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,[a] but is completely clean. And you[b] 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[c] 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)
Introduction
When you are going through Scripture you will come across certain phrases that grab you by the shirt collars and don’t let you go; yet, you will find that they are so wonderful to you, there’s not really much you can say about it, other than just allowing the words to ruminate in your heart and mind. John opens this new scene in chapter 13 with one such phrase in verse 1, “he loved them to the end.”
Our Lord knows that He has now come to His appointed hour of suffering where He will be betrayed by one of His own and delivered up to crucifixion to bear the sins of many. Knowing this He loves His own all the more, perfectly, unto the end. At the exact point in time when any one of us would been likely to jump ship and bail out to save our own skin, Jesus doubles down on His life for His own. “…having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.” John tells us this to show what compelled Jesus to stop and wash the disciples feet. This act of washing His disciples’ feet is a deep act of love. This is one of those things where the full significance of the act misses us a little bit, being that we live in such a radically different society. We don’t have to walk everywhere in sandals, feet washing isn’t a thing, and we don’t have servants or slaves. But as John tells us, this is an incredibly sacrificial act of love and service, and we see that in Peter’s reaction, that He is dead set against Jesus doing such a lowly thing for him, until he realizes how necessary it is. Outside of His suffering and cross, this may be the greatest act of love and service that Jesus does for His disciples. And it’s not so much in the literal act of washing their feet itself, but in what it signifies, which we will get into in a bit.
Verse 3-5: Jesus Humbles Himself as a Servant
So as Jesus is gathered with His disciples around the table for dinner, Jesus does something the disciples had never seen before. He gets up from the table, puts on servants’ clothes and begins to do the work of a servant. Jesus is the teacher here, the rabbi. He isn’t supposed to be doing the work of a servant. There is a hierarchy in the world, Jesus, don’t you know there are servants to do that, you are the teacher. But what Jesus does here is not just an act of service for service sake. It was symbolic and signified something far more important. The washing of feet was never done by superiors to inferiors, but always by inferiors to superiors. And here goes Jesus, the superior doing the work of the inferior.
Here’s where it’s important to understand the symbolism of what Jesus is doing. Jesus is not an egalitarian. He is not trying to erase the good hierarchy in the world. In fact, the hierarchical structure is necessary to understand the significance of what Jesus does for us in the gospel, pictured in the foot washing here. Jesus is showing that all of us are inferiors to Him. And we are so inferior that there is nothing that we can do, there is no service that we can perform, and no ritual that we can practice that can wash away our sin and make us right with God. For that to happen it takes the pure and holy prize jewel of heaven, the Lord Jesus, to stoop down to us and do everything necessary to wash away our sin. One of the amazing things about the gospel is that it was not an equal or an inferior that washes us and serves us and saves us, it is the highest and most wonderful Lord and King of all Heaven and Earth that humbles Himself to such a lowly position, becoming a servant, and giving up Himself for those far below Him such as us. Philippians 2:3-8, “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”
This whole act of humiliation that Christ performed in the gospel is pictured for us in the washing of His disciples’ feet. Verse 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, rose from supper.” Now, why would John need to give us this kind of preface if Jesus’ washing of the disciples’ feet was just a nice gesture of service? Because what Jesus did here, signifies that He would do much more. The gospel writer is painting a picture here for us. He is wanting us to see this typology. Because if we see this service of Jesus as signifying His humiliation and humbling Himself to the point of a servant and unto death on a cross, then the preface in verse 3 makes sense. Why in the world would the second person of the Trinity come down from His royal abode above to do such a humiliating work as He did to save small rebel creatures like us? He did it because He knew that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He was sent on the Father’s authority, and would return to the Father to be enthroned above. So in verse 3 Jesus knows His mission, this could be the covenant of redemption we could say. Then in verse 4 Jesus rises from supper. This is His rising from His place above. He gets up because He is about to come down. This reminds me so much of the various Psalms that call upon Yahweh to rise and save them. Even ones that we’ve sung this year like Psalm 3:7, “Arise, O LORD! Save me, O my God! For you strike all my enemies on the cheek; you break the teeth of the wicked.” Or Psalm 82:8, “Arise, O God, judge the earth; for you shall inherit all the nations!” Jesus’ rising from His place in heaven to come down in humility and power to save is the answering of the prayer and song of the Psalms.
So Jesus rose from supper, verse 4, “He laid aside his outer garments…” Now here is great imagery of Jesus laying aside His heavenly garb of His pre-incarnate glory. “…and taking a towel, tied it around his waist…” Here is the other side of the laying aside of His pre-incarnate glory, he then puts on a towel. He puts on human flesh, which was certainly a less glorious garment than that which He took off. So Jesus then gets down and does the work He came to do, He washes away sins, then to complete the imagery we are told in verse 12 “he had washed their feet and put on his outer garments and resumed his place.” This is the rest of Philippians 2 that after Jesus humbled Himself to the point of death on cross it says, “Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” So that’s the image: after Jesus humbles Himself and does the work of redemption He rises and resumed His place above in glory.
