A Clean-Feet Community

Nothing so astonishes a fractured, lonely, hurting world as a community in which radical, faithful, genuine love is shared among its members. There are many places you can go to find communities of shared interest. There are many places you can go to find people just like yourself, who are connected by a love for sports or music or politics. But it is the mandate of the church to become a community of love, a circle of Jesus followers who pour into one another because Christ has poured his life into them. A community who exhibit love not based on the affinity or attractiveness of its members, but on the model of Christ, who washed the feet of everyone, even Judas.
This week we’ll be looking at John 13 and discussing the powerful implications it has for our life and church.

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If you don’t have a Bible, our professional Bible cart drivers are making their way to the front, but this is just an incredible passage that all of the gospel of John, the account of Jesus’ life, has built up to this point. As Stall said last week, I mean, it’s all kind of coming to a climax right here. This is basically three years of Jesus’ ministry, 30 years of His life, in that first portion of the book. Then the final, basically, two months of His life are from this point forward. So this is kind of this point right here, as this pinnacle moment in this gospel account.

So I’m just going to read it, and then we’re going to kind of go through and look at some key things and see how this passage plays into our life today because it really does have some powerful implications, not only for us, individually, but for who we are as a church, the kind of people we’re going to be, the kind of community we want to have. So here we go, John, chapter 13: “It was just before the Passover Feast. Jesus knew that the time had come for Him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved His own who were in the world, He now showed them the full extent of His love.

The evening meal was being served, and the devil had already prompted Judas Iscariot, son of Simon, to betray Jesus. Jesus knew the Father had put all things under His power, and that He had come from God and was returning to God; so He got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around His waist. After that, He poured water into a basin and began to wash His disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around Him. He came to Simon Peter, who said to Him, ‘Lord, are You going to wash my feet?’ Jesus replied, ‘You do not realize now what I am doing, but later you will understand.’

‘No,’ said Peter, ‘You shall never wash my feet.’ Jesus answered, ‘Unless I wash you, you have no part with Me.’

‘Then, Lord,’ Simon Peter replied, ‘not just my feet but my hands and my head as well!’ Jesus answered, ‘A person who has had a bath needs only to wash his feet; his whole body is clean. And you are clean, though not every one of you.’ For He knew who was going to betray Him, and that was why He said not everyone was clean. 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. I tell you the truth, 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 13:1-17)

So let’s set the scene. Within a span of five days, the two most important foot washings in the history of the world took place. Stall was talking about this last week: On the Saturday before Palm Sunday, the Saturday before Jesus was going to ride into Jerusalem to present Himself as King, He went into the house of Mary, His friend, who washed His feet with costly perfume. If you weren’t here last week, go back. That’s John, chapter 12. Then five days later, this One who, at His feet, anointed with this costly oil of Mary, washes the dirt off the feet of the disciples before sharing with them this powerful teaching.

See this is how the Lord is. I mean, these next few passages and the next few chapters (we’re not going to get there today) are some of the most beautiful passages of Jesus speaking into His disciples, praying for them, preparing them. It says things like, “It’s better for you that I’m going away because unless I go away, the Holy Spirit can’t come to you, but I’m not going to leave you as orphans. I’m going to send you accounts through the Holy Spirit, and He is going to teach you all things and remind you of everything I taught.”

See Jesus was getting His disciples ready, but before He teaches, He touches. We see it’s just before the Passover there, verse 1. Now this is huge because the Passover meal was the meal that points back to that time in Israel’s history where God had broken them out of slavery, where He had stepped into their oppression, their captivity, and set them free. Now if you remember, you can go back (and it would be good this week to look at), Exodus, chapter 12, like God had sent Moses back to His people to speak to Pharaoh, to release His people from captivity, had, through Moses, unleashed this series of plague because Pharaoh had hardened his heart against His people and wouldn’t release them, wouldn’t set them free.

Finally, the final plague, this great sign the Lord brought was the killing of the firstborn son, the death of the firstborn son, but if the angel was prevented from striking anyone protected under the sign of God’s covenant sacrifice. See if the people of God had sacrificed a lamb and placed the lamb’s blood on the doorframe of their house, on the top and on the sides of the door, then the Angel of Death would pass over that house, and they would be spared from the punishment that was coming. So they killed a lamb, painting its blood on the posts and on the top of the doors.

