“He’s doing it all wrong,” I thought to myself.
Sure enough, Grandson #2 wound up making a bit of a mess as a result of his choice to finish off the ice cream cone by eating it from the bottom up.
This only stands to reason: When you chomp off the tip at the stern, a waffle cone can no longer fully contain its cargo. Drips will drop, and run down your chin and sticky-up your palm and inevitably some will fall (entirely wasted) at your feet.
What’s the best way to finish off a cone? From the bottom up, naturally!
All of which, of course, is a thoroughly entertaining process to a five-year-old. Eating becomes a bit of an adventure. Sure, some melted ice cream escapes … but oddly somehow it leads to joy.
So maybe there’s something to this wrong-way method after all. Maybe it merits a closer look, my taking the time to develop a deeper appreciation of its apparent madness.
I wonder, too, if this is along the lines of what Jesus’ companions were thinking … as he broke Passover bread for them on the night before he died. He – and they – knew the ritual well. They’d spent the better part of a week getting ready for the feast. “Go into the city and a man will meet you, carrying a jar of water,” Jesus says.
It would appear they followed his instructions to a tee, and so found the large upper room and made preparations there for their holiday meal. But soon enough, Jesus departs from the Passover script. He breaks the bread and says “Take it. This is my body.” And I gotta think somebody at that table must have said to himself, “He’s doing it all wrong.” This is NOT how Passover is done.
Likewise with the cup: Instead of using it to remember God’s ancient promise, God’s providence, Jesus says it now seals a new covenant. That’s not how it’s supposed to be done, is it?
“So maybe something different is happening here,” his companions must have thought. And maybe we – who now remember that wrong-way meal – are called to share in their long-ago wonder.
It’s certainly worth considering, is it not? That when we take and eat, we are truly entering into something new. Something simple. Something inexplicable. And something, oddly, that leads to joy.
Let us pause now…to recall that we are in the presence of the Holy & Merciful One.
IHS
With Us Still 