Sermon Tone Analysis

We have a solemn…I guess compared to some of our celebratory services…a bit of a solemn service today, but a solemn scene for us in Scripture today as we look at Jesus washing the feet of the disciples.

And we find ourselves in John, chapter 13, at a scene that I think is often misunderstood in light of the greater context of what is going on.

Sometimes we limit its application, and its teaching, and its understanding.

I simply entitle the message today /Are You Able?/ drawing from another encounter that Jesus had with James and John and their mother, because I think that what Jesus is demonstrating for us in this scene today, it's really asking all of us that similar question…Are we able?

Are we able to do and to serve and to be a servant as Jesus was?

And I put up on our graph a picture of the Cross because indeed that is the ultimate expression of Christ's service for us.

The Scriptures tell us that, and it calls on all of us to have that same mindset to be willing to bear our cross, to be willing to humble ourselves to the point of being able to die if necessary in order to serve as Christ serves.

So as we look at the text today, I want us to draw some analysis to some other texts, and to look at that greater concept so that we can understand, I think, fully what illustration Jesus is showing us here, what greater picture He is teaching the disciples and teaching us as His disciples today that we might be able to follow.

In John, chapter 13, it begins by saying, /"Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that His hour had come that He should depart from this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end."/

Now there is, as there always is in academic circles, some discussion on when this event is taking place, but the general understanding is that this is the night in which Jesus was betrayed, that this is the night when they are going to partake of the Passover meal, and through that introduce the Lord's Supper.

And that it is during this process that Jesus will participate in and lead in the washing of the feet of the disciples.

Notice… it says, /"When Jesus knew that His hour had come that He should depart from this world to the Father"/…that Jesus is now focused on the coming crucifixion.

He is focused on His purpose for coming.

We just looked in the text, if you've been going with us through John, where Jesus said that His hour had come.

And that He asked rhetorically the question, "What should I do?

Ask the Father to take Me out of this situation?

No, because it is for this reason that I came."

And now He says…He's reflecting upon the fact that this very grave, very sober moment has arrived, and in so doing that the thought process of our Savior is…notice what he says in the rest of the verse, /"Having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end."/

In other words, in the Greek, it is that He loved them to the uttermost, and He is going to demonstrate that love.

The washing of the feet is to be…as John introduces it for us in verse 1…an illustration of the extent, the uttermost level, the ends to which Christ loved His disciples.

It says in verse 2, /"And supper being ended, the devil having already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray Him."/ John wants to let us know, he wants to be very clear, that we who will read this for years to come, don't forget that among those whose feet Jesus washed was Judas Iscariot.

The one who had already had in his heart, who already had made plans to have Jesus arrested, to have Jesus betrayed to the authorities, that Jesus knew this, and that Jesus is expressing His love even to one who is not going to love Him back!

He is showing His love to the uttermost.

This uttermost expression of His love for His people even though among them is one who doesn't care for what Jesus is doing…one who is there to betray Him.

In verse 3 it says, /"Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God and was going to God."/ Now that is kind of a strange introduction of words there.

We're getting ready to set the scene for the washing of the feet, but John reminds us of something that Jesus knows as He prepares to do this.

And I want us to look at this verse for just a moment.

It says, /"Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God and was going to God."/ What is he saying?

What he is saying is that Jesus knows that He has all power.

God has given all things into His hands.

Jesus is all-powerful.

Jesus knows He is from God.

He knows His home is in heaven.

He knows the power, the royalty, the majesty, the authority that He has.

He has the authority to destroy the devil right then!

He has the authority to execute divine wrath on Judas Iscariot.

He has all power to bring an end to all of the evil plans of the world against Him.

But instead He is going to set that power aside.

John wants to paint the picture that this One who is going to gird Himself and wash the disciples' feet is not just any servant, that He is Almighty God, that He knowing His power…knowing His power…is going to give it up.

It says, /"Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God and was going to God, rose from supper and laid aside His garments, took a towel and girded Himself.

