Now before the feast of the passover, Jesus, knowing that his hour had come that he should depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, loved them to the end.
John's Gospel turns a corner here: the public ministry is over, and Jesus now speaks as One on His way out of the world. Everything that follows — the towel, the basin, the farewell talk — grows out of what He knew and whom He loved.
The verse opens with what Jesus knew. One writer weighs how complete that knowledge was.
He was the only man whom nothing took by surprise. All was read and known and felt in the presence of God His Father. He knew all along that He was to die. He knew its form, its character, and its aim — in God's purpose, and in the malice of man and Satan. Here we see more: how near it now was, and how immense its consequences, stood before His mind.
None of that cooled His love. Another writer lists what He saw waiting for Him:
He knew every detail: the malice of Satan, the treachery of Judas, the denial of Peter, all the disciples forsaking Him, the bitter persecutions of the Jews and of the Romans, His crucifixion. More dreadful than all of these, He knew He must suffer the judgment of God for our sins. These things are not mentioned here. Yet through it all His love for His own stayed as full and pure as it had been from the beginning.
The wording is striking. It does not say He was cast out of the world, though He was; it says He would depart out of it, to the Father.
This is the language belonging to the One who came into the world with a mission to carry out, and when it was complete He would go out of it quietly, calmly, confidently, in the blessed consciousness that what He came to do had been gloriously done. He came forth "from the Father" (16:28) and He travelled through a sin-ridden world, His footsteps constantly dogged by those who always tried to prove His moral failure; thank God they could not.
This departure also marks a structural break in the book. From here on, the Christ speaks as one already on the other side.
All through the Gospel, from chapter 1, He is unknown to the world, and rejected by the Jews. "He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him." But from chapter 13 He speaks as going out of the world and ascending on high.
Early in this same Gospel the words "His own" described a nation that turned Him away. Here the same phrase marks out a unique company in the world.
John's Gospel records the rejection of our Lord Jesus Christ very early. Yet in these wonderful words in John 13 we read that there was still something in the world that He called His own... If what was His own in John 1:10 was kept from Him, and if His own people Israel refused Him, that only brought the eternal purpose to light. In the world that would later crucify Him, He has brought to light a unique company that He gladly owns as distinctly His own.
One writer starts from an ordinary human joy:
The human heart has a peculiar joy in having something it can call its own. It is not so much the value of the thing owned, as the simple awareness that it is mine. Now it is just like this that Jesus speaks of us. He tells me that I am His, and that He delights in its being so.
Time is not the main point of this phrase. One writer traces the word itself:
The expression "He loved them to the end" does not simply mean that He loved them to the end of His pathway... Look at another expression in the New Testament, in Hebrews 7:25: "he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him." This word has the same root as "end" in John 13:1. It means that He loved them completely, He loved them utterly, He loved them abidingly.
Another puts the same thought in terms of cost:
He loved not merely till the end, as a question of time, however true this may be, but taking up each need, and bearing all the labour for them, whatever the draught on it, unremittingly and without wavering.
Leaving them did not end His service.
He had loved His own, He loved them to the end; His heart did not give them up, but He knew that He must leave them. Would He cease to be their servant in love? No, He would be it for ever. Everything was ready for His departure, even the heart of Judas. The wicked treachery of Judas lay below Him; the glory He was about to enter lay above Him. Neither one separated His heart from His disciples. He ceases to be their companion; He remains their Servant.
- Knew. He saw it all ahead — Judas, Peter, the cross — and none of it lessened His love for His own.
- Departed. No one drove Him out. He went out to the Father, His mission finished and His communion with the Father unbroken.
- Owned. Rejected by His own nation, He still found in the world a company He gladly calls "His own."
- Loved. "To the end" means to the uttermost — completely, utterly, abidingly — not merely to a date on a calendar.
- Served. Because that love could not stop, He kept serving: He ceased to be their companion, but He remains their Servant for ever.
And during supper, the devil having already put it into the heart of Judas [son] of Simon, Iscariote, that he should deliver him up,
Two forces sit at the same table in this verse. One is the love of Jesus for His own. The other is a plan of betrayal, already planted in the heart of one of the twelve men Jesus chose to be with Him. John names the source of that plan and names the man. Then he shows the Lord rising from the meal to serve.
Older translations read "supper being ended." Commentators read it the other way: the meal was still going on. The timing matters, because of what the Lord does next.
The Authorised Version treats the phrase as meaning the end of the meal. But I agree with those who take it as the arrival of the time for supper. The wonderful action we are about to hear of confirms this. There is no doubt that it was usual to have the feet washed before supper, not after.
The suggestion did not fall on neutral ground. Judas had a known appetite, and the enemy knew its price.
Judas was a covetous man. He loved money — a very common love in every age. He had preached the gospel. He had walked in company with the Lord Jesus during the days of His public ministry. He had heard His words, seen His ways, experienced His kindness. But, sadly, though an apostle, though a companion of Jesus, though a preacher of the gospel, he had no heart for Christ. He had a heart for money... Satan knew this. He knew the particular craving of Judas. He was fully aware of the price at which he could be bought.
That appetite had a history. The fall came in steps, not all at once.
We can see three steps in his fall. First there was the unjudged covetousness which led him to become even a thief (John 12:6). Then came the action of Satan. He put it into Judas' mind to recover part of his loss (John 13:2). The three hundred pence which the ointment was worth had not come into his hands, and in the end he settled for ten per cent of that sum. Lastly Satan entered into him. The master spirit of evil took personal control. Nothing was to go wrong in the arrangements that would bring about the Lord's death.
Verse 2 and verse 27 describe two different things, and the distance between them is a warning.
Judas was clearly there, and the devil had already put it into his heart to betray the Lord (v. 2). Afterwards the Lord gave him the piece of bread, and Satan entered into him (v. 27). Satan drove him to carry out his purpose. That is the fatal result of not refusing at once a first suggestion or form of evil (1 Thess. 5:22).
The devil was out to ruin a soul as well as to strike at the Lord — and Judas never knew whom he was selling.
Here we are reminded of the devil's hostility to the Lord, and of his readiness to ruin an immortal soul forever, set against the unchanging love of Christ towards His own... Who was Judas betraying? He little knew. But here the writer tells us. It was the One into whose hands the Father had given all things. Judas, therefore, the chief priests, and the devil must all be subject to His power, to be dealt with as He wills. All are absolutely at His disposal. As a man Judas saw Him. He betrayed a man, very likely hoping that the Lord would escape by some act of power, so that His enemies would lose their prey while he kept the money.
The betrayal came through someone inside the circle, and that is part of its horror.
So it was with Jesus. The enemy's hate came out most strongly as the love of God showed itself in Him and through Him. But how crushing to human pride that the devil worked through a man and a disciple, the close, personal, honoured follower of the Lord Jesus!... In that holy company he had trifled with sin, with the greed that always clung to him. Now the devil prompted him to gratify it by betraying the Son of God.
