The following Publications for the use of District Visitors are soid at the Office of the General Society for promoting District Visiting, No. 19, Exeter Hall. Plan of Operations, Instructions to Visitors, &c. 2d. A SERMON, PREACHED AT ST. MARY-LE-STRAND CHURCH, IN BEHALF OF THE GENERAL SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING DISTRICT VISITING, MASTER OF THE TEMPLE. JOHN xiii. 12—15. 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 ought also to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you. AMONG the various incidents which are recorded by the Evangelists, as having occurred during the night which immediately preceded the crucifixion of our Lord, there is not one which is introduced with more solemnity than the washing of the apostles' feet. "Now before the feast of the Passover," says St. John, "when Jesus knew that his hour was come that he should depart out of this world unto the Father, having loved his own which were in the world, he loved them unto the end. And supper being ended (the devil having now put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray him), Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he was come from God and went to God; he riseth from supper, and laid aside his garments, and took a towel and girded himself. After that he poureth water into a basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded." Such is the impressive manner in which the Evangelist brings before our consideration this simple action of our Saviour, and the minute particularity with which he describes the circumstances that accompanied it. Nor is this all. We may remark, as equally singular, the importance which our Lord himself appears to have attached to the transaction, and the mysterious remonstrance which he addressed to Peter, B when he would have resisted, in his own case, the performance of the rite. For when Jesus came to Peter for the purpose of washing him, "Peter said unto him, Lord, dost thou wash my feet? Jesus answered and said unto him, What I do, thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter. Peter saith unto him, Thou shalt never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me. Simon Peter saith unto him, Lord, not my feet only, but my hands and my head. Jesus saith unto him, He that is washed, needeth not save wash his feet, but is clean every whit. And ye are clean, but not all.” The extraordinary solemnity of this whole narrative, and the apparent mystery attached to the act itself, have led to endeavours to give it a degree of importance commensurate to the dignity with which it is introduced. Some have, therefore, conceived that the Saviour intended the ceremony of washing the apostles' feet with water, to be regarded as emblematical of his cleansing the souls and bodies of his disciples from all sin, by the mingled water and blood which flowed from his side, when he was pierced, for the world's transgression, upon the cross. This opinion is principally supported by a reference to the conversation which has already been quoted as having taken place between our Lord and St. Peter. But it is certain that the only light in which Jesus himself has taught us to look upon the incident is, as a motive to go and do likewise. This, at least, is the only lesson which he at the time derived from it; and we shall find upon a careful review, that the whole circumstances of the case may be satisfactorily explained without having recourse to any mystical allusion to his own propitiatory sacrifice. Jesus came, as we have seen, to Peter, and Peter, knowing both his own unworthiness and his Master's divine origin and dignity, said unto him, "Dost thou wash my feet?" Is it meet that an office of such lowliness should be performed by the everlasting Son of God for one of the humblest of the sons of men? "Jesus answered and said unto him, What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter." As yet thou art ignorant of the reasons which have induced me to adopt this course; but as soon as I have done what it is my purpose to do, then thou shalt be made acquainted with the cause. Not satisfied to submit, or not aware of our Lord's meaning, Peter still more vehemently replied, "Thou shalt never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me." In other words, If in disobedience to my will thou refusest to permit me to do that to thee which I desire, and wilt not, without a full and previous explanation of the reasons of my conduct, bend to my authority, and be washed, thy presumptuous disobedience too plainly shows that thou hast no part with me in that submissive disposition with which I ever have, and am ever ready, to follow the will of my heavenly Father, even in the most mysterious of his dispensations. Struck by these words, which, whether he comprehended them or not, he felt to contain a strong rebuke, Peter passed, with his accustomed energy of character, from the excess of obstinacy to the excess of zeal. He saith unto him, Wash, "Lord, not my feet only, but my hands and my head. Jesus saith unto him, He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit." He that is already cleansed, whether from the filthiness of the flesh or spirit, does not require, for the end which I have now in view, to submit to more from me than the washing of his feet. For by that previous cleansing he has been already purified, and needeth not, therefore, for that purpose, to be washed again. Obey, then, in what I desire, and give me an opportunity of doing neither more nor less to thee than that which my own wisdom sees fit. So wilt thou show thyself my disciple, and so shall I be able to give you an example of that conduct I wish to recommend to your observance. It thus appears evident that there is nothing in the statements of our Lord to his apostles which may not be explained without any allusion to his blood, as washing away the sins of mankind. Such a secret and mystical reference is unnecessary to elucidate the language of Jesus. As it is a needless, therefore so also must we consider it an unnatural course to assume such a reference in order to account for the circumstances under which, in the particular case of Peter, the washing of the apostles' feet was performed. But though we have explained the conversation between our Lord and Peter, it still remains for us to assign some reason for that great solemnity, with which the narrative is introduced to our notice by St. John. To account for this, then, there are some who would per suade us that the mere act of washing the feet of the disciples of Christ was intended to be a perpetual ordinance in his Church. As the Lord's Supper was ordained to be celebrated in continual remembrance of Christ, so do they maintain that this act of washing also should be repeated in continual imitation of Christ. They consequently imagine that to give greater weight to this apparently insignificant duty, the most awful period of our Saviour's life—even the night before he was crucified and slain-was chosen for the institution of this ceremony, as well as of that sacrament of the Gospel. In pursuance of this notion, there are those of the Church of Rome who are accustomed, year by year, in the week in which they commemorate the death of the Redeemer, to repeat the act of washing the feet of the poor, and imagine that by that outward deed alone they have accomplished the precept of Christ, in doing to others as he himself did to his apostles. But surely such a limited view of the subject is altogether unworthy of the divine wisdom of our Lord. The sacrament of the Lord's Supper is an ordinance adapted to the strengthening and refreshing of our souls, even as our bodies are by the bread and wine. But the mere employment of washing a poor brother's feet at a fixed period of each returning year, is utterly vain and valueless, except as an example of that entire and uninterrupted course of kindness we should show to all who are placed in the same relative situation to us, in which our blessed Saviour stood to the apostles he had chosen. Had this ceremony, indeed, been performed by the apostles with the same annual regularity with which they almost daily celebrated the supper of the Lord, and had they expressly commended it to the observance of the universal Church; or had they even implied that they deemed it binding in its literal sense, we might then have admitted it as a necessary rite of th Christian religion. But there is one only allusion to it throughout the remainder of the New Testament, and there* it is clear that St. Paul, in describing the good works of the widows he approved, intended, under the particular expression of "washing the feet of the saints,” to designate their general habit of performing the requisite services of hospitality, to those whom they received under their roof. * 1 Tim. v. 10. |