Their journey to deliverance, their journey to freedom, their first step towards the Promised Land was through this doorway of blood, the shedding of the blood of an innocent lamb, and when that night had passed, and the Angel of Death had gone, they plundered their captors, and they walked through the blood of the lamb into freedom. For thousands of years, the children of God, Israel, had pointing back to that time, and the key festival of the entire Jewish calendar was this Passover festival, where they remembered what God had done for them, where God had stepped in, set them free, and moved them into a land of abundance.

They were told to remember, and so they did. Every year they remembered. They would eat the lamb, and they would eat bitter herbs as a reminder of the pain of slavery, and they would eat unleavened bread to remember their escape was made in a hurry. God stepped in and set them free, and so here we are, Jesus, at the Passover Feast, this moment that has been pointed to for thousands of years. They didn’t know it, but for thousands of years, this remembering of what God had done was actually a picture pointing forward to what God would do.

Right now, Jesus is saying, “I’m doing it. I am the One you have been waiting for,” and so, there, we know from other Gospel accounts, Jesus took a loaf of bread and He broke it. He took a cup of wine, and He said, “This bread, broken for you, is my body, and this cup is the shedding of My blood for the forgiveness of sins. Do this now in remembrance of Me.” (Luke 22:17-19) Remember God has stepped into our captivity, our oppression, our brokenness, and He became broken. He died so we could find life.

In this Passover Feast, it says, the next verse, “…Jesus knew that the time had come for Him to leave this world and go to the Father.” (John 13:1) Now it’s interesting that John kind of uses this phrase of like the hour or the time that has come or not yet come as kind of marker throughout the book of John. The last time I got to share, we looked at John, chapter 2, and Jesus’ first miracle, and if you remember what Jesus’ response was when Mary came up to Him in like a panic that the wine has run out this wedding they’re at, and Jesus response was…”Why are you bothering Me? My time…,” this same word here, “…has not yet come.” (John 2:4)

Then later, we see where they would try to attack Jesus or take Him by force, or you know, they would try to arrest Him, and they said they couldn’t lay their hands on Him “…because His time had not yet come,” (John 7:30) and yet here, we see Jesus’ time has come. Everything is pointing up to this moment. Now what about for us? What if you knew tomorrow you were going to the Father? You’re going to die tomorrow. You knew it. You found that out. How would you spend today? What would you say? Who would you surround yourself with? What would be significant to you today?

Now you know, people who know they’re time is coming, people who have an illness or have been diagnosed with cancer, or they knew their death is quickly approaching, there’s always this kind of perspective shift. If you have ever walked through that with somebody, you have seen it or even somebody who has come out of that, but during that season, there’s just this thing that happens where, all of a sudden, the things we thought were so important, all of a sudden, just don’t seem that important anymore.

The things we just kind of neglected and didn’t really care about, all of a sudden, become really important. So what about you? What would you want to make sure you said, that you gathered your kids around and make sure they knew? What would you want to say to them? Your grandkids, what would you want to be remembered of you, or what would you want them to know as they’re going on in life without you?

Now that’s important for us to think about, but it’s also important to understand this passage because Jesus knew what was about to happen, and this is His perspective: He is going to the Father. He knows what is waiting for Him on the other side of that door when He steps out into the night, and here He is with His closest friends. What does He want to make sure they get? What does He want to make sure He says? What does He want to make sure they remember?

It goes on: “…He now showed them the full extent of His love.” (John 13:1) Then Jesus kind of looks around at this crew, and He knew who they were. He had been hanging out with them for three years. He had seen the places they had fallen short, they had messed up, they had not understood, they had gotten confused, they had doubted, they just didn’t get what He was about. He had seen when they were scared, when they were arrogant, when they were arguing, and yet He looks around at this crowd, and it says He shows them the “full measure.”

Some of your translations say, “He now loved them completely. He loved them to the uttermost. He loved them without limit,” even knowing their junk. What’s even more significant is the next verse tells us Judas had already made up his mind to betray Him, and so as Jesus looks around this room, it’s not just a bunch of people who, you know, they’re going to fall short. They’re going to kind of run and hide and be scared, but they’re going to come back, and they’re going to end up changing the world, but there’s this one in there who’s going to betray Him.

