Washing Feet

Kristine Cucinotta Murphy

I delight in the Lord this day, to find a ball park with a bathroom, as I sit on my coat on the cold concrete floor to wash my feet and oil them well. A fresh breath taken in of cleanliness, exhaling a joy of relief after my feet have been sweating and stinking in the rain boots they have been in to keep from getting muddy in days of rain we have been walking in.

The most toxic and yet vital part of our body is our feet. Toxins through pores on the bottom of our feet build up on our souls, pun intended, of where we have walked, what we have eaten and all our flesh has soaked in through our skin.

Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, that have I given unto you, as I said unto Moses.”

–Joshua 1:3

But, to stay healthy we must daily wash our feet and cover them with an anointing of oil to keep them clean. The first part of our body we must wash is our feet, to be able to walk where we must each day.

If we aren’t walking in peace, we are no different than anyone else, full of uproar, unsteady, sickly, chaos, anxiety, anger, contentious, confusion and all of the other toxins in this world.

And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace;”

–Ephesians 6:15

And then, God’s Word came alive and became man and washed his disciples feet! He didn’t say go wash your feet, he humbled himself as a servant and washed them for them.

God tells us this day, since Jesus Christ washes our feet, go and wash other’s feet, especially a man to wash his wife’s feet. The husband’s high calling is to sanctify his wife, by peace. Oh blessed are the peacemakers! To cover her in cleanliness of holiness. That grace!

And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

–1 Thessalonians 5:23

Many marriages hold a ceremony of the groom washing his bride’s feet in symbolism of this very daily responsibility of a leader in servanthood to make disciples at home and out in the world.

What do we gain by the washing of feet?

Cleanliness, holiness, righteousness in perfect peace that surpasses all understanding.

If we aren’t walking in peace with clean oiled feet, we will pile up so much filth and the diseases of this world.

And, behold, a woman in the city, which was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster box of ointment,”

–Luke 7:37-38

38 And stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment.

We live, we feel, we are effected in our moral, physical and Spiritual being through our feet.

We also breathe through our feet, ask anyone who’s mother rubbed that greasy, menthol Vicks vapor rub on their feet when they were sick. The grease keeps our feet from cracking and causing openings to get infected. A protection and a way to keep the menthol to stay where it needs to be. It also puts a coated layer to warm the feet. When you have warm feet, you have a warm body. When you have clean feet, you have a clean body, and when you have a protected feet, you have a protected body!

The feet is where, in all ways we must walk, to tarry through this wicked world on our way to our Promise Land with God for all of eternity.

Did you wash your feet today?

Are you disciplined from a solid foundation of discipleship into apostleship?

Did you wash someone else’s feet today? Do you daily just make one disciple, even in your own home?

So after he had washed their feet, and had taken his garments, and was set down again, he said unto them, Know ye what I have done to you?

Ye call me Master and Lord: and ye say well; for so I am.

If I then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet; ye also ought to wash one another’s feet.

For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you.

Verily, verily, I say unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord; neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him.

If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them.

I speak not of you all: I know whom I have chosen: but that the scripture may be fulfilled, He that eateth bread with me hath lifted up his heel against me.

Now I tell you before it come, that, when it is come to pass, ye may believe that I am he.

Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that receiveth whomsoever I send receiveth me; and he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me.

When Jesus had thus said, he was troubled in spirit, and testified, and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me.

–John 13:12-21