Jesus washes the disciple’s feet. (Read John 13-1-17, CSB)
Before the Passover meal begins, Jesus does something that a servant generally does, he washed the disciple’s feet. Think of your own home. Often people take off their shoes when they enter their home to keep from tracking in dirt. Washing feet in Jesus’ day was similar. They wore sandals and so as they walked along the dirt roads, their feet would get quite dirty and crusted with mud, dust, and whatever might be on the path, or road.
Jesus opted to wash the disciple’s feet and all of them seemed to comply except for one, Peter, who said that Jesus would never wash his feet. When Jesus said that, “If I don’t wash you, you have no part with me.”
Peter then says to wash all of him, and Jesus says that it is not needed if one has already bathed. Jesus then goes on to say that they are all clean except for one, Judas, who was about to betray Jesus.
The verse is often interpreted that we should be servants as Jesus demonstrated by washing the disciple’s feet.
May I suggest another meaning. Everything that Jesus did had a deeper meaning than the “surface meaning”. Jesus said that they were all clean, forgiven of their sins, baptized (baptism does not forgive us of our sins but is symbolic of being cleansed from our sins).
He tells Peter that he does not need to cleansed completely, just his feet. Jesus is telling Peter that he is clean, (saved), but that he will get his feet dirty (sin) and just needs to wash his feet, i.e. ask forgiveness – not lose his salvation. Later we will see Peter deny knowing Jesus…. he gets his feet dirty and later Jesus “washes his feet”, He forgives Peter.
Peter did not fully understand what Jesus was illustrating. Yes, Jesus was being a servant, and like Jesus, we need to serve others. One way we do that is by forgiving them when they sin against us. Knowing that if we sin, that we do not need to be baptized again, but that we just need our “feet washed”.
Discussion Questions:
- After we come to trust Jesus as our Savior, do we become perfect and stop doing bad things (sinning)? No
- What should we do when we sin? ask for forgiveness
- If baptism is a picture of what Jesus did for us – us buried with Him in death, and raised in newness of life (cleansed from our sin), then what is Jesus washing the disciple’s feet a picture of? Jesus forgiving them of sin
- How can we have a servant heart like Jesus when He washed the disciple’s feet? Forgive others, serve others
End in prayer asking God to give you a servant heart like Jesus, and the capability to forgive others when they wrong you.