Now that we have discussed the typology, I want us to transport back into the narrative.
Verse 6-8: Objections to being served by Jesus
So as Jesus gets down to wash the disciples’ feet, Peter objects. It seems he cannot bear the thought of His teacher serving him like a Gentile slave. Of course Peter in his hyperbolic way says “you shall never wash my feet.” We can understand Peter’s questioning of Jesus in verse 6. But then Jesus answers in verse 7 telling Peter that while he doesn’t understand now, He will understand one day what Jesus is doing. Therefore we must take Peter’s saying that Jesus will never wash his feet as high defiance in sin. Peter is refusing, in that moment, to trust Jesus even though he doesn’t understand why Jesus would do what He is doing. Peter’s defiance is a lack of faith. He is not trusting the Lord’s designs. If Jesus tells Peter that afterward he would understand, faith would receive the washing, trusting what Jesus has said.
But what Peter displays here is common to man. Peter shows us some common objections to being served by Jesus. There may be many things that we can’t understand about God, but faith takes the words of Jesus, what is known and clear, and trusts them, despite not fully understanding everything. But so often unbelief manifests itself in rejecting everything because there is something that the fallen and limited human mind cannot understand. That is high defiance and rebellion. We are to trust what God has made clear to us and know that it will all be made more clear one day.
We don’t know all of Peter’s reasons for objecting to Jesus washing his feet, but clearly he didn’t like the thought of Jesus serving him in that way. Pride will commonly object to being served by Jesus. So sinful man in His pride will object the finished work of Jesus to cleanse us from sin, because we couldn’t have such a one doing such dirty work for us, and in accepting that admitting that we are indeed dirty with sin, unable to cleanse ourselves. Another objection to being served by Christ could be false humility. False humility thinks “Oh no, no, I’m not good enough for Jesus to do this for me.” Whether it is sincerely meant or a show, it matters not. So you have either, “I’m too dirty for Christ to wash me, I’ve done too much, and gone too far.” Or you have the prideful thought that says, “I’m already clean. I don’t need Jesus to do this for me, I am already clean.” Either objection is faithless, high defiance and rebellion.
Verse 8: The Necessity of being washed/served by Jesus.
Jesus rebukes Peter with a stern warning. In this we see the necessity of being washed by Jesus. Or the necessity of being served by Jesus. Peter could have no share with Jesus, if Jesus did not wash him. That remains true for us today, not literally with our feet, but with what the foot washing signifies – the washing away of sin.
So often people think that being a Christian is all about what we can do to serve God. Or what we do to clean ourselves up or how hard we try to be really good and moral people. Or even people believe that being a Christians is all about us serving other people. While it is true that Christians are to be servants and give our all to serve God and one another, and that is noble and good – that is simply a fruit of what makes us a Christian. We become servants because Jesus first served us. I am not trying to make a false dichotomy between serving Jesus and being served by Jesus, I am simply trying to emphasize that the order and foundation is absolutely imperative that we get right. The only way to be saved by Jesus is to be served by Jesus. We can have no part and will be allowed no share in Christ, if we are not served and washed by Him. It doesn’t not if we want to literally get down and wash people’s feet, although that would make no sense in our day in age, there is not enough feet in the world to wash that will justify us before God. At the end of the day the problem is that our feet are filthy. They are foul. They carry the vile stench of the manure of sin and rebellion. We can reach down and try to scrub and scrub all day long but we will never be able to wash our own feet. Because it isn’t just our feet that is dirty. It’s our hands too, it’s our face, it’s our heart, it’s our lips, and our eyes, we cannot escape the dirt of sin all over us! You can’t clean dirty feet with dirty hands, and dirty water, and dirty towels and rags of sin. The only way that we can have our sins washed away is by the One who has no sin! The only way our sin can be removed is by the one who has no spot or blemish in Him – the pure and spotless servant lamb of God. And He has to be willing, and He is. And we have to be served by Him.
Notice the idea conveyed in verse 5. Jesus is wiping the disciples’ feet with the towel that He wrapped around His waist. So as He wipes their feet, the dirt and mud comes off their feet and on to Him – on to His towel. Remember the towel was the image of flesh that Jesus assumed in the incarnation. And this is the gospel. The only way we can have our sins removed from us, is if Jesus takes them upon Himself. This is what Jesus has done. He put on flesh so that He could put on sin. Just as servants need towels to do their cleaning, so the Son of God needed flesh to do His. We needed a pure and undefiled God-man with unsinful flesh to put our sins on, and that is what Jesus has done. 2 Corinthians 5:21, “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” The only way to be saved by Jesus is to be served by Jesus.
