Dirty No More
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| Photo by Amritanshu Sikdar on Unsplash |
John 13 tells us the story of Jesus washing the disciples feet, and it shows us the love and humility of Jesus in a beautiful way that has lessons for our lives today.
Jesus Washes the Disciples' Feet
[1] Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. [2] During supper, when the devil had already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray him, [3] Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going back to God, [4] rose from supper. He laid aside his outer garments, and taking a towel, tied it around his waist. [5] Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him. [6] He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, do you wash my feet?” [7] Jesus answered him, “What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand.” [8] Peter said to him, “You shall never wash my feet.” Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no share with me.” [9] Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!” [10] Jesus said to him, “The one who has bathed does not need to wash, except for his feet, but is completely clean. And you are clean, but not every one of you.” [11] For he knew who was to betray him; that was why he said, “Not all of you are clean.”
[12] When he had washed their feet and put on his outer garments and resumed his place, he said to them, “Do you understand what I have done to you? [13] You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. [14] If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. [15] For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you. [16] Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. [17] If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them. (John 13:1–17 ESV)
What is the point of washing the feet?
"the washing of the feet was the first act on entering the tent or house after a journey. The Orientals wore only sandals, and this washing was refreshing as well as cleanly. In the case of ordinary people, the host furnished the water, and the guests washed their own feet, but in the richer houses, the washing was done by a slave. It was looked upon as the lowliest of all services"
The disciples and Jesus are about to eat the Passover meal. In first century culture like this one, eating meant "reclining at table," where all people would sort of lay around the short table. This meant that your feet would likely be in someone else's eating space, right near their face. You would also have someone else's feet near your space, so you're going to want to have clean feet.
In this instance, the disciples would be expected to wash their own feet. In other instances, like in richer homes, a slave would come and wash the feet of the disciples. In no circumstances would someone like Jesus, the disciples Rabbi, or teacher ever wash their feet. But what we see here is Jesus making himself a slave, making himself the servant of his disciples. Instead of them washing their feet, their master makes himself their servant and does it for them. Jesus doesn't practice this act of humble servitude from a place of obligation, but from a place of authority.
HUMILITY FROM AUTHORITY
See what John says:
"Jesus knew that the Father had given all things into his hands, that he had come from God and was going back to God." (v. 3)
In other words, Jesus had all power and authority over all creation and all people, not just his disciples as their master or teacher. And in his authority, he chose to become lowly, to serve.
What do we think of as leadership in our world?
Power, strength, charisma, and a strong will are a few of the words that come to my mind. In our world, a leader might be someone who by sheer power of will or charisma can get people to follow them and do what they want. This isn't the picture we get of Jesus.
As Jesus shows us, in God's economy the mark of true leadership is servanthood.
There's a great passage in Matthew 20 where the mother two of Jesus' disciples asks that they would get to sit on Jesus' right and left hand in the glory of his kingdom. The other disciples find out and get upset. All 12 disciples and the mother are thinking about greatness in the world's terms. Jesus answers them to show the contrast of how the world sees leadership and what leadership looks like in God's kingdom:
[25] But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. [26] It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, [27] and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, [28] even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Matthew 20:25–28 ESV)
Whoever would be great among you must be your servant. Whoever would be first among you must be your slave. The way that Jesus speaks of leadership in God's economy shatters our categories. Great leaders are great servants. Great leaders in God's economy are the ones who lay down their lives for others. How can we be sure of that? It was the very mission of Christ.
"The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many."
In this world, we desire power because we want others to serve us. A king or queen in this world is a person who has people at their service, at their disposal. Their whole focus is to do the will of the king or queen in service to them.
In God's economy the King of glory, Jesus Christ came into the world to serve. Imagine the Queen of England kneeling down to wash the feet of a homeless man in England. Imagine the President of the United States scrubbing the feet of an elementary student in Baltimore. This is the picture we get here, of Jesus with all authority stripping off his outer garment and bending down to wash the messy feet of his disciples. Jesus came to serve.
