Tuesday 11th November
Read John 13:6-11
“He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, ‘Lord, are you going to wash my feet?’
7 Jesus replied, ‘You do not realise now what I am doing, but later you will understand.’
8 ‘No,’ said Peter, ‘you shall never wash my feet.’
Jesus answered, ‘Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.’
9 ‘Then, Lord,’ Simon Peter replied, ‘not just my feet but my hands and my head as well!’
10 Jesus answered, ‘Those who have had a bath need only to wash their feet; their whole body is clean. And you are clean, though not every one of you.’ 11 For he knew who was going to betray him, and that was why he said not every one was clean.” (NIVUK)
So often we think in terms of the immediate. We wake up each morning and the troubles of the day break in. Rarely do we lift our thoughts to the largest of pictures: the restoration of all things in Jesus.
Peter is still single-mindedly focused on the immediate. He does not stop and reflect on Jesus’ call for patience and revelation and understanding. Jesus is asking for faith from Peter. Yet Peter can’t get past the ‘wrongness’ of Jesus washing his feet like some slave.
Typically for Peter, he doubles down. Well, he actually ‘infinites’ down! For he declares that ‘never’, literally ‘in all eternity’, will Peter allow Jesus to wash his feet. The irony of making a statement that is so patently caught up in the instant, the moment, was clearly not lost on Peter in the long run. Else how do we read it now?
Peter did eventually reflect and understand, but only through pain and suffering and betrayal. Will you take his lesson on faith? Ponder the bigger picture when things seem darkest and most confusing.
