A blessed Maundy Thursday to all!

We are hosting some extra “prep” days here this week because there is so much extra preparation to do.

Let’s share ideas and questions and get help with last minute details.

Please do share what you are especially energized by at this point in the week.

How are you pacing yourself during this challenging week?

Your struggles and prayer requests are also welcome here.

You can find the daily readings for Holy Week here.

Become a member of our Facebook group and join the lively discussions there.

How is Holy Week going for you?

No, really.

Let’s talk about it!

77 thoughts on “Holy Week Prep Party: Maundy Thursday Edition

  1. I'm awake ridiculously early, but not on purpose, and trying to decide whether to close my eyes or just give in and get up. Because of a funeral yesterday, I am way behind and not ready for tonight. Kathrynzj pointed me to material she shared at LiturgyLink, and I may just use what's in the UCC Book of Worship (yes, my despair has sunk to that level). I do have a sense of the service I would like, but there has been no time to put it in paper. Aargh!So, that's my truth this early morning.

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  2. Hi, just back home from Thursday evening service. Friday is printed and ready to go, I think, I'll have one more look to double check. and for the first time ever, I have the liturgy done for Sunday. Normally I can’t think about it until after Friday service is over and I have had time for my own Friday reflections. It helped that Good Friday this year is very similar to 3 years ago – thanks to RGBP Facebook comments  Martha, hope you get some inspiration and some sleep.

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  3. Good morning, Martha. I hope you were able to get a little more sleep. As for tonight, maybe you can use the Book of Worship as a starting point (or back up) and incorporate other creative material into what's there. If desperation shows through, well, that's not incongruent with the mood of what we gather to commemorate. That's how my inner Pollyanna is trying to make it through!Which makes me wonder . . . Was Jesus feeling complete? I notice he introduces a new commandment and two new rituals. These are the things I think about before coffee!We are doing a soup meal around the table and incorporating a worship and Communion into that. As an interim, I am trying to go with what they've "always" done and not change too much. Since I have done something similar before — but not around a cross-shaped table (?!) — I got to re-use that liturgy. And, no, it's not exactly like what they've done before but it's nothing weird, either.Going to make some coffee and oatmeal. There's plenty, so help yourselves!

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  4. Chrism service and renewal of vows over and done with this morning. One down, 4 to go . . . Tonight is by the book as it's my first Maundy Thursday here. I also know the sermon is less than inspiring. It will make my husband happy as our daughter has just send him a book entitled "101 things to do during a boring sermon"! Good Friday is almost done — just worrying it is too long and I'm trying to shorten it and tie up loose ends. Like a pearl downunder I find it very hard to think about Easter Sunday till I've worked through Good Friday. Ideas there, but not much more. Hang in there everyone! Lots of coffee on the go. At this stage I am concentrating on surviving and not falling asleep in the Garden of Gethsemane!

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  5. "in paper," hmmm…I guess for the hour, and considering I was typing with one finger on my iPhone, it's a pretty good ratio of mistakes to success. :-)I did sleep a little more. Thanks for the kind thoughts, Sharon and pearl.Sharon, that's a very good point about Jesus at the end of his life. I often describe the Farewell Discourse — okay, stop me right there. "I often describe the Farewell Discourse" — am I serious about me or what? Let's try again. The way it's written in John, he sure does try to jam in a lot on that one last night. Last year this time, Lucy and I watched the long version of "The Gospel of John," the movie with Desmond from "Lost" as Jesus, and that section goes on for.ever. We get the same build of frantic explanation in a different form in Matthew. And it's there in Mark, too, just a little more compactly formed, and not in the lectionary.I was going with John only until I remembered the disciples don't fall asleep in John, so this morning I'm back to mixing up gospels — which for some reason I can't stand to do.I am making this so much more complicated for myself than it needs to be, in large measure because last year I worked very hard to do something different (a Tenebrae style service that used the whole Matthew Passiontide liturgy, with Communion in the spot it occurs in the story), and it fell flat. Well, to me it did. And especially to my worst critic, which isn't even me. I have a teenage daughter. All the way home "Worst Maundy Thursday ever, etc." This had to do with the way the readers didn't follow instructions, but I blamed myself for not making things clear enough. Since then I've concluded that there are very few people in the congregation with what I would describe as a ritual instinct, which makes these kinds of services hard. Okay, I've thrown it all out there. If I'm tempted to tell this sad story to anyone else again today, I'll refer them here. 😉

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  6. Hi all,Holy Week going well so far. Palm Sunday dramatic reading of Mark was very well received.Tonight I am incorporating Communion with the Tenebrea story so that the congregation feels what it is like to be a part of the story. The service will end in darkness with a stripping of the altar and a solo of "Were you there"

