Washed by Jesus

[00:00:01] Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. [00:00:09] I want to pull a line out of what we just sang. [00:00:16] Grant that heavenly minded he make us. [00:00:21] Grant that heavenly minded he make us. In. In our passage from John 13, Jesus has a discussion with Peter. It's not the first discussion he's had. [00:00:37] Not too long ago he said, who do you say that I am? And Peter said, you're the Christ, the Son of God. And then Jesus proceeded to tell Peter and the others that he was going to die, be put to death and rise from the dead on the third day. And Peter said, surely not. You know, not you, you're not going to die. [00:01:01] And Jesus said, get behind me Satan, get behind me. For you're not thinking of the things of God, but of the things of men. Heavenly minded, make us. Make us heavenly minded. [00:01:18] Peter needed that. [00:01:21] He was thinking of the things of men, not the things of God. [00:01:25] Shortly after this, they're going to go to the garden of Gethsemane where Jesus is arrested. Men are going to come with torches and lanterns and with weapons coming to arrest Jesus. Peter's going to pull out his sword and cut off the ear of the servant of the high priest. [00:01:44] Is that what Jesus wants him to do? No, Jesus actually undoes his action, puts the ear back on the man. But you see, Peter is still thinking well about the things of man, not the things of God. [00:02:00] Make us heavenly minded. [00:02:04] Well then Peter is going to deny Jesus three times. [00:02:08] Afraid. Afraid to be thrown in with Jesus, afraid to share in Jesus sufferings. And so he denies even knowing Jesus. Three times. Now, now he had said before boldly, jesus, we're going to stick with you to the end. And Jesus said, well here's what's actually going to happen. You're going to deny me three times before the cock crows. [00:02:33] So Peter denies Jesus three times, warming himself there at the fire. [00:02:39] And the cock crows. Imagine that moment. [00:02:45] Make us heavenly minded. [00:02:48] What does that mean to be heavenly minded? [00:02:54] It's put a few different ways in scripture. Set your mind on things above, not on things on earth, right? [00:03:07] So make us heavenly minded. [00:03:09] Another way to say that is give us the mind of Christ, the man from heaven. [00:03:16] Give us the mind of Christ. [00:03:19] All right, so let's talk a little bit about Jesus washing his disciples feet. [00:03:26] Invariably around this time somebody tells me about a time when a pastor pulled out the bowl of water and invited somebody to come up and take off their shoes and socks. And I've seen it too and it's powerful, right, to see somebody washing somebody else's feet, because feet are truly disgusting. And so. Well, you, you know, unless you've just taken a shower and maybe depending on who you are too. [00:04:00] Yeah. Anyway, we'll leave that behind. But it's powerful to see somebody washing somebody else's feet. It's just naturally. Naturally. It shows humility and love and service, a willingness to get dirty, which maybe, maybe we have even less these days. But certainly in Jesus day, it would have been a servant maybe washing the feet, which is exactly why Jesus is doing it. [00:04:28] But it's a powerful image to see somebody do that and expresses nicely, puts it in front of us. What's in the reading. [00:04:38] Why is he washing his feet? [00:04:41] I mean, maybe just because that's what a servant would do. And Jesus is taking the form of a servant and then uniting his disciples to himself in taking the form of a servant. Straight out of Philippians 2, which was a reading this last Sunday. [00:05:00] But I think that there's a little bit more going on with foot washing. [00:05:05] Why do you wash your feet? It's because you've been walking around in sandals. Which sandals I don't think are at the sort of the center of attention in the passage necessarily, because everybody wore sandals. [00:05:19] So why wash feet? Well, because people have been traveling. They've been traveling a road. [00:05:27] Now, that traveling image is used throughout Scripture. One place is Psalm 1. [00:05:33] Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked. Right off the bat there, who walks not in the counsel of the wicked. See, we all walk in the counsel of someone, the advice of someone in the wisdom. Wisdom from one source or another, from our own wisdom, what not. But that image of walking, it's like we are constantly choosing a path to walk. [00:06:01] So maybe it's what am I going to do today? What are my goals and ambitions? Or maybe it's what fires do I need to put out first. Whatever it is, I'm choosing a direction, a course for the day, and then I'm going to walk that. Or I'm going to get distracted and walk another path. That's possible, too. [00:06:20] When we find ourselves in a moral quandary, maybe it's difficult to figure out which path we're going to take. How do the paths present themselves? Well, they just kind of do. All of a sudden you're in the