PRAYER OF CONSECRATION
Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.
Jesus, I belong to you.
I lift up my heart to you.
I set my mind on you.
I fix my eyes on you.
I offer my body to you as a living sacrifice.
Jesus, we belong to you.
Praying in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.
John 13:34–35
“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
CONSIDER THIS
In many traditions of the church, one particular practice stands out as a compelling, visual illustration of the quality of love that Jesus intends to exist between him and his followers as well as among his followers. It is a practice that provides us with a metaphor for how we are to love one another as the world watches on.
Permit me to leave us in suspense for a bit for the sake of effect. This special practice was implemented by the early church (often before a Eucharist) and continues to be used by Methodists, Wesleyans, Anglicans, Lutherans, Mennonites, Presbyterians, Catholics, Orthodox Christians, Pentecostals, Charismatics, and non-denominational Christians, by the Pope on Maundy Thursday, and by followers of Christ across cultures and millennia. It is a practice that is used as the central metaphor in viral social media posts encouraging us to love our enemies and in commercials reducing people to tears during the Super Bowl.
It is a practice that finds its roots in what Jesus did just before he spoke the words of John 13:34–35.
In John 13:1–17, just before his betrayal, Jesus gives his disciples a visual demonstration that is called the Pedilavium in some traditions. In some worship settings, a musical version of John 13:34 is sung as groups perform the ritual act to commemorate what Jesus did.
We’re ready now to pull back the curtain. What did Jesus do that so many have memorialized?
Jesus poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’s feet.
Knowing it was soon his time to go, knowing what would follow, and knowing that all power had been put in his hands, Jesus got up from the evening meal, took off his outer clothing, and put a towel around his waist.
It was a common practice in the ancient world to provide water for a sandaled guest to wash their own, dusty feet when they entered a home. In some cases, a servant would wash the feet, or even the host of the gathering might wash the feet of the guest as well.
Jesus was showing them, physically demonstrating, that love humbles oneself, lowers oneself, to tenderly serve the other—regardless of either person’s status or position in society.
God washes feet.
Peter is caught off guard that Jesus would do this and initially refuses. Then Jesus tells him, “Unless I wash you, you have no part with me” (v. 8). Peter then relents, and suggests Jesus wash his hands and head as well! Peter wants to completely “have part with” his Lord.
It’s worth our time to read the next part together:
When he had finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place. “Do you understand what I have done for you?” he asked them. “You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and rightly so, for that is what I am. Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.” (John 13:12–17)
This is the quality of love that Jesus is speaking of when he says in verses 34–35, “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
The word for love used here is agape. It is unconditional, valuing, esteeming, generous love.
If we, like Peter, want to have a part in Jesus, to be in union with Jesus, if we want the reality of his habitation in us and our habitation in him to take on its full meaning in the way we love one another, then we must allow Jesus to wash our feet. He washes our feet with his love and he meets us in our points of need as we come in humble and complete surrender. And, then, learning as apprentices, we are to take the next step in allowing him to wash the feet of others through us. We may do this in actuality as many church traditions do, or metaphorically as we act in humble love toward all we meet.
But either way, washing feet is the image behind the new command of Jesus—to love one another as he has loved us.
Jesus in us, and through us, is tying a cloth around his waist and getting ready to wash feet every single day. According to John 13:34–35, the world will not be won by people who spend most of their energy keeping to themselves, checking in on their investments from time to time, honing their religious practices to perfection, or even singing songs of faith with exuberance.
The world will be won by Jesus loving others through those who have learned to love one another like this—those who have actually become love in the process of washing feet.
In union with Jesus, we can wash feet—we can love one another in this way.
THE PRAYER
Lord Jesus, I am in you and you are in me. There are many feet to be washed in my circles of relationship. Show me whose feet I can wash with your love today. In Christ Jesus, I pray, amen.
THE QUESTIONS
What opportunities have you had lately to humbly love and serve others? How has this new command of Jesus shown itself to bring more freedom to your life?
For the Awakening,
Dan Wilt
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One Response
I believe that “foot washing “ is demonstrated when we sacrificially spend time, which is the only commodity that we cannot create more of, in service to others, with no expectation of reward other than the joy that comes from knowing that you’re centered in God’s will. This for me, is my incentive. We are blessed to be a blessing to others.