Primary Significance of the Passage

Introduction and Context of the Sermon

0:03 Now may I invite you to turn with me in your Bibles to the 13th chapter of the Gospel of John. John chapter 13, and follow as I read in your hearing the first 17 verses.

0:22 John 13 at verse 1. Now before the feast of the Passover, Jesus, knowing that his hour was come, that he should depart out of this world unto the Father, having loved his own that were in the world, he loved them unto the end. And during supper, the devil having already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray him, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he came forth from God and goes unto God, rises from supper and lays aside his garments, and he took a towel and girded himself. Then he pours water into the basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded. So he comes to Simon Peter, and he says to him, Lord, do you wash my feet? Jesus answered and said unto him, What I do you do not know now, but you shall understand hereafter.

1:36 Peter saith unto him, You shall never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, If I do not wash you, you have no part with me. Simon Peter saith unto him, Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head. Jesus said to him, He that is bathed, he that has had a tub bath, needs not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit.

2:09 And you are clean, but not all. For he knew him that should betray him. Therefore he said, You are not all clean. So when he had washed their feet and taken his garments and sat down again, he said to them, Do you know what I have done to you?

2:29 You call me teacher and Lord, and you say, Well, for so I am. If I then...

2:35 If I then... If the Lord and the teacher have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet.

2:44 For I have given you an example that you should do as I have done to you. Truly, truly I say to you, a servant is not greater than his Lord, neither one that is sent greater than he that sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you, if you do them. Now let us again pray and ask the help of the Spirit of God.

3:14 I acknowledge that standing before you after a hiatus of some five weeks, everything seems strange and looking at things with the one eye and almost feel like I'm preaching my first sermon on the street corner. The Lord knows our frame. He understands all of these things. Let us look to him for his special grace and help.

3:36 Our Father, how we thank you that we are privileged, according to the command of your word, to pour out our hearts before you at all times. And we now pour out our hearts, asking that as we take this portion of your word before us, that the Holy Spirit will indeed come and teach us more about Jesus. You will help your servant that amidst the strangeness of the circumstances of standing again in this pulpit, he may know that blessed ministry of the Spirit, swallowing him up in utter self-forgetfulness, that he may come and minister to your people and minister to sinners. O Lord, come to us in this hour we plead in Jesus' name. Amen. Now as I've already indicated, five Lord's Days have come and gone since I stood behind this pulpit to preach to you the word of God. And the last message I preached was message number five in a series entitled, The Blessings and Benefits Along with the Dangers and Liabilities of the Second Generation.

4:49 And there will be several more sermons in that series that I fully intend to preach, much of the preparation for the next two already being done before the hiatus with my problems with my eyes. However, in the providence of God, at the point in which the retinal tears occurred, and I was under orders to stop reading, I was in the, latter part of John chapter 12, in my own devotional reading through the New Testament. And so when the doctor gave me the green light to begin to read again, albeit with just the one eye as I'm able to, I found myself in those latter verses of John 12 and then immediately into John 13. And this incident of our Lord washing the disciples' feet came with such freshness and power to my own heart that as I prayerfully considered, what I should do in returning to the pulpit, I found myself desiring with all of my heart that in a kind of celebration of the Lord's faithfulness, that I don't stand before you blind in one eye, that I want to set Jesus before you. And that if God is going to give me yet more years to minister, that Jesus, in all the glory and fullness of His own beautiful, and His mighty saving work,

6:17 will in new ways be the great theme and passion of my preaching. And so this morning, and God willing again, next Lord's Day morning, we're going to consider the Lord Jesus under this title, the Savior with the towel and the basin. The Savior with the towel and the basin. And I want you to note with me, first of all, as we look at the passage, and we'll cover, God willing, the first 11 verses this morning, we're going to note, first of all, the setting of Jesus' act of washing the disciples' feet.

The Setting of Jesus' Act: Chronological, Personal, and Dispositional Strands

6:59 The setting of Jesus' act of washing the disciples' feet. If you will look at the text, you will notice that the washing of the feet could very easily have been set before us by moving immediately from the first word, the words of verse 1, down to verse 4. It could read very smoothly this way. Now, before the feast of the Passover, Jesus rises from supper, lays aside His garments, took a towel, and girded Himself.

7:35 And then the subsequent details of the foot washing. But the Spirit of God constrained John to set before us the setting of this act, of foot washing, in verses 1b through verse 3. There are set before us specific elements of this very definitive setting in which the Lord Jesus performed this act of washing the disciples' feet. And I want you to note with me three strands of the setting of this act of Jesus.