situation and you've got options and you have to decide. And maybe one path is easier and the other path is harder, but the harder path is right. [00:06:44] Which path are you Going to walk. We all are walking paths all the time. [00:06:53] Jesus washes Peter's feet. See, Peter is about to deny Jesus. Peter's been been thinking of the things of man, not the things of God. And that's going to continue. [00:07:08] Jesus tells Peter, you don't understand right now. Well, because he's still got that other mindset. He doesn't have the mind of Christ. He's not thinking from Jesus perspective. [00:07:20] That's going to continue. But after the resurrection in the Gospel of John, Jesus comes back to Peter. He calls him, and Peter actually takes off his outer garment and jumps into the lake and swims to shore to see Jesus. [00:07:36] And just as Peter denied Jesus, warming himself by the fire, Jesus called Peter to a fire there on the shore of the lake and he forgave Peter. I think in Washington, I think in washing Peter's feet. One of the things that's going on, I think there are lots of layers to it. I think one of the things that's going on is that Jesus is forgiving Peter. [00:08:07] That is his attitude from the start there. I mean in his prayer, high priestly prayer in John 17 and perhaps before. [00:08:17] Jesus is speaking to the Father about his disciples, saying he's not going to lose one of them except for Judas, but he's not going to lose one of the ones that he's chosen. Peter and the other disciples, they belong to Jesus and their perspective isn't right in the moment. Jesus is going to go alone to the cross and do what no one else can do. But he's going to come back to his disciples and say, peace be with you. [00:08:49] Jesus has forgiven them already. Just like from the cross. He'll say, father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. [00:09:00] Jesus is washing Peter's feet in advance of the road that Peter is going to take, the path that seems easiest, the path that's going to help him escape suffering. [00:09:16] Jesus is going to come back to Peter and bring him back onto the proper path. In fact, he's going to join Peter to himself in his mission. Peter is going to go out to the world proclaiming the gospel for Jesus sake. Jesus living in him and speaking through him by his spirit. [00:09:37] Jesus says that to him on the shore of the lake after his resurrection, he says, peter, do you love me? Peter says, yes. Jesus says, feed my sheep and so on. [00:09:49] Feed my sheep. Jesus joins Peter to himself on his path. Jesus himself is the path, he is the road. I am the way, the truth and the life. Jesus said, peter's going to walk that path. [00:10:05] Well, Jesus doesn't just wash Peter's feet. [00:10:09] He tells his disciples to wash the feet of one another. [00:10:15] And actually, after his resurrection, when he comes and says, peace be with you to his disciples, he also says, if you forgive the sins of anyone, they're forgiven. [00:10:31] As I've forgiven you, so forgive one another. As I have washed your feet, so wash the feet of one another. [00:10:40] After all, that is how God showed His love for us. He showed his love for us in this. That while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. While we were still dirty, Christ washed us, washed us clean and continues to wash us, continues to call us off of those wayward paths that we sheep run down, continues to call us, enlighten us with his gifts, forgive our sins as he sanctifies us and conforms us to Himself. [00:11:18] We're not through Holy Week yet. [00:11:22] We're only approaching the Cross. [00:11:25] But. But fix your eyes on Jesus, stability. Look at the way that he, ahead of time, is showing love and forgiveness to Peter. How he is already looking with compassion on his sheep who are about to be scattered, who are going to run away in fear, who themselves are unstable. [00:11:48] He knows what's going on, when something big's gonna happen, and you know it. [00:11:56] Does the anticipation ever kill you? You know, you just can't stop thinking about it. Have you ever gotten, you know, clammy hands because you're nervous about a situation or felt like you can't think straight or say what you actually want to say because of the intensity of the situation? [00:12:15] Jesus. [00:12:17] Jesus goes ahead, walks his path to the cross. [00:12:22] Unwavering, stable, nothing out of place, everything intentional. He says, no one takes my life from me. I lay it down of my own accord. [00:12:34] He went to the cross, steadfast, immovable, for our sake. [00:12:43] We're more like Peter, but Peter, before and after the resurrection, we can feel our own instability, our own tendency to choose another path, to choose the easy path, to avoid suffering at all costs. [00:13:00] But Christ has come to you and me, forgiven our sins, washed us clean, continues to wash our feet daily as we look to him for forgiveness. And he's chosen you. He's chosen you to carry his message to those around you and to the world. In Jesus name, Amen.