Jesus also came to give his life as a ransom for many. This was according to God's eternal plan to redeem a people to Himself, and it is what gives Jesus the authority from God that John describes in verse 3:
The Apostle Paul describes how Jesus receives power from God the Father in Philippians 2:
[3] Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. [4] Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. [5] Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, [6] who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, [7] but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. [8] And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. [9] Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, [10] so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, [11] and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:3–11 ESV)
1. Jesus is God. Jesus is and always has been, the eternally begotten Son of God, one part of the Godhead, or Trinity.
2. Jesus laid down his Godhood in the sense that he did not cling to it. Jesus did not keep his position as God as something to "be grasped," but rather came to earth as a baby in a manger, taking on human form.
3. Jesus emptied himself by taking the form of a servant. Jesus, fully God, became fully man. The Author of time and space entered into his own story. The one through whom all things were made became a thing that was made, conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary. In this way, Jesus "condescended" to us, and became like us.
D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones says, "The Son of God became a man so that men could become sons of God."
4. As a human, Jesus fully identified with our weaknesses, but he lived a sinless life. Jesus fully obeyed God in every way. This is the great distinction that we have with Jesus the man. We fail to obey God hour-by-hour! We don't do the things God desires for us to do, and we do the things God doesn't want us to do! But Jesus never sinned, rather he perfectly lived out the will of the Father, even to the point of dying on a cross. We have to remember the depth of God's love for us, in that it was according to God's definite plan and foreknowledge (Acts 2:35) that God willed that Jesus went to the cross.
God willed His Son to die. God decreed that the most precious person in the universe, the holy and just Jesus, would die and that this would make the way for heinous, vile, and insolent sinners to be reconciled to Himself.
God willed His Son to bear the punishment for sins that we deserve, which is death, separation from God.
Jesus humbled himself by becoming obedient to God.
In humility Jesus obeyed God, even to death on the cross. Jesus entrusted himself fully to God.
Jesus constantly taught that "He who humbles himself will be exalted," and we see this play out in the rest of this passage.
5. God has highly exalted him, giving Jesus the name that is above every name. God makes Jesus the Lord of all creation, the ruler and King of everything.
God rewarded Christ's humility with exaltation. In our world, we often see this happen the other way around, or at least we think it will. It is the proud man, the boastful man, or the one who can strong arm his way to the top who will acquire great standing or position. But in God's economy this is not so. Jesus said, "The one who humbles himself will be exalted, and the one who exalts himself will be humbled."
In God's world it is the person who humbly serves others that is exalted. Jesus Christ washing his disciples feet is our constant reminder of that truth.
THE GOSPEL OFFER
The story of Jesus washing the disciples feet gives us this beautiful picture of servant leadership, and it also portrays a picture of the gospel message for us to see. We are reminded that Jesus came to give his life as a ransom for many. A ransom implies that we are in some sort of slavery or hostage situation. A ransom implies that we cannot work or pay our way out of the situation, that we need someone to intervene. We need a Savior to come in and pay our redemption price.
Jesus came into the world to serve us by being our Savior. Jesus gave his life as the ransom we needed to be freed from the slavery that we have to sin and the penalty of death that our sin deserves.
The only way to receive this redemption is to receive it as a gift. We have to receive God's gift of grace that comes in Jesus' life, death, and resurrection. The way we receive this gift is by faith.
"For there is no distinction: [23] for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, [24] and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, [25] whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith." (Romans 3:22b–25a ESV)
We cannot buy ourselves out of slavery by working our way to God. You cannot earn a gift, you can only accept it. We cannot redeem ourselves. This is why we need Peter (who is really all of us) as our example:
[8] Peter said to him, “You shall never wash my feet.” Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no share with me.” [9] Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!”
Peter essentially says to Jesus, "I'll be the one to wash my own feet thank you very much!" This is exactly the same thing we say to God when we refuse the gospel offer of justification by faith. When we try to work our way to God by our works instead of believing in Jesus, we tell God, "I'll work my way to you, thank you very much!" We become just like Peter, pridefully self-dependent. But the gospel is clear, we can't work our way to God. We can't pay the ransom price our sin deserves, so Jesus does it for us. We can't wash our own feet, Jesus has to do it for us.
