Eternally Loved By God

Welcoming Words

Good morning, everyone. It is beautiful to be back here. We arrived here a little bit early. We thought church starts at nine o'clock, and we thought it was just going to be us, Pastor Lee, Tracy, and a couple of other people. But it's good to see that many of you are here, and I look forward to opening the Word of God and seeing what He has for us.

Reflecting on the Past Year

This is the last day of 2023. Can you believe it? This year has gone. It went by very quickly. And perhaps you can think back and reflect upon some of the really great moments, moments that fill your heart with joy and rejoice in those moments. And perhaps you can also think of some moments that were not so great, moments of grief, moments of pain, moments of losing loved ones, moments of utter loneliness, and a thousand other things that we as humans have to face.

Embracing the New Year

But yet another year is before us. And I pray that as you are transitioning into this new year today, you think of the things that are the most important.

A Story of Losing and Finding

There's a story of a man who goes to visit a friend, and he's in a village, and the night is really dark. And as he's coming back home, he loses his way. He doesn't know which way to go. And he takes one street and goes up and down. He just does not know how to get home. And as he's doing this, a police officer is standing and watching him, and he thinks that perhaps he's a thief trying to go into some house and steal something. So as the man comes back, the police officer calls, "Who are you? Where are you going? Where have you come from?" And the man answers, "If I knew the answers to those questions, I would have been home already."

Contemplating Life's Fundamental Questions

Sometimes, I think thinking about those basic questions, the most important questions of life, allows us to be back home. Who are we? Why are we here? Where do we come from? And where are we going? And so today, as we are ending this year, I want us to go to the Word of God and see how the Word of God answers those basic questions to us.

Matthew Perry's Comment

Because one of the things that happened in this year, I'm sure you heard of it, Matthew Perry was one of the celebrities that passed away. They think it could be a suicide; it could be just an overdose. But here he was, one of the most famous people that we have seen in the past 20 years. He was in the show called Friends, a huge celebrity. But when you look at his life, he spent most of it doing drugs, and he was intoxicated for most of it. And if you listen to some of his interviews, the reason he did most of those things is because he didn't know who he was. He says this in his book, "I did not know why I am here." He says, "I made a deal with the devil to become as famous as I could. And yet when I became famous, it was in those moments that my heart was empty as it could be."

Seeking Answers in the Word of God

And so when we look at the Word of God, what does it have to say to us when it comes to the basic questions of our identity? Who are we? Why are we here? What are we meant to do? But I want to add one other question at the very beginning. I think if you are going to find out who we are, we should first ask, who is God? Who is Jesus? What is the story of humanity? And when we open John chapter 1, verse 1, it says, "It was just before the Passover festival. Jesus knew that the hour had come for him to leave the world and go to his Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end."

The Life and Times of Jesus

What a beautiful picture. This is possibly an Easter service chapter or a scripture that usually people use, but I think it is very, very pertinent that we look at these words on the last day of a year. Here's the reason why. When we look at the life of Jesus over and over again, we see this phrase that is used, "When his time had come." We see this in John chapter 5, in John chapter 7, in John chapter 8. The Jews want to stone Jesus in chapter 8, and it says, "Jesus walked away because his hour had not come." And when we come to chapter 13, we see that it says, "Jesus knew that his hour had come."

Understanding Jesus' Mission

What does it mean? What does it mean that the hour had come? Jesus talks about the hour that is supposed to come, the hour had come for him to be glorified. And what that means is that the way he was going to be glorified was through the cross. And so, right before his crucifixion, we see this image of Jesus. Jesus knew the hour had come. What do we see? Who is Jesus? What do we see about him? The first thing that we see is that Jesus is omniscient. He knows all things. It is remarkable as I talk with so many Muslims in the live shows that I do, as we do evangelism and discipleship, one of the things they continue to tell me is this, "What kind of a God do you have? You say Jesus is God; how could humans just come and take Jesus and crucify him?" The image of Jesus sometimes that we can even have as a church is that Jesus was doing his ministry, and all of a sudden, the poor guy was taken by some people and he was crucified. But when we read the Word of God, we see that Jesus knew. None of this was unplanned. Jesus knew that he had come for the very purpose of what he was going to face. He knew that the hour had come for him to leave the world. It did not surprise him. Jesus knows, Jesus knows that when the time for the cross has come for him, the time of suffering and pain that he has to face, and he knows not just his own pain, he also knows our pain when we have to go through it. Jesus knows that the time has come. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

