because that’s how I work. I’m most productive at getting weird tasks done when larger ones loom in the near future.] I tried to look at the back of the board, wondering the best way to cover it. The large bulletin board fell. I bled my own blood. I did consider it a small accomplishment that I didn’t swear when it fell since Marilyn was just across the hall. Score one for Lindsay.
Communion visit.
Lawn mower tutorial by Bob. [It’s a thing.]
Lastly, last night was our Maundy Thursday worship service. It actually was quite awesome. I’ve been meeting with three fourth graders about communion and last night they had their first communion. It was so fun to watch them come to the altar rail with their families and to see them as they experienced it for the first time. We talked about how gathering at the table is important and a gift, and how each of us have a place.
Maundy Thursday service ended with the reading of Psalm 22 and the stripping of the altar. I read the psalm from the lectern as the altar women stripped [the altar]. I’m standing there, reading, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” leaning on the heels of my shoes, as I normally do and shouldn’t, and suddenly my heel is gone. First thought in my head is that my heel broke through the lectern platform and there is now a hole in the carpet. Really, not a rational thought at all but you stand in front of a congregation reading a psalm with a suddenly broken heel and see what comes to your mind. I realized then that indeed, my heel was broken, but actually, in the middle of reading, tried to bring my foot up so my free hand could check out the damage. Again, not rational. But that’s what happened. The grace given to me was that Maundy Thursday is a service that ends in silence and I didn’t not need to walk out in any hurry or in front of the congregation. I sat up front until most of them had already filed out.
Then I limped out, a perfect end to a maundy of mishaps.
