John 13

The Lord has withdrawn with His disciples to be alone with them. He wants to open His heart to them and tell them Who His Father is for them. Now that He is about to leave them, He wants to tell them in various ways what their new position before God the Father and in the world is in contrast to their position in Israel. Therefore He has moved into the upper room of a house in Jerusalem. In that upper room He wants to celebrate the Passover with them.

In the other Gospels we read about the preparations for this and get to know the outer circumstances of the Passover (Lk 22:8-13). John does not occupy himself with that. He describes a different kind of preparation. He writes about the spirit or mind in which the Lord gathers His own to celebrate it. In a special way he gives us a taste of the atmosphere of Divine love in which this event takes place. This preparation is done by the Lord Himself. He does this in full awareness of the fact that His hour has come (Jn 12:23; 17:1; cf. Jn 2:4; 7:30; 8:20).

Christ is the only Man with Whom nothing ever happens unexpected. He knows everything perfectly in advance. That His hour has come means that He will die on the cross, rejected by men and forsaken by His God. Yet John does not speak about that. What John says about the end of Christ’s life on earth fits his Gospel. John does not describe the wickedness of man or satan, nor God’s wrath over sin, but tells us about the Son’s departure from the world back to the Father. This is what preoccupies the Lord Jesus and what forms the background of the coming chapters.

It is all about the Father and what the Son’s going to the Father means to His disciples as objects of His love. Everything is known and felt by Him in the presence of the Father. That is why His going to the Father out of this world is directly connected with His love for His own who are in the world.

We have also read about “His own” in the beginning of this Gospel (Jn 1:11). There it is about His people Israel as His own, but that they, His people, did not receive Him. Now John speaks again about ”His own”. That is not His people as a whole, but it is they from His people who have received Him. They are truly His, they belong to Him, they are His sheep.

To them, His departure to the Father means a great loss. How lonely they will feel in a hostile world. The Lord Jesus is aware of this and therefore He will leave them with an impressive proof of His love for them, a love that will be there to the end. The proof of that tremendous love certainly concerns His work on the cross. We can think of an infinite depth of love.

His love also extends lengthwise, into the future, for it is a love of which, no matter how far we look, the end cannot be seen. That is what John means when he writes about “loved them to the end”. If we can think of something having an end, His love goes beyond that. No matter how far we can look into the future, His love is there too. Whatever misery and sorrow we may experience, His love goes deeper. The measure of this love cannot be fathomed or measured. We can only experience and admire this love.

After the introductory words about His going to the Father and His love for His own, we now come to the scene of the washing of the feet during the Passover. But first John mentions what the devil managed to do in the heart of Judas. This shows us the great contrast between the Lord’s actions and those of Judas. The Lord acts by the Spirit of love for the Father and His own, while Judas has opened himself to the devil. The Lord Jesus gives Himself for others; Judas betrays the Lord out of his own interest.

When the supper has begun, the Lord gets up from supper to serve His own. While He gets up to do so, He is fully aware of His connection with His Father. As the Son of the Father, He knows that He has received all things into His hands, just as He knows that He will soon fall into the hands of depraved people. It is therefore impressive to realize that He Who gets up to serve the disciples is the eternal Son Who, as Man, receives all things from his Father’s hands in order to share them with those who participate in His death and resurrection.

It is also noticeable that verse 3 speaks of both “the Father” and “God”. When we read the name “Father” it is usually in connection with our privileges, with our blessings. When we read the name ”God” it is usually in connection with our responsibility.

The Lord Jesus knows that He came from God. His purpose was to serve God on earth. He knows that He fulfilled that service perfectly to God’s glory and thereby answered His responsibility entirely. That is why He can go back to God. This relationship of the Son to His Father and His God is the starting point for the washing of the feet. The Son wants us to share with Him what He received from the Father and what He did for God. For that we need the washing of our feet.

Fellowship with the Son in what the Father has given Him can only be possible if we are aware that that Father is also the holy God in Whose presence nothing can exist that has to do with sin. Nobody is more aware of that than the Son. He knows His Father and God in a perfect way, and He knows exactly how His Father and God values Him. Therefore, no one but He can do the cleansing of defilements which enables a person to partake with Him. That is why He gets up from supper and lays aside His garments. Symbolically He renounces all glory that His God and Father has given Him.

