Absolutes - Part 4 — David Adams

Jesus’ Humility in John 13

Or is more effective the partial rapture or the rain? Actually, looking over the audience this morning, I think the partial rapture was more effective than the rain was. So you've done very well in coming under this hindrance this morning.

Turn with me, if you will, please, again to the Gospel by John, for that's our main source of meditation during this week. The Gospel by John, and we're reading this morning from chapter 13, John 13 and 1.

Now, before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour was come, that he should depart out of this world unto the Father, having loved his own which were in the world, he loved them unto the end.

And supper being ended, the devil having now put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray him, Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he was come from God, and went to God, he riseth from supper, and laid aside his garments, and took a towel, and girded himself.

After that, he poureth water into a basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them what the towel wherewith he was girded. Then cometh he to Simon Peter, and Peter saith unto him, Lord, dost thou wash my feet?

Jesus answered and said unto him, What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter. Peter saith unto him, I shall never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me.

Simon Peter saith unto him, Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head. Jesus saith unto him, He that is washed, or bathed, needeth not save to wash his feet. But is clean every wit, and ye are clean, but not all.

For he knew who should betray him, therefore said he, Ye are not all clean. So after he had washed their feet, and had taken his garments, and was set down again, he said unto them, Know ye what I have done to you?

Ye call me Master and Lord, and ye say, Well, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example that ye should do as I have done to you.

Verily, verily, I say unto you, The servant is not greater than his Lord, neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him. If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them. I speak not of you all.

I know whom I have chosen, but that the scripture may be fulfilled, He that eateth bread with me hath lifted up his heel against me. Now, I tell you before it comes, that when it is come to pass, ye may believe that I am.".

The Timeless Deity of Christ

There's another one of our I am's that we have been considering a little in these studies this week. I thought perhaps I should run quickly over what we have been touching on in the mornings of this week, and just remind you a little bit, perhaps, of what we have been touching on.

Some of you may not have been here, especially those of you who went on the partial rapture the other morning and then came back again. Some of you will remember, at any rate, that we started off by considering from Chapter 8 the timeless deity of the Lord Jesus, and that was when he was contrasted in his conversation with the Jews, with Abraham, and he said so marvelously, so startlingly, so arrestingly, before Abraham was, I am.

We began our considerations of the I am's with that stepping stone, with that platform, if you will, and it is, of course, as the most sublime I judge of all of them, that he should say that, particularly after the conversation he had had with the Jews in Chapter 8.

Timeless deity of the man who came, as we were noticing in our little study regarding the trilogy of the cities in Bethlehem, and he who came to Bethlehem through the medium of the Virgin Mother was he who was before all time.

It was he, it was not another, it was not an impersonation of him, it was he himself who came and walked amongst the disciples and amongst the Jews, as well as the Galileans, when he was here. The timeless deity of the I am.

Christ’s Absolute Sovereignty

And then we went from there to Chapter 4 and also Chapter 6. In my advanced age and state of decrepitude, I'm not remembering some of these details, but I should have done in Chapter 6 and Chapter 18.

The second one that we looked at was that of his total or absolute sovereignty. Chapter 6, we saw him walking on the sea of Galilee as he returned from the miracle of the loaves and fishes. When he showed, he demonstrated that this one who was from eternity, we say eternity past, there's no such thing with the Lord, you understand.

Eternity past is our way of speaking of something which was before time, but he was always before time. And things will then of course will come after time, won't they? I was listening to a brother preach just recently, and he was telling his audience and preaching the gospel that it was time they made their decision for Christ, because you see the time, the day is coming, he said, when there'll be no more time.

And he was telling them what eternity is, that eternity is timeless. But that is good hymnology, I suppose, but it's not very good theology, because eternity is not a timeless period. Eternity is endless, but not timeless.

Time began when God created the heavens and the earth. And as long as there is matter, there is space. And as long as there is space, there is time. Regardless of what you're considering, if you have a planet out there somewhere, another planet over here, well then in order to go from one to the other, there must be time.

Same thing happens between the neutrons and the protons and the atoms. Time is very infinitesimal, but there's time. For as long as there's space, there has to be time. So we used to sing, we used to say, of course, that time ends and then eternity.

And we sang that hymn very frequently in my younger days in the preaching of the gospel. Time ends and then eternity. But hymns are beautiful, they're pretty, and some of the choruses are quite diddy-like, you know.

But they're not all good theology, and we must not base our theology upon hymnology, because hymnology is not necessarily good theology. And hymnology says time ends and then eternity. Well, it's not so, because time never ends.

