True Leadership
What characteristics do you look for in a leader? I asked this question while having dinner with friends on Wednesday. The first characteristic they came up with was '? someone who does not dominate but leads humbly, by example. The second one was someone who is secure in themselves. The third was someone who knows where they are going, who has vision. The fourth was someone who takes responsibility when things go wrong. I was pretty stunned at how closely these describe Jesus in John 13.
But what is true of a leader, often becomes true of those they lead. If you belong to the new community begun by Jesus the Messiah, 2 millennia ago, people should notice three things developing in you:
1) a servant heart increasingly given to voluntary acts of menial service 2) a growing sense of security about yourself 3) and a sense of purpose and determination '? like you're going somewhere.
You see, belonging to the community of Jesus, means patterning yourself on Jesus, who 'though he was in very nature God, did not grasp rank, but took the form of a servant, humbling himself unto death, even death on a cross. Phil 2. But Jesus' humility, was possible because he was secure, he knew exactly who he was, and he knew where he was going '? with loving, but steely determination.
The world of Jesus' day had no concept of humility as something good, as a virtue. Humility was not one of the virtues listed by Plato. Greco-Roman culture was an honour-shame culture, as largely was ancient Hebrew, and lowering your station in life is not encouraged. If you stoop below your station you dishonour your name and your family. Jesus was about to demonstrate a new way of being human '? deliberately stooping to do menial acts, out of love.
A Stanford University business analyst, by the name of Jim Collins, did a study into what made a good company rise above its competitors and become what was termed a great company. The research team were surprised, indeed shocked to find that the kind of leadership required for turning a good company into a great company, was not a leader with a big personality, who frequently made the headlines. The good-to-great leaders seemed to have come from Mars, they said! They were a paradoxical blend of self-effacing, personal humility and professional will, or determination. Western civilisation has been profoundly influenced by Jesus, as recorded in John 13, but personal humility is still not common in the world at large.
Would you keep your Bibles open to John 13. George told us last time that Jesus knew his 'hour', or 'time' had now come. Chapters 13-17 now take place in the 'upper room'. If you think of Jesus' earthly life as a mission trip from heaven to earth...his mission was to successfully set up a small 'outpost' or 'franchise' or 'community' of heaven on earth, among his disciples. The mission was now nearing its completion, when he would return to heaven. So here he is with his closest friends in the departure lounge. What do you do when you are going away for a long time? You spend quality time with your closest people. The disciples are Jesus' closest people. They don't know it, but they're going to lead the new franchise of heaven, when Jesus is gone. So this is a farewell, and their last PD professional development '? being held in the departure lounge of the upper room.
It's just before Passover. Can you remember how John introduces Jesus in ch 1? The 'Lamb... of God, who takes away the sin of the world' - the Passover lamb. And here we are just before Passover. In ch 12:27, we saw that Jesus wanted the Father to save him from this terrible 'hour'. But he knew this was why he had come and through enduring it he would 'glorify' the Father's name. We saw his determination then, and now we see it again. He knows his hour has come to 'depart from this world and go to the Father'. He knows exactly where he is going '? back to His father. And because he knows this, he determines to keep loving 'his own, to the end', meaning - fully...completely...to the last! He won't flag, or deviate from loving them.
But side by side this determination to love, lay the devil, verse 2 tells us! The old enemy now makes his final assault on Jesus with a horrible twist '? he will use one of Jesus' 'own'. He'd already put the idea of betrayal into Judas son of Simon Iscariot.
But Jesus is secure in his identity - v3 ..'knowing that the Father had put all things into his hands...and that he had come from God and was going to God'.... Jesus is secure in the knowledge that the Father had put 'all things' into his hands! Which means the devil's plan of betrayal can't be outside of Jesus' control. How easily he could have used this power wrongly. He could no doubt have convinced Judas of the foolishness of betraying him. He had changed water into wine, raised Lazarus from death, fed 5000 people, walked on water. He could do anything! But... he gets up, strips off his clothes and proceeds to wash the feet of 'his own'.
He was also secure in knowing he had come from God and was going to God. He was divine... yet he gets up, strips off, kneels before each disciple, and washes their feet, including, we must presume, Judas. He descends to serve them in the most menial way possible.
Let's think about this! For Jews, dust was connected with death. The unclean animals in the OT all pawed the dust, and the serpent's curse was to go on its belly in the dust. Death returns us all to dust. So Gentile, rather than Jewish servants washed feet for this reason '? foot-washing was associated with uncleanness and death. So Jesus was doing something unheard of '? willingly associating himself with death.
Verses 4 '? 5 give us the detailed description of an eye witness - The outer garment, the towel around the waist, pouring water from a jug into the basin... Why so much detail? So it can be visualised, precisely because it was such irregular behaviour!
But when Jesus gets to Peter, Peter verbalises the disciples' embarrassment. He is trying to 'save face' for Jesus! But Jesus' response is steely, 'Unless I wash you, you have no share with me'. 'Share' literally meant inheritance, so Peter is running the risk of being disinherited! Of being cut off from Jesus. Jesus washing Peter's feet requires him to submit to a very strange act he can't get his head around. But Jesus holds absolutely firm here, because it will be the pattern for how Peter must lead the new community.
A former commander-in-chief of the US forces in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, was asked how he approached the Taliban insurgency in that country. This is what he said, 'I have found in my experience that the best answers and approaches may be counter-intuitive. The opposite of what it seems you ought to do is what ought to be done...' God in Christ approached the insurgency of the human condition not with a display of his power, but '? humility. He didn't come in glory, so we would fall at his feet, he took the task reserved for the lowest place on the social ladder '? a gentile slave. How comfortable are you at doing menial tasks for the sake of others?