Then we read that He takes a towel. He does that with the very hands in which the Father has placed all things. He does not use His hands to exercise power, but to serve. He uses His hands to wash the feet of His disciples. Then He girds Himself with the towel He has taken. Girding points to serving (Lk 12:37; 17:8). By what He does to His disciples, He gives us an unforgettable lesson in humility. It seems that Peter has understood that lesson (1Pet 5:5).

When the Lord has prepared Himself for His servant work, He pours water into the basin and begins to wash the feet of the disciples and wipe them with the towel with which He has girded Himself. The washing of the feet by the Lord has a spiritual meaning. The Lord serves here as a Slave. When He became Man, He took the form of a Slave (Phil 2:7). He will never give up this position and service of Slave (Lk 12:37; Exo 21:5-6).

We might think that He stopped being a Slave when He entered glory. He shows us here that this is not the case. He begins a new service among His own that consists of removing the uncleanness they have acquired in their wanderings through the world. For this purification He uses the Word of God which is compared with water (Eph 5:26; Jn 15:3). When we read God’s Word, it has the effect that our thoughts are cleansed. If we have things in our life that are wrong, He makes us aware through His Word. We can then confess that and remove it. That is the cleansing He works.

For this cleansing, the Lord uses water, not blood. It is about presenting the truth, that is, God’s Word as that which cleanses. The blood has more the aspect of reconciliation. He uses the Word to cleanse those who are already reconciled by the blood. The blood cleanses in relation to God, the water cleanses in relation to the believer. The blood is applied just once. God always recognizes its value. The effect is eternal. The believer is sanctified by the blood once and for all (Heb 9:12; 10:14). The application of the blood never needs to be repeated, just as no one once born of God needs to be born of God again.

After the Lord has washed their feet, He wipes them with the towel with which He was girded. Wiping also has an important spiritual meaning. Wiping the feet means getting rid of the memory of the cleansing. When someone has been cleansed of a sin by the Lord through His Word, He does not come back to it. This is also important for believers among themselves. If a believer sins and someone else points this out to him and the sin is confessed, then that sin is gone. That sin may not be brought to mind as an accusation of the other again.

When the Lord comes to Peter to wash his feet, Peter objects. He finds it inappropriate that the Lord is going to wash his feet. He is the Lord, isn’t He? Then it cannot be so that He, the Lord, bows down before him. Peter reveals here a trait of character that many of us also have. Sometimes we refuse to perform this humble service ourselves, and sometimes we refuse such a service to be performed to us, but we will motivate our refusal in a different way than Peter does here. Such an attitude shows that we don’t mind sin all that much. We must learn – and it must penetrate deeply to us by what the Lord is doing here – that the defilement we incur by our going through the world is so bad that nothing less than Christ in His humiliation can cleanse us from it.

The Lord answers Peter that he does not yet know what He is doing, but that he will understand it hereafter. By this he means that Peter will only fully understand the meaning when the Holy Spirit has come. It may also be possible that the Lord is pointing ahead of His statement after the foot washing. Another consideration is that Peter will understand the spiritual meaning once he is restored by the Lord after his denial of the Lord.

Peter is not very much impressed by the words of the Lord. He does not moderate his tone, but vigorously contradicts Him. He will never cooperate with what he considers to be too humiliating an act for the Lord. With similar powerful statements, Peter also said that the Lord would not suffer and die (Mt 16:21-23). He speaks without self-knowledge and without knowledge of the Lord. The Lord tells him the consequences if He does not wash him. Then He will have no part with Him.

The Lord does not say: ‘You have no part of Me’. Every believer has part of Him. The Lord spoke of “no part with Me”. This means that a believer has part with Him in all that is His part, that is all that the Father has given Him (verse 3). From eternity He always has everything in His hands as the eternal Son and the Creator. But He has become Man and now as Man He will possess what has always been His possession as the eternal Son. This has made it possible to share it with people. In this way we have received life from Him because He is life.

In order to have part with the Son in that which He has received as Man, it is necessary that the believer is cleansed of everything that defiles Him. We don’t even have to think about specific sins, although sins are of course an obstacle to fully enjoy with the Son what the Father has given Him. It’s about becoming defiled merely by the fact of our going through the world. It’s about a defilement which we cannot do anything about, but that is nevertheless there. The Lord Jesus washes the feet of the disciples because they have inevitably become dirty from walking through the streets of Jerusalem.

