Jesus has arrived in Jerusalem, his final destination. It’s the Passover season, so there are thousands of people who had traveled for miles to celebrate their story of deliverance from Egyptian slavery and to offer sacrifices to God so that their sins would be forgiven, God’s judgment would pass over them, and their relationship with God would be restored for the coming year.
But as the nation is celebrating, the religious leaders are plotting against Jesus . . . They had labeled him as a threat to their power.
They are losing their war of words with Jesus. They’re losing their influence, they’re losing money, and they’ve come to a point where they’re going to do something about it. They’re going to kill Jesus.
But in order to do this they need the help of someone on the inside.
And they find it in a guy name Judas. One of Jesus's disciples, a key figures on Jesus’ leadership team.
Now if you are one of the other disciples, this is a really bad day because things aren’t going as planned. Because they had labeled Jesus as a conqueror and so this was supposed to be the time when everything that they have been doing for the past 3 years of their lives culminates and Jesus establishes his kingdom . . . What could be worse than one of the guys closest to Jesus selling him out for money?
This is one of the problems we see with Jesus over and over and over again . . . everybody’s got a label for Him; what he should do, where he should be, how he should act . . . And when he doesn’t do those things or fit into the label that we’ve created for him . . . we so easily turn our back on him, or question him or wonder if there’s a God at all . . . don’t we?
But what we see in this story of God is that he is in control and that he has plan and his plan is a good plan and it won't be disrupted by the labels we place on him.
So it’s the day before Jesus is going to be arrested and he’s getting his friends together to share a meal with them. And among those present is Judas.
Now, If you knew that tonight was your last night, tomorrow that you were going to be taken out in a horrendous way, and the guy that was gonna set it all up was a good friend of yours, would you have him over to dinner tonight?
Well some of you may – but you probably have him over to take him out before he takes you out.
Most of us wouldn’t bring him over to your house, feed him dinner, love him, be nice to him, treat him with dignity but that’s what Jesus does. He sits down and has a bite to eat with him, that’s how Jesus chooses to spend his final moments.
The way the meal would have worked is this: unlike our dining, their dining table would have been lower to the ground, and it would have been surrounded with pillows, and you would lean on one arm, and you would eat with your head towards the platter of food, and your feet pointing away.
So Jesus is sitting there talking with his friends, he notices that they all have dirty feet.
In that culture, typically a servant would clean your feet as you came into a house because you’ve been walking along dirtied, muddied paths and you’re wearing open toed sandals so it’s between your toes, and under your toenails and your feet are a gross mess . . .
But they were using a borrowed room for the meal so there was not a servant and in this scenario the job would go to the person in the room who was considered the lowest on the totem pole.
Well, according to Luke’s version of this story, the disciples are busying arguing over who is the greatest so clearly none of them see themselves as the lowest.
So Jesus takes off his outer garment and puts a towel around his waist, gets a basin of water, and takes the feet of the men and he scrubs them – humility beyond imagination.
I mean it’s enough that God would come down and be one of us. But then, for God to come down as the lowest servant among us all, it is scandalous.
But the thing that struck me most is that He washed the feet of Judas, the feet that are going to walk out of the meal and betray him for a couple of bucks . . . why would he do that?
He did this because he loved the Father and to bring glory to the father.
And that’s the heart of humility!
Now, I really struggle with this because Judas is a punk, and a thug and a thief and a murderer and he shouldn’t get his feet washed.
But as I struggle with this it forces me to get honest with myself.
• Have I taken money that God has blessed me with and used for things other than God’s purposes? Yeah. Guilty.
• Have I turned my Back on Jesus? Yeah. I have at times.
• Have I maintained this outward sense of piety, when in my heart I was bitter and angry? Yeah. I have. I really have.
• Have I at times, like Judas, thought that God was wrong or that God didn’t know what he was doing, or that God couldn’t be trusted, that somehow Jesus needed my advice?
• I have, we all have. And yet, Jesus humbled himself before me. He has loved me. He has served me. He has forgiven me.
And so, I think that the real reason that Judas bothers me so much is because I am far more like Judas than I am like Jesus . . . and maybe you feel the same way.
