Friends,
 
Tonight, join us for our Maundy Thursday service at 7 PM. Make reservations if you plan on coming in-person. We’ll meet in our sanctuary. The service will be streamed at FirstPres.Live. 
 
We’ll have communion and think about what Jesus said to his disciples when he shared the Passover with them in that upper room. Show up or tune in. 
 
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We are at capacity in the Sanctuary for Easter morning. If you still want to come to church this Sunday at 10:15 AM, you are welcome to join us in our overflow space in Westminster Hall to watch the service on screens. We are limited to 36 in that area so reservations are still required.  Being filled to capacity is a good problem, but turning people away is an agony.
 
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Today is April Fool’s Day. I’m not a big prankster. I love to joke around. I like corny jokes. I like satire. I like dark humor, limericks, jokes without punchlines, well done slapstick. But I don’t like to hurt people with humor. Sometimes I do exactly that with an inappropriately timed joke, and I don’t mean to. But pranks are designed primarily to shock, and some of us don’t like shocks. I’m one of those people. So, I don’t short-sheets beds at summer camp. I don’t set water cans above doors for people to walk in and get soaked. I don’t set people’s alarms for two in the morning. 
 
I know a man, who must remain nameless, who was the editor of his East-coast college newspaper. Their staff printed an April Fools edition of the school paper saying the president of the university had been fired, and he, the student editor of the newspaper, had been appointed acting president by the board. A member of that board who lived on the West coast got the news (and this was before the internet) and was livid that he had not been notified and included in that board meeting. Telegrams were sent to mobilize the board that had made this awful decision. Everybody soon got the idea that they had been had, and most thought it was funny. Nevertheless, it caused a real flap. Formal apologies were written. Assurances were made. Printing budgets were examined. Nobody got expelled, but the West-coast board member, who never saw the humor in the stunt, was also the father of the said editor’s girlfriend. That relationship was doomed after the prank, as the poor girl was forced to choose between her father (and tuition) and her innovative boyfriend who became a big time editor at a big time magazine. 
 
So, I don’t do pranks. They can go awry. But I rather like the idea of being a fool. 
 
Yes, a fool.
 
In an outdoor service of worship long ago in Virginia, I was juggling cans of food during the sermon talking about the Apostle Paul who described himself as a “fool for Christ” (First Corinthians 4). After the service Sondra Underwood, whose name I will use, came up to me and grabbed my arm. She said, “Today you helped me find my calling. There’s so much in this world that I cannot do. I’m just not worthy or smart or good enough. But I can be a fool for Christ.”
 
That metaphor spoke to her. She was a natural cut up. She liked to wear purple. Once she tried to sneak food out of a Las Vegas hotel breakfast buffet, and later had to explain a purse full of unwrapped breakfast fare to a TSA agent at the airport. Sondra was laughing so hard, they almost called an ambulance. Her husband had check through another line and came up to the TSA agent and said, “She’s like this all the time. I’m sorry.” But her wasn’t. Johnnie and Sondra are peas in a pod, and she’s a fool and owns it. She ran afterschool detention at the local high school, and Sondra turned so many kids around with her, well, foolishness. She made them laugh. She made them cry. She made them believe in themselves. She brought light wherever she went. She is a fool for Christ.
 
Be foolish today. Be extravagant in your love for others. Laugh at yourself. 
 
Happy April Fool’s Day—and I’m not joking.
 
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(Today’s joke come from Gary and/or Linda Peterson: Why did the chili pepper have trouble being an archer? Because he didn’t habanero.)
 
 
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Here’s today’s devotional from the Presbyterian Outlook:
Maundy Thursday, APRIL 1, 2021
MARK 14:32-42
In this story, we eavesdrop on Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane on the night before his death and witness the struggle of his disciples to stay awake with him while he prays. What does Jesus’ struggle evoke for you? What does the disciples’ struggle evoke for you? With whom do you most identify?
Practice: Prayerfully read this story, reflecting on the various struggles it conveys and their impact upon you.
Journal: Sense the movements of your spirit and the emotions that they evoke as you reflect on this story – both movements toward God and away from God – and note in your journal what happens.
 
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Good Word 
 
John 13:1-17, 31b-35
¹Now before the festival of the Passover, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. ²The devil had already put it into the heart of Judas son of Simon Iscariot to betray him. And during supper ³Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, ⁴got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. ⁵Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him. ⁶He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?” ⁷Jesus answered, “You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand.” ⁸Peter said to him, “You will never wash my feet.” Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.” ⁹Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!” ¹⁰Jesus said to him, “One who has bathed does not need to wash, except for the feet, but is entirely clean. And you are clean, though not all of you.” ¹¹For he knew who was to betray him; for this reason he said, “Not all of you are clean.”
¹²After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you? ¹³You call me Teacher and Lord — and you are right, for that is what I am. ¹⁴So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. ¹⁵For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you. ¹⁶Very truly, I tell you, servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them. ¹⁷If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them. 
³¹When he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. ³²If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once. ³³Little children, I am with you only a little longer. You will look for me; and as I said to the Jews so now I say to you, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come.’ ³⁴I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. ³⁵By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

Let us pray (maybe this poem will shape a prayer from you.)

 
Acquainted with the Night
by Robert Frost

I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have walked out in rain—and back in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.

I have looked down the saddest city lane.
I have passed by the watchman on his beat
And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.

I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet
When far away an interrupted cry
Came over houses from another street,

But not to call me back or say good-by;
And further still at an unearthly height,
One luminary clock against the sky

Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right.
I have been one acquainted with the night.

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Much, much love to you all.
 
Matt Matthews
Cell: 864.386.9138
Matt@FirstPres.Church