In the same way, we too become defiled spiritually when we go through the world. Unsolicited or unintentionally we see and hear things every day that defile our mind and can influence our thoughts. That makes their daily cleansing necessary (2Cor 7:1). We undergo this daily cleansing when we read God’s Word in prayer. Our mind and thoughts are washed clean by reading God’s Word. No believer can do without it. This service of cleansing is what the Lord Jesus does to us when we read His Word. He can also do this by someone we hear preaching or applying God’s Word in a meeting, or when someone comes to us and draws our attention to something in God’s Word.

When the Lord has told him this, Peter falls into the other extreme. He wants the Lord not only to wash his feet, but also his hands and his head. But that is not what is meant either. The Lord responds to Peter’s exaggerated reaction by giving further important teaching, as He always does after statements or reactions that demonstrate how much His words are misunderstood. He is a Teacher full of patience.

He declares to Peter – and to us! – that there are two forms of washing. There is a one-time washing of the whole body. This is what happened during our conversion (1Cor 6:11; Tit 3:5). It is the one-time spiritual renewal through the Word and the working of the Spirit that is not repeated (Jn 3:3-6). It is the receiving of new life through which we have become children of God. Who once is a child of God, cannot become a child of God a second time. After that it is necessary to wash the feet regularly. This regular washing also takes place through the Word (Psa 119:9).

We have a picture of both forms of washing in what happened to the priests in the Old Testament. When a son of Aaron was ordained a priest, he was washed completely on that occasion (Lev 8:6). That act was not repeated. When the priest entered the sanctuary to serve, he had to wash his hands and feet from the laver (Exo 30:19). He had to do this every time he entered the sanctuary to serve.

This repeated act is what the Lord represents here in the foot washing. Only here it is not a matter of washing the hands, but of washing the feet, because the feet speak of walking and that affects our entire behavior. In the picture of the service in the tabernacle, we see that the washing of the feet is the preparation for entering the first part of the sanctuary, the holy place, in John 14-16, and entering the holy of holies in John 17.

In His teaching to the disciples, the Lord says that a person who is completely washed, is completely clean and needs only to have his feet washed. However, there is an exception among the disciples, someone to whom all this teaching about foot washing does not apply. There is one among them who is not completely clean because he is not completely washed, i.e. because he has not been converted and has no new life. The Lord knows that one exception and He also knows what is in the heart of that disciple. The heart of that disciple is not connected with His heart. There is no life connection between Him and that disciple. Therefore, what He said does not apply to a man like Judas.

The Lord has washed the feet of all disciples, including those of Judas. He has taken His garments again. Then He asks them whether they understand what He has done to them. From His question it appears that there is more connected to His deed than just making sure their feet are clean so that they can go to the table refreshed. By asking this question He wants to test their heart.

Without waiting for an answer, He is going to teach them, and us, about what He has done. He knows what they call Him and He is saying that they are right to do so. In the first place they call Him “Teacher”, someone who teaches, and in the second place “Lord”, someone who has authority over them. The order for them is that they first receive teaching and then start to obey. It is often the same with us. We first have to see the reasonableness or usefulness of something before we do what is said.

Based on their acknowledgment of Him as their Superior He teaches them more about what He has done. He tells them that what He has done to them, they now have to do to each other. When the Lord says that, He reverses their order and says that He is in the first place the Lord and in the second place the Teacher. This means that in the first place it comes down to obedience to Him as Lord and only then to accepting the teaching He gives about it. So, the first is mindset, the willingness to obey; then from that follows understanding of or gaining insight in what is being asked for.

Foot washing is an act of brotherly love. The love among each other will lead us to perform this service to each other, so that fellowship with the Lord can continue to be enjoyed. The teaching of the Lord has not been theoretical. He has given them an example (cf. 1Pet 2:21). The purpose is that they will start to do as He has done with them. They have not only seen Him do something while they were watching. No, they have experienced personally what the Lord has done.

After He has returned to heaven, He has continued that service. He is still cleansing us when we read His Word or are reminded of it by others. His example is meant to bring us to perform that deed and thus involve us in it.