Yet the plot did not stop the Lord's service to His own. It went ahead at that very hour.
Nothing can stop or hinder this service for His own. He girds Himself to wash the disciples' feet at the very moment of Judas' betrayal of Him (John 13:2). He owns all things. He came from God and He is going to God. That dignity does not hold Him back from this service either. On the contrary, He uses His power in humbling Himself to serve His beloved ones.
- Snare. Judas loved money, and the enemy knew the exact price at which he could be bought.
- Suggestion. The devil put the plan into his heart. At this stage it was still only a suggestion, not yet a takeover.
- Surrender. A first suggestion not refused at once opened the door; by verse 27 Satan had entered him.
- Sovereignty. The man he sold was the One into whose hands the Father had given all things. So Judas, the priests and the devil were all at His disposal.
- Service. In that same hour Christ rose and washed His disciples' feet. Nothing could stop His love for His own.
[Jesus,] knowing that the Father had given him all things into his hands, and that he came out from God and was going to God,
Between the last supper and the cross, John tells us what was in the mind of Jesus. Not fear. Not the betrayal already in motion. He knew what the Father had put in His hands, and He knew where He came from and where He was going. What He does with that knowledge is the surprise of the chapter.
One writer asks us to weigh what Jesus knew, and then to watch what any other person would have done with it.
Notice how the Holy Spirit has recorded this for us: "Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands." Everything the Lord did in this chapter, He did in the full consciousness of the unmatched dignity the Father had put upon Him. His right hand was full and His left hand was full. The Father had put all things into the hands of Jesus, whom men despised. The Father had committed to Him the whole range of the glory of God: the control of angels, the blessing of men, the judgment of devils; things in heaven, things on earth, and things under the earth. This was proof of the absolute confidence the Father placed in Him. He knew it, and knowing it, what will He do? What would any other man have done? Would he not have unveiled the glory before the astonished eyes of those who had despised Him? Did Jesus do this? No. He rose from supper, laid aside His garments, tied a towel around His waist, and washed His disciples' feet.
The scene has been read alongside Paul's description of Christ emptying Himself. The two accounts are placed side by side, with one careful limit.
In John 13 you get in symbolic language what Philippians 2 plainly declares. He who "did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped," who "made himself nothing," is shown by John as "laying aside His garments" — not His deity, but His glory. He humbled Himself. And in wonderful grace He took the place of a servant: He took a towel and "tied it around His waist."
The verse names where He was going: back to God. One writer draws two things from that word.
It says "to God" in verse 3, because this affirms that Christ returns in the spotless divine perfection in which He left God. He is just as perfect as ever, and He goes back as such to God — He goes back just as He came. He did not go half way, but came from God and went back to God. And then He must bring us into the same place too. Either He must give us up, since He could not stay here where we are, or He must do everything needed to fit us to be where He is.
Another writer follows the two halves of the verse: out from God, and back to God.
He came out to reveal God; no created being could do that. Having done that, He went back to God. He did not come a Man from heaven; He came out to take the body prepared for Him. But if so, He did not go back as He came out. He took manhood in order to go there, and He has gone there as man. He did so because He is taking up again the place He had left, the place that belongs to Him as God. In this sense He has carried manhood to the throne of God. As people often say, God has come out and Man has gone in, in the same blessed One.
The "all things" were His, but the moment to take them up had not come.
The time has not yet come for Him to take possession of the "all things" the Father has given into His hands. But He rises to secure what is more precious to Him than everything else: the unbroken and unrivalled possession of our hearts, against all that would dispute it with Him.
His words to Peter settle what the washing was for.
His own words explain it all: "If I do not wash you, you have no share with me" — older translations read "no part with me." What do we learn from this? That all His people have a part with Him. They share all the benefits of His life and death. The Father loves them as He loves Christ Himself. They have a part with Him in His future glory. They are heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ. He washed their feet knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands. In doing so He declared this: the love He had for His disciples while He was with them in the world would go on after He had left them.
- Knowing — Everything He does next flows from what He knew: the Father had put all things in His hands.
- Given — He did not use that glory to impress anyone. He laid aside His garments — never His deity.
- Coming — He came from God to reveal God. He went back in the same spotless perfection, carrying manhood to God's throne.
- Claiming — He left the universe unclaimed for now, and reached first for our hearts.
- Sharing — He stooped so we could have part with Him — sharers in His love, His glory, His inheritance.
rises from supper and lays aside his garments, and having taken a linen towel he girded himself
At supper with His disciples, Jesus stood up and did the work of a slave. Every movement counts — rising, laying aside His clothes, taking the towel, tying it on — and each one raises the same question: why?
One writer sets what Jesus knew about Himself against what He then did:
Everything the Lord did in this chapter, He did in the full consciousness of the incomparable dignity that the Father had put on Him. His right hand was full and His left hand was full. The Father had put all things into His hands — into the hands of Jesus whom men despised... He knew it, and knowing it, what will He do? What would any other man have done? Would he not have unveiled the glory before the astonished eyes of those who had despised Him?... He rose from supper, laid aside His garments, tied a towel around Himself, and washed His disciples' feet. In the tenderness of divine love He did for them the labour of a slave!
Was the meal over when He stood up, or just starting? One writer weighs the wording against the custom of the day:
The Authorised Version treats the phrase as meaning the meal had ended. But I agree with those who take it to mean that the time for supper had come. The wonderful action we are about to hear of confirms this. Without doubt, the custom was to wash the feet before supper, not after.
Commentators differ on what the removed clothing pictures. Some see in it an earlier and greater stooping:
With this consciousness He rises from supper: lowly service is to follow the sweetness of communion. He laid aside His garments. This quietly reminds us that He laid aside the garments of Godhead glory and dignity, to serve as a man in the place of subjection. Then He took a linen towel and tied it around Himself, for His aim was the blessing and comfort of His disciples.
Others read it as the setting aside of His rank in that room:
He rose up from supper, put aside His garments and tied a towel around Himself. In doing this He put aside His place as their Lord and Teacher and became a servant to each one. They held Him in the deepest respect. For Him to stoop down and do so lowly a task as washing their dirty feet was itself a proof of the love and tender feeling He had towards them. It also showed He was willing to go right down to the lowest level to meet their needs.
The towel is not decoration. It is working clothes. One writer traces the picture behind it, and what it lays on us:
The figure comes from the apron a slave tied on, so that he could work hard without soiling his clothes. The Lord had a far different motive. He stooped lower still when He tied on a linen towel to wipe the feet of His own, which He washed clean from defilement. This was holy love; and this alone compels us to tie on humility.