And in our language, God describes himself, and he describes that which is yet to be, with two plural words, unto the ages of the ages. And you know if you have ages, unto ages, then you have time, don't you?

Otherwise the word is meaningless. That's the way God describes himself, and that's the way he describes the endless existence of all his subjects. Unto the ages of the ages of the ages. That's time. And so time does not end and then eternity.

And anyway, when you stop to think about it, you know, eternity always has been. And this globe of ours is merely hanging in eternity. We speak about eternity past and we speak about eternity future, or from the way you're facing me, it's eternity past over there and eternity future over this way, left to right, I suppose.

But actually the globe and the whole universe is hanging in eternity. Eternity is up and down and around always, and so we have now become creatures of eternity. We are presently living in eternity. I'm not too sure about that.

Well, it's a rainy morning and we can't expect too much, can we? Very well. Now, so the Lord spoke about his absolute sovereignty. He walks upon the water. He has subjected beneath his own feet and all the circumstances of life that his people meet, and wherever they meet them, and whatever the circumstances are, whatever the opposition is, he walks on the storm, his absolute sovereignty.

But then we went from there to chapter 18. You will remember when we saw our Lord facing the angry mob when they came to take him. And there he showed in what appeared to be his hour of weakness, his hour of loneliness, for the disciples are all in the motion of forsaking him and fleeing from him, as he stands facing his enemies, the traitor and those whom he had brought with him in order to arrest the Lord.

You remember how he displayed once again his absolute sovereignty, for he stands seemingly helpless in the presence of his hateful enemies. And when he asked him whom they sought, they said, Jesus of Nazareth.

And he said, I am. And when he said that, again he displayed his absolute sovereignty. They fell backwards to the ground. And that was our second study this week. And then our third study was his unlimited capacity, for we went to John's Gospel, chapter 4, and we found out that he has the ever-abundant source of living water.

And that water we discussed a little bit in detail in connection with the woman of Sychar's well. And we saw that the refreshment which she had sought, the rest, the peace, the companionship, the love, the care which he had sought and had not found to be satisfying, our Lord said that which he would give would be water springing up into everlasting life.

And he was unlimited in the abundance of his supply of living water. And then from there we went to chapter 6 again, and discovered that that unlimited abundance was applicable to the bread of life. And he used the example of the miracle of the loaves and fishes, and he gave us that marvelous discourse that we still have trouble with sometimes, don't we?

And I expect you went home and thought about it and said, well, Brother Dave got us up beyond the ankle tonight. That was kind of deep water when we started talking about eating the flesh of the Son of Man and drinking his blood.

So he has showed himself to be unlimited as well in the abundance of his supply, the supply of living water and his supply of living bread, the living bread which came down from heaven. And then we went from that to see him as the light of the world, the light of the world in chapters 8, 9 and 12.

And we looked at that in brief and saw that our Lord is the Unsullied One who moves into all the circumstances of life, shows himself as the light of the world, ready to reveal and ready to heal. That was our study from chapters 8, 9 and 12.

Incomparable Humility and the Authority to Serve

Now, this morning we've come to chapter 13, and I want to consider with you now something about what I'm going to call his incomparable humility. We all know the story about the feet-washing of our Lord in his sovereignty, because you see, you remember it said at the beginning, Jesus knowing, that's verse 3, that the Father had given all things into his hands.

What did he do when he was conscious of the fact that the Father had put all things into his hand? You know, the connecting link between some things, some verses that we have in scripture, we do not always perceive.

We don't take advantage of them. And the gospel preacher loves to preach on John 3 and 36. I have done it myself many times in the years gone by. He that believeth on the sun hath everlasting life. He that believeth not the sun shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him.

And the gospel preacher often uses that text. And when he sits down beside a concerned person who is looking for salvation and clarity and assurance, he reads that text with him or her. He that believeth on the sun hath everlasting life.

And then, of course, the question comes, does the inquirer believe on the sun? And the answer to that question insincerity determines whether they have life or whether they do not. For he that believeth on the sun hath everlasting life.

And he that believeth not the sun shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him. And there is the question put to them. And you know why we use John 3 and 36 with such frequency? I think I have yet to hear the gospel preacher base verse 36 on verse 35.

Can you remember what it is? Now, I'm going to challenge you. You can't look it up. You're not allowed to look it up, you see. I want to know, those of you who repeat John 3 and 36 with alacrity, with ease, do you know what 35 says?

You don't look too enlightened about that one. Well, now, 36 depends on 35. And this is one of those things that we often do with Scripture. We take a verse out, we put it in a frame and hang it on the wall, or we put it in our memories and hang it up there.

