He . . . began to wash the disciples' feet.
John 13:5
The Lord Jesus loves His people so much that every day He is still doing for them much that is analogous to washing their soiled feet. Their poorest actions He accepts; their deepest sorrow He feels; their slenderest wish He hears; and their every transgression He forgives. He is still their servant as well as their Friend and Master. He not only performs majestic deeds for them, when in all His priestly garb and function He stands up to plead for them, but He also humbly, patiently goes among His people with the basin and the towel. He does this when He puts away from us day by day our constant infirmities and sins.
Last night when you bowed the knee, you mournfully confessed that much of your conduct was not worthy of your profession; and even tonight you must grieve again that you have fallen into the selfsame folly and sin from which special grace delivered you long ago. And yet Jesus displays great patience with you. He will hear your confession of sin; He will say, "I will—be clean!" He will again apply the blood of sprinkling and speak peace to your conscience and remove every spot. It is a great act of eternal love when Christ once for all absolves the sinner and places him in the family of God; but what condescending patience it is when the Savior with much long-suffering bears the repetitive follies of His wayward disciple, day by day and hour by hour washing away the multiplied transgressions of His erring but still much-loved child! To dry up a flood of rebellion is something marvelous, but to endure the constant dripping of repeated offenses, to bear with a perpetual trying of patience, this is truly divine! While we find comfort and peace in our Lord's daily cleansing, its legitimate influence upon us will be to increase our watchfulness and quicken our desire for holiness. Is that your experience?
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From Morning & Evening revised and edited by Alistair Begg copyright © 2003. Used by permission of Crossway Books, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers, Wheaton, IL 60187, www.crossway.org.