8:11 First of all, there is the chronological strand. Third, third, 13.1a. Now, before the feast of the Passover.

8:21 And then as we read down through to verse 2, and during supper. So that this act of foot washing is described first of all in terms of before the feast of the Passover and during supper. Now, what in the world is the significance of this strand of the chronological, chronological setting? Well, we must put ourselves in the mindset of a loyal Jew.

8:53 Furthermore, we must put ourselves in the mindset of our Lord Jesus Christ Himself. In Luke 22 and verse 15, Luke records that Jesus said, with desire, have I desired to eat this Passover with you. This was to be our Lord's last, last Passover with His disciples. And with passionate desire, He longs to eat this Passover with them before He Himself suffers as the Passover Lamb.

9:30 And so as they gather in that room, you'll remember the preparations were made by a friend who had set aside this room. As they gather, the Lord Jesus above all others knows the true significance of the bleating of every Passover Lamb from that night in Egypt when God commanded His people to slay the Passover Lamb and to sprinkle the blood upon the doorpost and the angel of death would pass over them. Jesus knows the significance of the Passover. He knows the significance of every Passover Lamb that has had its throat slit and whose blood has been sprinkled upon the doorpost.

10:15 He knows the full significance of this Passover, the last Passover, that He will meet with His own disciples. He knows that everything in that Passover meal points to Him as God's Lamb who will take away the sin of the world. And so the washing of the feet is in this very distinctive Passover setting with all of its focus of mind and thought upon God's great work of redemption in delivering His ancient people out of Egypt pointing towards His greater work of redemption when He will deliver His people by the suffering of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. But then notice secondly of the setting not only the chronological strand but the personal consciousness strand. John by the Holy Spirit underscores certain aspects of the personal consciousness of our Lord Jesus as He comes to this setting of the Passover and to the washing of the disciples' feet. Now we must not read into this that this is the first time Jesus was conscious of these things but John says that in this event of the act of foot washing these became focal points

11:43 of the consciousness of our Lord Jesus. Notice the first aspect of this personal consciousness is what I'm calling His consciousness concerning the events immediately before Him. Look at the text. John 13 and verse 1.

12:01 Now before the feast of the Passover Jesus, knowing that His hour was come that He should depart out of this world unto the Father. Here is the personal consciousness of Jesus that at this time the hour had come. You'll remember throughout the book of John we read His hour had not yet come. But now the scripture says His hour had come.

12:31 If we look back into chapter 12 verse 23 Jesus answered them saying the hour is come that the Son of Man should be glorified. Verse 23. Verse 24. Verse 25.

12:43 Verse 25. Now is my soul troubled and what shall I say? Father save me from this hour but for this cause came I unto this hour. This consciousness that the hour had come that He should depart out of this world unto the Father but that He would be departing by way of all of the shameful brutality of the cross that He would depart that He would be departing not by a direct translation into His Father's presence but by way of the public rejection the public humiliation the brutality the agony the forsakenness the dereliction of the cross and then by way of the triumphant resurrection and the empty tomb and as our Lord comes to this incident of washing the disciples' feet John is careful not only to identify the chronological setting but this personal consciousness setting Jesus conscious that the hour has come and He comes to that hour not without deep struggles of soul back in John chapter 12 in verse 27 the scripture tells us that He acknowledges openly now is my soul troubled

14:09 my soul is deeply agitated troubled these are adumbrations previews of the agony described in greater detail in Gethsemane but He says my soul is troubled and why is it troubled? because He knows the hour of His suffering the hour of His rejection the hour of His public humiliation the hour of the darkness of the abandonment the horrible forsakenness of His Father that hour has come and there are two mighty streams flowing into and through the soul of our Lord Jesus at this point on the one hand there is that mighty stream of His delight in the presence and fellowship of the Father there is the stream of His consciousness I do always the things that please my Father He could say I know that you hear me always there was the stream of the cultivated consciousness of unbroken communion with His Father and He knows as this hour approaches that mighty stream is going to be disrupted it will for a period of time be stopped up and our Lord does not face the agonies of the cross the physical shame and punishment and pain and the greater spiritual desertion

15:37 He does not face them stoically because He is the God-man He says my soul is troubled it is experiencing tremendous upheaval there is this mighty stream of His cultivated unbroken communion with His Father that He knows will be touched in that hour and yet there is another stream that pours into His soul and that is His resolute commitment to do the will of the Father I do always the things that please my Father this stream that flowed through His soul from the dawning of His consciousness so that as a twelve-year-old lad He says to His mother woman didn't you know that I must be about the things of my Father and now these two streams flowing into His soul cause this great disruption as I meditated upon the passage I thought back years ago when my wife and I were privileged to spend just twenty-four hours in Banff National Park out in the Canadian Rockies and I shall never forget to this day I can relive the scene we came to a place there in the National Park where two mountain streams came together and as they flowed down and joined there was a wooden footbridge over the confluence the coming together of those two mountain streams and from that point on they named it