Standing up marked a change of place. He was about to leave them, but leaving would not end His service:
He could no longer stay with them on earth. He had to leave them; but even so He would not give them up. He would make them fit to be where He was... They were all supping together here at the same table. But He leaves this position, just as He left His personal company with His disciples, by going up to heaven, by going to God. But, if He does, He still girds Himself for their service, and takes water to wash their feet. Although in heaven, He is still serving us.
The service He does for us leaves a duty behind:
We are to copy the action of our Advocate. If we rejoice in the service He is doing for us in this role, we must never forget the duty laid on us to serve one another. Is there not room here for much heart-searching? Do we know our own duty as well as we know the teaching about Christ's service to us?
- Knowing — He acted in full awareness that all things were in His hands, and used that dignity to do a slave's work.
- Rising — leaving the table shows He could not stay with them on earth. He stood up to make them fit for where He was going.
- Laying aside — the garments He removed picture a stooping. Writers differ: some see the glory of Godhead, others His place as Lord and Teacher.
- Girding — the towel is a slave's apron, and that same holy love is what obliges us to tie on humility.
- Continuing — the girding was never untied; from heaven He still serves, and asks us to serve one another.
then he pours water into the washhand basin, and began to wash the feet of the disciples, and to wipe them with the linen towel with which he was girded.
Jesus stoops down and washes the feet of His twelve disciples. Commentators see two things at once: a real act of lowly service, and a picture of what He keeps doing for His people.
The details of the scene follow the custom of the day, and each step lowers Him further.
In that country, if a man invited you to his house, the first thing he did was provide water for the feet. In Genesis 18:3-4, Abraham did this; in Luke 7 the Lord reproaches Simon that he did not. The Lord takes here the place of host, and provides the water, and He also takes the slave's post, and washes their feet. The Lord of glory stoops down and washes the feet of these twelve men. It was perfect grace. He who was God stooped down and became a man. Then, as man, He stooped to do something few of us would have the grace to do.
He put water in the basin, not blood. That choice separates two works of Christ.
Notice carefully that the question here is water, not blood. Readers of John's Gospel will have seen how much he makes of "water" as well as "blood." His first letter also says the Lord came by water and blood — not by water only, but by water and blood (1 John 5:6). He purifies as well as atones. He uses the word to cleanse those who are washed from their sins in His blood.
That distinction matters most at the moment a believer fails.
And if we do fail, this is no question of putting away sin, and of blood. It is a question of water. Christ is then an advocate, pleading for us to restore our souls. In John 13 He did not put blood into the basin, but water... I have defiled my feet, and then I get water, and not blood. Water, as a figure, always signifies the application of the word by the power of the Holy Spirit.
He washed one part of them only, and the choice was deliberate.
The Lord washed the disciples' feet, not their hands. Hands are for work and the feet for walking. His action has a meaning in connection with our walk in the world. We pick up defilement as we pass through this world. And defilement cuts off communion with the Lord... We must come to Him with our failures, our stumbling, imperfect walk, our defilement. We place ourselves in His hands, as the disciples placed their soiled feet in His loving hands. His own perfect light then searches us to the core and shows what has defiled us. Once we are cleansed, we can enjoy His fellowship and have part with Him. This needs confession and self-judgment on our side.
So what does the washing gain for us? The answer is about now, not later.
Here we see the Lord putting us in contact with the Word — the water of purification. He Himself applies it by the Spirit to our consciences and our walk. His aim is to give us a present part with Him, not a future one. "If I do not wash you, you have no share with Me."
The towel finishes what the water begins.
There was something else to be learned in the selfless act of the Lord. The water He poured out and used removed the dirt and defilement. With the towel, it also set "His own" clean and at ease in His presence. There was to be no distracting element upon them. He would have them know comfort and rest.
Jesus told them to do for each other what He had done. One writer warns that we can copy the props and miss the point.
Our Lord said, "I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you." He certainly did not mean that we should copy Him in the mere preparations for that service — the girding with the towel, the pouring of water into the basin. Many show great skill at such preparations. But they break down at the act of feet washing, because they refuse to kneel down to reach the brother's feet... "If I do not first judge in myself the flesh I see active in my brother — for the same exists in me — I am not fit to wash his feet."
- Stoops — He takes both the host's place and the slave's place, providing the water and then kneeling to use it.
- Water — the basin holds water, not blood: He atones by blood, and goes on purifying by the word.
- Feet — hands are for work, feet for walking; He deals with the defilement our walk through the world picks up.
- Part — the share He gives is present, not future: no washing, no communion with Him now.
- Towel — He finishes the work. He wipes His own clean and at rest, then tells us to kneel and do the same for each other.
He comes therefore to Simon Peter; and *he* says to him, Lord, dost thou wash *my* feet?
The Lord moves round the table with basin and towel, and when He reaches Simon Peter the silence breaks. Peter is not asking for information. He is protesting — and the answers that correct him carry everything this chapter teaches about cleansing.
Washing feet was a job for slaves, so the shock lands in the two words Peter stresses — You, and my.
In the full awareness of His personal dignity He rose. He took a towel and a basin of water, and went on to wash the disciples' feet — a service usually done by slaves in wealthy homes. Peter expressed his astonishment: "Lord, do You wash my feet?" Both pronouns are emphatic. The Son of the living God doing menial service for a Galilean fisherman! Peter could not bear the thought.
Peter's objection sounds like devotion. One writer still counts it a failure.
Peter was too self-confident. He was ignorant not only of himself and of the defiling scene around him, but of the depth and constancy of Christ's love. So he says to Him, "Lord, do You wash my feet?" We grant that he could not know what had not yet been revealed. But was it fitting in him, was it reverent, to question what the Lord was doing? He may have thought it humility in himself, and honour to the Lord, to decline so menial a service at His hands. But Peter should never have forgotten this: Jesus never said a word and never did an act except what was worthy of God and showed the Father.
Peter speaks three times in this scene.
The others accept the Lord's service in wondering silence. Peter, driven by his forceful character, says everything he thinks. Three times he speaks, and each time he exposes his ignorance of the Lord's mind. His first words play down the Lord's lowly service. His second refuses it outright. His last impulsively accepts the service, but in a way that would strip it of all its deep meaning. Yet, as someone has said, "If the mistakes of the disciples warn us, the answers that correct them teach us far more."
One writer draws a whole argument out of the delay in the Lord's reply.
The Lord answers, "What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand." So we learn that at that moment the disciples could not grasp the spiritual meaning of the Lord's act. Later, when the Spirit has come, He will make it all plain. Clearly then this service was not, as many say, a lesson in humility taught by the Lord's own act of supreme humility. There would be no need for Peter to wait for a later day to see the humility of the act. His very words show that the Lord's humility was uppermost in his thoughts at that moment.
If the meaning is not simply humility, what is it for? One writer starts from what we already have, and what we still need.
