Good morning!
Welcome to your morning coffee! May our Heavenly Father give us a heart for each other. Father, your son commanded us to love each other selflessly with humble hearts. Humble us. Out of our faith and trust in you, make us brave enough to embrace your humbling work in our lives. Father I am afraid of your work in me to humble me. I would never do it. It must be you, Father. Do for us what we cannot do for ourselves. Make us able to obey your commands. And Father, just as you are willing to love us, let us be willing to obey you! Let us love one another with humble hearts. In the name of Jesus and by the Spirit we ask these things. That we might obey your will and please you.
Your Morning Song: "Hallelujah Anyway" By The Rend Collective Experiment
Your Monday Morning Recap: John 13:1:16 (quoted here v. 14)
If I then, your Lord and Teacher,
have washed your feet,
you also ought to wash one another's feet.
How should we love each other? Is Jesus saying that in order to love one another we have to actually wash each other's feet or does this foot-washing symbolize something more?
Yes.
To a certain extent we each ought to consider the people in our lives that would be blessed by a good foot-washing. I've done it for a few people and each time it has been a deeply Godly, wonder-filled thing.
But Jesus chose foot-washing here to demonstrate to his dearly beloved disciples what they would later realize would be one of the foundational pieces of the formation and flourishing of the church (the people, not the building).
Jesus dressed himself like a slave to wash his disciples feet.
How easy it would be if that was all he was asking us to do! Just make a quick, if awkward clothing change, and just grab some feet for a few moments.
Church, my dear brothers and sisters, Jesus calls us to dress our hearts like those who are a slave to the true needs of all. Beyond a foot-washing, we, each of us, need each other to love each other to such a deeply intimate degree that goes so far beyond a simple foot-washing.
Do we cringe at the grime and the dirt within each other? Do we cringe and withhold our love? Do we groan inwardly when someone takes our "How're you doing?" as if we meant it? When we say that we'll pray for someone, do we? Are we scared to offer to pray for others because we don't want to? Do we only invite people over for dinner that we like? Do we go to a Bible Study only if we like the people? Do we go to Sunday morning service because of what we can get? Or what we can give? Does the idea of loving others in their need sound exhausting?
Let us dress our hearts as the least, as slaves, church. And wash each other's feet, both literally and in all manner of need. And let our human awkwardness at Godly intimacy be the smallest of prices to pay to be known as those who love and obey.
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