17:07 the Indians named it years ago kicking horse creek and as you stood there and you stood there you stood on that footbridge the tremendous power as these two streams came together and the footbridge literally shook from the effect of those two streams coming together Jesus is experiencing these two streams coming together in His soul and He says now now is my soul troubled and it will be troubled until the final horrible terror of abandonment is passed and He can say Father into Thy hands I commend my spirit and so it is in this setting fully conscious of what awaits Him John tells us that Jesus knowing that the hour had come that He should depart out of this world unto the Father and He knows that He will depart by means of Judas' horrible betrayal verse 2 the devil having already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot to betray Him verse 11 He knew him that should betray Him therefore He said you are not all clean it is in this setting of Jesus' own personal consciousness of the events that lie before Him that He washes the disciples' feet but furthermore you see in this strand

18:36 of His consciousness He was conscious in a heightened way of His unique position and identity look at another thing that John says Jesus knows verse 3 Jesus knowing you see the emphasis verse 1 Jesus knowing that His hour was come now John says Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into His hand and that He came forth from God and goes unto God rises from supper Jesus is fully conscious not only of the events that lie immediately before Him but He is conscious of His unique position and identity Jesus knowing that the Father had placed all things into His hands Jesus is conscious of His unique identity as God's Messiah to whom the Father has delivered all things with respect to the redemption of His people earlier in John's Gospel chapter 3 and verse 35 this note had been sounded it will be sounded again in our Lord's high priestly prayer you have given Him authority over all flesh that He should give eternal life to as many as you have given Him Jesus is conscious

20:04 before He ever lays aside His outer garments before He ever wraps Himself with the apron the towel-like apron before He ever takes the basin He is conscious that all things all power all right and government in heaven and earth is in His hands and John is careful to underscore that our Lord Jesus did not have a temporary fit of amnesia and forget His true identity as Messiah into whose hands the Father had deposited all things furthermore He is conscious of His identity as the pre-incarnate Word the very Son of God Jesus knowing that He came forth from God and goes unto God this is the language of the Lord's awareness that He came from God takes us all the way back to John 1.1 in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God verse 14 the Word became flesh how did the Word become flesh when He came from God to us by way of Mary's womb He is conscious

21:31 that He is the eternal Word become flesh none of us would say we are conscious that we came forth from God we will say that we are conscious we had a beginning of existence sovereignly superintended by God in our mother's wombs and we have a birthday in which we put in our appearance but to say we came from God would be sheer blasphemy that Jesus is conscious of His identity not only as Messiah into whose hands there has been a deliverance of all things to administer messianic functions and duties and privileges but He is conscious that He comes from God and goes to God remember in John 17 He said Father glorify me with the glory that I had with you before the world was as one author has said when we take the Christ of Scripture we must either curse Him as a blasphemer or fall at His feet and worship Him there is no middle position Jesus fully conscious of His own identity as Messiah fully conscious of His identity as the pre-incarnate Word but then there is a third strand of the setting from the chronological strand the personal consciousness strand there is the dispositional strand of the setting look at it in 13.1b now before the feast

23:01 of the Passover Jesus knowing that He His hour was come that He should depart out of this world unto the Father having loved His own that were in the world He loved them unto the end John says whatever I am about to write concerning the foot washing of the disciples the Jesus of the towel in the basin you must understand this the larger context is His own love His own and having already loved them He loved them to the end and the commentators differ what is the end in view and I will not weary you with the possibilities but this much is clear whatever He does in the immediate context that follows it is impelled by this unswerving love of Jesus for His own whatever He does in His own love that is not bound by circumstances or even bound by the dullness of the disciples as we see it in blabbermouth Peter in this very setting having loved His own He loved them to the end with all of their blindness with all of their spiritual dullness with all of their near sightedness

Cultural Background of Foot Washing

24:31 He loved them He loved them to the very end so that He would not leave them to the end so that He would not leave them to the end in the moment of His love and His love and His love and His love and His love and His love and Standard footwear. Sandals were not something you wore when you were on vacation or went to the beach or perhaps were lounging in the backyard. Sandals were standard fare, not shoes such as we have, but sandals. And dirt roads and footpaths were part of the societal structure. No macadam roads, no concrete sidewalks, so dirty feet from travel were a common experience.