And we don't actually know what the mat is around the picture. You know, you have to have a mat on the frame, don't you? So, what is verse 35? The father loves his son and has given all things into his hands.

Believe on the sun and you'll have everlasting life. Isn't it the natural outcome, 36 of 35? Isn't this the reason why he that believes on the sun has everlasting life? Because the father loves the son and he's put all things into his hands.

Therefore, he that believes on the sun has everlasting life. It's an interesting thing, I think, if we just check ourselves up now and then and say, oh yes, I know that verse real well. I wonder what the verse that comes before it says.

And I wonder what the verse that comes after it says. Because, you know, I've seen verses taken out of context and put on a wall and hung in a church building, and they have no more connection with what they're saying to the congregation at all.

The Danger of Taking Scripture Out of Context

I used to frequent gospel halls and preached in them in many parts of Canada and other parts and the states, and so many times, hundreds of times, I think I've seen a text at the front of the building on the wall behind the speaker, and it would say, gather unto me my saints, they that have made a covenant with me by sacrifice.

Some of you remember that one? Oh, come on, some of you are as old as I am. And I used to sit in the audience and look at that text, come gather unto me my saints, those that have made a covenant with me by sacrifice.

I said, isn't that wonderful? Here we are gathering here now because and based upon the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus. So we're gathered unto him. And then one day, you know how your wheels kind of spin around sometimes, especially if the preacher's kind of dull, and you're looking around and you're looking at these texts and you're thinking about these texts, you're not listening to what he's saying.

And that you're looking at these texts, or you're looking at the architecture of whatever you are. And I was looking at this text, you know, gather my saints unto me, those that have made a covenant with me by sacrifice.

How marvelous that is. I wonder where it is. Must be in the New Testament somewhere. Of course, you know it isn't. No. And so, when I looked it up and I said, I wonder, does this have anything to do with a New Testament church?

Sounds like it, doesn't it? It doesn't. When you look it up and you discover what the context is, instead of it meaning that the believers come together to remember the Lord and the Lord suffered to break bread, it means rather God's going to call his people together in a future day because he made a covenant with them by sacrifice, and they have turned their back on the covenant, and he's brought them through great tribulation, and he's calling them together to judgment.

But I don't think any of the brethren that painted that text and put it in a frame and hung it on the wall did it with the view that the audience would look at that and say, oh, on the basis of the covenant of the sacrifice, God's going to call us to judgment.

They never thought of that, did they not? Those of you who have seen it know that the reason they've got it there is because they've applied it to a New Testament church that has nothing to do with a New Testament church.

But we take it out, we put it in the frame, we hang it on the wall, and there it looks real pretty, doesn't it? Yeah. That's like how we apply the 122nd Psalm to the weather. This is the day which the Lord hath made.

Some of you heard me on that one. Yeah, this is the day which the Lord hath made. Well, well, well. Aha. They didn't sing that one in the boat when they were crossing the Sea of Galilee and thought they were going to drown.

Well, it has nothing to do with the weather, of course, as you know. But it's a pretty little course. This is the day. This is the day. Yeah. Now, here's a passage of Scripture, too, in agreement also with John 3 and 36, 35 and 36.

Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, what did he do? What did he do with that kind of trust? What did he do with that kind of authority? Go over to chapter 17. When you get to chapter 17, you remember he's speaking to his father and he says, As thou hast given him authority over all flesh, thou hast given him power or authority over all flesh.

He's talking to his father. The 17th chapter of the Gospel by John is so often misinterpreted, alas. And here the Lord is speaking with his father. And he says, Father, the hour has come. Glorify thy son.

What hour is he talking about? That thy son also may glorify thee. How is the father going to glorify the son, and when is the son going to glorify the father? What's he talking about, the hour? And then he goes on to say, As thou hast given him authority over all flesh.

What's he going to do with that power? What's the expression of true power? What is the evidence of real authority? What did he do here? Knowing the Father had put all things into his hands, supper was ended, he got up from the table, he divested himself of his outer garments, he took a towel and girded himself in the garb, in the habit of the household slave, and he got a basin with water and got down to wash his disciples' feet.

What has that got to do with the Father giving all things into his hands? Well, when we came to the close of our reading, verse 19, again it's another I Am, isn't it? When you go back over to chapter 17 that I've just mentioned to you, and he says, As thou hast given him authority over all flesh, what to do?

That he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. Now, what we conceive to be authority in our days, as far as position is concerned, position of authority means that everything comes this way.

As the centurion said to the Lord, you recall, he said, I'm a man under authority, and I say to one servant, go, and he goes, and I say to another servant, come, come, and I say to another servant, do this, and he does it.