Judas doesn’t even know the significance of the choice he is about to make. I mean, Jesus knows. Jesus knows, because of what Judas is about to do, He is going to be brutally murdered, tortured, spit upon. In fact, we know Judas doesn’t know it because as soon as he starts to see what’s going down, he tries to return the money to make it stop, but Jesus knows. Even though Judas has set his mind against Jesus, is going to betray Him, has walked closely with Him, and now is going to turn his back on Him, turn Him over to those who hate Him, who want to kill Him, it says Jesus loved them without measure.

So the evening meal is being served. It says, “Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under His power, and that He had come from God and was returning to God.” (John 13:3) See Jesus knew who He was. He knew His rightful place. He knew His identity back when He first started His ministry and had gone to get baptized, “And the Holy Spirit descended on Him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: ‘You are my Son, whom I love…”

Then He had experienced the Mount of Transfiguration, where He had taken a couple of closest friends and gone up on a mountain and God speaks out of the heavens, “This is My Son. Listen to Him.” (Luke 9:35) Jesus knew who He was. He knew His rightful place. He knew where He had come from, and He knew where He was going, and in that place, rooted in His identity, He was able to step out of His rightful place, take off His outer garment, and kneel down into the position of a servant.

See the significance here isn’t just about Jesus, the Leader, taking on a role of a slave, but it’s about what God did for us. Just as Jesus wrapped Himself in a towel, so did God wrap His divinity in human flesh, and He was still God, totally God, always God, and yet wrapped in the towel of humanity. So back then, foot washing was actually pretty normal. Now for us, it’s not necessarily the normal, whatever the opposite of normal is. It’s abnormal for us in a culture where most of us take showers most of the time, hopefully.

There’s a little bit of space between some of you here. I know Mike tried to get you scoot in, but there might be something else going on here. For most people, foot washing isn’t quite our custom, you know? I mean, it’s not something that’s a part of our everyday culture, but for them, in that culture, in a culture of shame and honor, a culture with cleanliness and uncleanliness, was a really big deal that set your identity apart, that determined who was allowed in and who was kept out. This idea of being clean was important, and so as a gesture of honor, anybody who stepped into your home, you would have somebody wash their feet.

Now because of the nature of the task, when you think about it…see I wore flip-flops today sort of as an object lesson here…they just wore simple flip…I mean (flip-flops, I don’t think they called it that) sandals, just like leather, you know, just a strap of leather around their feet. They didn’t quite have, you know, the incredible paving system we have. Ronald Reagan Parkway through Palestine, you know, that wasn’t… It was dirty, dusty roads they walked on, and so as they walked, their feet would get nasty.

They didn’t drive in cars. They had donkeys and other animals that relieved themselves in various places on the roads, so they’re walking through just yuck. So they’re going to walk into somebody’s house, and it’s a way to honor them and to acknowledge, I consider you worthy to come in, then I’m going to clean your feet. You can step into the threshold of my home. Because it was such nasty job, it was reserved for the lowest person in the household, so the lowest slave, the least important servant.

In fact, some commentaries believe, actually, the Jews wouldn’t allow their… I mean, a Jewish servant was allowed to wash people’s feet, but it would be reserved for Gentiles because they didn’t want to mess with their own cleanliness. Now in that context, Jesus, Master and Teacher, kneeling down, their Lord, to wash their feet was a really big deal. See for them, it was a borrowed room, where Jesus was going to gather during that Passover time to remember what God had done, this act of deliverance.

So there wasn’t somebody there. There wasn’t a servant waiting. So Jesus, who was the Leader of the bunch, who obviously should have been the last to take on that role, gets up from His place, kneels down, and washes His disciples’ feet. So we see in this, this just beautiful picture of Christ humility, His willingness to lift up others above Himself even to His own detriment. You know, Paul, reflecting back on what Jesus did, on who He was, wrote in Philippians 2 that Jesus was One, “Who, being in very nature of God…made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant…humbled himself and became obedient to death – even death on a cross!” (Philippians 2:6-8)

So Jesus takes off His outer garment, wraps Himself in the covering of a slave because He knows who He is. He knows where He has come from, and He knows where He is going, that all authority has been placed under His feet. To show the fullest extent of His love, God took on flesh, cast aside His garment as King, and took on the covering of broken humanity in order that we can cast off our brokenness and take on the garment of righteousness. The Word became flesh. The King became a slave. The Lord became a lamb.

