Tag Archives: Passover

Be the servant of all

Jackson and Lauren wash each other's feet

Jackson and Lauren wash each other’s feet

Tonight the kids and I gathered around a bowl sloshing with water, our pant legs rolled up. We took turns wrapping a towel around us, and washing each other’s feet. The floor got soaked and the water grew dirty, but our hearts were brimming.

On the night before Jesus was crucified, He gathered His disciples for their last supper together. As they began the Passover celebration, Jesus got up and began to serve His friends in the most humbling way. The King of Kings took off His outer garment, wrapped a towel around His waist, and washed the disciples feet. He wanted them to know how much He loved them, and demonstrate how we are to serve each other.

Read more about Jesus serving His disciples in John 13:1-18.

Learn more about 2 Weeks 2 the Cross and explore ways to experience Easter in a meaningful way with your family.

Thankful: God came to serve

Whoever wants to be first among you must be a slave to all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life–a ransom for many.

– Mark 10:44

Today, I am thankful that God did not send His Son into the world to be served, but to serve.

Jesus showed us what it means to serve, to freely display love through action. The night before He would carry the cross through Jerusalem’s streets, Jesus took on the form of a slave to preview the extent He was willing to go to redeem mankind.

Jesus knew that the Father had given everything into His hands, that He had come from God, and that He was going back to God. So He got up from supper, laid aside His robe, took a towel and tied it around Himself. Next, He poured water into a basin and began to wash His disciples’ feet and to dry them with the towel tied around Him.

– John 13:3-5

Jesus humbled Himself to show His disciples, and us, that love means serving. It requires us to set aside our wants and desires to meet the needs of others. God knew our desperate state. He understood that our lives needed to be cleaned, and we could only be made right with God by His Son making the way through sacrifice. Jesus did not come to demand our worship and praise, though that is what He deserved as the Lord of Lords. He came to serve and give His life as a ransom, to purchase our freedom from sin.

So even with all the power and rightful authority He possessed, Jesus wrapped a towel around His waist and began, one by one, to wash His disciple’s feet during their last Passover together. With the cross before Him, Jesus spent some of His last treasured moments with His friends knelt down before them, removing their sandals and wiping off the dirt.

God’s example to us in the Upper Room is also our challenge.

You call Me Teacher and Lord. This is well said, for I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example that you also should do just as I have done for you.

– John 13:14-15