25:32 And in the hot and warmer times when feet would be sweaty, the dirt would cling to the feet, this matter of foot washing was an emerging social custom that had real tap roots in a necessary physical action. Now, there was nothing in Old Testament law that in any way mandated foot washing. And as far as the scholars who know a lot about rabbinic law have been able to discern, there was nothing even in the tremendous proliferation of rabbinical laws about washing hands for this and washing for that and washing for the other. There seemed to be no rabbinical tradition concerning the washing of feet. So as best we can discern, it had become a common courtesy. The washing of the feet had become a universally accepted practice of common courtesy, so that if you were to come to my house, I would be thought boorish, socially incompetent and insulting if I did not make provision to wash your feet, however that provision would be made. And Jesus refers to this in Luke chapter 7. You remember when he's in the house of Simon the Pharisee, he says to him,

26:49 after they're upset when this woman washes his feet with her hair and with her tears, in Luke chapter 7 and verse 44, and turning to the woman, let me get the exact verse, yes, and turning to the woman, he said to Simon, do you see this woman, I entered your house and you gave me no water for my feet, but she has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. Jesus knew that this was a commonly socially accepted custom, and Jesus was offended when he was not shown that common courtesy. Let me say by way of an aside, you young people live in a generation that despises the idea of custom and common courtesies. Remember, it is unlike Jesus to be insensitive to common courtesies. Opening doors, thank you ma'am, yes ma'am, yes sir. Kindly please, it is Christ-like to be aware of those common courtesies, and it is not wrong for someone to feel insulted if they are denied them.

27:58 And if you want to commend the gospel, don't go around denying people the right of common courtesies. That's a little P.S., a little aside, that's a freebie. I think what Pastor Seaton would call a throwaway.

28:11 Now we come back to the text. In that setting, it was obvious that the man who had loathed his life for the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ, was not a Christian. The man who had loaned them this special room. You remember, the Lord sent them ahead into the village and said, you make preparations, and preparations were made.

28:25 It's obvious that that man understood the social customs. When Jesus went to get a towel and a basin, he didn't have to run around and find it. It was there. He obviously set them up.

28:35 A towel was there, a basin was there, sufficient water was there, assuming that someone in that crowd would have been willing to take the place of the foot washer. Now, as best we can do, let's look at this. We can discern from secular sources, among the Jews, peers did not wash one another's feet. If you came to my house, I would not wash your feet, but I would have a servant wash your feet.

28:59 But it would not be a Jewish servant, a Jewish house servant. It would be someone who was a Gentile or a slave. It was considered a very demeaning action. Similar to what it might have been years ago when you didn't have bathrooms with flush toilets, and someone had to empty the thunder jug.

29:17 And so I tried to find some illustration that had a parallel. That's probably the closest. Can you imagine if your task was to empty the thunder jugs? A very demeaning task.

29:27 Well, that's sort of a parallel. That's the social setting of foot washing. It was a social custom that had very real, practical implications. It grew out of necessity.

Description of Jesus' Act and Peter's Objection

29:39 But it was a social custom that had the significance that the servant, the lowliest one, performs the task of washing feet. Now then, having looked at that brief background, cultural background, let's look at the specific details of the act of Jesus washing the disciples' feet. And one of the things that you don't get in the ordinary English translation, though the American Standard tries to capture it, John was there, remember. And because John was there, the remembrance of these details is so fixed in his mind that again and again throughout this narrative he uses what the linguists call, the exegetes call, the historical present. He uses present tense verbs as though the scene is occurring right before his eyes. And then he intersperses it with aorists, which speak of definitive action. So John, in a sense, as he sits composing this part of this gospel, he's reliving the scene.

30:44 He thinks of the Lord Jesus and the self-consciousness of Jesus. At this time, Jesus has a heightened, focused, personal consciousness of what lies before him. He understands the full significance of the Passover. Jesus is conscious that he comes from God and goes to God by way of the cross.

31:07 He's conscious of his identity as the Messianic Lord. All things have been delivered to him. And now what does he do? Well, John with great meticulous detail tells us.

31:19 Look at verse 4. He rises from supper, lays aside his garments, that is, his outer garment, and he took a towel and girded himself. And probably the closest thing to that towel we would have in our day would be a very long apron. And he ties it around his waist and it comes down to his ankles.

31:46 And picture that apron being made of something akin to heavyweight terry cloth. All right? Obviously, that was there in the room. And as they are all reclining, the meal has just formally begun.