See this wasn’t just a picture Jesus was doing to show humility or service, but sacrifice, and so when Jesus gets to Peter and Peter is like, “No, no, no, no. Come on, Jesus. Get up off the floor. You’re not going to wash my feet. That’s not where You belong. Here, let me wash Your feet.” Jesus is like, “You don’t get it. You don’t understand. It’s okay. You’ll get it one day,” and Jesus says, “Unless I clean you, you have no part in Me.”

Then Peter kind of (classic Peter) goes a little bit overboard: “Well, in that case, not just my feet but my hands and my head, as well.” Then Jesus says this really interesting statement: “A person who has had a bath needs only to wash his feet; his whole body is clean. And you are clean, though not every one of you,” (John 13:10) because He knew the one who was going to betray him. See the foot washing Peter needed represented his acceptance of what Jesus was about to do in sacrificing Himself.

Because the truth is, because of what Christ did for us 2,000 years ago, because of the cross, because of His blood that was shed for the forgiveness of sins, we are completely cleansed. In God’s eyes, because of what Christ has done, we are purified, declared holy, righteous, without spot or blemish. Romans 8:1: “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” You are unpunishable. There is no shame. Jesus took all of our junk, all of our baggage, all of our dark, hidden places, all of our dirt on Himself on the cross.

Some of you may have been sitting in church for 20 years, but you still sit in a place of condemnation. Like Peter, have you accepted what Jesus has done for you? Any place you feel guilt, shame, condemnation, and embarrassment, take it to the cross. Let Jesus have it. Let Him wash your feet. Receive what He has done for you. Jesus asked, “Will you receive My washing?” You’re not going to earn it. You don’t deserve it, but Jesus knows who He is, and the only way for us to be made clean is for Him to be lifted up to take our dirt on Himself.

Hebrews 10:19: ” Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, His body, and since we have a great priest over the house of God…,” who’s Jesus, “…let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful.”

For some of you, maybe that’s just where you need to stop, is right there. Is there any place of shame in your life? Is there any place you have yet to receive what Christ has done for you? Yeah, yeah, I know. I believe it. I believe Jesus died for my sins. Man, I just don’t want to think about that time. I don’t want to think about that thing. In Christ, there is no condemnation.

First 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, purifies us from all sin. If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”

“So after He had washed their feet, He had taken His garments and sat back down in His rightful place and asked them, ‘Do you know what I have done for you? Do you understand what it is I have done? You call Me Teacher, the One who instructs in the ways of eternal life, and Lord, the One who has authority over all things, and rightly so because that’s what I am. Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet.'” (John 13:12-14)

See it’s interesting to note, in Luke, as Luke’s reflecting back on this night, this dinner that they shared with Jesus, that the disciples had shared, he records this conversation that’s going on that John doesn’t record that’s happening between the disciples that Jesus wasn’t a part of. I mean, He knew what was happening, but He wasn’t really engaged in it, and that was they were arguing about who was going to be the greatest in the kingdom.

When Christ finally, when Jesus finally, reclaimed the kingdom, when He casts off their Roman oppressors, when He set things right, when He came into His own as the Messiah, as the One who was going to get rid of all those who oppressed and held them in captivity, who kept them in exile, who was going to be the greatest? Who was going to be governor, and who was just going to be mayor? Whose throne got to sit closest to Jesus? Who was going to be the most important? Jesus says, “That’s not how My kingdom works. If you want to be exalted, then you’re made low. If you want to be a leader, then you become a servant.”

“For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.” (Mark 10:45) See Jesus’ greatest goal there, it wasn’t just that His disciples would get it, though He wanted that to happen, but it’s that they would take His mission, His message, forward after He was gone. See these were the men who were going to go into the world serving God, serving each other, and serving all the people to whom they were taking the message of the gospel. He knew they would be empowered by Jesus’ ultimate act of service: dying for their sins.

They would be the ones who would personify that picture in Isaiah: “How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation, who say to Zion, ‘Your God reigns!'” (Isaiah 52:7) It would be their feet that were taking the message of the gospel, the message of the kingdom to the world, and just as He had washed them, they now needed to wash each other’s feet.

You see because of what Christ has done, you’re clean. You’re purified. You’re forgiven. There is no shame on your life. There is nothing you have done Christ has not taken on Himself, but we still live in a broken, fractured, dirty, messed up world. As we walk through life, we have the tendency to pick up the sediment of sin on our feet. So Jesus was saying, “You were already clean because of the words spoken to you. Because you believed in who I am and what I have done, you’re clean. You’re not guilty before God.”

