THE WASHING OF THE FEET – John 13:1-17

Posted by Pastor Greg Allen on July 24, 2013 under PM Bible Study |

PM Home Bible Study Group; July 24, 2013

John 13:1-17

Theme: Jesus sets for us the example of service in washing the feet of His disciples.

(Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture references are taken from The Holy Bible, New King James Version; copyright 1982, Thomas Nelson, Inc.)

We begin a new section of John’s Gospel this evening. From John 1:19 to 12:50, we’re told about Jesus’ public ministry. That public ministry ended with the bold declaration He made of Himself in John 12:44-50—the last words He spoke publically before being arrested and taken to the cross.

And now, beginning in Chapter 13, and going all the way to the end of chapter 17, we’re given a description of His private conversation with His disciples just before He went to the cross. This section is remarkable because it is the longest single record of a conversation in the New Testament. But it’s remarkable most of all because, in it, we are given the heartbeat of our Savior with respect to those He loves—ending in Chapter 17 with a prayer He prays for those He would shortly thereafter die for. If you want to know how much the Lord Jesus loves those who love Him, then a good, careful, prayerful reading of this section of the Gospel of John is the place to go.

And this evening, we’ll look at the first great event of this great section in John’s Gospel—our Lord’s washing of His disciples feet. It’s an event in which the Lord Jesus vividly demonstrated for us how much He loves us—not only in His act of dying for us, but in His ongoing care for us. In it, He demonstrates the degree to which He would condescend in serving us—a remarkable thing when you consider the things that He said about Himself in 12:44-50. And more; in it, He even gives us the example of how we are to love and care for one another.

Note, then . . .

I. THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE WASHING (vv. 1-5).

A. John begins by telling us “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” (v. 1). The fact that this was before the Feast of Passover was important to stress; because it was the Passover meal that He was about to celebrate with His disciples. He would present Himself at that meal as the very Passover Lamb that the feast was meant to celebrate. He was, as John the Baptist said, “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29). Note that Jesus knew that “His hour had come”. In John 12:23, He even declared, “The hour has come that the Son of Man should be glorified”. That “hour”—that is, that all- important occasion—was the time of His sacrifice for sinners in obedience to the Father, His resurrection three days later, and His subsequent ascension to the Father. It was the hour “that He should depart from this world to the Father”. And in all of it, note that He loved His own—that is, the disciples. What did it mean that the disciples were ‘His own’? Dr. Ironside wrote that they were His own in a five-fold sense:

(1) They were His own by creation; He brought them into being. The very life we have comes from Him. (2) But then more than that, they are His own by redemption; He went to the cross to purchase them. Of course, He had not yet died on the cross when He contemplated this little group in the upper room, but He looks at the cross as though it were in the past. He had come for that purpose. In the next place (3) they are His own by the Father’s gift. In the 17th chapter of this book, seven times over Jesus speaks to the Father of the “men that Thou gavest Me out of the world.” We who are saved have been given to the Son by the Father. (4) We are His own by right. He had to work in our hearts and consciences convicting us of sin, and that led to repentance toward God, and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. So we were born of the Spirit and made the children of God. (5) Then we are His own by subjugation: It was His own grace that ended our rebellion and brought us in chains of love to His feet. So we belong to Him in this five-fold sense (H. A. Ironside, Addresses on The Gospel of John [New York: Loizeaux Brothers, Inc., 1942], p. 548).

These disciples, we’re told, were “His own” even though they were “in the world”. But He loved them—and loved them to the very end. With all their failings and misunderstandings—and even looking ahead to the fact that they would be scattered from Him at the time of His arrest; and that Peter would even deny Him three times—He never stopped loving them. And now that He was about to leave them, He was very protective of them. He would later pray, “Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We are” (John 17:11).

