Maundy Thursday Reflections: On the washing of feet

How easily we let You touch us, that night. Looking back, knowing what I know now, could I have let You? I don’t know. And yet, You would not be denied.

I see you in the dim room, kneeling on the cold floor, face full of anguish. And we, bewildered, lifting our feet one by one, feeling this wasn’t right, wasn’t the way it should be. Yet You were always right, and so we followed along. Until we didn’t.

We confessed You as Lord, believed in You as Messiah, fully trusted in the strength of our allegiance. How little we knew of You, truly. How ignorant we were of the very God who lived among us. I felt it when you reached me and the touch of Your hands took my breath, flooded me with shame. I felt then, as You gently washed clean the callouses, that You saw all, suffered all of me. I felt how much You wanted me to know Your love.  Ah, how did I endure it? The audacity of the very hands that shaped the universe cupped around my filthy flesh.

Peter spoke for all of us, I think, brasher even than usual in his fear. I saw the panic in his eyes as You approached, and I understood. “You, Lord, wash my feet? Never.” You smiled, knowing his love for the pride it was. He fairly squirmed as You knelt there, as You pretended not to see his eyes full of tears.

We were eager then to prove ourselves. To be worthy. But even as You served us, You spoke of our soon betrayal; even as You entered Your deep loneliness, You knew we would fail you utterly. And yet, knowing, You knelt, You washed, You held us.

The touch of Your hands that night, Your body bent over my twisted toes, caressing the feet that would soon run from You in terror. The feet that would abandon You. This is what I remember most, even after all that followed. My own feet, cleansed and held and wept for, while Yours were pierced, mutilated, bloodied, and broken.

This is the true miracle, is it not? My Lord kneeling at the feet of His betrayer. My Lord weeping for the one who would choose fear over faithfulness. My Lord washing me clean before I even knew truly what it meant for each of us.

Oh, how often these feet still want to run in fear. How often they leave You. How often they forget. Touch them again, and again, and as often as it takes.