When we come to these communications (John 13), what is the first thing He brings out? Not salvation, for we already know we are saved for eternity. There is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. But we do need provision to keep us clean while on the journey, and the Lord gives this at the opening of the chapter.
Peter's question is about who decides what the Lord may do.
Now Peter should have said, "If the Lord stoops down to wash my feet, it must be because His love is at stake, His glory is at stake, the will of His God and Father is at stake, and, more than that, because I need it." All our needs only give occasion to bring out the Lord's grace and to display His glory. Who would want to be without that? So it is not a question of whether it suits me. I am sure I need it. The question is whether it suits Him.
The scene is not sealed off in the past.
We need not wonder at Peter's reluctance to let the Lord serve him in this way. The Master at the feet of the servant naturally seemed out of place. But what shall we say when we remember that He now, in glory, stoops to do that lowly service for the humblest believer on earth? It was love to the end. Love to the end it truly shows — love no creature could have predicted or even guessed at.
- He comes. The Lord moves down the line and reaches Peter. He offers the service before anyone understands it or asks for it.
- He is questioned. Peter's protest looks like reverence. In fact it puts his own sense of what is fitting above his Master's act.
- He explains later. "You do not understand now" points to a meaning deeper than humility — one the Spirit would open up later.
- He keeps us clean. This is not the washing that saves; it is provision for the defilement picked up on the journey.
- He still serves. The One now in glory still does this lowly work for the humblest believer. So the only wise answer to His hands at our feet is yes.
Jesus answered and said to him, What I do thou dost not know now, but thou shalt know hereafter.
Peter had just recoiled at the sight of his Master kneeling with a basin. The Lord's reply does not explain the act. It delays it. Two small words carry the weight: "now" and "afterward." What was hidden in this washing, and when would Peter see it?
Many read the foot-washing as Jesus modelling lowliness. But He told Peter to wait for the meaning. The lowliness was the one thing Peter could already see.
To Peter it was unthinkable that the Lord of glory should stoop to wash those wayward feet. So his first words are protest mixed with surprise: "Lord, do you wash my feet?" The Lord answers, "What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand." So we learn that the disciples could not then discern the spiritual meaning of the Lord's act. Later, when the Spirit has come, everything will be plain. Clearly, then, this service was not what people often say. It was not a lesson in humility taught by an act of supreme humility on the Lord's part. Peter would not need to wait for a later day to see the humility of the act. His own words show that the Lord's humility was uppermost in his thoughts at that moment.
The Greek behind the verse uses two different words for knowing. The ESV renders both as "understand." One writer keeps them apart, because the shift from one word to the other is the point.
But the gentle Lord answered him in fullness of grace: "What I am doing you do not know (οἶδας) just now, but you will know (γνώσῃ) afterwards." Was this not a serious but compassionate hint to Peter, if he had been in the mood to learn? He should have gathered from the Lord's words, even if he did not at once bow to His act, that there was a meaning worthy of Him. He thought it due to the Father, in truest and lowliest love to the children, to wash their feet. He should have gathered more than this: what he did not know of himself then, he was to learn afterwards. I take it this means after His rejection and death, resurrection and ascension, when the Holy Spirit would be given to guide them into all the truth.
The delay had an end point. Writers tie it to the coming of the Holy Spirit.
Only when the Holy Spirit came down was there the spiritual understanding to learn the meaning of this action. All through the Lord's life people misunderstood His words. Until a person has the Holy Spirit, there will never be knowledge of the mind and ways of God. Having life does not mean having power and understanding. The possession of the Holy Spirit marks the difference between believers now and those of past times.
Because that day has come, the meaning is open to us. One writer notes that the Spirit has come to guide into all truth, so "the time to which the Lord referred has arrived." Asking what the Lord meant is not prying into mysteries beyond a believer's reach (C. E. Stuart).
So what was there to see? Commentators point beyond that evening to a service the Lord carries on now.
The Lord's action here is deeply symbolic. To take from it only the lesson of humility is, I do not hesitate to say, to miss the point of the teaching. We see it must have a deeper character by reading from verse 7 to verse 10. It is essential to having part with Christ. It is, in fact, the Lord's present service in the Father's presence for His people in this world.
Peter did not learn this as theory. A time came when he knew it in reality.
And all this shows us that forgiveness is one thing. Communion with Christ, as the object that fills our hearts, is quite another... Mark His ways of love with Peter. "What I am doing you do not understand now," Jesus had said, "but afterward you will understand." The time had come when Peter should know the action of the washing of the Word in the reality of its blessing. He should also welcome the love of Jesus that stooped to do it.
The same words meet us when life makes no sense.
What weighty words! "Now" and "Afterwards"! How much we all need to remember them! Often "now" is wrapped in darkness we cannot see through. We cannot explain our Father's dealings at all... We are wholly taken up with "now." Dark, unbelieving reasonings fill our minds. Then those precious words fall on the ear in a still small voice: "What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand."
- Not humility. Peter could already see the Lord stooping. If that were the whole lesson, the Lord would not have told him to wait.
- Peter's "now." He saw the act but not its meaning. The gap was real.
- The "afterward." The Holy Spirit came, and the gap closed. Life in Christ alone does not supply that understanding.
- The meaning. The washing pictures the Lord's present service for His people from the Father's presence. It is essential to having part with Him.
- Your "now." When you cannot explain what God is doing, the same words hold. Darkness belongs to "now." Light belongs to "afterward."
Peter says to him, Thou shalt never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, Unless I wash thee, thou hast not part with me.
Peter answers the towel and basin with a flat refusal, and the Lord's reply turns a lowly act into the one condition of fellowship with Him. His words "no share with me" raise a question every believer must settle: what is Christ washing, and what do we lose by refusing it?
Peter's "you shall never wash my feet" sounds like reverence, but it puts his own sense of fitness above his Master's judgment. One writer traces what Peter should have reasoned instead:
Now Peter ought to have said, "If the Lord stoops down to wash my feet, it must be because His love is concerned, His glory is concerned, the will of His God and Father is concerned, and, more than that, I need it." For all our needs only give occasion to bring out the Lord's grace and to show His glory. Who then would wish to be without that? So it is not a question of whether it suits me. I am sure I need it. The question is not whether it suits me, but whether it suits Him.
The Lord's wording matters. Older translations read "no part with me" where the ESV has "no share with me," and the point turns on the little word "with." He does not say Peter would have no part in Him. These are two different things:
Notice that the Lord does not say, part in Me. The service of feet-washing is precious, and yet it could never secure "part in Christ." That took the greater work of the Cross. Once accomplished, that work can never be repeated, and it has secured part in Christ for ever to every believer. Feet-washing is an earthly picture of a service that continues in heaven. That service lets believers on earth hold communion with Christ in heaven. For do not the Lord's words "part with Me" mean communion with Himself?