After that, He poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded."/

He performed a menial servant's task.

A task so menial that the rabbis' teaching of the day was that if you had Jewish servants and Gentile servants, you would never ask a Jewish servant to wash the feet because it was beneath even the Jewish servant's role that you would get the lowest person in your mind to be the one to perform this basic, menial task.

So you can just imagine the reaction and the shock of the disciples.

Now the disciples have not offered to wash each others' feet.

They would not think to wash the feet of one of their peers.

Alright, this was something the servant in your household would do for your guests, but you wouldn't do it.

The disciples would never think to lower themselves so low as to take on the role of a servant and to wash each others' feet.

After all they need their own feet washed!

"I need my feet washed.

Am I supposed to wash your feet when I need my feet?

Well we need to get somebody, a servant, who can just take care of both of us."

So imagine the shock.

Here is the Messiah, the One who up to this moment they are intending to take over as King of Israel.

And now He dresses Himself as a servant and begins to serve them.

Paul explains that to us a bit, I think.

A very familiar text, and one that we have encountered several times in our study of John, but in light of this scene that is before us and to get to what I think Jesus is trying to show us, we need to look at it again.

In Philippians 2, verse 5: /"Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ."/

In other words, have the same mindset of Jesus in what Paul is about to say.

This is how you ought to think.

You ought to think as Jesus thought.

And we already know a little bit about how Jesus was thinking.

John has already told us that.

And Paul tells us that.

He tells the Philippians that.

In other words, he says the same things, and it's in verse 6.

Notice: /"Who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God."/

In other words, Jesus did not consider it a wrong thing to lay hold of equality with God, that Jesus did not misunderstand that He was God.

Jesus didn't see the title of God as being something that if He held onto that He'd be stealing it…He'd be stealing the authority.

No, Jesus fully knew that He was God!

And to be called equal with God, Jesus knew that!

But notice, even knowing that, verse 7 says, /"But made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men.

And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross."/

Jesus knew at every step that He was all-powerful.

He knew at every step that He had all authority.

And what He is showing the disciples…I want you to get this…is that though He has all authority and though He has all power, He is going to set that aside.

And what the washing of the feet is there to do is to illustrate and demonstrate what Jesus was going to do in just a few hours.

It was an illustration of Jesus setting aside His power, His role, and His authority, not taking on and girding Himself in a towel this time, but taking on and girding Himself in crucifixion, suffering as a common criminal to serve you and me.

He was going to take off His kingly role, take off His messianic title, send back and hold off the angels who would have come to help Him, and is going to wrap Himself in the form of One who dies, and be a Servant obedient even to the point of death.

And so what Jesus is showing them…Luke tells us this.

Luke says normally it's the servant who washes the feet, not the owner of the home.

"But I am showing you what ministry looks like.

I am showing you what you have to be willing to do yourself to follow Me." Well the disciples are in shock.

Let me continue in John, chapter 13, verse 5. /"After that, He poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded."/

Verse 6: "Then He came to Simon Peter.

And Peter said to Him, 'Lord, are You washing my feet?'" "Are You…the Messiah, the King of Israel, the One whom I've declared to everybody as the Son of God…are You going to wash my feet?"

/"Jesus answered him, 'If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me.'"/ Jesus says, "If I'm not able to fulfill this servant role with you, Peter, then you have no part in My ministry.

My ministry is all about service, and if I can't minister to you, you can't be part of My ministry.

You can't be part of Me.

You have no part with Me."

And notice what Peter says in response to that.

He puts in his own superlative here.

Peter said in verse 9: /"Simon Peter said to Him, 'Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head!'"/

In other words, "If being with You involves a cleansing, then just clean me all over!

Just pour water all over me so that I'll be even closer to You, that I'll even be more a part."

In other words, Peter's heart was he wanted to be with Jesus.

He wanted to have a part with Him.

He was socially trying to keep himself from having His Messiah lower Himself before him.

Socially, he was driven.

Humanly, by human standards, he saw this as wrong.