Peter at least gets the seriousness of being cut off from Jesus. But he over-reacts...'wash my hands and head'. So Jesus picks up Peter's over-reaction to teach something deeper. If a person has taken a shower, their head and hands will be clean, so washing them again isn't necessary. The disciples are in the category of those who have showered '? they've been spiritually washed clean, 'but not all of you'. What does this mean? The disciples, apart from Judas, are in a trusting relationship with Jesus, so they're clean.
So before the cross, Jesus is counting the disciples clean, included in his family. They're like all the faithful in Israel who died before Jesus came. They believed God's promises and like Abraham, their faith was reckoned as righteousness. 2000 years after the cross, faith in God's promises is still the way we are made clean. God's promise to us is that if we believe in his Son, we are welcomed into God's family. John's whole gospel is aimed to help people believe in Jesus and receive the family inheritance, the 'share with him', of eternal life.
Here then is who we are - our true identity, and here is where we are going - our purpose and destination. As believers in Jesus, we are 'in a relationship' with the Son of the God of the universe...and we are heading for eternal life. This means we will rise from the dead to a new heaven and a new earth. People should therefore be noticing changes in us '? that we are more and more secure in who we are, and they should see us increasingly as people who know where we're going. This should be leading us increasingly to lives of self-giving service of others in menial, loving-to-the-end ways.
This is what Jesus goes on to say in verses 14-15, 'So if I your master and rabbi, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done'.
Jesus would die that weekend, to take away the sins of the world. The disciples couldn't die for the sins of the world, but their lives would cross-shaped. Ours are to be cross-shaped too - liberated to do menial tasks, laying social rank and perception aside on each other's behalf.
But in case the disciples were inclined to argue, Jesus shuts them down with clear logic in v 16 ... 'servants are not greater that their master, nor messengers than the one who sent them'. He is their Teacher and Lord '? so clearly above them! They could not rise above him, in fact their duty was to copy him. So in the new Christian community Jesus was forming, the leaders would not rule, but serve each other.
As servants and messengers they would be sent to set up other franchises of heaven. And v17 contains a promise '? 'If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them'. Blessing, shalom, God's peace and joy will also accompany their determination to follow Jesus' example.
I find it so easy to be convinced at the intellectual level, but to falter in the reality of the moment. How we need to pray for God to propel us into humble service of each other.
In verse18 there is another who falters. Jesus quotes from Psalm 41:9. Let me read it to you: 'Even my close friend, whom I trusted, he who shared my bread, has lifted his heel against me'. It is so easy to falter. Judas was one of Jesus' closest friends. They ate from the same bowl. But as we know, the devil had sown ideas of betrayal, and this was not the first time Judas had weakened. Remember in ch 12 when Mary anointed Jesus' with the bottle of perfume worth 60 grand? Judas objected, since he was the keeper of the purse. We're told there that he had become a thief, and was known to steal from it. Money was where he faltered. Where are you vulnerable? Lay it down. Its not worth it.
You see even Judas' treachery, will serve God's mission. Verse 19 - Jesus is fore-telling what is about to happen, so that when it does happen, the disciples may have objective evidence of his - divinity, and believe that Jesus is literally, 'I am' '? the personal name given by God to Moses at the burning bush.
Then stunningly, Jesus takes the intimacy he shares with the Father one extraordinary step further, and draws the disciples into it. He emphatically says, 'Truly, truly, whoever receives one who I send, receives me, and whoever receives me, receives him who sent me'. The intimacy and authority he has as God the Son, he now passes on to those who will form his new community, and carry his message! This is an anticipation of Jesus sending out the disciples at the end of the book. It confirms them in their intimate status with Jesus and through him with the Father, and because of that - as his future ambassadors to the world. You and I are equally God's ambassadors today. Whoever receives us when we speak of Jesus, receives Jesus, and the Father. We have the task of bringing Jesus to those who don't know him yet as humble, cross-shaped people. There is no room for people who wish to dominate others in the new community begun by Jesus the foot-washing Messiah.
Verses 21-30 are highly emotional. We see Jesus become distressed, agitated. His emotional pain spills out as he shares that one of them will betray him. But Jesus loves Judas to the end, extending special honour in feeding him the choice morsel. This act was an affirmation of a relationship, a way of honouring a friend. No wonder the disciples did not understand that it Judas was the betrayer.
We see how close the 12 were with Jesus, reclining together around their meal. We see questioning glances darting among the disciples as to who could possibly betray Jesus. We see their confusion, thinking Judas is going out to buy something. But above all, we see Jesus' dogged, loving, costly, determination to go... to the cross. Judas accepts the choice morsel from Jesus, but Satan enters into him and Jesus says, 'Go quickly '? get it done...'. And we see Judas' turn his back on Jesus, and go out into the night, both literally and into spiritual darkness.
Don't falter. By believing in Jesus God's Son, you are welcomed into a relationship with Jesus and through him, with God. This is who you are. You are secure. And this means you are on your way to a new heavens and new earth... you will be departing and going to Jesus, and meeting his Father, who is your Father. You know where you are going. Are you determined like Jesus to serve in your job, at home, among your friends and family, in society, and within this outpost of heaven, in humble acts of love, to the end? You are not above your Teacher and Lord.