Now then, why should you have to come to my home to cure, to heal my servant? Just speak the word. Those are your servants. Here's a man who has a grasp of the magnificent power of the living word of the Christ.

You just speak the word, and my servant will be healed. I'm not whether you should come under my roof. When I first read that, you know, and spoke a little bit about it years ago, I thought this man was very arrogant.

Lord, you don't need to come under my roof. I'm a man of authority. I say to a servant, go, and he goes. I say to another one, come, and he comes. Here's authority in action, commanding, demanding. That's not what he's saying at all.

Sounds arrogant, doesn't it? But it's not arrogance. It's not even a man filled with his own self-importance and the authority that he has over a hundred soldiers, as well as those under his care as a centurion.

No. What he's saying is, Lord, I have this authority, but I'm not whether you should come under my roof. I'm not worthy of that. But if you, in your authority, just speak the word, and your word knows no boundaries, and it knows no distance, it is always active in its authority.

Just speak the word, and my servant shall be healed. Actually, it was a confession of humility, but we thought, because of the way he said it, it was an expression of self-importance, because I have all these servants, and I tell them to do what I wish, and they must do it.

So he says the Lord's authority is so superior to his authority. Now, in John chapter 17, when the Lord speaking to his father says, I was given him authority over all flesh, what's he going to do with that authority?

He's going to give eternal life. He's going to give. It's going out from the authority, not coming to the authority. We're used to that kind of authority, aren't we? If we have authority, well then, let's just let everybody see it, right?

Let them know that we have authority, and we express authority by demanding or commanding. The Lord expresses authority in John 17 by dispensing, giving out eternal life to as many as thou hast given him, and then he went on to explain the purpose of eternal life, that they might know that he is the only true God, and so on.

That's a beautiful subject. Now, coming back to this case here, Jesus knowing that the father put all things in his hands, what's he going to do? He's going to make a demonstration of true authority. Authority which is godlike, authority which proceeds from our Lord himself, is authority which is expressed by humility.

We don't know that kind of authority, do we? But you see what he is doing? He is showing us that true authority recognizes that we are under authority, and we must express this by humility. Let's just look at that.

Foot-Washing as a Lesson in Humility

So, what does he do? He rises from supper, lays aside his garments, and took a towel and girded himself. After that, he pours water into a basin. He's really acting as the household servant, isn't he?

And he begins to wash the disciples' feet, to wipe them with a towel wherewith he was girded. And so we have the interesting story of our Lord expressing authority, expressing the fact that all things are put into his hands, even the disciples' feet.

He has a marvelous study, isn't he, our Lord? It is so contrary to ourselves that you run up against something like this, and you say, oh, the father's given all things into his hands. What does he put into his hands?

A basin of water. What does he take into his hands? A towel. And what does he do with his hands? He washes the disciples' feet. Now, this subject of feet-washing, as you know, is practiced sometimes in some areas with some groups of people.

In fact, I was talking with a lady once, and she used to attend a certain congregation where they practiced, literally practiced, feet-washing, in keeping, they thought, with John chapter 13. Seems to me they never really saw the basic lesson in John 13.

But anyway, they were practicing feet-washing. So I asked her how they did it, and when it happened, and how did they get along with it? And she said, well, we just did it once a year, but we did practice the feet-washing in our congregation.

And I said, well now tell me, how do you get along with this thing anyway? How does it work? Watch this as I'll tell you. Ann said to me, now look, you and I are going to make an agreement. I don't want, I don't want for the life of me to have to wash Mary's feet.

And I don't suppose you want to wash Mary's feet either, so why don't we agree that we'll wash one another's feet? And then we won't have to wash Mary's feet. See? So that's, she said, that's what we did.

When the feet-washing time came around, she said, we just got into a position where Ann and I, we had each other picked out, and we knew what we were going to do, so I washed Ann's feet, and Ann washed my feet, and somebody else had to wash Mary's feet.

We didn't have anything to do with that problem at all, so we just let it go by that way. That's how we arranged it. And then she says, one day I thought, I don't think that's what the Master meant. No, it wasn't what the Master meant.

This thing that is supposed to be a lesson in humility had got to the place where they had wiped away all the humility, and they were making choice of what they were going to do by the ritual, which was contrary to the essence of the example.

Easy to twist these things, isn't it, sometimes, for our own convenience? So somebody else had to look after Mary's feet. There was something about Mary's feet that neither one of the two wanted to have anything to do with it.

