John 13:1-20, theme verse John 13:14
The praise and honor and glory be to our heavenly Father who seeks true worshipers who worship Him with the Spirit and truth.
In this seventh Sunday after the Pentecost, I pray that His grace of the application of all the benefits which Jesus earned for our salvation and also the glorious ministry of the proclamation of His kingdom by the power of the Holy Spirit may be full in our life. Last week, we looked at the overview of the Book of Glory as the second main theme of the Gospel of John so from this week, we would like to look into more details about His teaching in the Book of Glory. This week, when we look into the foot-washing, I hope we could learn few lessons together.
1) The Gospel of John as the last book of Gospels was written by the Apostle John, around AD 90-100 for the Johannese communities who were faced up with the attack of the heresy on Jesus’ divinity and humanity, while experiencing also the growing persecution from the Roman Empire and Jewish communities, in order that they might believe that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of God and also that by believing, they might have abundant life in His name even in the midst of persecution as written in John 20:31.
2) And John wrote his Gospel in his own unique way, I mean, John structured his Gospel, in the way that between prologue and epilogue, he put the book of signs in which he put seven signs for Jesus as the Messiah and the book of glory in which Jesus’ suffering and death and resurrection.
3) In the Book of Glory as the second part of the main body, John recorded
a) Jesus’ foot washing of His disciples after the Passover meal,
b) and the farewell discourses, in which i) Jesus gave new commandment to love one another, promising to send new comforter, the Holy Spirit, ii) and exhorting to remain in Him, iii) to take heart, followed by the priestly prayer
c) and the passion stories, I mean i) after trials by Jews and Pirate, ii) dying in the cross on Golgotha, yet in the third day, iii) He was raised.
As such, while in the Book of Signs from chapter 1 to 12, John tried to testify Jesus is the Messiah through providing seven important signs related to Jewish institutions and feasts during His kingdom ministry, in the Book of Glory, John recorded the very personal teachings after the loving final Passover meal with His beloved disciples, when recognizing the time has come to return to God the Father after suffering, crucifixion, resurrection and ascension. Specially in this Book of Glory, John reveal his own theology that he treated Jesus’ death at the lowest as the highly lifted time when He recovered and received the glory, paradoxically by saying in 12:32 that “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself” and in 19:19-20 that Pilate wrote an inscription and put it on the cross, reading, “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews,” written in Aramaic, in Latin, and in Greek.
4) Anyway, in this “Book of Glory,” which is the second book of the main body of the Gospel of John, in the beginning, the event of Jesus washing the disciples’ feet after eating His last meal with his disciples, that is, the foot-washing ceremony, is recorded. And this foot-washing ceremony has two meanings. in other words,
a) First, in relation to soteriology, Jesus' foot-washing ceremony symbolizes Jesus' washing away of disciples’ sins through the vicarious atonement ministry of the Lord on the cross to become God's family.
b) And secondly the foot-washing ceremony also has the meaning of humble service as an ethical example. In other words, in the fact that Jesus, the King and Lord, stood in the position of a servant and washed the feet of his disciples, we can discover the humility of the Lord, which Calvin said was the most important precept of Christian religion and is also the most important virtue we should pursue. Also, through the service of the Lord washing the disciples' feet, we can find His loving service as the identity of Christianity and the greatness of Christianity as John Charles Ryle said. And also as the word “example” in verse 14 which is the translation of Greek “hypodeigma” which has the same etymology with “paradeigma,” refers to the model of the temple in the Old Testament which was used as a model to built the temple by the architect. Likewise, this word shows that the Lord, who is the new temple, has shown an example to follow His humble and loving service as the body of the temple. Therefore, although there is no mention of the Holy Communion in the Gospel of John, as found in the Synoptic Gospels and even in 1 Corinthians, John tried to show that true meaning of the Holy Communion which includes eating and drinking the body and blood of Jesus, the Son of God, is to eat the body and to drink the blood of Jesus as being washed away from sin and becoming God's people and to live in that meaning and also as Jesus said those who serve humbly are blessed, since humble serving proves that they have eternal life, so I believe that all of us here who received the true faith in the Lord serve others as proof of his or her salvation.
