Welcome to Day 38 of Journey to the Cross, a forty-day devotional preparing our hearts for the celebration of Resurrection Sunday. Have you ever thought about what you would do if you knew it was your last day of life? Jesus knew He was about to die, and we see what He did on His last day in John 13.

Before the Passover Festival, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. Now when it was time for supper, the devil had already put it into the heart of Judas, Simon Iscariot’s son, to betray him. 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 outer clothing, 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. He came to Simon Peter, who asked him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?”

Jesus answered him, “What I’m doing you don’t realize now, but afterward you will understand.” “You will never wash my feet,” Peter said. Jesus replied, “If I don’t wash you, you have no part with me.” Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not only my feet, but also my hands and my head.” “One who has bathed,” Jesus told him, “Doesn’t need to wash anything except his feet, but he is completely clean. You are clean, but not all of you.” For he knew who would betray him. This is why he said, “Not all of you are clean.”

John 13:1-11

Jesus was the guest of honor at the evening’s Seder Meal. He knew what was going to happen soon. Yet Jesus demonstrated His love for His disciples by serving them in the most humbling way possible. Jesus stood up and took of His clothing. He grabbed a towel and wrapped it around himself, and bent down to do the work normally reserved for slaves.

He poured water into a basin, got down on bended knees, and took His disciples’ feet in His hands. Then Jesus, God in flesh, began to wash their feet. This job was the lowest of tasks that even Jewish slaves were exempt from it. Foreign slaves were delegated this job. Yet Jesus was not a foreigner. Jesus was a Jew, from the house of David. Jesus was not a slave. He was a rabbi, a teacher with a massive following. Jesus was the Son of God, the Messianic King. Peter had proclaimed his belief in Jesus as God’s “Anointed One” (Hebrew: Messiah; Greek: Christos). Yet the Anointed One, the very Son of God, went down on bended knee to wash His followers feet.

Understanding Jesus’s position, Peter cried out, “You shall never wash my feet!” He refused. His feet were filthy. Jesus’s humble service probably made Peter uncomfortable, for he knew the roles should be reversed. He should be washing Jesus’s feet! Peter was likely thinking that Jesus is the Son of God, his rabbi. He should be the one serving Jesus.

Peter was probably not alone in feeling this way. The other disciples had journeyed with Jesus for three years. They had seen Jesus’s amazing miracles. They had watched Him feed thousands of people with small amounts of food. They had seen Jesus heal lepers and paralytics. They had even seen Jesus raise people from the dead. But on this night, their journey with Christ took an unexpected turn. The Son of God was on bended knee, serving them.

Yet we know what the disciples did not yet know. This was not the lowest Jesus would humble himself. Within 24 hours of this event, Jesus’s humble service would shatter every expectation. He would hang, bleed, and die on a Roman cross. The Apostle Paul wrote in Philippians 2 that Jesus,

“who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited. Instead he emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity. And when he had come as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death— even to death on a cross.”

Philippians 2:6-8

And he challenged the Christians at the church at Philippi, and therefore us Christians today by extension, to “Adopt the same attitude as that of Jesus Christ” (Philippians 2:5). So that is my challenge to you today. Adopt the same attitude of Jesus, one of humble, loving service.

As you pray today, say something like: “Christ Jesus, you stoop to low places to serve your people. You serve without limit. Give me the humble willingness to be served by you. Help me to serve others as you have served me – in humility and in love.”

Thank you for joining me for Day 38. Join me tomorrow, Good Friday, as we talk about God Suffering with Us.