Jesus washed our bodies, but we need each other to wash our feet. So how do we wash one another’s feet? What does that look like? What does it look like to live as a community, to move forward in the ways of Jesus, in the ways of kingdom, in this world? How do we remove that sediment of sin that builds up as we walk through life? Well, the first place is confession.

Now we talked about we confess to God the places we fall as short. We acknowledge we are sinners, that we have turned our back. We have rebelled on God, and we acknowledge what He has done for us. We receive His forgiveness. That’s that passage in 1 John. Then there’s this other passage at the end of James 5:16 that says, “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.” Confess to places you fall short of all God intends for you so you can be made whole.

So like Christ, we need to know who we are, where we come from, and where we’re going, and there are times junk builds up between us and the Lord, where we fall short of what God intends for us as men and as women. We don’t live out who He has made us to be. Even as believers, I’m sure most of you would probably agree, you don’t always live the way God would want you to live. You don’t always walk in the fullest freedom God intends for you. You don’t always embrace the love of Christ that He has for you and wants to pour out through you. We fall short.

In those times, we need others to help us remember who we are and who we belong to, where we have come from and where we’re going. See confession isn’t just saying you’re sorry, though it’s good to be sorry. That’s not what confession is about. If you think about confession, like a confession of a criminal, it’s simply stating what’s true, what’s real, what the story is, what’s going on. It’s acknowledging to one another the places we have fallen short.

So there’s something that happens that’s significant for our hearts and our souls when we confess to each other, and that only can happen in a community rooted in what Christ has done for them first, that walks in the reality of the grace and the love of Jesus. See I can confess to you because I know there is no judgment on me because Christ has taken everything on Himself. I don’t bear my sin anymore even though sometimes I forget that, and I need you to help remind me I was a sinner, but now I’m a saint; I was in captivity, though I live sometimes like I’m still in bondage, I’m really a free man.

We wash each other’s feet as we confess and remind each other you are sons and daughters of the King, that He knows you by name; He knit you together in your mother’s womb; He put your frame together; God knew the man or the woman He had made you to be. He doesn’t just redeem, but He restores. I love that passage in Philippians: “God will carry out His work in us until the day of completion in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 1:6) He is not done with you, and we need each other to wash our feet, to clear off the sediment of sin that builds up in our life between God and us.

The other way we do that is we have stuff that builds up in our walk with Christ, but also, as we go through life, we have the sediment of sin that builds up between us and each other, in our relationships. As brothers and sisters, that junk has to get removed before it becomes toxic to the body, and Buddy talks about this a lot because Jesus was really clear about it: Matthew 18, Jesus says, “If your brother has sinned against you, go to your brother.” (Matthew 18:15)

It doesn’t say, “Go to your brother’s best friend. Go grab a quorum of individuals who are on your side and acknowledge, along with you, what a jerk your brother is.” Don’t go to the pastor. Don’t go to the teacher. Go to your brother or sister. Go to one who has offended you. Only them. If somebody has offended you, done you wrong, embarrassed you, lived in such a way that you feel like is not right or correct, that falls short of what God intends for them, don’t come to me. Go to them.

If I have offended you, if I have done something that bothers you that you don’t think is right, come to me. The reason we’re able to do that is because we know who we are. We know where we have come from, and we know where we’re going. Because if I go to my brother, they have offended, and I go to them, and I’m honest with them about that offense, not to their friends, not to my friends, but to them and only them, and they reject me, they embarrass me, they completely come back in my face, it doesn’t change who I am. It doesn’t change how much God loves me. It doesn’t change what He has done for me.

See the reason I can go to my brother with an offense is because I am rooted in who God is. He doesn’t change based on your response, and when you say, “I can’t go to them because I’m afraid of how they’ll respond,” you’re actually questioning God’s character, not theirs. See I was starting to think about it, and I wondered like, How different would the church be if the evangelical world took gossip as seriously as we take issues like gay marriage and abortion? The only thing we are not capable of bearing ourselves is our own sin. That’s why we need Jesus.

Whenever we interact with somebody in a way that it feels unbearable, what they have done to us, or what we have seen them do, it’s because it’s pointing back to something in ourselves, somewhere that we need to go to the cross. When we stand with Christ and what He has done for us, then we can go to our brother, and we go to them.

