In the beginning the Word already existed. The Word was with God, and the Word was God. He existed in the beginning with God. God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through him. The Word gave life to everything that was created and his life brought light to everyone. John 1:1-4 NLT
Recently, I have been journeying through the Gospel of John and discovering more and more just how beautiful Jesus really is. The entire story of the Bible is about our incredible God who wraps Himself in human skin, becomes one of us, so that He can bring us Home. We know this is done through the very sacrifice of His own life by the shedding of His blood on the Cross for us. He enters into our story, our brokenness, our marring because He loves us in a way that we simply cannot comprehend. The journey of a God with skin on, the God who breathed all that we see into existence, the One who left what was perfect to become one of us will forever wreck me. I am undone. What a beautiful Jesus.
Jesus, who is the Word, who was with God at the beginning enters the human story and does not come as one demanding recognition, but as a servant. God becomes a servant. God comes and shows us the way to real life, real living. It doesn’t look like we would expect it to. If this had been done our way, we would have come, taken charge and forced ourselves upon the weaker. God comes and identifies with the weak, enters into the story of the broken, lifts up the fallen and redeems the human race.
We see this play out so powerfully in John 13 before Jesus surrenders Himself to the Father’s will through laying His life down on the Cross, He is sharing a meal with His disciples. He rises from supper, takes off his outer garment, takes a towel and ties it around His waist. He pours water into a basin, and begins to wash the feet of His disciples. One of the final acts of Jesus before laying His life down was to wash feet. Most people would be running around trying to get in all the last minute things they want to check off their list of things to get done in this life. Not Jesus, He surrendered to the ministry of the towel and basin. God with skin on washed dirty feet. He served and in doing so was laying out an example for them to follow, for us to follow.
What is even more incredible to me is that even though He knew one of them would betray Him, He did not cut him off or cast him away. He washed all of their feet. He served them all. Betrayer, Broken, and Beloved. All were served.
The God who holds this all together by the power of His Word. The one who put breath in nostrils of those sitting at that table, washed their feet. God Served.
If you understand foot washing at all you will understand that it is not something done standing over someone. It requires kneeling. So, Jesus did not just wash their feet, He knelt before them. He moved lower. He entered into the realm and into the place that caused them very likely to make eye contact. They looked down into His eyes. They gazed into the beauty of the Word looking into them, piercing their very souls. The Gospel story is so powerfully beautiful. So incredibly wonderful. So, overwhelmingly humbling.
While there is no way I can fully lay out all that is transpiring at this table, I want to emphasize a few things that move me to my core.
The first being, there is no place God hasn’t gone to reach us. Regardless of how deep into the trenches we have gone, the Word came and made His home there just to be with us. He knows how to take marred and broken things and redeem them. There is no story out of God’s reach. You can’t hide from Him. He is coming for you. He knows where you are and how to locate Himself in your story.
Next, I am overwhelmed when I look a bit more into foot washing in this context. Foot washing was an honour given by a host when you entered their home after travelling on the dusty roads of the Middle East. It served to remove the dirt accumulated by those travelling with either no shoes, or open toed sandals, but it also became a place of refreshing. As the host would wash off the dirt, they would rub oil and those weary feet would be renewed and ready to continue wherever the next part of the journey would take them.
In this case, Jesus is taking the position of the host. Serving and lowering Himself, to ensure those He loves are refreshed for the journey ahead. He knows dark moments are coming for them. He understand the road that lay before them that will bring deep pain and anguish of heart. So He serves them, offering them refreshing and healing. He wipes off the dirt that has accumulated as part of their story and offers them fresh oil for the road ahead.
He, the Word washes, anoints, and refreshes. He gives them what they cannot understand so that when they do understand they will see that they were equipped with all they needed.
The Word has come to us. The Word anoints us. The Word refreshes us. The Word equips us. The same Word that was with God at the beginning, is with you and I right now. This same Word, that took on human skin, picked up a towel and basin to serve broken, marred sons, will pick up your broken pieces and bring refreshing to your life today, if you will just gaze into those beautiful eyes as they pierce the deepest places in you and bring wholeness.