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  7. Tonight we have a supper followed by a communion service followed by en enactment of the Garden of Gethsemane. I'm apprehensive about the latter: the actors are nervous and self-conscious (and, of course, not actors), so have frequently burst into laughter in our couple of rehearsals. I wrote a little drama in which, in the moments before they fall asleep each time, the disciples talk about how they didn't expect anything like this, about their delight when they were called from their fishing boats, about the Transfiguration — events which led them to surmise that things would not fall apart as they have — and about how they will never abandon Jesus. And then they fall asleep, which so far has had a comedic effect. I have a little time to work with them on tone tonight, but . . . I spent time with them all on Sunday trying to teach them a bit about imaginative prayer and asking them to spend some time this week contemplating their characters and how they might have experienced this night, but that's a new suggestion as well.The play was mostly the worship committee's idea; the hope to turn it into a spiritual experience of prayer and attentiveness was mostly mine. We'll see.And yes, Martha, ritual instinct is a hard thing to hone, I blame myself for not having written the drama a little differently to help that along, and now that you mention it I'm glad that my daughter with her theater experience will not be there to critique!

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  8. This year I wanted to stick with Mark as much as possible. The entrenched tradition for MT is a pot-luck meal. One family likes lamb and so they bring that and another brings roast beef…and the rest provide the sides. I long for a simple meal. I am reading a small section of John on the foot washing after which we will wash hands. Then the new commandment from John. We have a group of people singing and then we shift back into Mark's passion, communion in a circle, and Mark's garden scene will be the final piece. Besides that…home communions…four down…four to go….I have one paragraph written for Easter.

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  9. Good morning, y'all. We have a shared service with the other American Baptist church in town. The other church is hosting this year and thus planning the service (which I have yet to see and likely won't see until 15 minutes before the service). It's my turn to preach and I'm freaking out a little bit because so far I have no words written. But I'm preaching in about 10 hours so I hope inspiration flows fast and soon. I'm preaching the Corinthians text and so basically focusing completely on the Last Supper and our observance of it.

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  10. I'm afraid that a bit of most uncomfortable and sour church competitiveness has risen in my heart! I pastor a tiny church on a tiny square of a tiny country town, in which the only other nonresidential establishment is a combination firehouse/post office. Last night a church a few miles away, out in the country but with its own piece of property, left fliers around town advertising a community Easter egg hunt Saturday afternoon in our town square.Now, if the situation were reversed, I would have approached the pastor of the church located on said town square and asked her if her church might like to join forces in hosting an Easter egg hunt there. Not that we own the town square. But this is a TINY town, we are the only church, and we have a big sign in the square.Would you just go and host a church event in what is essentially another church's front yard?Am I being . . . exceptionally unChristlike, especially on this particular week-end, in even allowing this situation to nag at me?

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  11. Robin, a kind assessment would be that they just didn't think about it, but it would nag at me, too. I could write a book on how professional church leaders could be more intentionally collegial and cooperative. I could also write an anonymous book of real-life examples of how that doesn't happen. Perhaps a RevGal collaboration . . . ???Earthchick, let us know if we can help or bring you calming herb tea or anything!Sounds like you are on a roll, Purple. I have a few home communions to do myself. GG, so happy that things are going well for you!

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  12. Good Friday busy printing out at last! All 20 pages of it — in fact 60 when in A5 and double spacing. The printer can't believe it's having to work so hard.Robin, I don't blame you one bit for the way you are feeling. I seems to me it would be only courteous for the other church to invite you, especially as it's on your 'turf'.Now to get myself mentally ready for the evening Eucharist and footwashing. I'd love to to wash hands, Purple. Did it in another parish and it was really meaningful. I also saw a suggestion that we wash feet and take it in turns. Maybe next year when they may be less freaked out by a "new" priest who keeps changing things!

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  13. That would be a wonderful RevGal collaboration! I have only been here six months and so I am listening, listening . . . but I am at a loss as to why there is not more collaboration among all the tiny country churches out here.

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  14. GRR. I find that kind of stuff so ridiculously irritating. I will be unChristlike on your behalf, and will dislike them and their behavior with enough fore for the both of us, so that you can be holy and welcoming yourself. :-)Maybe on Saturday at the egg hunt, you should have some church members out (in church t-shirts if you have them!) offering snacks and drinks and flyers about YOUR worship services, Sunday School, VBS if you have one, etc. 🙂

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  15. Hey, at least attending church on MT is an entrenched tradition, and you aren't expected to cook the meal yourself. I know a lot of pastors who would be grateful for either of those things.