Now if they won’t listen, if they don’t move towards reconciliation, then Jesus says, “Go grab somebody else to go with you as a witness.” I’m trying to restore this relationship. Come with me. They’re not receiving it, and is there something in me that’s offensive? Am I wrong in this? I want somebody else alongside of us to help us move towards reconciliation, and then if they reject it, if they reject even you with that one other person, then take it before the church.

There is this other interesting phrase. I would encourage you to go back and read it, but Jesus says, “If they still won’t receive it from the church, then treat them like you would a pagan or a tax collector,” (Matthew 18:17) which is a really interesting way to word it because how did Jesus treat pagans and tax collectors?

Then lastly, Jesus… We wash each other’s feet, we remove the sediment of sin that builds up as we walk through a dirty, dusty broken world by confessing the places we have fallen short and acknowledging what is true, what is real, on behalf of each other, the power of confession. I’m coming back to this. In an individualized, Western culture, the idea of corporate confession seems really foreign, but there’s something on it. There’s something that happens in our hearts, in our souls, in our minds, when we live in a community where we can be honest with each other because we know what’s really true.

Then what would it look like if we were the kind of people who took our junk one to another, not one to everybody else, not one to Facebook? It broke my heart the other day, watching this exchange take place on Facebook of some people who were obviously very, very hurt. What they needed was to just come to each other and say, “I have been wounded here, but I believe in what Christ has done for me, and I believe in what Christ has done for you. Let’s walk in wholeness.”

Then lastly, this picture of what Christ has done is this model of radical service because remember Jesus washed Judas’ feet. The one who was going to betray Him, who hated Him, who had turned his back on Him, the One who should have been utterly repulsive and offensive to Him, Jesus knelt down and washed his feet. What would it look like as a community if we intentionally pursued those we should call our enemies?

What would it look like if we went after those who smelled to us, whether literally or metaphorically? We don’t want to be around them. Nothing so astonishes a fractured, lonely, hurting world as a community, in which radical, faithful, genuine love is shared among its members. Now there are lots of places we can go to find communities of shared interest because we like the same sports teams or like the same music or have the same political bent.

There are many places we can go to find people with the same affinity, but it’s the mandate of the church to become a community of love, a circle of Christ followers, who pour into one another because Christ has poured His life into them, a community who exhibits love not based on affinity or attractiveness, but on the model of Christ who washed the feet of everyone, even Judas. That’s authentic community, to go to the outcasts, the broken, the lonely, the dirty, to serve them in a way that lifts them up, that points them towards Christ because of what Christ has done for us.

We have talked, over the last few months, a lot about… You have heard these about missional communities, getting started, going, and actually, it’s interesting; we’re about to celebrate Maundy Thursday again, and Maundy Thursday is that day in church history we remember the Last Supper. I mean, this John 13 passage and the associating passages in the other Gospels are what Maundy Thursday is about. What’s interesting is last year we started this thing where we decided to go into homes to gather with friend and family because it’s what Jesus did and celebrate this Last Supper together, what Jesus did, and what it signifies and means.

It’s actually out of those gatherings a lot of our missional communities started, and so we’re going to do that again this coming Maundy Thursday. We’re going to gather in homes and take Communion together and remember what Christ has done, but what I want you to hear about missional communities is it’s not something else to add to your life. It’s really just a different way of seeing the life you already have, about being intentional about the community that’s around you, about being intentional, about those you’re going to serve who Christ has already put before you.

See it’s just that gathering where you get together with a group of people who love Jesus. You love each other, and you have that honest face where you can confess brokenness, and you can remind each other of who you really are, where you’re reconciled and you continue to seek reconciliation, where you point each other towards Jesus and thing figure out, How can we intentionally love and serve those who are around us? I mean, it’s actually super simple, really.

It’s fun; in our neighborhood, we have been getting together here for a few months now, and every other Sunday night, we just get together and have dinner together and pray for each other and look for ways to serve our neighbors. I know there’s a group of people who go down to Clarkston every Sunday with Infusion. They come together, pray for each other, love on each other, but then go and serve those apartment complexes there that have become the hands and the feet of Jesus, and in a sense, wash the feet of those who most of the world would declare not worthy or dirty.

That’s the function of the church. That’s the function of God’s people. So for some of you, maybe it’s like Peter, to receive Christ-washing for yourself, and for some of you, it’s to move like Christ has commanded us, to wash those who are around us.

