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.
Verily, verily, I say to you, The bondman is not greater than his lord, nor the sent greater than he who has sent him.
Jesus has just washed His disciples' feet and told them to do the same for one another. Verse 16 gives the reason behind that command. He seals it with a solemn "Truly, truly" — and it asks who we think we are, if such service is beneath us.
The force of the verse rests on a comparison. Whatever place a servant holds, his lord holds a higher one — and that higher One has already knelt at the basin. One writer notes that the Lord never gives up His place as Lord when He stoops.
It is the joy of the heart of the Lord Jesus Himself to place Himself in that posture in which He can bring us in to share His own blessings with Himself. As Lord of all, He stands alone, and above us all; and this He cannot give up, for it would be the denial of Himself. He has all authority to command as Lord, and He will soon be revealed as Lord. Yet in His humbling He was pleased to give us an example, so that we should follow in His steps. He delights to come down to our level, to lift us up to His own glory. This is the way of grace.
The verse names two relationships, not one. The second word, "messenger," is the Greek word that reaches English as "apostle."
The Greek word is apostolon (our word "apostle"). At first it meant simply "a messenger, one sent on a mission" (Abbott-Smith). That is how it is used in John 13:16, and perhaps in 2 Corinthians 8:23.
A title that means "sent one" can quickly become a badge. One commentator sees the Lord's double "truly" as a guard against that drift. He then draws a sharp conclusion about anyone who refuses the towel.
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 a labour of love. So He gave His solemn words, as a standing witness to all His own. In a world of empty show and selfishness they are so ready to forget His word and wander from His way. But His warning still stands: to refuse His service of washing the feet of His own is to set yourself above the Lord, and to claim a greater place than His Who sends even an Apostle.
The comparison is almost too plain to need saying. Yet one writer says our pride still acts as if it were not true.
If we are hesitant to obey this word, then we need to be reminded that the servant is not greater than his Lord (v. 16). How vast an understatement is this! Yet in our pride we may too easily act as though we were greater than He! We need this pressed upon us: happiness lies not in knowing alone, but in acting rightly on what we know.
One writer treats the foot-washing as a call to restore a fellow believer who has failed. Fault-finding can counterfeit that work, and it reaches for a different instrument.
Here, though, is a clear call, and this is where we most often fail. We are to share His grace in seeking to restore each other when failure has come in. On the one hand, it needs faith and self-denial and divine affections. Indifference about it exposes our own failure. But on the other hand, the righteousness that criticises another is as far as possible from washing the feet. It looks more like the whip than the service of the towel and basin.
The test is posture. Another writer notes that people copy the preparations but refuse the part that lowers them.
Many are very good at such preparations, but they break down in the actual foot washing, because they refuse to kneel down to reach the brother's feet. They come to him with an air that says, I have come to wash your feet. … One well-known servant of Christ said it well: "If I do not first judge in myself the flesh I see at work in my brother (for the same is in me), I am not fit to wash his feet." If I have been in the dust before the Lord before I go to my brother, I will seem small to him, and so I will be able to remove the dirt gently.
- Rank. The verse fixes a permanent order: the servant under his lord, the messenger under his sender. Nothing we are ever raises us above the One who knelt first.
- Title. The word behind "apostle" means a messenger sent on a mission — a description of work, not a badge to wear.
- Refusal. Turning down lowly service is not modesty; it claims a place higher than the Lord's own.
- Counterfeit. Criticising a fellow believer is the whip, not the towel. Real washing kneels, and judges self first.
- Doing. We know this truth and still ignore it. Happiness lies not in knowing it but in doing it.
If ye know these things, blessed are ye if ye do them.
Jesus has just washed His disciples' feet and told them to do the same for one another. Now He adds a condition: the blessing is not in knowing this, but in doing it.
The verse assumes the disciples now understand what has happened. Older translations word the promise "happy are you," and the writers below use that wording. One writer marks where that blessing lands.
Certainly the believer is not said to be blessed for his doing, but in it... No doubt, it is a day of knowing what God has revealed, and He has revealed nothing more fully than Himself in His Son. But it is a day of obedience for the faithful, no less than of life and peace, and of fellowship with the Father and the Son. Knowledge without obedience is a sad and shameful reproach. "If you know these things," said the Saviour, "happy are you if you do them."
"These things" points back to the basin and the towel. One writer ties much of our lack of happiness to leaving that work undone.
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. "If you know these things, happy are you if you do them" (John 13:17). I think the secret of a good deal of the lack of happiness lies in this. We are not doing this. If we were more eager, in the spirit of meekness, to take the spot off some erring child of God, we would know more of what this means. 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 have the humility of Christ, so wonderfully shown in this moving scene.
Not every attempt to put another right is this service. Kelly marks the difference using the tools of the scene.
On the one hand, it needs faith and self-denial and divine affections. Indifference about it exposes our own failure. But, on the other hand, the righteousness that censures another is as far as possible from washing the feet. It resembles the scourge rather than the service of the towel and basin. And certainly, if grace is needed to bear the washing, a far larger measure must be at work to wash the feet. ... Self is the greatest hindrance in dealing with another's trespass.
The verse follows straight on from the Lord's reminder that a servant is not greater than his master. We need that reminder, because in practice we act as if the opposite were true.
If we are hesitant to obey this word, then we need to be reminded that the servant is not greater than his Lord (v. 16). How vast an understatement this is! Yet in our pride we may too easily act as though we were greater than He! This truth must be pressed on us: happiness lies not in knowing only, but in rightly acting on that knowledge.
Kelly presses the same point to its conclusion: to turn away from this work is to claim a rank above the One who did it.
To decline His service in washing the feet of His own is to set oneself above the Lord, and to claim a greater place than His who sends even an apostle. Oh, for the blessedness of doing as well as knowing these things!
The promise is not only for the one whose feet are washed. The blessing runs back to the one holding the basin.
What is more, feet-washing not only refreshes the weary soul. It also gladdens the heart of the one who does the service. That is why the Lord can say, "If you know these things, happy are you if you do them."
Darby ties this service to Christ Himself. We cannot work it up on our own.
It is the only real service. It is what Christ wants and does about His sheep; loved even if they do fail. It is great glory, the very heart of union with Jesus, if we are permitted and enabled to do it, if Christ does it in us. But this can only be in real union with Him. ... Again, again I say, "If you know these things, happy are you if you do them." Happy! It is the way of happiness.
- Know — you may grasp the basin and the towel completely. The blessing is not attached to that. Knowledge without obedience is a sad and shameful reproach.
- Stoop — you cannot clean another's feet from above him. If it is not done from a low place, it is not this service at all.
- Wash — the work is applying God's Word in grace to the conscience of a believer who has gone wrong. Censure resembles the scourge, not the towel.
- Refuse — holding back is not neutral. In pride we act as if we were greater than the Lord who took the basin Himself.
- Happy — the blessing comes in the doing, not for it. It reaches both sides: the weary soul is refreshed, and the servant's heart is glad.