With a double “truly” and an authoritative “I say to you” He points out that they cannot ignore His example, as if they would consider themselves too good for such service. He is the Lord and they are the slaves. He has done this humble work as the Lord. Then they should not consider themselves to be greater than He by saying ‘no’ when that service is asked of them to perform it to others. He sends them to do this; they are His envoys. He sends and is thus greater. As the Sender He has done this humble work, how much more they are obliged to do this work when He sends them to do it.

He also knows that ‘knowing’ and ‘doing’ are two things. That is why He urges them to do what they know now. He does not do this with a threatening ‘woe to you, if you do not do these things’, but with an encouraging “blessed if you do them”. Applying the Word to our dealings cleanses from defilement. Consequently, we can remain in undisturbed fellowship with the Lord Jesus. True brotherly love will desire this for every brother and sister and consequently the service of foot washing will also be performed. And is that not a service that makes us happy?

What the Lord has done and taught His disciples can be summarized in three catchy words: humility, sanctification and happiness. These words at the same time indicate an order that we cannot turn around or leave out an element of. The path of sanctification and happiness begins and continues with humility. Humility leads to sanctification and sanctification leads to happiness. There is no happiness without humility and sanctification.

Once again the Lord speaks about the exception among His disciples. Judas did not accidentally get into the number of the twelve. Choosing Judas as one of His apostles has been a deliberate choice of His. He chose him because Scripture spoke of a man like Judas (Psa 41:9). In that psalm it is about Ahithophel, the counselor of David, who became his traitor in the hour of great distress in which he found himself (2Sam 15:12; 16:21; 17:1,14,23). There is a clear parallel between Judas and Ahithophel, just as there is between the Lord Jesus and David.

It is particularly painful to be betrayed by someone with whom you have eaten your bread, which is a sign of close fellowship. Lifting the heel speaks of treacherously tripping an opponent. This is how Judas dealt with the Lord Jesus!

While the Scripture word expresses the sorrow that the Lord experiences from the act of Judas, there is also the complete submission to Scripture and thus the peace of acceptance. The importance of Scripture and the knowledge of it are enormous. They form the basis of all His speaking and acting. This is how it should be for us as well.

It does not mean that Judas has been chosen to betray the Lord. That is his own choice, for which he bears full responsibility. Here the Lord tells His disciples about the betrayal of Judas in order to strengthen their faith in His Person. Once what has been foretold takes place, it is proof that the prophet has spoken the truth. He is the promised Prophet (Deu 18:18-22).

In verse 16 the Lord spoke of those who are sent to wash the feet of others. He said that they should not feel too good to do this service. After all, He, the Lord and the Teacher, has shown it to them and by doing so has given them an example. Now He speaks about those whose feet need to be washed. He makes it clear that it is not up to whom receives this service, to decide whether the person who comes pleases him or not. It is about accepting the service of foot washing.

Whoever comes to wash our feet is sent by the Lord and is to be received as such. Even if a Judas were to come to us, we would still have to receive him since he was sent by the Lord. Hence, we will receive the blessing, because by receiving such a person, we receive the Lord Jesus and the Father. Accepting this service will also mean that we will not share in the fate of Judas. The fate of Judas is not for those who receive the ones sent by the Lord.

After the Lord has spoken about who He will send, He thinks of Judas and is deeply troubled. His becoming troubled in spirit is not caused by the thought of the betrayal that will take place and its consequences, but by the fact that it will be one of them, who has been in His company all the time. He makes His disciples, among whom Judas is still found, known what He is busy with in His spirit. Thereupon he makes a solemn declaration as we see from the word ”testified”. The certainty and at the same time the seriousness of this word are further emphasized by the preceding double “truly” followed by the authoritative “I say to you”.

The disciples look at one another in despair, wondering of whom He is speaking. This attitude shows that among the disciples there is no suspicion whatsoever toward Judas. To them, he seems to be a completely sincere person. Judas is a striking illustration of a false apostle about whom we read in 2 Corinthians 11 (2Cor 11:13-15). It shows that the Lord Jesus has never made any allusion that He distrusts Judas or dislikes him or has shown anything else that would make Him want to warn the other disciples about Judas. He has always given Judas His full trust.

