Today marks forty days before Easter. Join us in making time for quiet moments in the presence of Jesus this Easter season.
Read: John 13: 1-17
Reflect: It’s amazing how even very young children imitate their parents, copying facial expressions, or echoing a turn of phrase, sometimes without knowing what the words mean. Humans are imitators. We do what we see, even more often than we do what we’re told.
At the end of John’s Gospel, Jesus gives what is sometimes called his final sermon. It’s four chapters long. Jesus’s love for his disciples, and all believers, overflows in his words. He is preparing them for his death and his resurrection. But the miracle the disciples are about to witness—the single greatest act of love of all time—defies understanding. It’s a lot of information to take in, and the disciples seem confused by most of it.
Jesus knows all about human frailty. And maybe that’s why, before he begins his long sermon, he shows his love through action.
John tells us the story in true eyewitness detail. Jesus takes off his outer clothing, fills a bowl with water, and grabs a towel. But John doesn’t say that Jesus says anything. He does something. He washes the disciples’ feet.
The whole Easter story is told in this simple action of great love. Jesus, God in flesh, puts on servant’s clothes and kneels down to touch the most dirty, hurting, and stinky parts of us. He sees our need. By humbling himself, he makes us clean.
Like the disciples, we have a lot of information coming at us all the time and from every direction. We have more answers at our fingertips than at any other time in history. But all that information makes us more anxious than joyful. It makes us lonelier rather than more connected.
Words and information can fail us. But often, in those moments, actions are clear.
After washing his disciples’ feet, Jesus tells them, “Now wash each other’s feet.”
Even if the disciples missed most of what Jesus said, if they imitated his act of service and love, they’d get his heart, and they would carry it to others.
During the Easter season, believers serving with Every Home carry Christ’s love through action all over the world. Sometimes, they literally wash feet. Many churches host creative events, and Every Home teams give small gifts, like garden seeds, to families in need. Easter Outreaches represent a unique opportunity to show Jesus’s love. You can help show the love of Jesus through action when you give!
