Monday, May 31, 2010

Party favors! (John 13:12-15)

So you wanna throw an old school dinner party. And by old I mean ancient. Like 2000 year old school. First off, it's important to remember that most of the streets of the time aren't paved and everyone wears sandals. That means everyone's got really dirty feet. It was common courtesy to offer a nice foot washing to the guests on the way in. According to etiquette you have a couple options. You could give them some water and say, “Have at it!”, or if you really like them you have someone wash their feet for them. So who's ready to volunteer for crusty foot washing duty? This job was so undesirable that Jewish socialites wouldn't let their Jewish servants do it. It was relegated to the heathen servants. Basically whoever was lowest on the totem pole was the foot washing machine.

But when Jesus threw his last party he demanded to take the role. That would be kinda like walking into the Trump Towers and seeing Donald Trump shining everyone's shoes for free. Jesus is setting the example of humble servitude. And after the demonstration, he says it's the disciples turn.

To express the idea of the serving attitude being handed down through the generations, I portrayed foot washing passing on to people of different eras. At the time, I didn't realize that the ceremonial foot washing is still commonly practiced in many churches across the board. It is mostly associated with the Maundy Thursday service since that coincides with Jesus' original example.


If you keep a foot washing basin at your front door:

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