We All Get a Little Dirty

When Jesus washes His disciples' feet, they're reluctant to offer them to Him. But He tells them directly that unless they give Him their feet to wash, then they "have no part with Him."

This washing is representative of our spiritual dirtiness and how only Jesus can truly cleanse us in the ultimate gift of salvation.

But I was thinking about how the feet of the believer can still get dirty. This is a dirty world, and since we're to be in it (although not of it), we're often left with dark soles and dark attitudes.

Jesus points out that we're to wash each other's feet, and this is obviously not a one-time act like salvation. So what is it?

It's the act of respecting our brothers' and sisters' vulnerabilities, carefully placing them in our hands and gently washing them clean in the name of Jesus.

I think we often assume acts of service are mainly caring for the poor, the down and out – physically providing for those who can't provide for themselves, and yes, this is true.

But in our Western society, Satan's upped the ante on his game play, heading directly to the root of our minds, the root of our families, and making it feel like we can't even share what's really going on behind closed doors with the very people we're to walk this life with.

And I get this strong feeling in my heart that since his tactics are always evolving, so should ours. We need to be willing to go beyond surface talk and offer our "feet" to those who should be able to properly care for them.

But that can only happen if we're truly offering up our sins to God regularly ourselves.

A good friend and I started a mental health from a Biblical perspective group at church, and since that launched, she's been able to sit with so many people, just being a soft place for them to land.

This is being Jesus.

I think sometimes, we want to do "big things" for God, and in our small human minds, "big things" are often things that bring us our fair share of the glory.

This kind of thinking is so wrong, and I know that because I've thought it myself.

But like the disciples who were fighting over who was the greatest before Jesus got on the ground and humbled them, we too, need to stop forcing acts of ministry and instead, humble ourselves before each other, serving from a clean mind, a clean heart, and a willingness to follow our Lord even when it means helping to clean up somebody else's dirt.