B. Now; John takes us to some of the most immediate of the circumstances of the washing. He mentions five remarkable things

1. He writes; “And supper being ended . . .” (v. 2a). That’s the way it’s translated in some versions. The word “ended” is inserted however. The original has it simply “supper being”; that is, that supper was still going at the time when He rose up from it. This is important. Jesus did not wash the feet of the disciples as something separate from the Passover supper, but as something that was a key part of it. The cleansing depicted in it may be what Paul was talking about in 1 Corinthians 5:7-8; when he wrote; “Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” Perhaps this was meant to remind us that a key part of our Lord’s sacrifice for us is our daily sanctification unto Him.

2. John goes on to tell us, “the devil having already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, to betray Him . . .” (v. 2b). Way back in John 6:70, Jesus told His disciples, “Did I not choose you, the twelve, and one of you is a devil?” In the next verse, we’re told, “He spoke of Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon, for it was he who would betray Him, being one of the twelve.” Jesus knew from the very beginning who would betray Him; and knew that the devil had already by this point moved Judas to go to the leaders and arrange His betrayal. Remarkably, He even washed Judas’ feet—though He made it clear in doing so that Judas was not among those who were truly “clean” (v. 10).

3. John then adds something else that Jesus knew; “Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God and was going to God . . .” (v. 3). For Jesus, the act that He was about to perform for His disciples was an act of immeasurable condescension. He, who had perfect awareness of His divine majesty—into whose hands the Father had given all things; who came from the Father and was going to the Father; and who knew these things to be so—stooped down and washed the filthy feet of men! Truly, as Jesus Himself said, “the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many” (Matthew 20:28). What a great servant our Savior is! What an honor it is to be served by Him!

4. John tells us that, Jesus knowing all this, He “rose from supper and laid aside His garments, took a towel and girded Himself” (v. 4). In doing this, He was not simply acting as a servant, but was taking on the appearance of one. It’s hard not to see in this a picture of what we’re told in Philippians 2:5-8; “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, 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..

5. Finally, John tells us, “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” (v. 5). This was a common courtesy in the days of our Lord. People who would travel the dusty roads of that land would find their feet soiled by the time they arrived at the home of a host for dinner. A household servant would wash the feet of the guests as a standard expression of welcome. The Pharisee Simon, who once invited Jesus into his home, didn’t even show our Lord the common courtesy of giving Him water for His feet (Luke 7:44); but Jesus Himself took the very humble task of ministering in this way to His disciples.

II. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE WASHING (vv. 6-11).

A. After having described the circumstances of the washing, John then goes on to tell us about Peter. Peter must have watched as the Lord washed the feet of the other disciples; and as the Lord drew near to him, he may have thought to himself, “How can they even let the Lord do this to them? How can they let Him who we all know to be the Christ— the Son of the living God—stoop down and wash their filthy feet? How can they even think themselves worthy to allow it to happen? Why; if anything, we ought to all be washing His feet! I certainly can’t allow Him to do this to me!—not with all the failings and sins in my life!” John tells us, “Then He came to Simon Peter. And Peter said to Him, ‘Lord, are You washing my feet?’” (v. 6). Jesus—who knew all men; and who certainly knew what was going on in Peter’s heart—”answered and said to him, ‘What I am doing you do not understand now, but you will know after this’” (v. 7). Peter didn’t realize at the time that this was something that was necessary. Our Lord’s words that he would “know after this” may refer to the time when the Holy Spirit would come and make all things clear (John 14:26); but it may refer to the fact that Jesus would explain His actions shortly in verses 12-17. “Peter said to Him, ‘You shall never wash my feet!’ Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me’” (v. 8). Jesus was illustrating a spiritual principle that is vital to a relationship with Himself. Unless His followers received from Him what He was doing to them, they could not be said to actually be following Him.

