The Call to Servanthood

Servanthood is among the great markers of the Christian life. The deeper one walks with Christ, the more profound their sense of service runs. The true Christian delights in serving others, for they know that as they serve others they are in fact serving Christ (Matthew 25:40). And what greater sense of satisfaction could a Christian experience than tending to the Savior himself? But the depth of our servanthood runs deeper still. As we serve others, and as we take the lowest role, the most unwanted positions, and fulfill the least enjoyable tasks, we are in fact behaving like Christ himself. In a sense, it is in our most humble service of others, that we most identify with our Savior.

On the night of his betrayal and arrest, Jesus performed an act of service that would not easily be forgotten by his disciples. He washed their feet. In the days of Christ, men typically wore open toed sandals. So, at the end of a day, one’s feet were particularly dirty. What’s more, because of the presence of many animals and the lack of systems for cleaning up waste alongside paths and roads, the role of cleaning feet was particularly unsanitary. According to the norms of their culture, touching another person’s feet was work only suitable for slaves and servants. There was a particular aspect of shame associated with being responsible for cleaning another person’s feet. It was the lowest a person could go. Yet, it is there where we find Jesus.

While there are numerous examples of the shame associated with washing feet in Jesus day, there are no other examples in all of ancient literature of a foot washing performed by a leader. That is to say that Jesus is the first leader in all history, that we know of, to dare serve his followers in this way. Peter is so shocked by the audacity of Jesus that he initially recoils and cries out, “Lord, do you wash my feet?” Peter did not have a category to describe how unsettling it must have felt to have the man whom he believed to be the messiah, dare to lower himself in such a way. Peter was yet to learn the lesson of the moment. Jesus was not just washing the dirt from the feet of his disciples, but he was teaching them a new way of life. He was bathing them in a new perspective of humble sacrificial love and service towards others.

When Christ completed this act of love, he said, “If I then, 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 to you (John 13:14-15).” We must pause and ask ourselves whether we are truly following in the footsteps of our Savior. Christ’s love was sacrificial, and so ought our love be. Christ did not just talk about washing feet as a symbol or an illustration of the kind of love we ought to exhibit. He humbled himself, took on the form of a servant, and he scrubbed.

Yet, Jesus’ greatest display of humility was still to come. It was at the cross, when he gave his life as a ransom for His Church, when he willingly stepped underneath the wrath of God on our behalf, that we most fully understand the extent of his humility and the greatness of heart of a servant. Jesus was God in the flesh, worthy of every honor and title man has ever created, and yet he took on the form of a lowly servant.

In this moment of foot washing there is something particularly simple that strikes a nerve in a unique way. Christ washing his disciple’s feet touches on those modern idols of ambition, independence, and success that run so deep in each of our live’s that most of us—myself included—are unaware of how driven we are by such values. Against such vanity, Christ continually beckons us to see greatness not where the world sees it. Our secular age knows nothing of Christ’s humility. It cannot, for the moment you remove Christ as the cornerstone of your life, the only only thing to replace Him with is the self. And if the self is your cornerstone—as modern secularism would have us believe—then the never ending pursuit of self-glorification will ultimately consume you. But if Christ, the true Christ as He is revealed to us in the Bible, is your cornerstone, then everything about you changes. Your vision for your life, your heart for your family, your desire for your community, your love of strangers, all becomes shaped by Christ’s Words. And he had a lot to say about how we serve others.