The reason for the basin is the road. What He began with water He continues by other means:
This assurance is solemn, and not for Peter only. It is for all who make light of the same gracious provision on His part, who forget or have never grasped their own need of it. The question is not so much about life as about fellowship — about a part with Christ rather than in Him, though the two cannot really be separated. Christ was going on high to God; Peter and the rest were still on earth, surrounded by defilements along the way. Christ would neither reduce His love to His own, nor treat their failures lightly. So the disciples' feet needed washing, since walking through the world soils them. And this is carried on by the word applied to the conscience by the Spirit. The believer bows, judges himself, and is cleansed in practice. His communion returns, and he can enjoy the things of Christ. He has part with Him.
The stress falls on the pronoun: if I wash you. He holds the basin, and this is not work we can do for ourselves:
Still the Lord waits on His own, girded, with the basin and towel, ready Himself to do the work so needed, so impossible to do for ourselves. "If I wash you not." So He expects, not clean feet, but feet to be cleansed; and the cleansing is what He has undertaken to perform, and we may safely — though not carelessly — leave it with Him.
Behind the whole scene stands His departure. He is not abandoning them; He is preparing them for the place He is entering:
In John 13 the Lord is sitting with the disciples as their companion in the world. He knew that the glory was His and that He was going to it. In the perfect holiness of His nature He says to Peter, "If I do not wash you, you have no part with me." I am going away, but I am not going to give you up. I must have you with me where I go, and dirty feet will not do for heaven.
Peter's mistake did not stay in the past. We repeat it whenever we hold the Word at arm's length:
Sadly, I fear that too often, like Peter, we resist the wholesome water of the Word — and with less excuse than he had. He might have pleaded that he did not know Christ's intention; we cannot. We know now that He would only shape us by it for deeper intimacy with Himself, for we are His own. But we love too well something He must detach us from. And yet it is Jesus who stoops to wash you! My brother, my sister, can you say to Him, "You shall never wash my feet"? Yet we say it in effect if we are afraid of the truth and try to turn its edge away from us and our ways.
- Part in Him — the Cross secured it once for all; that work never repeats and never fails.
- Part with Him — communion with Christ where He now is, and that is what the washing keeps open.
- His hand alone — the work is impossible for us; He does not wait for clean feet but undertakes the washing Himself.
- His instrument — the Word, applied to the conscience by the Spirit; we bow, judge ourselves, and communion returns.
- His purpose — He is going to glory and means to have us with Him; dirty feet will not do for heaven.
Simon Peter says to him, Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head.
Christ has just told Peter that without this washing he has no part with Him. Peter's answer swings from flat refusal to asking for everything. So what is right in his eagerness, and what is wrong with it?
Peter is the only disciple who speaks during the foot-washing. Each thing he says misses the point in a new way.
"Then He comes to Simon Peter." The others accept the Lord's service in wondering silence. Peter, driven by his forceful character, says everything he thinks. He speaks three times, and each time he exposes his ignorance of the Lord's mind. He first objects to the Lord's lowly service. Then he refuses it outright. Then he accepts it on impulse, but in a way that would rob it of all its deep meaning. Yet, as someone has said, "The mistakes of the disciples warn us, but the answers that correct them teach us far more."
Peter's second answer is wrong, but the longing behind it is not. He has grasped one thing: he cannot afford to lose a part with Christ.
Peter objects to the Lord humbling Himself to wash his feet. Then he learns that this washing is essential if he is to have part with Jesus where He was going. And so we learn more. His wonderful service for us includes recovery from sin and the restoration of the soul. But it goes much further, in love that cannot bear a cloud between us and Him. He provides for the removal of whatever would block the light and joy of His presence. Peter thought he could not have too much of such washing.
Peter asks for his hands and his head because he fears his whole standing with Christ is at risk.
It is a question not so much of life as of fellowship — of a part with Christ rather than a part in Him, though the two cannot really be separated.
The Lord's warning alarms His servant. At once he runs to the opposite extreme: "Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head." Now Peter cannot have too much. He wants the whole bath again, as if all the value of his earlier washing could evaporate, and he needed it as much as if it had never happened. But it is never so. To see and enter the kingdom of God one must be born again, born of water and of the Spirit. But this is never repeated. The new birth allows no such repetition.
In the next verse the Lord answers with two different Greek words. English translations render both as "wash."
The Greek words for "washing" in John 13 differ in meaning, and that difference teaches important truth. The word in John 13:10 is louō, "to cleanse, wash thoroughly." Anyone cleansed in this sense never needs that washing again. He is, as the Lord said, "completely clean." Yet to have "part with" Christ, he still needs his feet washed, because of the dirt he picks up along the way. Here the word is niptō, an action used only on parts of the body.
Peter's words hold the seed of two opposite mistakes. One would make new birth something you can lose and get back. The other would drop daily self-judgment. Christ's reply corrects both.
Christianity holds both truths together. It never weakens the basic and eternal character of the new birth. And it never denies how vital continual self-judgment and confession are. The bathing is never repeated. The feet-washing is always needed here on earth, if we claim to have communion with Christ.
The bathing happens once. The feet-washing is the work Christ keeps doing for those already His. Commentators put the stress in different places. Some stress cleansing from the dirt of the road. Others stress refreshment for a tired spirit.
The dust of the road soils and tires a traveller's feet. In the same way the believer meets the daily round, the duties of home life, the pressures of business life, and the constant conflict with evil. His spirit often grows weary, and that keeps him from sharing Christ's things with Him. He has not done anything the conscience would take account of, calling for confession and the work of the Advocate. His spirit is simply tired and needs refreshing. Christ delights to give that refreshment, if we will only put our feet into His hands.
- Refusal. Peter first says never, then says everything. Both answers are his own opinion offered to Christ, and both are wrong.
- Affection. What drives the second answer is real love. He has heard that this washing means a part with Christ, and he wants all of it he can get.
- Ignorance. Asking for hands and head is asking for the bath again — as though new birth could wear off and need repeating.
- Distinction. The Lord's reply uses two different words. One is a bath given once and never repeated. The other is a washing of the feet we need every day.
- Balance. Hold only the bathing, and you never judge yourself. Hold only the feet-washing, and you doubt your standing. Christ's answer to Peter keeps both.
Jesus says to him, He that is washed all over needs not to wash save his feet, but is wholly clean; and ye are clean, but not all.
Jesus is washing His disciples' feet at supper, and Peter has just asked Him to wash his hands and head too. The answer here draws a line between one washing that happens once and another that is repeated.
Two different Greek words for washing stand behind this sentence, and the priests' service pictures both.
Our Lord washed the feet of His disciples as a symbolic act. He said, "The one who has bathed [Greek louō, to wash the WHOLE body] does not need to wash [Greek niptō, to wash A PART of the body], except for his feet, but is completely clean." The first washing matches the ceremonial washing of the priests all over, which was never repeated. The second matches the washing of the hands and feet at the bronze basin, done again and again.
