Part 3: Looking Out For One Another Series

Series: God’s Best for One Another

Part 3: Looking Out for One Another

John 13:1-17, Gal 6:1-2, James 5:16-18, 1 Thess 4:13-18

Sermon by Rick Crandall

McClendon Baptist Church - Sept. 13, 2009

BACKGROUND:

*Does God care how we treat one another in His church? -- He most certainly does. We know this because He talks about it over 60 times in His Word.

*Last week we looked at some definite don’ts, -- things God doesn’t want us to do to one another. And we started this series by looking at the crux of how we should treat each other: It’s the Lord’s command to love one another with His kind of unconditional love.

*Today our focus is on looking out for one another. And our first Scripture takes place on the night before the cross, just before Jesus gave us the command to love one another. Let’s begin by reading John 13:1-17.

INTRODUCTION:

*Have you seen any selfishness in other people this week? -- Sometimes all I have to do to see selfishness is look in the mirror.

*This little poem describes how we are sometimes:

I had a little tea party

This afternoon at three.

‘Twas very small –

Three guests in all –

Just I, Myself and Me

Myself ate all the sandwiches

While I drank up the tea;

‘Twas also I who ate the pie

And passed the cake to me. (1)

*We live in a very self-centered world, but God doesn’t want us to be selfish like that. Jesus wants His followers to look out for one another, and today’s Scriptures show us how.

1. First: Serve one another.

*Jesus Christ is our greatest example of humble service, and we see the Lord at work here in vs. 3-5:

3. Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God and was going to God,

4. rose from supper and laid aside His garments, took a towel and girded Himself.

5. After that, He poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded.

*The King of kings stooped to wash His follower’s feet!

*Eric Ritz explained that “in the holy lands, feet were coated with dust because of the dry environment. When it did rain, feet and toes were caked with mud.

-Remember, the Jews wore sandals not Florsheim shoes.

-Remember, the streets were traveled by beasts of burden, not Buicks, so you can imagine the raw sewage lying around everywhere.

-There were no street cleaners or garbage pick-ups, so you can imagine the filth and dirt which would have accumulated on their feet!

*Because of this, in every house there was a copper urn and basin with a pitcher by the door to wash the feet of those who entered. (2)

*Angela Akers tells us that in Jesus’ day the washing of feet was a task reserved not just for servants. This job was given to the lowest of servants. (3)

-But the King of all creation stooped down that night to wash His follower’s feet!

*Jesus showed His followers how to look out for one another. Then in vs. 12-15, He began to teach them:

12. So when He had washed their feet, taken His garments, and sat down again, He said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you?

13. You call me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am.

14. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.

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

*The Lord wants us to follow His example of humble service to one another.

-Does this mean that we are supposed to wash each other’s feet? -- Missionary Doug Meland and his wife would say, “Maybe.”

*The Melands were Bible translators among the Fulnio Indians in Brazil. When Doug first got there, he was simply known as “the white man.” That was not a compliment, because the only white men those natives knew had burned their homes, and robbed them of their lands.

*But after the Melands learned their language and began to help the people with medicine and in other ways, they began calling Doug “the respectable white man.” And when the Melands began adopting the customs of the people, the tribe began to call Doug “the white Indian.”

*Then one day, Doug began to wash the dirty, blood-caked foot of an injured Indian boy. And he overheard a tribesman say, “Whoever heard of a white man washing an Indian’s foot before? -- Surely this man is from God!”

-From that day on, whenever Doug would go into an Indian home, they would say, “Here comes the man God sent to us.” (4)