32:02 And in the particular social setting, they would have been reclining on mats with a low table, resting on their elbows. As the meal begins, no one has come forward to do the task of foot washing. They're all lying there with their feet going out from the table, dirty, possibly smelly. But not one of them sees the basin and the towel and says, Hold it, fellas.

32:32 We've omitted a vital social custom. And surely with our Lord among us, one of us would count it a privilege, not only to wash one another's feet, but wash his feet. But no one did it. One wonders if they thought about it.

32:51 One wonders if it came to the mind of more than one of them. But not the lowly servant's task for me. Not the lowly servant's task for me. And then as the supper begins, suddenly the Lord Jesus pushes himself back from the table, rises up, goes over to the place where the apron and the basin have been placed, takes off his outer garment, puts the apron around him, takes the basin of water, and begins one by one to wash the disciples' feet.

33:28 Now how far he got and how many he washed until he got to Peter, we do not know. Any attempt is pure speculation. Look at the text. So he comes to Simon Peter.

33:42 He had begun to wash the disciples' feet, wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded, whether he did one of them, two of them, three, four, five, we don't know. But when he comes to Peter, Peter, seeing what's going on, objects and says, Lord, and in the original again, the force is clear, Lord, do you wash my feet? Not, Lord, do you wash my feet? Or, do you wash my feet?

34:12 But it's, do you, sovereign Lord, who has won our hearts, won our affections, whom I have confessed to be Son of God, Messiah, do you wash my feet? There's an incongruity here. Lord, something's not right. Do you wash my feet?

34:40 Jesus indicates, Peter, what I'm doing has a deeper significance than getting the dust and the dirt and the smelly sweat off your feet. Look at our Lord's response. Jesus answered and said unto him, What I do you do not know now, but you shall understand hereafter. Now, if all he was doing was giving an example of humility and meeting this social exigency, Peter would have known.

35:12 The Lord was very conscious that there was a deeper, more profound significance in his taking the place of the common slave in order to wash their feet. And he said, What I'm doing you do not know now, you shall understand hereafter. And that language in John's Gospel points to the hereafter of the death, the resurrection, the descent of the Holy Spirit as the one who will come and take of the things of Christ and reveal them to the disciples. And our Lord says to Peter, Peter, you object to me washing my feet.

35:46 You cannot comprehend the significance now, but you will understand hereafter. You must allow me to wash your feet because it has profound significance that cannot be understood in the present setting. It's impossible. Peter saith to him, You shall never wash my feet.

36:09 And again in the original it's forceful. He uses the word forever. You shall not wash my feet. Unto the ages.

36:19 As long as I have breath, I exist and you exist, you're never going to be found washing my feet. Bible, got no humor. Here's Peter facing up to his Lord just like he did in Matthew 16. The Lord said, I'm going to go to Jerusalem.

36:37 I'm going to be rejected and suffer and die. Peter says, You're never going to die. As long as I have breath, you're not going to die. Now the same Peter.

36:47 Don't you love him? Maybe it's because I see a lot of me in him. Lord, never, never wash my feet. Remember now what Jesus has said.

37:00 This that I'm doing has profound significance. And Peter, you can't understand the significance now, but you will hereafter. And it's so profoundly significant that I'm determined to wash your feet. Notice how the Lord expresses it in the next verse.

37:15 He says to Peter, If I do not wash you, you have no part with me. If I do not wash you, you have no part with me. Now is Jesus saying, If I don't wash your feet here and now, you will apostatize and I will disown you. Obviously not.

37:39 The Lord is speaking in terms of the deeper significance that Peter cannot understand now. And he's talking in terms of the language of that deeper significance and says, Peter, if I do not wash you, you have no part with me. Your relationship to me is determined by whether or not I wash you, by whether or not I take the place of the despised servant in order to cleanse you. Well, Peter thinks he gets the message and so he flips from saying, As long as you have existence and I have existence, you're never going to wash me.

38:16 Now Peter said, Lord, not my feet only, but my hands and my head. Anything that's exposed, Lord, splash the water on it and wash me. If washing my feet secures that I'm saving me, joined to you, then Lord, not my feet only, but do my hands and my head. Do anything that's exposed, Lord, wash me.

38:34 And the Lord answers. Jesus said to him, He that is bathed, he that has had a tub bath, does not need save to have a sponge bath for his feet, but is clean every whit. And you are clean, but not all. For he knew him that should betray him, therefore he said, You are not all clean.