So let us all be like Peter after Jesus' mild rebuke and say to Jesus: "Wash all of me!" We have to accept that the way God cleans us up is not by our works but by uniting us to Jesus by faith. This is the gospel offer today, that we can be right with God, justified, righteous, all by the accomplished work of His Son, Jesus Christ our Redeemer, on the cross.
Have you let Jesus wash your feet?
What ways are you trying to work your way to "being right with God?"
IMPLICATIONS
Lastly, let us look at a few implications:
1. True leadership is servanthood.
We all have the opportunity to be great leaders, especially when we remember that truly great leadership is servanthood. No matter what position we find ourselves in life, we can follow Christ's example of humble servitude.
Roommates? Do the dishes unexpectedly.
Employee? Clean the break room without anyone noticing.
Boss? Take action to serve and develop your employees.
Spouse? Do something that honors your partner.
Student? Offer help to another student that you see is struggling.
Any one of us can be leaders in our homes, communities, places of work, churches, friend groups by serving others as Christ has shown us and served us.
[10] So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith. (Galatians 6:10 ESV)
2. Authority is given to edify others.
What roles of authority has God placed you in?
Who are people that you can influence?
Do you have expertise, insight, intelligence, skills, or wisdom that others don't have?
Do you have gifts that can help others?
We all have impact and influence! These are all versions of authority! We can use our lives to edify others. When we edify others with our authority we glorify God. When we edify others with our authority, we are loving our neighbor as ourselves. When we edify others with our authority we are showcasing that God's love is at work in our hearts. When we edify others with our authority we are showing that we aren't end users of God's blessings, but rather that we are blessed to be a blessing.
Another way we can use our authority is to leverage our privilege. We see in Jesus the perfect living out of this word from Paul in Romans 12: "Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly." Jesus associated with the lowly of this world, and healed them, redeemed them, and lifted them up. We are those lowly of this world!
Jesus didn't grasp his privilege as God, but emptied himself to obey God and serve us. In obedience to God we too can step out of our comfort zones and move into spaces where we can edify others. Instead of grasping onto the good things and advantages we've had in our lives and hoarding all our blessings for ourselves, we can lay down our privilege with the intent of building others up. We can seek righteousness, justice, and mercy in this world. We can be a voice for the voiceless, strength for the weary. We can be burden-bearers for other image-bearers of God. But we can't do this if we are haughty or too stubborn to leave our comfort zones or to associate with the lowly. So let us use our authority and privilege to edify others.
3. We have to let Jesus be our redeemer instead of trying to fix ourselves.
Lastly, we have to trust that what God has told us in the gospel is true. Jesus has redeemed us from having to keep the law, and Jesus has freed us from our slavery to sin. We are free in Jesus to relate to God by grace. God's power is at work in us through the Spirit. God's Spirit is what does the work in our lives as we lean into His power. We didn't save ourselves, and we don't keep ourselves going, but we persevere in believing in Jesus and seeking holiness. We lean into Jesus, we run to him, we pray, we obey, and we trust in the power of God to save us, keep us, and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. We have to live by faith, remembering that the same power that lifted Jesus from the grave is at work inside of us making us more and more like Jesus every day.
A POEM IN CLOSING:
Jesus, you kneel before me
You remove my shoes and I am exposed
My feet are grimy
full of calluses and cracks
pungent with sweat and toe jam
I’m embarrassed by them
I pull back but you reassure
You’re not offended
I feel welcome in your hands
vulnerable, yet safe
You remove my shoes and I am exposed
My feet are grimy
full of calluses and cracks
pungent with sweat and toe jam
I’m embarrassed by them
I pull back but you reassure
You’re not offended
I feel welcome in your hands
vulnerable, yet safe
The cleansing begins
I see your reflection in the ripples
I see me, too
Your water brings truth and life
Who I am and who I can be
I see your reflection in the ripples
I see me, too
Your water brings truth and life
Who I am and who I can be
I am whole and home in the touch of the towel
You look at my neighbor and hand it to me
You look at my neighbor and hand it to me
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