5) Through Today’s text, we would like to learn few things. Firstly, we would like to see what it means by bathing and foot-washing. By the way, in the conversation between Jesus and Peter in today’s text, two words appear: “bath” and “foot washing.” I mean, looking at today's text, when Jesus wanted to wash his feet, based on the common practice that a servant washed his or her mater’s feet or a student washed his or her teacher’s or a child washed his or her parent’, when Peter insisted not to do it, Jesus said, “Unless I wash you, you have nothing to do with me.” Then this time, Peter, as if confessing that everything inside him was still unclean, he said, “Lord, wash not only my feet, but also my hands and my head.” So, at this time, the Lord said, “He who has already bathed does not need to wash except his feet.” So according to today’s conversation between Jesus and Peter, Peter seems the one who has already taken a bath. The Greek word “kataros,” translated as “clean,” appears three times in the Gospel of John, not only in verses 10 and 11 of today’s text, but also in chapter 15 verse 3, in which the Lord says, “Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you.” Therefore, the Lord's words in today's text can be understood as saying that Peter has already bathed and became clean by the Lord's words, and also he will be washed clean through the Lord's atonement work on the cross. In other words, we can know that bathing and foot washing can mean the washing away of sin through the “Word” and the “Jesus’ body and the blood of the Cross.” Secondly, so then, it is possible to understand the Lord’s word to wash one another’s feet as to wash one another’s sins integrating the soteriological meaning and the meaning of ethical example for the Lord’s Word. But it seems awkward. Of course, these two meanings, I mean, the soteriological meaning and ethical exemplary meaning can be separated and understood to mean that we should serve each other in sacrificial love just as Jesus sacrificed his life. However, I believe that there is another deeper meaning in the commandment of the Lord to wash one another’s feet. Of course, we cannot wash away each other's sins. That's clear. However, if we interpret the Lord’s words today from a different perspective, bathing and foot washing can mean the washing of our sin through God’s Word, water and the regeneration of by the Holy Spirit, based on 1 Peter 1:23, “since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God” and Titus 3:5 “he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit,” and also Hebrews 10:22, “let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water” and also the washing of our sin through the blood of Jesus of the cross, based on 1 John 1:7 “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.” But, we can also these washing away of our sin in the time perspective, I mean, there are the immediate cleansing of our sin and renewal through the Word and regeneration, and the progressive cleansing of our sin as the sanctification process. So, if we apply the Lord’s words, “Wash one another’s feet,” into the process of sanctification, although we cannot wash away each other's sins, but, still
a) we can pray for each other as James 5:16 says, “Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.
b) And also we can admonish our brothers and sisters who are in sin as Matthew 18:15 says, “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother.”
c) And also going one step further, in Mark 2, when four friends carried a paralyzed man who could not come to the Lord in Capernaum, removed the roof to let down him, Jesus forgave his sins and healed him. As such when we discover the weaknesses of our fellow Christians, we can believe, hope and help them to go to the Lord together and receive the washing of our sins, as Gal 6:2 said to “bear one another’s burdens”.
In this sense, I think it is said in 1 Corinthians 13:6-7, the chapter on love, that “love does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth; Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.” Finally in that sense, I think this foot-washing shows how Christian love looks like in our daily life. I mean, we Christians have certainly been cleansed of our sins through the atonement blood of of the Lord in cross, the Word of God, the rebirth through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, and the faith in Jesus Christ. Yet since we still have weaknesses within us, when we encounter our fellow believers who are walking with carrying another weakness, we can encourage each other, pray together, and carry that weakness together. If we become that kind of church, then I think it is clear that everyone who has seen such love will know that we are disciples of the Lord who have received forgiveness of sins. I think that’s what the Lord meant today when he said, “Wash one another’s feet.” So I pray that when our Lord says, “Wash one another’s feet,” we could follow in his way of humble and loving service.
Key Questions as Small Group Activity
Q1 According to today’s text, we can know that Jesus’ commandment to wash one another’s feet implies two important concepts of Christianity; humility and serving. Regarding the humility in which we grow and the service which we have to do, after reviewing where we are in our humility and serving, I hope you could share your experience and thought with your team members together.
Q2 And also Jesus’ word to wash one another’s feet makes us think about how we can help and bear one another’s burden. So, after meditating on how you practice this Jesus’ word in your life, I hope you could share your thoughts with each other to learn from each other.
Love you. Thank you. God bless you.
Prayer Note
Dear ( God’s attribute which you found Today ) God!
Thanks for ( something you received through the sermon or even during the week )
Praise, gratitude and glory be to You, Lord!
Today, I realized my sin (pains) that ( the sin God reminded through the sermon ),
please forgive (or heal) me and help me not to repeat ( the sins you recognized ).
I learned that ( something you learned through the sermon )
Please help me to live in that ( learned way of life )
I pray in ( Jesus’ attribute you find ) Jesus’ name. Amen.
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