The Primary Significance: Humanity's Defilement and Christ's Unique Cleansing

39:02 Strange incident, isn't it? But I've tried to be faithful to the text and make it come alive so that you read between the lines, not read into it something that's not there, but see and feel what is there. Well, having considered together the context of this act of foot washing, having looked at the description of Jesus' act of foot washing, now we come this morning in the third place to the primary significance of Jesus' act of washing the disciples' feet. God willing, next week, verses 12 to 17 are the secondary significance of the foot washing incident, but it forms a separate area of focus with its tap roots in this primary. But as I've meditated and reflected on the passage, I felt in the interest of time and focus of our concern, we ought to stop this morning with what I'm calling the primary significance of Jesus' act of washing the disciples' feet. It should be evident from our consideration thus far that something more than mere supplying of a social custom is in view. The statement of Jesus regarding the profound significance, Peter, you don't understand now, you can't, but afterward you will, and then his insistence of the absolute necessity

40:30 of the foot washing. If I wash you not, you have no part with me. Jesus' underscoring of the profound significance and the absolute necessity sets the framework for our understanding the primary significance of Jesus' act of washing the disciples' feet. And it's all bound up in these words, and these are the words that have gripped me in the past days.

40:57 Verse 8, Peter said, You shall never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, If I wash you not, you have no part with me. And if there's one part of the passage that I pray God will ring in the chambers of every heart in this place this morning, it's these words from the lips of Jesus. If I do not wash you, you have no part with me.

41:24 If I do not wash you, you have no part with me. If I do not wash you, you have no part with me. Now let me attempt to open up those words and their significance to every one of us. First of all, we are all like Peter, defiled, polluted, and utterly unfit for communion and fellowship with God in virtue of our sin.

42:04 We are all like Peter, defiled, polluted, and unclean in our state of native sinfulness. Remember what the prophet Isaiah said in Isaiah 64 in verse 6, but we are all as an unclean thing and all our righteousnesses, the best things we do, are as polluted garments. Remember in Mark 7, Matthew 15, these Pharisees so concerned about spiritual and ceremonial cleanness and they're upset with Jesus that he doesn't insist that his disciples go through the ritual washings that their rabbis demanded far beyond anything God had demanded in the law. And the Lord Jesus said, your problem is you don't understand spiritual defilement. It is not that which you pick up in the marketplace in touching or rubbing shoulders with a Gentile dog that defiles. It's what comes out of the heart that defiles.

43:03 For from within, out of the heart, proceed. And then Jesus lists everything from pride and evil thoughts and murder and adultery. These, he said, proceed from the heart and they defile the man. Sitting here this morning, there are many things we have in common.

43:22 But this we all have in common. Like Peter, natively, in and of ourselves as sons and daughters of Adam, we are defiled, polluted, and unclean in our sin. And in Revelation 21, 27, we read, And there shall enter therein nothing that defiles or is unclean, except I wash you. You have no part with me.

43:54 Begin to see the profound significance. You won't understand these words now, Peter. But hereafter, when the Spirit comes, and you understand the significance of what I am facing, even now, as I am on my way to the cross, as on my way to rejection, as I am on my way to the Father's frown in the shrouded heavens, being plunged into hell itself, Peter, you'll understand hereafter. By nature, Peter, you, like all the sons and daughters of Adam, are unclean, vile, filthy, and in need of my gracious cleansing.

44:33 If I wash you not, you have no part with me. If I do not wash you, you have no part with me. Why? Because we are all like Peter, defiled, polluted, and unclean in our sin.

44:51 Secondly, it is Jesus Himself and Jesus alone who can cleanse us from our sin. Jesus Himself Jesus alone. Why is Jesus so insistent that He washed Peter's feet? As D.A. Carson has said, if it were only to prove His humility, this would be mock humility. Peter, you've got to let me wash your feet because I'm showing to all you haughty disciples who wouldn't wash one another's feet, let alone my feet. You're a bunch of proud popes that need to be humbled. No, no.

45:29 Jesus is insisting that He washed Peter because He wants to underscore this truth that it is Jesus Himself and Jesus alone who can cleanse us. Peter, if I do not wash you, you have no part with me. Peter, this is not a task for John or for Andrew or for Philip. This is my unique prerogative.

45:58 If I do not wash you, you have no part with me. Peter, I myself am the one who cleanses. I'm on my way to the Father by way of Gethsemane and Gabbatha and Golgotha and Peter. Therein, as you yourself will know, when you write to the saints scattered there in Asia Minor that we are redeemed not with corruptible things such as silver and gold but with the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.

46:31 Peter now sees he's the lamb. He had to die that he alone can cleanse. He himself must cleanse. If I wash you not, you have no part with me.

