Anything Except His Feet – John 13-15

Joy: You’re listening to Season 2 of the Lifting Her Voice podcast.   This is Episode #314 and today we’ll read John chapters 13-15 together.   One who has bathed doesn’t need to wash anything except his feet, but he is completely clean.

Welcome

Welcome to the Lifting Her Voice podcast, Season 2!  I’m your host, Joy Miller, and I invite you to grab your Bible and join me – from the beginning – simply reading God’s word together.  We built some spiritual muscles in 2020 with just the New Testament.  But this year we’re going all out, cover-to-cover, Old Testament and New.  So, whether with your first cup in the morning, your commute to work, or as the last thing on your mind before sleep, God’s Word will equip you for every good work.  I’m really glad you’re here!

John Chapter 13

Jesus Washes His Disciples’ Feet

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.”

The Meaning of Foot Washing

When Jesus had washed their feet and put on his outer clothing, he reclined again and said to them, “Do you know what I have done for you? You call me Teacher and Lord — and you are speaking rightly, since that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done for you.

“Truly I tell you, a servant is not greater than his master, and a messenger is not greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.

“I’m not speaking about all of you; I know those I have chosen. But the Scripture must be fulfilled: The one who eats my bread has raised his heel against me. I am telling you now before it happens, so that when it does happen you will believe that I am he. Truly I tell you, whoever receives anyone I send receives me, and the one who receives me receives him who sent me.”

Judas’s Betrayal Predicted

When Jesus had said this, he was troubled in his spirit and testified, “Truly I tell you, one of you will betray me.”

The disciples started looking at one another — uncertain which one he was speaking about. One of his disciples, the one Jesus loved, was reclining close beside Jesus. Simon Peter motioned to him to find out who it was he was talking about. So he leaned back against Jesus and asked him, “Lord, who is it?”

Jesus replied, “He’s the one I give the piece of bread to after I have dipped it.” When he had dipped the bread, he gave it to Judas, Simon Iscariot’s son. After Judas ate the piece of bread, Satan entered him. So Jesus told him, “What you’re doing, do quickly.”

None of those reclining at the table knew why he said this to him. Since Judas kept the money-bag, some thought that Jesus was telling him, “Buy what we need for the festival,” or that he should give something to the poor. After receiving the piece of bread, he immediately left. And it was night.

The New Command

When he had left, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man is glorified, and God is glorified in him. If God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once. Little children, I am with you a little while longer. You will look for me, and just as I told the Jews, so now I tell you, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come.’

“I give you a new command: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you are also to love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

Peter’s Denials Predicted

“Lord,” Simon Peter said to him, “where are you going?”

Jesus answered, “Where I am going you cannot follow me now, but you will follow later.”

“Lord,” Peter asked, “why can’t I follow you now? I will lay down my life for you.”

Jesus replied, “Will you lay down your life for me? Truly I tell you, a rooster will not crow until you have denied me three times.

John Chapter 14

The Way to the Father

“Don’t let your heart be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? If I go away and prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you to myself, so that where I am you may be also. You know the way to where I am going.”

“Lord,” Thomas said, “we don’t know where you’re going. How can we know the way?”

Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will also know my Father. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

Jesus Reveals the Father

“Lord,” said Philip, “show us the Father, and that’s enough for us.”

Jesus said to him, “Have I been among you all this time and you do not know me, Philip? The one who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words I speak to you I do not speak on my own. The Father who lives in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me. Otherwise, believe because of the works themselves.

Praying in Jesus’s Name

“Truly I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do. And he will do even greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, I will do it so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.

Another Counselor Promised

“If you love me, you will keep my commands. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever. He is the Spirit of truth. The world is unable to receive him because it doesn’t see him or know him. But you do know him, because he remains with you and will be in you.

The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit

“I will not leave you as orphans; I am coming to you. In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me. Because I live, you will live too. On that day you will know that I am in my Father, you are in me, and I am in you. The one who has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. And the one who loves me will be loved by my Father. I also will love him and will reveal myself to him.”

Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, “Lord, how is it you’re going to reveal yourself to us and not to the world?”

Jesus answered, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. The one who doesn’t love me will not keep my words. The word that you hear is not mine but is from the Father who sent me.

“I have spoken these things to you while I remain with you. But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and remind you of everything I have told you.

Jesus’s Gift of Peace

“Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Don’t let your heart be troubled or fearful. You have heard me tell you, ‘I am going away and I am coming to you.’ If you loved me, you would rejoice that I am going to the Father, because the Father is greater than I. I have told you now before it happens so that when it does happen you may believe. I will not talk with you much longer, because the ruler of the world is coming. He has no power over me. On the contrary, so that the world may know that I love the Father, I do as the Father commanded me.

“Get up; let’s leave this place.

John Chapter 15

The Vine and the Branches

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. Every branch in me that does not produce fruit he removes, and he prunes every branch that produces fruit so that it will produce more fruit. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.

“Remain in me, and I in you. Just as a branch is unable to produce fruit by itself unless it remains on the vine, neither can you unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. The one who remains in me and I in him produces much fruit, because you can do nothing without me. If anyone does not remain in me, he is thrown aside like a branch and he withers. They gather them, throw them into the fire, and they are burned. If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you want and it will be done for you. My Father is glorified by this: that you produce much fruit and prove to be my disciples.

Christlike Love

“As the Father has loved me, I have also loved you. Remain in my love. If you keep my commands you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love.

“I have told you these things so that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete.

“This is my command: Love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this: to lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants anymore, because a servant doesn’t know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me, but I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce fruit and that your fruit should remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he will give you.

“This is what I command you: Love one another.

Persecutions Predicted

“If the world hates you, understand that it hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own. However, because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of it, the world hates you. Remember the word I spoke to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours.

“But they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they don’t know the one who sent me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin. Now they have no excuse for their sin. The one who hates me also hates my Father. If I had not done the works among them that no one else has done, they would not be guilty of sin. Now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. But this happened so that the statement written in their law might be fulfilled: They hated me for no reason.

The Counselor’s Ministry

“When the Counselor comes, the one I will send to you from the Father — the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father — he will testify about me. You also will testify, because you have been with me from the beginning.

Close

Ya gotta love Peter.  “Lord, not only my feet, but also my hands and my head.”  But is he alone in this?  How many of us want to get saved again?  Respond to the altar call a second time.  You know…just in case the first one didn’t take.  Or maybe we could do it better this time.

 Jesus’ response says it all. “One who has bathed,” Jesus told him, “doesn’t need to wash anything except his feet, but he is completely clean.”  

If we’re bathed, in other words, believed and begun our life of following Jesus, we’re clean.  We don’t need to do it again.  We will mess up…our feet will get dirty every day.  For that we have to ask forgiveness…wash our feet.

Apparently, Judas Iscariot had never bathed.  He talked a good story, was a member of the Twelve…everybody thought he was clean.  But Jesus knew his heart.  You are clean, but not all of you.”  

 Prayer

Let’s pray.  Lord, nobody wants to be Judas.  You know our hearts, Lord.  If we need to be corrected, please do that.  Show us what to do.  Make us clean.  You are kind and merciful and we trust You with our hearts.  We are so grateful for this wonderful gift of grace You have given us.  We really can be clean!  We praise You for that.  Amen.

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Thank you for joining me here today.  I pray that by spending time in His Word every day, you will be changed.  Visit me at Lifting Her Voice.com with your comments and questions.  And don’t forget to visit the Blog page while you’re there.  If you like the podcast, it would be great if you’d give it a five-star review and share it with everyone you know.  Don’t forget to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.  See you tomorrow!

Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Christian Standard Bible(r), Copyright (c) 2017 by Holman Bible Publishers. Used by permission. Christian Standard Bible(r) and CSB(r) are federally registered trademarks of Holman Bible Publishers.