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  16. ok, the maundy thursday prayer stations are probably as done as they're going to get. Next I have to put together the spoken instructions and prayers that I have to lead, and a basic order for the musicians to follow. The stations I settled on are:praying for enemies/reconciliationpraying for the world giving-our-worries-to-God betrayal confession images-of-God taste-and-see station about sweetness (with chocolate)Connected like aspen trees paper prayer chainHandwashing I'm a little worried that there's not enough room at each station for the number of people signed up, and I probably need another 2 stations to ease the congestion, but I just can't come up with 2 more. I'm happy to take ideas, as long as they don't require me to go to the store, up until about 3pm central time. lol.Thank goodness Good Friday is a simple read-the-story-choir-sings-passion-chorales service this year. I don't think I could take it if I had to organize volunteer readers or monologues or drama of any kind. it'll be very simple tomorrow night–darkness, story, simple music. phew.For those still working on prayers/etc, LiturgyLink has dozens of things up for MT/GF/Easter. If you've written something for any of those, or if you've written something for next week already, please email it in and help your colleagues all over the world!

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  17. Okay, I don't know what's going on, but my writing is flowing and I'm actually enjoying it (I hope I didn't just ruin it by saying that!). So YAY. Now I'm going to take a breakfast break, since, even though I've been up for a long time, I haven't eaten anything yet. And my sermon is all about food, so it's kind of making me hungry….

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  18. Robin, that would bother me, too! Do they maybe have a tradition of doing it? Do you have any sense of how your congregation feels about it?I like Teri's idea!!

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  19. Good morning! We did Mark's Passion narrative on Sunday, as arranged by a member of the church for 6 voices and interspersed with hymns and powerful choir participation. So we are using Matthew tonight for worship around dinner. The prayer centers are set up for after worship. We have 11 Holy Week specific stations and then 3 or 4 of our usual stations set up. Like you Teri, I'm not sure how many people will participate, but I think there's enough to handle whatever crowd we might get. I'm staying at home today until noon. Which is my small concession to not going insane after a crazy busy week that isn't even close to being over. I'm going to work on the Easter sermon in the quiet of my home and then go to church to finish with prayer center preparations. Blessings to you all!

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  20. I am so thankful for this community. It's very comforting to know that my frustrations and stresses during this week are a normal part of ministry. Thanks for being there!Good Friday is done and ready to roll. I got the Easter bulletins mostly done yesterday (Grump #1 – no church secretary). I don't know what I was thinking – I don't quite have the Maundy Thursday stuff ready and now I really feel under the gun. (Grump #2 – there's no altar guild so I have to make sure everything is set up correctly AND I have to arrange for the stripping of the altar, which really has me stressed out).Tonight's sermon is written (it's here if anyone is interested) and the bulletin is mostly done, except for the stripping of the altar thing. And that's just stressing me out. It was like pulling teeth to get readers for last Sunday's readers theatre of Mark's Passion (Grump # 3 – they just want to come to worship and sit in the pews and have the pastor do the WHOLE worship).And I'm mourning that I have no choirs, or special music, or drama team, or any of the teams that do cool worship planning stuff (Grump # 4 no special music for Easter). So basically, I'm out of sorts so I'm also grumping that I had to take the trash to the curb again and I've had to do so much running for me teen, etc.Not a very good place to start the Three Days, I'm afraid. But I know that after tonight's worship, I'll be better. Most of this is just stage jitters and nervousness from this being the first Holy Week here. On the plus side, I think I have identified the pressing issue that my congregations need to work on – ownership and participation in worship. They complain that the younger generations don't want to be involved and aren't coming – yet they come but aren't involved.Thanks for listening to me whine. I needed to rant a little.

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  21. CHrism Mass and ministerial commitment this morning was good and uplifting in many ways – though not keen on the unholy scrum afterwards to grab oils. Stations of the Cross last night, which I love. Used traditional art – photos of stations from Wantage (have also used alternative artists, though this is not usually appreciated by majority!). Had positive feedback and was grateful partly because I was (am) so tired, and stations takes a lot of organising (don't have stations 'built' into church building). Yesterday had a very busy Easter family crafts afternoon, which was great (and contributed to tiredness!). So tonight I don't have to preach (hurray!), will do washing of feet for the few brave enough to volunteer, have the powerful stripping of sanctuary and keep vigil until midnight in the Lady Chapel transformed beautifully into garden of remembrance. Tomorrow have walk of witness (ambivalent feelings), an hour of Good Friday reflections with Mark's passion, then children's Good Friday service (telling the story of how the hare became the messenger of the Christ Child, and making our own paschal candles). Go well, fellow preachers and worship crafters – you are doing important work!

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  22. I have really appreciated the very good things at Liturgy Link and have used things for tonight's Maundy Thursday service.I love the prayer stations for tonight. I would love to try something like that sometime.