46:47 And remember who this Jesus is. It is the Jesus who came from God and is returning to God. It is Jesus on His way to die. It is Jesus who having loved His own loves them to the end.

47:02 It is this Jesus who says if I do not wash you you have no part with me. And He says that to every one of us this morning. Judas had his feet washed but his heart was never washed. An ordinance administered by Jesus had no power to cleanse the heart.

The Essence of Saving Faith: Submission to the Cleansing Christ

47:29 It is Jesus Himself, Jesus alone who can cleanse. That's what you must understand. You must embrace. Thirdly, the essence and this is the burden of my heart this morning.

47:44 The essence of saving faith is submission to the Jesus of the towel and the basin. The essence of saving faith is submission to the Jesus of the towel and of the basin. This was a stumbling block to Peter and no doubt to the others though they didn't speak up as Peter. You, Jesus, Messiah, Lord and Master, you shall never wash my feet.

48:19 There is a gross incongruity. You are taking the place of a common slave. And Jesus said precisely and in that lies your redemption. For my Bible says have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus who being in the form of God thought not the being on an equality with God a thing to be grasped but emptied himself taking the form of a slave.

48:52 You see the beautiful external picture of it all. He laid aside his garments, wrapped himself with the towel and took the basin. It was still Jesus. He laid aside nothing of his essential being, just his garment.

49:13 The accouterments of the position of Lord and Master and he takes the form of a slave. When the eternal word left the presence of the Father he did not leave his deity. It is impossible for God to un-God himself but he lays aside all the accouterments and the trappings of heaven, takes the form of a servant and is willing to die a death reserved for criminals. And it is in that way that he provides cleansing from sin and the essence of saving faith is willingness to have the Jesus of the towel and the basin cleansed. You see that is the offense of the Gospel. Lord let me at least have my own little hand towel and scrub a little bit of my own to say all of my spiritual cleansing rest in the hands of incarnate deity smothered with his own blood, bruised and beaten and forsaken by God. That withers every last strand

50:40 of human pride. Nothing, nothing, nothing in my hands I bring simply. To thy cross I cling foul, foul! I to the fountain fly.

50:53 Wash me, Savior, for I die. Oh, you dear children, you hear so much and at times you let yourself get all in a tizzy of confusion saying, am I saved? Here's the issue, dear children, here's the issue. Are you willing, sitting here this morning, to say, not with Peter, you shall never wash my feet, but to say, Lord Jesus, I can't understand why you'd be willing to leave the glory of your Father's presence, the adoring worship of cherubim and seraphim, and angels, and the glorified spirits of just men made perfect?

51:31 Why you'd be willing to come to us by way of a little maiden's womb? Why you'd be willing to live in poverty? Why you'd be willing to come to this incursed, sick, sorrowful, shattered, smattered, bleeding, hurting world? But Lord Jesus, you did.

51:52 You laid aside your garments. You took the towel in the basin. You went to the cross to die for sinners like me. Lord Jesus, I put myself in your hands to be cleansed by you.

52:05 Oh Jesus, of the towel in the basin, I look to no other to be saved. That's what it is, children. Are you willing to be saved by the Jesus of the towel in the basin? That's why he insisted, Peter, I'm going to wash your feet, because bound up in that act is a profound illustration of how it is that men come to enjoy the blessings of my salvation.

The Result of Saving Faith: Once-for-All Cleansing

52:38 And then the fourth thing we see in this text is this. The result of saving faith is a once for all irreversible cleansing from sin. The result of saving faith is a once for all irreversible cleansing from sin. Look at verse 9.

52:58 Peter said, Lord, not my feet only, but my hands and my head. And Jesus said to him, obviously alluding not to this temporary physical act of foot washing, but something far more profound. He that is bathed, he that has had a tub bath, needs not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit, and you are clean. You see what Jesus is saying?

53:24 There is a definitive answer once for all initial cleansing that need never be repeated. Oh yes, it is true that as we walk through this world our feet become soil. There is the ongoing problem of the outcropping of our remaining corruption and our remaining sin. And we need the ongoing foot bath, the ongoing sponge bath of daily forgiveness and daily cleansing.

53:54 First John 1.9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. But oh dear people, grasp what Jesus is teaching here. He is emphasizing here the wonder that there is an initial once for all irreversible cleansing from sin for all who are willing to submit to the Jesus of the towel and of the basin.

54:24 I ask you sitting here this morning, has He washed you? He says if I wash you not, you have no part with me. The bond by which Christ brings His people to Himself is that of the towel and the basin. When we have been brought to the place where we say I am done trying to fix myself up, I am done trying to cleanse myself, it is futile, it is empty, it is useless.