Opposite the hypocrisy of Judas shines the deep and sincere love of the disciple who is in the immediate vicinity of the Lord Jesus. He is reclining on His bosom. This indicates intimacy (Jn 1:18). John does not mention the name of the disciple. However, there can be no doubt that he means himself when he writes about the disciple “whom Jesus loved” (Jn 19:26; 20:2; 21:7,20,24). He calls himself that because he is aware that the Lord loves him.

The Lord certainly loved all disciples, but John is aware of this in a special way and cherished himself in that love. John did not take that place in order to receive messages for others, but intimacy with the Lord Jesus makes one familiar with His thoughts and enables him to serve others with them. Peter recognizes the place of intimacy that John takes. He did not occupy such a place himself because he still expected a lot from himself. But that did not prevent him from serving the Lord, and he did so. Nor is he jealous of John’s place, but recognizes him in it by giving him a hint.

It is a good thing to ask believers of whom we know that they live close to the Lord and His Word what light they have received from Him on a particular matter. John does not think it is a stupid question and he does not say: ‘Ask it yourself.’ The disciples complement each other. Each receives from the Lord his own formation, place and service. It is good to have an eye for that and to accept and appreciate that of each other.

John then asks the question who it is. The Lord answers by referring to a symbolic act at the supper. He says it is him to whom He will give the morsel after He has dipped it. Because He speaks emphatically about ‘the’ morsel and not about ‘a’ morsel, it is assumed that it refers to the act by which a host opens the supper. He takes ‘the’ morsel and gives it to the most important person at the table. It is a gesture of honor. With this gesture of honor, the Lord with love and grace makes another attempt to speak to the heart of Judas to bring him back from his pernicious path. But also this tribute is rejected by Judas.

Then all barriers are gone for satan to enter Judas. This rejection is the third and final step in the fall of Judas who first came under the power of money (Jn 12:6), which then made him an instrument of satan to betray the Lord for money (Jn 13:2), and here satan enters into him. The ruler of the demons takes the lead personally.

The Lord tells Judas to act quickly. Satan now gets the opportunity to do what he has always wanted to do because now it is God’s time. Judas does not become evil just now. He was already evil because of his greed for money, to which he gave in at everyday temptations. The Lord completely knows the heart of Judas. That is why He tells him to do quickly what he has to do.

Still nobody suspects anything of what is going on in Judas. The Lord has given the disciples the clearest clue, but there is no mention in their agenda of a surrender of the Lord and His death. They simply do not take into account the fact of His surrender. Therefore, any reminder from Him in that direction passes them by. They find a practical explanation for His words. Judas just has to go and buy something, like he always did when something was needed. After all, he had the money box. Or he had to go and give something to the poor somewhere. Apparently the Lord gave the order for that more often.

Judas does not refuse the morsel. He knows that the Lord sees through him. After he has taken the morsel the Lord gave him, he immediately leaves the scene into the night. It is night around him, but even more it is night in his soul.

When the traitor has left, the Lord Jesus is alone with His own and free to begin His farewell speech. He is able to open His heart without restraints. To be able to get to know God’s thoughts or to carry them out, every obstacle must be removed. In His thoughts, the Lord Jesus moves to the cross, where He will be glorified as the Son of Man. He speaks as if it were happening at that moment, “now”, after the traitor had left.

He can already see the full result before Him. The ‘now’ here is the ‘now’ of the cross. What the traitor is going to do and do quickly contributes to the glorification of the Son of Man. This glorification takes place in the death He will suffer on the cross. Glorification means the complete demonstration of all the glorious qualities of Him as the true Man Who has always perfectly obeyed His God in everything. This has been apparent throughout His entire life, but will find its culmination and crowning on the cross.

On the cross every Divine and human excellence of His Being has come to complete unfolding. Everything He is as Man Who lived for the glory of God has found its crowning on the cross. His devotion and surrender were manifested there at its highest. There we see a Man, as God meant a man to be. At the same time, God is glorified in Him, for every excellence of God has come to light in Him on the cross.

In the death of the Son of Man, the revelation of God is brought to a climax. God is perfectly justified in His Being, in His nature. His righteousness, His majesty, His love, His truth, they are all fulfilled on the cross as they are in Him. It is the glory of the Son of Man to glorify God’s Name in the very place where the first man dishonored God.