By way of application I want us to think about this in terms of how we come to church. Yes, we ought to serve one another and have our eyes and ears open for ways that we can do so when we gather together. But when we are participating in corporate worship, the most fundamental thing, first and foremost, is that we are coming to be served by Jesus Himself. As the means of grace are ministered to us, it is Jesus Himself serving us by giving us the grace we need, stirring up confession, assuring us of our pardon, and sanctifying us by the washing of the water of the Word. This is why it is of first importance that a church get the worship right. Because if if we are not first receiving from Jesus and being served by Him, we’ll have nothing to give to others. That’s what you should look for first in a church: are the means of grace being faithfully administered? If they are you can come and be served by Jesus. And then turn around and lay down your life for the brethren.
Verse 9-11: The Daily Washing by the Word
So now here Jesus changes the metaphor. We have the washing away of our sins by the blood of Jesus that fully and finally justifies before God. Peter wants his whole body washed by Jesus now that he knows the necessity of it, but Jesus tells Peter essentially: you are washed and cleaned already. And such a one, only needs his feet washed. So the idea is that one can be bathed and cleaned but then through walking around will dirty their feet again necessitating a foot washing. What this signifies is the fact that those who have taken a part in Christ by being washed by Him, are clean. They have been declared clean. And they are! Yet in life, though we are partaking in Christ, we still dirty ourselves in sin as we go, and while we don’t ever need to be re-justified, there is a daily washing in the water of the word that is necessary for our faith. If we have come to Christ we have fully and finally had all of our sins thrown into the bottom of the sea and removed from us as far as the East is from the West, yet daily we need to confess our sins. Daily, we need to ask God to forgive us of our sins, as we commit them. We need to be washed and renewed by the water of the Word each and every day.
Verse 12-16: We Follow His Example
Our Lord tells us here that what He has done for us should cause us to do the same for others. If Jesus who is our Teacher and Lord has stooped so low to serve sinners like us and to give up His life to totally redeem us, then there is no one too far below us that we should not love and serve. There are things that Jesus did that we are not to try and imitate. But Jesus explicitly tells us here, “I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you.” Now, does this mean that we today are to literally wash one another’s feet? No I don’t believe so because it was never about the literal washing. It was always about the washing that it signified, and displaying that love and humble service of Jesus that we are to imitate. So practically we imitate Jesus by finding ways in our day to humbling love and serve one another. By doing humiliating or difficult acts of love and service to one another. Maybe things like Mom’s changing endlessly dirty diapers. Or if you have elderly parents, bringing them in to your home to live with you or going to live with them instead of sending them into a nursing home to be taken care of by strangers. And when they live with you and get to a certain point, you’re going to have their messes to clean up, just as they did for you when you were a baby. That’s humiliating humble service and love. But we shouldn’t give a second thought to doing because of what Jesus has done for us. A.W. Pink says that “love seeks the good of its objects, and esteems no service too lowly to secure that good.”
As we go about thinking and acting on ways to love one another and serve one another. We need to keep on the forefront of our minds, that this does not justify us before God. Jesus already did that for us. You see God doesn’t need our works. He doesn’t need us or the things we can do. He can do it all without us. God doesn’t need our works. But that doesn’t mean they are not needed. While God does not need our works, He tells us to do them, because our neighbor does. If you read any amount of sermons by Martin Luther, it seems like he finds a way, someway somehow to make this application in every message. And honestly I don’t mind it when reading him. God doesn’t need our works, but our neighbors do.
We’ve been served to serve. God meets our practical needs through justifying people. Because justified people go around and meet one another’s needs. Luther’s emphasis on justification by faith alone and good works for our neighbor go absolutely hand in hand. God meets our practical needs by justifying people because justified people serve others.
This also means that as Christians, we need to gladly accept it when others want to serve us. Not if someone is trying to be obnoxious and intrusive, but in general we should be people who are willing to accept service and gifts from others. Because when we allow others to serve us, that is actually a service to them as well. Because God has called them to follow his example and serve others, so when we accept good works from others, we are helping them follow the example of Jesus. I say that because it can be hard for us to want to accept it when people want to do things for us. Again, this doesn’t mean we allow anyone and everyone to come in our homes and do whatever they want whenever. That’s ridiculous. But general good works.
Verse 17: These things bring us joy/happiness
So finally when we accept good works from others, we are also helping them be happy, because Jesus says we are blessed when we do these things. That means we are happy when we know and do them. But it is important that we “know” them and not just do them. Because you can go around and do all kinds of good works for other people, and be miserable. How is that? Because you could be going around doing them but not knowing them. You could be going around trying to justify yourself before God by them. And trying to justify yourself before God by serving others will not make you happy, it will be exhausting and miserable because you will never justify yourself that way. You could be going around serving others, without knowing and being a partaker in Christ. If you have refused His washing and serving of you, all of your service others will not bring true and lasting happiness, you will be miserable, you will not be blessed, because you have not known and been served by Christ first.
So would you come to Jesus Christ today? Come to Him with all your dirt, all your sin, all your mess, and be served, be washed, and be saved by Jesus. The only way to come and be cleaned by Jesus is to come with your sins, to come dirty. That is what is required to be washed by Jesus. So bring them all to Him.
And Christian, be washed and renewed by Him today in the washing of the water of the Word. Confess your sins today and do to others as He has done to you. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.
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