54:58 Lord Jesus, though it is the most unreasonable thing in all the world, that you should take the place of the servant, being found in fashion as a man, humble yourself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Lord Jesus, that you should overcome all of my stupidity and all of my Peter-like nonsense of trying to somehow argue with you that there is some other way. Lord Jesus, Lord Jesus, cleanse me from my sin. Wash me in your own precious blood.

55:37 Lord Jesus, wash me with that washing that need never be repeated, that once for all of the washing of regeneration. It is called by Titus and renewing of the Holy Spirit. Then you understand the significance of the foot washing. The primary significance is not its exemplary standard for the people of God.

56:04 That is secondary. You see, it is only when we are bound to Christ and to one another as the society of those who have embraced the Jesus of the towel in the basin that we really have the foundation upon which to relate to one another with the towel in the basin. That is why Jesus puts this secondary. I have left you an example to do to one another as I have done to you, but the assumption is we can never be foot washers to one another until first of all we have embraced Christ in his foot washing of us.

Call to Embrace Christ's Cleansing

56:47 If I wash you not, you have no part with me. Have you cast yourself upon the Jesus, the towel in the basin? No, no. That one simple question.

57:04 I said if you go out with nothing else, I want these words to ring in your ear. If I wash you not, you have no part with me. If I wash you not, you have no part with me. Has he washed you?

The Sobering Example of Judas and the Overtures of Mercy

57:19 I want to close by sobering you with the thought that Judas had his feet washed. Why? He had not yet left. Read on in John's Gospel.

57:36 It is plain. Jesus even refers to him. He says, you are all clean, not all of you. What was in Jesus' heart when he washed Judas' feet?

57:45 Have you ever thought of that? What was in Jesus' heart when he washed Judas' feet? The same thing that was in his heart when a few hours later Judas leads out the band from the high priest and the officials and comes to arrest Jesus. And when the signal is to kiss Jesus, remember how Jesus addressed him?

58:13 He said, Friend, friend, betrayest thou the Son of Man with a kiss? What was in Jesus' heart when he washed Judas' feet? It was the overtures of his mercy and his grace. Judas, you intend to betray me.

58:41 Judas, I know it. But Judas, I stoop to the role of a common slave and I wash your feet. The door of mercy was still open to Judas. You say, Wait a minute, Pastor.

58:56 It was decreed that the Lord should be... My friend, I leave God to sort out His decrees.

59:00 That's not my business. If Judas had embraced the office of mercy, who would have betrayed him? That's none of my business, none of yours. But I can say to any Judas sitting here this morning who came into this place with a heart set against Christ, wedded to your idols of stuff, Jesus comes to you in the Gospel with the towel and would debase him.

59:32 And He said, I'm yours if you'll have me. I don't understand love like that. As one of the commentators says when the passage says, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hand, why didn't He call down thunderbolts to strike Judas dead? Because it was still the day of mercy.

59:57 And my friend, He could strike you dead. Puny little creature of the dust. You can't draw your next breath unless He gives it to you. Who in the world are you to stand off defiant and say, I will not accept the towel and the basin.

Closing Prayer and Final Exhortation

60:16 Your arrogance is a stench unto heaven. But Jesus still comes to you in mercy. He says, if I wash you not, you have no part with me. So I told the brethren in the back when we prayed, I said, Oh God, if I could ask one thing of you in this day when you've mercifully put me back in the pulpit, mercifully heal my eye that I'm not blind in one eye, Lord above all else, I ask of you that someone this day will come to the Jesus of the towel and the basin and mark this day as the day when Christ cleansed you, when Christ pardoned you, when He welcomed you into the society of those whose feet have been washed by incarnate deity, humbling Himself, taking the place of a servant to secure the salvation of all who will have Him as the Jesus of the towel and the basin. Let's pray.

61:45 Our Father, we are overwhelmed and astounded at our Lord Jesus, fully knowing who He was and where He'd come from and where He was going, taking this place, the common slave, when proud disciples refused to bend and wash one another's feet. Oh, we thank You, Lord Jesus, and we pray that this day You will call many unto Yourself, that the revelation of Your love, love that drove You to the cross, love that enabled You to embrace from the heart the forsakenness of Golgotha, oh, Lord, may that love break down every barrier of resistance and unbelief, and may You get to Yourself this day more of the reward of Your sufferings. Lord Jesus, hear our cry and answer us. For Your name's sake we plead. Amen.