That is what servanthood is -- cleaning up other peoples' messes. That is what the Lord came to do. He spent his life cleaning up the messes that we make, putting things back together. He was a servant; he poured himself out even to the point of death.
The thing that is instructive to me is that Jesus poured himself out as a servant even for Judas. All the way through Jesus' association with Judas he was reaching out to him. He knew from the very beginning who it was who would betray him. Many times, through allusions, he would try to draw Judas toward him. His comment in the Upper Room that he was aware of what was going on was one of these attempts. Toward the end of his life, as he approaches the cross and sees Judas moving irrevocably toward betraying him, Jesus reaches out for Judas. Then, in this incident in the Upper Room, he washes the feet of Judas, the betrayer.
Evidently, all through their association, Jesus never gave any hint to any of the disciples that he knew it would be Judas who would betray him. The disciples were not aware of who the betrayer was when Jesus said that one of them would betray him. No one knew. The Lord loved Judas. There was never a hint of resentment, never even one note of bitterness. He just loved him and kept reaching out to him.
What beauty! How awesome is Jesus?!?! Loving even Judas to the very end, washing his feet even knowing what Judas would do within the next couple of hours. God loves us with this kind of amazing, grace-filled love.
Then Jesus commands his disciples to do the same, to be servants after Jesus' heart.
So, could you wash Judas' feet?
Could you wash the feet of a hypocrite? a traitor? a murderer?
Could you wash the feet of a Boko Haram or Taliban or ISIS leader?
Jesus commands us to pray for our enemies and wash each other's feet. Big stuff, hard stuff, life changing stuff of God.
No comments:
Post a Comment