The full washing belongs to the new birth, and God's grace keeps it in place.
The "washing of regeneration," the cleansing brought about in new birth, never needs to be repeated. Despite everything in this world that works against it, the effect is permanent... In how many ways we are reminded of the unfailing character of God's precious grace! The love that has laid hold of us for eternal glory is not going to be defeated in what it has taken in hand to do. The washing of the feet can be repeated again and again, but not the bathing of the whole person.
Neither washing in this verse is a fresh application of the blood of Christ.
There is the first bathing, the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, which is never repeated. But there is the need of having the feet washed whenever they are defiled along the way. Neither one refers to blood, but to water — necessary as it is that Christ's blood washes us from our sins for redemption.
The water in this scene is a picture. What actually cleanses is the Word, applied to us by the Spirit.
Now water is a well-known symbol for the Word... Paul speaks even more directly when he uses the phrase, "the washing of water by the Word," and this in connection with cleansing — though there it is the Church, not the individual believer (Eph. 5:26). It is very clear, then, why the Lord used water in the scene before us. He was showing that after He left, He would cleanse their feet — their walk — by applying the Word. How, then, is this application of the Word produced? When we sin, the Lord undertakes our cause with the Father. He then exercises the office of the Advocate. The result for us is that the Spirit of God begins to deal with us about it, in God's own time. He brings the sin to our memory and applies the Word to our consciences. This produces self-judgment in us and leads us on to confess our sin, and so we are restored.
If our standing never changes, what does the daily washing restore?
There is no repetition of that first and absolute cleansing of the person. If our feet get defiled as we walk through a muddy world, that defilement must be washed away, because it hinders our communion with Him. And He sees to this as Advocate with the Father, if we sin. The firm foundation of God stands, and our standing remains. But if we defile our feet, He deals with us by His word and Spirit, and so restores the communion that had been interrupted. He applies His advocacy to this need now that He is on high.
The verse closes with a warning: not everyone at that table was clean.
Then note that the washing of the feet, even by the Lord, gave neither life nor salvation. It is not for sinners but for saints, and is done only for the latter. That it gives neither life nor salvation is plain: Judas was not left out of the washing with actual water on that occasion. The time to unmask him had not come, so his feet were washed with the rest. Was the Lord unaware of what this man really was? He told them all that He was not. In the washing of regeneration Judas had no part. Being born of water and of the Spirit was an inward change he was a complete stranger to. Only for those who first have part in the washing of regeneration does the Lord now wash the feet.
- Bathed once. New birth is the whole-body washing, pictured by the one-time washing of the priests. It is never repeated and never lost.
- Soiled daily. Only the feet — the walk — pick up dirt, so only the feet need attention; the standing is untouched by the stain.
- Washed by the Word. The water is Scripture applied to the conscience by the Spirit, not a fresh application of blood. It restores communion, not our standing.
- Served by the Advocate. What the Lord did with water in that room, He now does from heaven as Advocate with the Father when a believer sins.
- Clean, but not all. Judas's feet were washed with everyone else's. The outward act gives no life; only the inward bathing does.
For he knew him that delivered him up on account of this he said, Ye are not all clean.
At the supper table Jesus had just told the disciples they were clean — "but not every one of you." John now explains why He said it: the Lord knew His betrayer, and washed his feet with the rest.
In verse 10 the Lord uses two different words for washing. That difference is what makes verse 11 clear. One writer traces the picture back to Israel's priests, who bathed once when they entered their office and washed again and again for service.
He used two words for wash, the first of which means to wash all over, or bathe. So He said that a man who has been bathed needs only to wash his feet. He was pointing to the two washings of the priests. First came the bathing when they were set apart for their office (Lev. 8:6), which happened once for all. Then came the frequent washings of hands and feet every time they entered the sanctuary (Ex. 30:19). This once-for-all bathing is ours when we are born again... So here, the Lord said to the disciples, "You are clean," adding, "but not every one of you" — with Judas in mind. Despite all his claims to faith, no new birth had ever reached Judas.
Nothing in the account suggests the Lord skipped the traitor when the basin came round.
The washing of the feet, even by the Lord, gave neither life nor salvation. It is not, as we have said, for sinners, but for saints, and is done only for them. That is clear from one fact: the Lord did not leave Judas out when He washed with actual water that evening. The time to unmask him had not come. The Lord washed his feet along with the rest... In the washing of regeneration Judas had no part.
Judas lacked the first cleansing, not the second. So his story is no example of a man losing what he once had.
The new birth holds and is never repeated, because it stays true and good. When one who is born again fails, that failure comes under Christ's active love and advocacy. He brings the soul to judge himself, so that fellowship is restored. Again, the case of Judas is not one of losing life. It shows that he had never been born of God, and no Scripture ever says he was.
Judas kept his place among the twelve disciples right up to the betrayal. The Lord's knowledge of him runs with other moments in this Gospel where He sees what no one else can see.
Until Judas showed himself by betraying the Lord, he had his place among the apostles. We learn later why he was counted among them — so that the Scripture might be fulfilled (13:18; 17:12) — while the Lord knew all along what he was, and the terrible sin he would commit. No one could deceive Christ. He knew what was in man (2:25). He knew that some of the crowd which had followed Him across the water did not believe (6:64). He knew who would betray Him (13:11). He is a Divine Person who knows all about everyone. He let that knowledge appear only as circumstances arose.
Judas stood closer to Jesus than almost anyone alive. That closeness did him no good at all.
There was one who was not born of water. Satan took advantage of that very one, and all the more because he was so near Christ. Nothing hastens the ruin of a man who has not received life from God like being near Christ. Someone may come into the presence of Christ not to receive life, but to push his own will and his own plans. He becomes nothing but the prey of Satan, and that in the form of direct opposition to the Son of God.
The Lord's service that evening meant something to eleven men at the table.
There was one present for whom it would have no meaning. The Lord has to say, "You are clean, but not every one of you." The betrayer had never been "washed all over." He had never been born again. So he would never feel the need for the Lord's gracious service, and never know its refreshment.
- Bathed — the first cleansing happens once, at new birth, and never again. The washing of the feet that follows deals with the dirt picked up in daily life.
- Missing — Judas lacked the first washing, not the second, so the Lord could not call him clean.
- Outward — the Lord still washed his feet with real water. The act itself gives neither life nor salvation.
- Known — the Lord was never deceived about him for a moment, and John's note says so.
- Near — closeness to Christ without life is no safety. Satan turned the very nearness Judas abused into his ruin.
When therefore he had washed their feet, and taken his garments, having sat down again, he said to them, Do ye know what I have done to you?
Jesus has just washed His disciples' feet. Back in His place at the table, He asks whether they understand what He has done. The answer goes far past the humility they had watched.
Note the change of position. He was down at their feet; now He is back in His own place.