Jesus’ Command to Serve One Another

All right, now, the Lord comes to Peter, and Peter says, I shall never wash my feet. In verse 7, the Lord said, What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter. And I think that should be sufficient for us to realize that this wasn't an example that was meant to be carried out literally, physically, because they knew what he was doing there.

They knew when they put their feet into his hands. They knew when he took the water and washed their feet. They knew when he dried them with a towel. But he says, what I'm doing now, you don't know. You don't know what I'm doing now, but you will understand it later on.

And I think that's sufficient for me, at any rate, in my simplicity, to realize that this was never meant to be an actual physical example. It was never meant to be a ritual or a practice physically. So he says, What I do thou knowest not now.

Peter said, You'll never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me. So in comes Peter again. He's always getting himself into a corner, isn't he? And then valiantly tries to get out of it.

So he says, Oh, well, if that's the case, then not my feet only, but also my hands and my head. Peter was either all in or all out, wasn't he? He was either totally submerged or he was walking on the water, one thing or the other.

No halfway measures with good Simon. So Jesus said to him, explaining this in verse 10, He that is bathed need not save just to wash his feet. That's all he has to do. And but he actually is clean every whit, and you're clean, but not all.

And you know, when it says clean every whit, the first thing you think is, Oh, they were totally clean. But then when he says, but not all, then he clarifies this. He's not thinking about the person. He's thinking about the individuals, because he has Judas in his mind.

And so he said, You're clean, but not all. And then he's not referring to the person, but he's referring to the people that were there, because he knew who should betray him. It's good that that clarification was put for us in verse 11, wasn't it?

Or we would think that it meant something else. So after he'd washed their feet and had taken his garments and was set down again, he said unto them, You know what I've done to you? Now here it is. You call me teacher and you call me sovereign.

You call me your teacher, you call me your lord. I'm putting these things together. He says, you say well. You are correcting what you say. I am your teacher, and I am your sovereign lord. And because of that, then I have given you an example that you should do as I have done to you.

I am your teacher. What is he teaching them? He is teaching them that to be invested with authority, he must exercise it all with humility. That's something we fight all our lives to learn, because when we get authority, we like to exercise it the way we think authority should be exercised.

But the Lord says no. The Lord says no. You call me your teacher. I am teaching you. He had been teaching them all through, particularly this gospel by John. As we, the little things we've been noticing, and I was going over some of them again this morning.

Dear me, we've only about half started this subject, but anyway, he said he had been teaching them. And now he's teaching them by his own personal example regarding how you use authority. How do you use authority?

By serving. I didn't draw to your attention the other day when we were considering the temptations in the wilderness, but it is of interest to know that when the adversary asked the Lord to fall down and worship before him, he didn't actually say to worship him.

He said to worship before him. And by the way, when you go to Ephesus, you'll find that in the message to the churches too, that the time will come when the Lord would bring those who are their enemies to worship at their feet, or to worship before them.

That's the idea of the position, not necessarily the dedication. So, the devil says, if you just come down and worship before me, then I will do this and this and this. The Lord answered him, it is written thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.

And when he repeated it, he put the two things together. Worship is service, and service is worship. And he put them both together. Now, we separate them. We think worship is something all distinct by itself, and service is out there somewhere separated from the act of worship.

But the Lord quoted Deuteronomy making them complementary. They go together. They don't have service on one hand and worship on the other. You don't have worship over here isolated. No. To worship is to serve, and to serve is to worship.

And these are complementary. These belong with each other. They're not segregated. They're not separate. And that's what he did in the temptation. And that's what he's showing here. You call me teacher, and you call me Lord.

You say, right, for so I am teacher and Lord. Then, if I, your teacher, and I, your sovereign, have washed your feet, then you should wash one another's feet. You should attend to the necessities of each other, and you should do it in an act of humility.

And that's something that's very difficult for us to learn. It's contrary to our nature. It's contrary to our nature to think that authority is expressed by humility. We don't put those things together, do we?

Worship Expressed Through Humble Service

Just alas, we don't put worship and service into a complementary relationship. No, we go in to worship, and when we worship, we do that by our singing, or by the expression of our praise, or by our personal meditation.

And then we go out to serve, in to worship, out to serve. It sounds very nice, brethren, but you know, it's a dangerous thing to think of, because our service is worship, and our worship is service. And that's what the Lord is saying here.

Now, if you call me master and Lord, or teacher and Lord, you say, well, for so I am. Here's another one of our I am's. If I, then, your Lord and master, do you notice how he switched the titles? You call me master first, and then you call me Lord.

Well, that's what I am. But if I, then, your Lord first, and your teacher second, he switches the titles. I've washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one another's feet. I've given you an example. You should do as I have done to you.