Now I love Peter because he has no filter and he’s skilled in the art of recognizing the obvious and then stating it. And he says to Jesus, “Are you going to wash me feet?”
Jesus says, “Peter, you don’t know what I’m doing, but trust me. In hindsight, in retrospect, further down the road, you will look back and you will say, ‘Now it all makes sense.’
Have you ever had one of those times where nothing made sense, you didn’t know where you’re going, what you are doing, or how you’re going to get there or why this has happened to you but then in retrospect, when it all comes together, you go, “Ah, I see now. God is a genius. It’s like he had a plan all along.”
That’s what he’s saying to Peter . . . “you don’t know what I’m doing right now but you need to trust me because some day this is all going to make sense.”
But Peter couldn’t believe what he was experiencing. It was horrifying to see Jesus washing his stinky, dirty feet; this is the work of servants. This didn’t fit into the label he had given to Jesus.
And so he said to Jesus, “You shall never wash me feet”
And Jesus responds, “Peter, if you do not let me be who I am, if you do not let me stoop down and act on your behalf to cleanse you, you will have no fellowship with me, and you cannot enter the kingdom.”
Well, the thought of missing out on the kingdom got his attention and he exclaims “If you must wash my feet, than not my feet only but my hands and my head also.”
Jesus has to clarify his point, “a person”, he says, “who has had a bath, needs only to wash his feet, and his whole body is clean.”
What does that mean? Well, before attending a banquet, people of the first century would take a bath at home in preparation of the great feast. As they would make their way to the banquet, their feet would get dirty from the mud and dirt and so the only thing that needed washing once they arrived was their feet.
Washing Peter’s feet pointed to the only thing he needed – the Cross of Christ. And Jesus is using this living parable to tell his disciples that “You only need me to wash your feet, to lay down my life for you. My death for you is all you need to enter my kingdom”.
By his death we are cleansed and we are made worthy to enter the banquet of the King.
After Jesus had this exchange with Peter, he then took back his place of honor at the banquet table and he says to his disciples . . . “Do you understand what I have done for you? 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 should also wash one another’s feet.”
• And here he is referring to both being like Peter, and permitting Jesus to cleanse us, and love us, and heal us, and renew us, and change us.
• And it also means being the hands and the feet of Jesus and living in such a way that he works through us, so that his love continues to be shown to its full extent.
I love it in the Book of Acts; the way that the early church grew is this very way. They didn’t have marketing campaign . . . they just lived out their lives and their faith and when people saw the way they lived they would ask questions like,
• Why do you feed that guy? He’s scam artist living off welfare. He’s not worth anything.
• Why do you clean that woman’s yard? She’s old and should be in a nursing home.
• Why do you serve those people? They don't deserve
• And why is it, that even when trial and strife come you people seem to have joy?
• And the answer is always . . . Jesus!
Jesus has loved me despite my labels and now I can really live and I can live in such as way that I can love people despite the labels they wear.
It’s a foretaste of the kingdom of God and it is to be lived in a public way so that people can see that there is something different about you and they are curious about what it is and you can say, Jesus!
On that night, Jesus had the clearest sense he had ever had in his life that he was the son of God. He knew where he had come from and where he was going and no sooner did he gain clarity on all that, that he was on the floor wiping the mud and dung off the calloused feet of grown men – even those who would betray him.
In this foot-washing scene, Jesus shatters the labels we place on him and he shows us what it means to be his church.
This king whose scepter is a towel is inaugurating a kingdom of foot washers.
Loving and caring and nurturing one another. It’s what we're supposed to do as a church.
But washing Judas’ feet, now that’s a hard task; loving those we've labeled as unlovable, caring for those who no one else wants to care for, embracing those who want nothing more than to hurt you.
Washing Judas’ feet is about living your life and loving God and asking God to show you those places where you could take opportunities, setting aside the labels we've placed on others, just like Jesus took this opportunity to serve somebody; to humble yourself, to love them, to extend God’s grace.
Because you know what that does . . . you know what it does when you wash the feet of Judas . . . It reminds you of your own brokenness, it reminds you of the painful labels we carrying with us and brings you back to the cross where Jesus loved you, healed you, and set you free.