The Greatest of These

This month’s devotional highlight comes from my seventh 30-Day Devotional “The Greatest of These.” As a fun fact about this particular one, I’ve written a brief introduction for all of my other 30-Day Devotionals, but I didn’t write one for “The Greatest of These.” I didn’t forget, and I wasn’t just being lazy. I simply couldn’t think of a better introduction than 1 Corinthians 13:13, “And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.” So, that was what I went with for the introduction. After all, that’s the verse that provided the inspiration for the title of the study, and all of 1 Corinthians 13 was influential as I wrote the devotionals.

Once again, I struggled to choose just one devotional to use for this highlight, but I finally settled on the devotional for Day 27 titled “The Master Serves.” I chose it because I needed the reminder not to be too busy or too caught up in my own life and my own problems to fail to look for ways to serve and help others. Jesus gave us such a powerful example of loving by serving, and it’s an example we need to be following.

The Master Serves

“If I then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet; ye also ought to wash one another’s feet.” -John 13:14

John 13:1-17

I want you to try just for a minute to put yourself in the disciples’ shoes in our passage. You left your entire life behind to follow Jesus and have followed Him for over three years now. In that time, you’ve seen Him give sight to the blind, heal the sick, feed multitudes with practically nothing, calm a storm with just a word, raise the dead, and so many other miracles… And, now, He’s girded Himself with a towel and is about to wash your feet. Peter’s initial “No way!” reaction makes perfect sense to me.

This was God in the flesh, the Messiah, the Savior of the world, the all-powerful, all-knowing Son of God, and He was washing feet–even Judas Iscariot’s feet, knowing what was in his heart. Why? Because He loved His own to the end. Because He was still teaching them. They needed this example to follow. They needed to understand that to love is to humbly serve. And, that lesson is as much for us today as it was for them that night.

In our “all about me” world, we need to be different. We need to be washing one another’s feet. We need to be looking for ways to serve others, not for ways they can serve us. We need to stay humble and not view anyone or any task as beneath us. We need to show love by serving.

Love serves.