B. It’s hard not to love Peter. He is so much like the rest of us who seek—in our imperfect ways—to follow the Lord! If allowing Jesus to wash His feet was necessary to a full relationship with Him, then Peter wanted a complete bath! “Simon Peter said to Him, ‘Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head!’” (v. 9). Peter, perhaps, was very much aware of the sinfulness that had characterized his daily life; and it convicted him that he needed a full cleansing. John tells us, however, “Jesus said to him, ‘He who is bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean; and you are clean . . .” (v. 10a). The cleansing that Jesus was speaking of was the complete cleansing of the soul that comes through a relationship with Him. In Ephesians 5:26-27, we’re told that Jesus gave Himself for the church “that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish.” That’s our condition before Him right now. “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). Positionally in Christ, we stand before God in perfect righteousness—100 % clean in His sight. But we live in a fallen world. We walk around in the course of this life on paths that are often sullied with sin. We don’t need to be “saved” over again. But we do need to come to Him often to confess our failings, and to be separated afresh from the wickedness of this world, and to have our feet washed from sinful contact with this world. As the apostle John once put it; “My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world” (1 John 2:1-2).

C. And then, after Jesus said to His disciples, “and you are clean”; He then added this remarkable comment; “but not all of you” (v. 10b). Not all of them were clean in such a way as to only need their feet washed. There was one who was still in sin; and for whom it could not be said that there was no condemnation before God. John tells us, “For He knew who would betray Him; therefore He said, ‘You are not all clean.’” (v. 11). What a condition Judas was in. Later on, when Jesus prayed His glorious ‘high-priestly’ prayer in John 17, He would say to the Father, “While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Your name. Those whom You gave Me I have kept; and none of them is lost except the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be fulfilled” (John 17:12).

III. THE LESSON OF THE WASHING (vv. 12-17).

A. Now; positionally, the washing of the feet communicated to the disciples that the Lord performed two kinds of cleansing on them. First, of course, was the great cleansing that washed them completely clean in the sight of God the Father. After that, there would be ‘no more condemnation’ in them before God. They would never again be so ‘unclean’ in His sight as to be rejected by Him; and they would always be fit for heaven. But there was a need for a daily washing of the feet—a daily confession of our sins and a daily renewal of our trust in Jesus’ sufficiency to purify us and sanctify us. This too is something that Jesus does for us. But that was what we might call the “theological truth” communicated by this washing. Then came what we might call the “practical example” given to us in it. John tells us, “So when He had washed their feet, taken His garments, and sat down again, He said to them, ‘Do you know what I have done to you?’” (v. 12). No doubt they didn’t! They were still stunned by it all—Peter perhaps more than the others! Perhaps Jesus would turn to us and ask the same thing—”Do you understand what I did to these twelve?—even to the one who would betray Me? Do you understand the practical significance of it to you?”

B. Jesus doesn’t leave us in the dark. He tells us. He said, “You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you. Most assuredly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him” (vv. 13-16). Jesus— our Lord and Master—ever set Himself above serving us. And in serving as He did, He forever established our pattern to one another. Some have treated this as if it were a third ‘ordinance’—along with baptism and the communion meal. But that may easily miss the point. We today rarely need our feet to be literally washed. But we do need someone, at times, to humble themselves and meet our needs. And they, at times need us to humble ourselves and meet their needs. Jesus once called His disciples to Himself and told them, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those who are great exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant. And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave—just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many” (Matthew 20:25-28).

C. And before we depart from this, note carefully the final word He spoke concerning the example He set for us: “If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them”

(v. 17). Jesus didn’t simply set before us a burdensome chore that made us miserable. Rather, in calling us to serve one another as He has served us, He has set before us the path to happiness and genuine fulfillment. We are blessed if we make ourselves one another’s servant!

* * * * * * * * * *

We ought to be deeply thankful to the Lord that He had stooped down to meet our needs. And in the end, His doing so, if we may reverently say it, leads to His greatest happiness!—”who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2). We—forever in His presence—are that “joy”! It was why He cleansed us by His own blood.

And in imitating Him toward one another, we too find our joy. May our Lord—who washed the feet of His disciples—teach us to follow His example, and serve one another in His name.