“FOOT WASHING”
Saint John 13. 1-13
Maundy Thursday: 1 April Anno Domini 2010
Fr JW Watson S.S.P.
Before the actual institution of the Sacrament; before the Words of Institution were first chanted by The God/Man (but after some sustenance had been eaten; "supper having ended") The God/Man acted.
At the First Egyptian Passover, God the Destroyer of all un-belief acted. It was only Blood from a Lamb "washed" upon a door that saved the Children of the Father. They were Passed-Over in Gracious Mercy; they were forgiven.
At the upper room Passover, God the Incarnated Second Person acted…but in a different way than one might have expected.
Only someone who has never been catechized, never read the synoptic, or who is in open rebellion to the Way the Lord deigns to work would quibble and carp over the re-telling of the Maundy Thursday events by the fourth Evangelist. As to why Saint John does not repeat the complete Eucharistic words and narratives of Matthew, Mark, Luke and Paul; reasons other than God so wills it, or, the Holy Spirit speaks by the Evangelists how the Paraclete deems (and not your own inner-higher critic nature) will suffice for the believer. All criticisms of God's action and God's record will be answered in paradise.
Foot washing. Even the thought repulses modern Americans. Oh, pampered "lords" and lord-wannabees have no problem with others taking care of their podiatry needs. Everyone relishes a nice foot massage, having bad nails trimmed, and having the soles of hot feet cooled in the burning summer… so long as it's done by some "domestic," some low (or lower) life; maybe a Mexican or some other impoverished minority that is the "object of loathing-du jour." But you would never want to wash the feet of the foreigner, drug addict, A.I.D.s infected homosexual, or sneering atheist.
But God washed feet. Why?
Christ stooped (literally) in menial servitude as an exhortation towards brotherly love. Christians who chafe at the exhortations in Holy Scripture (both from Christ and from Saint Paul's many letters) beware. You have not been called to be an anti-nomian or one who takes Grace for granted. You have not been pre-destined to no acts, but rather have been called from darkness to WALK in the light - - to do "good works."
The Lord was serious when He said "I have given you an EXAMPLE." The 12 were to DO as He was doing. The Church, as Church is to do as its Lord did. So are you. Bear one another's disabilities and shortcomings.
Is telling you to follow the example of Christ Law? Yes, it is insofar as you do not love your neighbor as yourself. Repent, take up your cross and follow Him to Calvary.
For as long as you live on this globe, you WILL soil your feet daily on the earth's filthy pathways. You are called to walk on/in/with (and to remain upon) THE WAY. Thus, in your walk, there must be constant foot washings of those members which carry you.
He also attended to sweaty feet as an example of true humility. He was forming the template that all of His under-shepherds must strain to conform to: being a servant to the Bride; a doulos (a Slave for Christ). For it was the lowliest servant who would be tasked with cleaning the grime and stink from off the feet of honored house guests. Is the pastor acting too much like a C.E.O., college professor, or media consultant…and not enough like a washer woman?
By his actions that night, low to the floor, outer garments off, dealing with dirt, Christ was also imaging His fast-approaching suffering. Scrubbing and rinsing the feet of Philip and Thomas of dust, dead skin, and the smell of death, Jesus was mirroring the same cleansing which He would do on Calvary. The Blood Jesus Christ cleanses you from sin.
And although Scripture makes it abundantly clear that the Lord delights in using "means," instrumentalities, intermediaries, representatives, and physical conduits…here, the God/Man uses His own hands. The very hands which would be punctured in the purging of your blackness were washing away the blackness from the feet of the Disciples.
Johannes Gerhard accurately points out that "feet" are always important. Since sin first physically manifested itself by "walking to a tree" it was "fitting" to wash the feet of the descendants of the Woman and her husband.
There's a reason that the Reformer from Wittenberg also instructs you to daily "drown the old Adam by contrition and repentance." In His action of foot washing, The Washer Himself directs you to daily perform a "spiritual" foot washing, for are not the "feet of your souls" daily covered with trespass grit and smelly caked-on sin?
This too, of course, is why Christ answers Peter the way He does about not needing to be completely submerged in a giant bathtub. Though you have already been completely washed clean of sin in Holy + Baptism, yet the unclean, sinful, lusts continue to stick to you.
You need to daily + "clean up" for as long as you live. But it is still ALWAYS the CHRIST, the Water from His side, which does the cleansing!
Christ FIRST washed the feet of the 12… then distributed the Sacrament. First the work of God's Body, the giving of God's Body, and THEN the giving out of Its MERIT, BLESSINGS, and BENEFITS.
So too, first you confess your debts, THEN you are absolved. First the Law, and THEN the Gospel. First you repent, and THEN you FEAST!
How merciful is your Jesus, not wishing that any be lost but that all might come into His sheepfold. The stooped, disheveled Savior ALSO washed the feet of Judas. To the end Christ douses the satanic flame, the devil's "hot foot" in an attempt to save Judas from his infernal infamy.
Finally, Christ both portrays and fulfills all the Old Testament types contained in Exodus (Exodus 40. 31-38). As Moses was given from God the norming behavior of priests washing hands and feet BEFORE entering the Tabernacle to make a sacrifice or to carry out the Ark of the Presence, so too NOW, Christ the very Sacrifice HIMSELF, would first wash the feet of His own "Levites," His Apostles. These "sent ones" were first washed and then sent, that through the preaching of the Good News, they would complete the true God-pleasing sacrifice of the New Testament. Peter and the others are first washed and then sent out to carry the Throne of Grace for Christ into all the world - - including Shawnee, Kansas.
We might say that Jesus is like the laundry man's soap of Malachi 3.2. For the robe of Christ which glowed with uncreated light from the Mount of Transfiguration (whiter than any fullers' soap could make it), is now this evening the very towel that Christ has wrapped about His Body. The fact that He dried their feet with that towel, that apron with which He was girded, is a visual reminder that is borne out whenever you gaze with faith upon His Holy Crucifix, for there too, He is girded with the apron of humility, servanthood, and love.
You are forgiven all your crimes. You are empowered by His Body and Blood to be what He wills you to be. You are not dirty any more, and your feet smell as fragrant as His Easter Lilies.
No, Saint John did not write about the Supper in the detail of Levi; but Saint John knew that I would stop talking now, and attend to the Supper, FOR YOU, that you might have this night, what John had that Maundy Thursday.
In the Name of The Father and of The + Son and of The Holy Ghost