Back when I knew I was going to marry Sadie, I decided I would propose because that’s what you do when you know you’re going to marry somebody, and I had just gone to Peru on a spring break trip with our high school here. While I was in Peru, I was with one of my best friends, Tyler, and we spent a lot of time praying about, you know, I was going to be flying back home to propose to this girl I was in love with. So we spent a lot of time talking and praying about what I wanted that to be and how I wanted that to look, and so it was fun.

So I came back, and Sadie was a senior at Furman at the time, and so I drove up to Greenville and took her on a picnic. I was so nervous, you know? Like I had practiced my whole little speech and gotten it ready, and then I had it all kind of planned out, and we actually were out on a picnic. We were throwing a softball together, and I was terrible. I mean, I’m not the best softball player anyway, but I was like throwing it in the woods, like throwing it on the ground three feet in front of me. She is like, “Are you okay?”

I was like, “Oh, yeah. Yeah, I’m good. I just… I’m a little rusty, you know?” The ring felt like it weighed 40 pounds in my back pocket, you know. So we went to the place we had our first date, which was this covered bridge right north of Greenville, and actually, a couple of weeks ago, Sadie and I took our kids back to that, to see the place Mommy and Daddy got engaged. Oh, there’s the picture right there. Had no idea the handful I would be getting 10 years ago when I… So we went back, so that’s the bridge.

Well, what’s funny about it now is that it’s now like a state park, and so it’s like surrounded by like parking lots and big fields with picnic tables and all this stuff, and I mean, I promise, before it was like this little bridge that was in the middle of the woods. Right now, it would be like going and proposing in the middle of Ronald Reagan Park, not exactly the most romantic moment, people running around, but then, it was a little more isolated.

So anyway, so I took her to this bridge, and I had gone to Peru. While I was in Peru, I had picked up a couple of things. I picked up a basin and this pitcher, and I went down under the bridge, and I got some water, and I put it in this pitcher. I came back up, and she was sitting on this leather stool I had also brought back. I knelt in front of her, and I poured the water into the bowl, and I started to wash her feet, and I said, “I want to wash your feet every day for the rest of our lives. I want, 50 years from now, when we get together with our children and our grandchildren, they say I served you well. Will you be my wife?”
She said, “Yes.” I think that’s what she said. She kind of choked it out there, but that’s not the point I want to make today because that’s my wife. That’s the woman I love. I was speaking about our children and grandchildren. Of course, I don’t want there to be any sin that builds up between me and God that would hinder who I am as a man or as a husband or as a father. Of course, I want to get that junk out. Of course, I want to be all God has made me to be, and of course, I don’t want there to be anything that builds up between us because I love her. She is my wife.

I don’t want there to be anything that has been a root of bitterness that has been buried for years that we find out years later has separated us and driven us apart. I want to get all of that junk out. I want us to walk in reconciliation towards one another and with our children. Of course, I want that because it’s the woman who I love. It’s my children, but when Jesus knelt down, He took the rag and washed the feet of the man who was about to turn Him over to be brutally murdered. He washed the feet of His most painful enemy. He washed the feet of the one who hated Him.

That’s the kind of community we’re supposed to be. That’s the kind of people we can be because of what Christ has done for us, that in our brokenness, in our hate, in our dirt, in our junk, Jesus knelt down, and by His death and His resurrection, washed our feet. What would it look like to be those people who live honest, open lives before God, honest, open lives between one another, and intentionally pursue those who the world finds despicable, dirty, neglected, alone, not worthy? That’s what I want to be a part of. Let’s pray.

Jesus, thank You. Thank You for what You did for us. God, thank You for this beautiful picture. God, I pray, even right now, if there’s anybody in here who has not received Your washing of their heart, who has not received Your forgiveness pouring over them as You have taken all of their junk, the weight they have been carrying, and put it on Yourself on the cross, I pray they would receive it even right now, that they would just go to the cross and lay it before You and let You have it. If there’s anybody who’s living, right now, holding on to something between them and somebody else, I pray they would deal with it, before they leave this room, they would deal with it.

If that person is here or not, they would get home and deal with it, Lord. Let there not be any place that grows up and there not be any toxin that poisons this body because we have refused to wash this dirt off of our feet. Lord, I pray, will You call to mind the places that are right in front of us, those you call us to love, to serve, to embrace, to welcome into our homes, to accept, to wrap our arms around, the way You welcomed, embraced, and wrapped Your arms around us? Lord Jesus, thank You for this picture and all the depth of meaning it has. Wash over us now, Lord Jesus, amen.