Now He takes up His garments and His seat again, and He is once more the Master among His disciples. He speaks to them all as Master.
He does not explain. He asks. Everyone had seen His humility, but one writer finds a deeper lesson behind it.
The Lord's humility in washing the disciples' feet is beyond question. He had solemnly urged them, in the plainest terms, to cultivate it, as we see in all the Synoptic Gospels. But there is another and deeper instruction. He is about to leave them, and what is on His mind is the fresh defilement they pick up walking through the world. About this He would search their hearts with the question, "Do you understand what I have done to you?" It is indeed His way to teach us later the good He has already done for us. As we grow up to Him in the truth, we understand better what we grasped only a little at first.
So what does the water stand for? One writer answers: the word of God, applied by the Spirit when a believer fails. It never repeats the sacrifice made once for all.
Christ suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous. The power of that sacrifice is as perfect for the believer as His Person is. That is why the oneness of His sacrifice is the great argument of Hebrews 9 and 10, over against the repeated sacrifices of the Jewish system. By His one offering we are not only sanctified but perfected forever. Is there no failure in the believer afterwards? Too often there may be. What, then, is the provision for it? It is the washing of water by the word. The Spirit applies it in answer to the Son pleading for us with the Father. Of this Christ was here giving the sign.
The disciples could not have answered His question that night. They only understood after the Holy Spirit came. Even so, the example still binds us.
The Lord gives what He had just been doing as an example of humility. But they would only understand it spiritually after the Holy Spirit came. Still, we are called in this sense too to wash one another's feet. That means applying the word in grace to the conscience of a brother who needs it, in the humility Christ has shown us. But the teaching points to what Christ is doing for us on high, where He remains always our Servant in grace.
So how do we copy Him? One writer looks first at how Christ treated His own disciples, then at what that asks of us.
How are we to carry this out? As Christ does in His heavenly glory. Look at the way He washed His disciples' feet while He was with them in the world. He patiently bore with all their weaknesses, mistakes and faults. He did it so that He might intercede for them, and remove from their hearts and minds everything that defiled them. In His glory Christ still serves His people in this way. And He truly said, "You also ought to wash one another's feet." He means in the same manner: bearing with their ignorance, errors, weaknesses and faults, and with any defilement that clings to them. We bear with it, I say, so that we might be the means of removing it.
Two things round out the picture. He wiped the feet as well as washing them, and no care we give each other can replace what He Himself does for His own.
And we do well to remember that besides the washing there is the wiping. Once the service is done, treat it as past. Bury the failure that called for it, and never throw it back at the person later. … Such a ministry is valuable when one fellow Christian does it for another in the right spirit. Yet it could never take the place of this kind of ministry from Christ. He must wash His people's feet as they need it.
- He sits. The One who knelt at their feet takes His seat again as Master. The same Person fills both places, and He teaches the lesson as Master.
- He asks. He questions them instead of explaining. His way is to teach us later the good He has already done for us.
- He cleanses. The water pictures the word, applied by the Spirit when the Son pleads for us. His one sacrifice is never repeated. This is the provision for a believer who fails.
- He waits. They grasped the meaning only after the Holy Spirit came. Understanding grew as they grew.
- He sends. What He did for them, they owe each other. Bear patiently with a brother's faults to remove them. Then bury the failure instead of raising it again.
Ye call me the Teacher and the Lord, and ye say well, for I am [so].
Jesus has just washed His disciples' feet. Now He points to the two names they always gave Him, owns both as true, and makes them the ground of everything He asks of them.
Jesus does not wave the titles away as flattery. He accepts them, then turns them into an argument about what the disciples owe each other:
The Lord next backs up what He had done by appealing to the titles they always gave Him. "You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am." He is One to obey as well as to instruct. Where His personal glory is known, it cannot be otherwise. If He then stooped in love to wash their feet, what did they not owe one another?
They say "Teacher and Lord." In the next verse He reverses the order — "Lord and Teacher." That switch has a practical point:
In John 13 the Lord says to His disciples, "You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet…" You will notice that the Lord reverses the words. We do not get the gain of the Lord as Teacher unless we recognize His Lordship. The Lord again said, "If anyone's will is to do God's will, he will know whether the teaching is from God" (John 7:17). So the One who rules comes first. We are often slow to accept divine teaching because we have not bowed to the Lord's authority.
The words "so I am" hold the line. Stooping to wash feet did not lower Him by a single degree:
No humiliation could ever change what He is in Himself. But through it He could bring home to the soul what nothing else could — His own gracious example… As Lord of all, He stands alone, above us all. He cannot give that up, for it would be a denial of Himself. He has all authority to command as Lord, and He will soon reveal it. Yet in His humiliation He gladly gave us an example, so that we should follow His steps. He delights to come down to our level, to raise us to His own glory. This is the way of grace.
Because these titles are true, the way we speak to Him matters:
"You call me Teacher and Lord," He says, "and you are right, for so I am." People have even prayed to Him as "Dear Lord." That kind of familiarity is not quite reverent. We cannot exaggerate the grace of Christ towards us. But as someone has well said, "The personal dignity of Christ is never lost in the intensity and tenderness of His love."
The title is not just a compliment. If He is Lord, then obedience is what the word means:
Our responsibility, then, as servants is obedience. As the Lord said to certain professors, "Why do you call me 'Lord, Lord,' and not do what I tell you?" (Luke 6:46). Or, as He said to His disciples, "You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet" (John 13:13-14). The moment Christ is revealed to us as our Saviour, and we acknowledge Him as our Lord, we should take Saul's attitude. He said, "Lord, what will you have me to do?"
He tells them their words are right. The last question is what stands behind the words — and older translations say "Master" where the ESV says "Teacher":
How far do we know the joy of this recognition of the Lord as Master? We call Him Master and Lord, and we say well, but do we do the things He says, for that is surely better?
- Say well. He does not correct the two names — Teacher and Lord. He confirms them: "so I am."
- Bow first. He puts Lord before Teacher. We gain from His teaching only once we bow to His authority.
- Stoop, not shrink. No humiliation changed what He is. He came down to our level to raise us to His glory.
- Speak reverently. His personal dignity is never lost in the tenderness of His love — nearness is not familiarity.
- Do better. Saying well is right. Doing what He says is better.
If I therefore, the Lord and the Teacher, have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one another's feet;
Jesus has just washed His disciples' feet, and now He takes His seat at the table again. He turns what He did into a claim on them — but is He asking for a ceremony to repeat, or for a service His people owe each other for life?
The disciples had two regular titles for Him. He quotes them back, but not in the order they used, and one writer draws a lesson from the switch:
They called Him Teacher and Lord, and He approves this, yet He Himself reverses the order (v. 14). We too often treat teaching as the most important thing, as if His Lordship grew out of His teaching. But Lordship comes first. Once we submit to His authority, His teaching has its proper value and bears proper fruit.
