Footwashing
(Jesus) 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. – The Gospel of John 13.5-6
The lawsuit was the last thing Larry
wanted,
but his lawyer said he had no choice.
Larry trusts his lawyer, knows that
suing people is
just another tool, not evil. But never
before
has he had to sue a fellow member of
the church. His church.
The congregation that celebrated his
children’s births
and stood with him and his wife as the
kids grew through
adolescent prank stunts and bad first
marriages.
Larry is suing Herb, an old church
stalwart, and
Sunday school was strained for a few
weeks afterwards.
“It’s only business,” Larry tells
Herb, pouring oil on troubled waters.
Herb is a good guy, his grandfather was
a bishop,
but he is new to the world of
contracts, negotiations,
and fungible loyalties. He knows the
Bible,
that Paul warned the Corinthians that
lawsuits were a sign
of defeat, that it’s better to be
cheated than to go to law.1
Herb doesn’t want to be cheated or to
cheat anyone,
let alone Larry, his friend and
brother.
Larry knows the Bible, too, but says
that Jesus never had to make a payroll.
He says it lightheartedly but means it,
believes
that Jesus might have said some things
differently if he
were here in an era of hypercompetitive
business.
Soon it is Maundy Thursday, time for
footwashing and communion,
and the resolution of the suit is so
far in the distance that it looks like
a pinpoint on a Northern Plains
highway. Herb ends up seated
next to Larry on children’s Sunday
school room chairs,
cradling his feet in the room where
half the men
are seated with shoes and socks off and
pants rolled up, the other half
kneeling with not a little difficulty
to wash their brothers’ feet.
Once Larry has rinsed Herb’s feet,
they embrace and, since they
are each of a certain age, don’t even
hesitate to exchange a holy kiss,
as Paul directs so often. Both weep.
The lawsuit won’t stop,
for more than brotherhood rides along
with these crying barefoot men.
Yet something bigger is here, cloaked
in a strange little ceremony.
What the lawsuit can’t bring,
reconciliation in pain, forgiveness
in the middle of brokenness, happens
now.
11 Corinthians 6.1-6