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  23. Ramona, you tell the truth about church life and pastor life.I like that this is a place where we can whine and rant and even figure out the pressing issues together. I look forward to reading your sermon for tonight.

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  24. Love reading everyone's comments. We have three pastoral types on staff, so we have divided up the responsibilities–tonight is interim minister's gig–so I am not feeling stressed about it. We have footwashing, communion, tenebrae…it's a lovely service, and she has tweaked it some in great ways. Tomorrow evening, our seminary student leads GF, and we don't do anything for Holy Saturday. A church in my neighborhood is doing a labyrinth walk on Saturday evening, so I think I will go to that…and Sunday, oh Sunday is full of balloons and flowers and egg hunts and alleluias and Hallelujah Chorus and reception of new members and blessing Mission Trippers and a little meditation somewhere in there entitled, "Really?". That's about as far as I have got with the sermon. 😉

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  25. Aah! A little diversion from my weekly letter to the congregation. Wondering about how to share the comment I heard at Bible study about the Resurrection–"I don't buy it and I don't know what to do with it." I suspect it is not an isolated take on the Resurrection. It lead to a great conversation and took the group to a much deeper level. Just want to be gentle with people's landmarks. Tomorrow an ecumenical Urban Stations of the Cross. Have to write my opening prayer and pull together the story I will tell about people turned out into the streets.Last task today–writing my Easter night sermon based on the Emmaus story. Leaning on Bruggemann's notion of Eastering.

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  26. I'm relieved to say the Order of Service is complete. I've also done the booklets for tomorrow. I'm adapting something from five years ago for my meditation tonight. I think I can go home and put my feet up for an hour! Phew!

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  27. Okay, I have a draft of my sermon for tonight done, and I'm going to take a break to take care of a couple of kid/home things before I turn to Easter sermonizing. Trying to figure out whether or not I want to change my title before it goes to print later this afternoon.There is so much to choose from when preaching Maundy Thursday, which has made me second-guess myself a little bit. Our congregation has a Tenebrae service tomorrow night, plus some will participate in the Community Good Friday Service midday tomorrow, so they will get plenty of the Passion. But our host congregation has no other Holy Week services. So in the past when I've preached MT, I've felt the need to really focus on the betrayal aspect of the evening and have even dipped into the GF texts. But this time I'm only doing the Lord's Supper (1 Cor. text) and I'm trying to let that be okay and sufficient.

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  28. Aw, thanks, Sharon! Both for your nice words about my blog, and for your reassurance about preaching about the Lord's Supper. I think you are right that we don't talk about it much, and I thought it would be especially good since this is a combined service for two congregations – it seems so appropriate to me that we come together around the table, and I want to talk about that.Anyway. Thank you!

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  29. I think I have everything ready for worship tonight. We'll see how it goes when people show up and I give them assignments on cleansing the altar!I'm thinking I should probably take a couple of hours to myself. The Easter sermonizing can wait until after tomorrow morning's Good Friday service.

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  30. I'm tucking the idea of preaching on the Lord's supper in my pocket for another year. I especially like what you said about the combined service for two congregations gathering around the table. It fits my context as well.

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  31. Well, I have survived my first footwashing. I found it amazing. I have never enjoyed it when having my feet washed, but doing it the other way round I found awesome and will certainly continue the tradition in this parish.Set up the church for tomorrow with bare rough cross in the sanctuary. I was going to "clothe" it with stole and crown of thorns (not very original, I know!) but the crown of thorns has disappeared so I have decided on a totally bare cross. Maybe next year I will have the energy to be more inventive — with the help and ideas from all you revgals!Bedtime for me and, at last perhaps, a good night's sleep with tomorrow's 3 hours prepared at last. I will think of you all still in the midst of MT. Have fun, even in the stress!

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  32. Hi everyone. Low key day for me today, as the choir handles the Maundy Thursday. Simple tomorrow, too. We have a labyrinth and (what will be I'm certain) small prayer circle following. Found a really good one online – Rex Hunt – had to adapt considerably, but it was a good jumping off place.Then, Sunday. Sunrise on our front patio and I'm giving the kids chalk and having them write the good news. It's Mark, you know, and I'm ending with "they told no one" and then "the story doesn't stop here." So, that will be good I think.Regular service still up in the air, but will have something to do with new members joining, receiving a special offering, pinwheels, The Hunger Games and the Hallelujah Chorus. Oh, yeah, and resurrection. Ever find you just have a few too many chainsaws you are juggling?

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  33. Great! I've just done some revising and have decided that it will actually be a good word for our combined congregations. Hope I still feel that way in 3 hours! 😉

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  34. What a great idea to give them assignments! And taking some time to yourself today — priceless.Check back here for more prep parties to help us all get to Easter Sunday.

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