in your tíme of need and despera tion. You don’t need to broadcast your problems to other people. Let the Lord bless your heart and life by giving you, as He did to John, real hope and assurance. C hapter F ive T here are innumerable facets to the life of our Saviour. For this study we consider John 13:4, “He riseth from supper, and laid aside his garments; and took a towel, and girded himself.” The setting is the Last Supper where Christ revealed those qualities which would render Him invincible. It was a very solemn moment. There are Christian prin ciples here which we often overlook. Here Jesus ministers to His disci ples. It was His hour of conquest, and what does He take but a towel. He could have taken a sword, con quering the world by force. (His disciples had hoped that He would do exactly that!) With His super natural wisdom and power, He could have crushed and humiliated every foe. He might have taken a pen which is sometimes “mightier than the sword.” He could easily have be come the leading author of any gen eration. He might have taken a loaf of bread since people go after any one who’ll feed them. He had al ready proved His power to do i t What better way to win the hungry and helpless? He might have resort ed to the sensational, even as the devil had earlier tempted Him to do in the suggestion to cast Himself down from the pinnacle of the tem ple. The foolish world will follow the man who does the unusual and spec tacular. And, my friend, we see a lot of this in Southern California. There are more cults and religious sects and more religious groups be lieving almost in nothing. Anything Christ wanted to do could have been achieved. You and I, if we had the opportunity, might have taken one 18
or all of these ways. Christ refused to do so, rather using a common, in significant towel. In middle eastern countries it was customary for shoes to be left at the door. The host would see that his guests’ feet were bathed and dried. Since there was no servant or specific host, one of the disciples might have picked up this brotherly deed. No one took the cue. Luke even records that at the Last Supper they argued among themselves as to which should be the greatest in the kingdom of Heaven. Each one was looking for a place of prominence. Christ girded Himself with a towel in the manner of a slave. This shows His astound ing condescension. The Lord of the universe, washing feet, if you please! The best schools of ethics would teach self-pride as the basis of all human virtue. What a revelation of true greatness! The Lord of the earth was doing what His disciples felt they were too good or were too thoughtless to do. What kind of an instrument does Christ want us to use? As He told His disciples, “Ye also ought to wash one another’s feet. . . . I say unto you, the servant is not greater than his Lord.” It was the moral sig nificance of the act that He wanted them to remember. His example was to be the criteria for Christian con duct, the towel the flag of His King dom. Our chief virtue today must be humility. There was a church which burned to the ground in a certain commu nity. Suddenly, in the excitement, two neighbors found themselves side by’side watching the holocaust. The one who attended services regularly remarked wryly, “This is the first time I’ve seen that church on fire!” There’s a real truth here. Too often the church isn’t on fire spiritually. It’s drifted from the principles and the purposes of Christ. It’s tragic when the church deals in ostentation and worldly display, boasting of its
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