God’s answer to the glorification with which the Son of Man glorified Him is the glorification of the Son of Man. This glorification will certainly also come about when the Son of Man has received all things from God to rule over them in the realm of peace. But God will not wait that long. He will also “glorify Him immediately” in the resurrection.

He will glorify the Son of Man as Christ by taking Him into heaven because of His work on the cross and giving Him the place of glory and honor at His right hand (Acts 2:36b; Heb 2:9). This means that Christ, until He will be revealed in glory on earth, will be hidden in God as the Glorified (Col 3:3). God glorified Him, not by giving Him the throne of David, an earthly glory, but by placing Him on His own (God’s) throne in heaven.

The Lord speaks to His disciples as “little children”. He does not say ’My’ children. They are not. Nowhere are believers called ‘children of the Lord Jesus’. He speaks to them as children of God. It is the name of sweet relationships and vulnerability. He will only be with them for a short time, because He will soon go to His Father. Just as He said to the Jews (Jn 7:34; 8:21), He now also says to His disciples that they cannot come there. This is because He will go to an entirely different domain beyond this world. It is in the sphere of resurrection.

The Lord’s going to that new place is not without consequences for the relationships that exist on earth. The disciples cannot now follow Him to His new place. He wants to prepare them that they will not be able to follow Him for the time being. For the time they are still on earth, He points them to a new way of dealing with one another that is entirely appropriate to the atmosphere of the place where He is going. That new way is the love they will have among each other as children of God. The great characteristic of the family of God is love because God is love. While the Lord Jesus is surrounded by glory up there, the children of God on earth love each other.

When He will no longer be with them as the most important pillar against which they can lean and seek support in a hostile world, they must find this support among each other. They cannot support each other in their own strength, but in the efficacy of the new nature they have received from Him through faith in Him. That new nature is love. If they treat one another in this way, they will be known as disciples of Christ. What a testimony that will be!

This new duty, loving one another, results from a new relationship between Him Who is in heaven and those who are on earth. This will be a convincing proof to those around them that they are followers of Him. Their love among each other will bear witness to Him Who has shown this love perfectly in His life and in His death, and still does: an infallible love. Their love must be of His ‘material’ and after His model, so that this love will remain, even when He is gone.

This is not about the love for lost people, however important it may be, but about the selfless search for good for the brother and sister. It is about loving one another as disciples of Christ in accordance with His love. When He will have risen from the dead, these new connections will be established and become more and more visible.

What the Lord says here, He calls “a new commandment”, because it is about the brother, not about our neighbor. The commandment to love one’s neighbor belongs to the commandments of the Old Testament (Lev 19:18). These commandments are given in order to get life. The sinfulness of man has made this impossible.

The new thing about the commandment that the Lord gives is that He gives the life by which the disciples can love one another. The commandment is therefore a natural thing, we do it as a matter of course. It is a commandment that is true in Christ and has been realized by Him. And because He is our life, it is also true in us and can be fulfilled by us (1Jn 2:8). This cannot be said of the law.

What the Lord said about his going away raises the question with Peter as to where He is going. He asks Him about it. The Lord does not answer by mentioning the place where He is going, but by saying that Peter cannot follow Him there now. By this He means His inimitable work on the cross. Once He has completed His work on the cross, it will be possible to follow Him. Peter will follow Him later as a martyr in martyrdom to get where He is.

Peter doesn’t understand this either and he asks Him for it. He also adds that he is willing to follow the Lord even in death. Although Peter means well, it appears from his words that he doesn’t realize what he is saying. He really loves the Lord, but he doesn’t know himself well. If he had listened better, he would have accepted the Lord’s words, even if he had not understood everything. Not listening well brings us a lot of loss and also a lot of pain. We often have to learn through painful experiences, which we could have avoided had only our heart been more subdued.

The Lord does not praise Peter for his love for Him, but tells him what he will come to. The seriousness of this prediction is again preceded by the double “truly” followed by the authoritative “I say to you”. The three times repeated denial by Peter of his Master, prophesied by the Master, exalts the Master. He restores Peter in spite of his repeated denial by His marvelous grace. And what He is to Peter, He is no less to us.