Our beautiful opening prayer asked us to ponder:
What is the mind of Jesus?
How is God at work in us?
There is so much going on between Palm Sunday it is easy to miss how John’s Gospel describes the mind of Christ. Only John tells how “Jesus got up from the table, hung up his outer robe, wrapped a towel around his waist as an apron, poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and then to wipe them dry with a towel.” Did the disciples immediately notice Jesus quietly washing feet or were they arguing about what, “This my body, broken for you” means? “When Jesus got to Simon Peter, Peter protested saying “you will never wash my feet!” Why did Peter resist? Peter was tasked with preparing the Passover meal, so perhaps he was embarrassed that they forgot to arrange for someone to do the footwashing? (Luke 22) Perhaps, Peter thought that footwashing was below Jesus’ position, status, or dignity. Jesus assures Peter, “You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand.” Peter pushes back, “You will never wash my feet”, until Jesus responds “unless I wash your feet you will have no part in me”
After washing everyone’s feet Jesus returned to the table and asked, “Do you know what I have done for you? You call me Teacher and Lord, and that is proper. If I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. I have set an example, that you also should do as I have done…... I am giving you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another”. (John 13) How can our washing of someone’s dirty feet be an essential part of following Christ? What do we do with this symbol-act of Jesus washing our feet?
At age 16, Rob Newton started working in restaurants as a dish washer. Now an executive chef, Rob told Food and Wine how “he feels a visceral pinch and panic if a dishwasher calls out sick… It’s a thankless, steamy, wet job, and if they go down, everything crashes.” You can’t cook without clean utensils. pots and dishes, and restaurants do not keep an endless supply of pot and plates. During my first summer doing summer missions, the dishwasher quit. So along with leading morning devotionals, leading recreation, and being a counsellor, I washed the morning and lunch dishes. The worst day was “spaghetti” day. You might be surprised what gross things middle schoolers can do with their lunch trays. It was an essential but not glamorous job, foodandwine.com/fwpro/the-toughest-job-in-a-restaurant
Out for a magical evening we can imagine we are the most important people in the world. Having once suffered a week with salmonella: let me assure you that an unwashed prep knife can ruin 8-10 days. You are not the most important person in the restaurant? Are we mindful of the dishwasher? Could we imagine Jesus washing our dishes or cooking our meal? Do we affirm the sacred worth of everyone we meet?
When we see the sacred worth of people it changes how we treat people, how we serve them! I had to ask, who are you, when I saw my dad, the old master sergeant standing in front of a changing table and cooing to his grandson, “Who made a stinky? Did you make a stinky” Love changes our tone. They will know we are Christians by our love .
Paul invites us to live within Jesus’s mindset : Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind.
Having one spirit and one mind does not mean we all agree about everything. It means we are all rooting for each other- we serve each other- we are no longer transactional. Knowing we are loved we want love to be our way of life . One chapter after speaking of being of one mind, Paul writes “Not that I have already reached the goal, but I press on to lay hold of that for which Christ has laid hold of me… I press on toward the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus. Let those of us, who are mature, think this way, and if you think differently about anything, this, too, God will reveal to you.” That is good news to understand that we can think differently and still be one in Christ.
Paul continues
Do not act out of selfish ambition or vain conceit.
Rather, in humility value others above yourselves,
Do not look only to your own interests
but care about others as much as you care about yourself.
Paul is not calling us to toxic theology that forgets we are made in “the very image of God!” We are called to imitate Jesus who took care of people, offered health care, offered good news to poor people, dined with outcasts, fed thousands, flipped over unjust tables, and washed feet. We are called to promote human flourishing (Matthew 6 and 25) This is what we do with any power we have, we serve people, because we see everyone’s sacred worth
In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, Christ made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a human, Christ humbled himself by becoming obedient to death— even death on a cross!
Imagine God serving humanity. Imagine the Creator serving the creation. Imagine God emptying gods-self of everything but love. Imagine leaving Heaven’s perfection to live with us. Imagine trading heaven with no tears, no sorrow, no death, no hatred, no vengeance, no sin, no injustice, no betrayals, no denials, no mockery, no crucifixion, and no death to be with us. Imagine God washing our feet. Imagine God crucified. Imagine God loving us so much to bear all injustice, evil and oppression to show us how to break the cycle of recrimination, revenge, retribution and to embrace life, healing, hope and resurrection.
- Have this mindset in you so that you sees all people as beloved
- Have this mindset in you so that welcomes everyone to the table
- Have this mindset in you so speaks forgiveness from the cross
- Have this mindset in you that makes strangers feel welcomed
- Have this mindset in you so that you loves
- Have this mindset in you that leaves the table of privilege and washes feet
- Have this mindset in you that knows love so deeply that love becomes our way of life. Amen