Some have taken these words as setting up a ceremony to keep. One writer reads them differently, and gives his evidence:
Formalism loses the blessing of our Lord's act by copying it literally. He did not set it up as a lasting ceremony. Acts and the Epistles, for instance, speak often of baptism and the Lord's Supper, but they do not speak of the washing of feet in the same way. That, along with its clear symbolic character, should keep us from misunderstanding this simple act.
If the washing is symbolic, so is the duty. The service He hands over is the Word applied in grace to a believer who has gone wrong, and it asks something of the one who gives it:
We ought to be able and willing to help each other. It is not feet-washing to point out the fault of another. If you are going to wash another's feet, you must get down low enough yourself... We are still called to wash one another's feet, to apply the Word in grace to the conscience of an erring brother or sister who needs it. But to really do this we must be in the humility of Christ, so blessedly shown in this heart-touching scene.
There is also a question of timing. A person in need of the service himself is in no state to give it:
Notice in passing: when we ourselves need our feet washed to be restored, it is not the moment to try to wash our brothers' feet.
The danger is doing the right thing in the wrong spirit. Correction can look like this service and be its opposite:
If He then stooped in love to wash their feet, what did they not owe one another?... On the one hand, it needs faith and self-denial and divine affections. Indifference about it shows up our own failure. But on the other hand, the righteousness that condemns another is as far as possible from washing the feet. It looks more like the whip than the service of the towel and basin. And if grace is needed to bear the washing, far more of it must be at work to wash another's feet.
The duty never expires, because the Master never stopped the work. He carries it on from heaven, and He looks for the same care among His people on earth:
He expects to see, among us on earth, the copy of what He is doing for us in heaven. He is there daily washing our feet, bearing our need and dealing with our defilement before the throne. And He would have us daily washing one another's feet, bearing one another's weaknesses and helping one another's joy, here on earth, His footstool.
The Lord did not only wash; He wiped. One writer draws a practical rule from that second detail:
None of us can take up such a work without real love for the other person and a true desire for his good. And we do well to remember that beside the washing there is the wiping. Once the service is done, count it a thing of the past. Bury the failure that called for it, and never bring it up against the person again.
- Bow first. He puts Lord before Teacher. His teaching only bears fruit in those who submit to His authority.
- Stoop lower. He stooped in love, so what we owe Him we now owe each other. He still washes feet from heaven and looks for the same care on earth.
- Word, not rite. The service is the Word applied in grace to a believer's conscience, not a ceremony to repeat.
- Towel, not whip. Pointing out a fault is not feet-washing. Harsh criticism is the opposite of the basin, and not caring at all exposes our own failure.
- Wash, then wipe. Once the service is done, bury the failure. Never raise it against the person again.
for I have given you an example that, as I have done to you, ye should do also.
The night before the cross, Jesus rose from supper and took a towel. He washed the feet of His own disciples. Then He sat down again and told them why. His word "example" raises a question. Was He starting a ceremony? Or was He giving His disciples a lasting pattern of love that reaches far beyond a basin of water?
Everything here turns on who was doing the washing. One writer points to Peter's reaction:
The Lord Jesus Christ did not wash the feet of the apostles that evening simply to teach a lesson in humility. All must understand this: here He gives us an example of stooping to lowly service for other Christians. Peter's exclamation, "Lord, do you wash my feet?" tells us what he thought of the act... He has stooped in a way and to a degree impossible for us. He, our Lord and Master, has stooped to serve His disciples. They may well stoop to serve one another.
One writer settles the ceremony question from verse 7:
Verse 7 is clear proof that the Lord did not mean His disciples to keep up a merely literal washing of feet. He meant something more important, and feet-washing is a picture of it. It speaks of the word of God applied to the details of our walk through a defiling world (Ephesians 5:26). If the defilement is to go, contact with defilement needs contact with the word. And who is more gentle and thorough than the Lord Jesus in applying that word?
So the service He models is one Christians still owe each other daily:
This feet washing is the lowly ministry of applying the word of God to the need of one another's souls, for the cleansing or preservation from the defilement of our daily contacts with the world. We all need this restoring ministry, and we should all engage in it for the help of one another.
The verse does more than tell disciples what to do. It tells them how far. One writer notes how long Peter carried the memory of that night:
Peter never forgot it. Twenty-five years later, in his first letter, he urges his fellow disciples to be "clothed with humility" (1 Peter 5:5)... The apostle could never forget the sacred head bowed over his unworthy feet... The Lord Himself sets the measure and the standard: "just as I have done to you" (John 13:15). This goes beyond the golden rule. It gives us not merely an ethic but an Example to copy. My debt to Him is the measure of my debt to my brothers.
The manner matters as much as the act. Fault-finding can look like obedience and be its opposite:
Here is a definite call to share His grace in seeking each other's restoration where failure has come in. It comes at the very point where we are most likely to fail. On the one hand it needs faith, self-denial and divine affections. Indifference about it exposes our own failure. On the other hand, the righteousness that censures another is as far as possible from washing the feet. It looks like the whip, not the service of the towel and basin. And if grace is needed to receive the washing, far more must be at work to do the washing.
Another writer names why the person fell, and where the helper must be:
Anyone who wants to cleanse another's feet must be down at his feet to do it. The soul that has fallen into sin has fallen because it has got away from the Source of holiness and strength.
What He did with water that night, He continues now from glory:
When Christ was with His disciples in the world, He bore patiently with all their weaknesses, errors and defects. He did it so that He might intercede for them and remove from their hearts and minds everything that defiled them. And so in His glory Christ is always serving His people this way. He truly said, "You also ought to wash one another's feet." He meant it in the same way: bearing patiently with their ignorance, errors, weaknesses, defects, any defilement that clings to them.
To refuse this service is no small omission:
The Lord knew the end from the beginning. He knew how soon His ministry would sink into a worldly institution. It would become a title of pride instead of a work of faith and labour of love... To refuse His service of washing the feet of His own is to set oneself above the Lord. It is to claim a greater place than He who sends even an apostle.
The action had two halves, and we tend to remember only the first:
And we do well to remember that beside the washing there is the wiping. Once the service is done, we should count it a thing of the past. We should bury the failure that called for it, and never bring it up against the person later.
- He stooped — the Lord and Master stooped to serve His own. He went lower than we ever can, so we may well stoop for each other.
- He meant more than water — not a ceremony, but the word of God brought to bear on a fellow believer's walk.
- He set the measure — "just as I have done to you" gives not a rule to keep but a Person to copy. Your debt to Him measures your debt to others.
- He rules out the whip — censure is the whip, not the towel. Get down at your brother's feet, wash, then wipe, so the failure stays buried.
- He still does it — Christ serves His own from glory today. To refuse to join Him is to claim a place above His.