The Depth of Jesus' Love

What a remarkable thing we see here at the very last moments of his life. What is Jesus thinking about? He's thinking about and he's acting out his love, having loved his own. He loved the disciples that were with him at that moment. But it is equally true to say that Jesus, when he was sitting in that world, in that moment, he was loving all who were his. Jesus deeply loved those who are his. And the question is, are you his? Do you belong to Jesus? Do your affections belong to him? Does your heart throb for him? Are you his? And the way we know that we are his is when we are deeply, deeply loved by him. It is very easy in this new year to begin this year by thinking, "I am going to read the whole Bible again. We all do it. I am going to be more. I'm going to come to church every Sunday. I'm going to do this and this and this and this. But can I share something that will free you today?"

The Priority of Being Loved by Jesus

Can you make it your priority this year to be loved by Jesus? Be loved by him. Be deeply loved by him. Because when you're loved by him, all these other things will come and fall into place. We don't come to church anymore so that we can do our religious due diligence, but we do it because we want to come and be loved by him. We read the Word of God not because we have to read the Word and we have to finish the whole Bible in a one-year plan. We do it because we want to be loved by him. We serve one another. Why do we do it? Because we want to be loved by him. At the core of our identity, we see this reality that we are deeply loved by the God of the universe. I think it completely changes the question of who we are and what we are supposed to do. Are you loved by Jesus? Jesus at the last moments of his life, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

Jesus' Acts of Service

And how beautiful that phrase is. He loved them to the end. It could mean two different things. He loved them to the end of his life. He loved them to the very last moments. But it also could mean, one of the interpretations is, that he loved them to the utmost. He loved them to the end of his very being. He loved them as much as one could love another. He loved his disciples. He knows. He loves. The evening meal was in progress, and the devil had already prompted Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot, to betray Jesus. Again, Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, that he had come from God and was returning to God. So, he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist.

Jesus' Knowledge and Humility

Two different things we see again. First, when you look at verse two, we see that Jesus also knows the heart of man and woman. He knows the heart of humans. He knows what is going on in Judas' heart. The devil is overtaking his heart. He's being enwrapped by a demonic force, causing him to betray Jesus. He chose to betray Jesus, and Jesus knew that he was going to do that. And Jesus also knew, verse three, that the Father had put all things under his feet. Jesus has all authority, and he says if he wanted to, he could bring a myriad of angels to defend them. And yet, having all authority, having all power, knowing that he had come from God, knowing that he was going to God, what does he do? I think if you were going to read this passage for the first time, as I did at one point, I think you would think that now Jesus knew his enemy. A good story would be that he had found out that he was going to be betrayed. Here was this moment, if he had all the power, he would avenge himself. He would get up, and he would call his other disciples, or he himself would overpower Judas and save himself and his disciples. That makes sense, and yet we see something else.

Jesus' Ultimate Act of Love

What does he do? He is poor, so he gets up from the meal. As a master, as a teacher, that was not his role. His disciples are supposed to serve him. And yet, what does Jesus do? He gets up, takes off his outer clothing, and wraps a towel around his waist, making himself a servant. After that, he pours water into a basin and begins to wash his disciples' feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him. He looks at his very enemy in the eyes, and instead of hating him, and instead of his heart being full of vengeance to avenge himself, he goes and washes Judas' feet.

The Invitation to Receive Jesus' Love

And perhaps you may think that you do not deserve the love of God. Perhaps you may think you're so far away. Perhaps you may even imagine yourself as a Judas of a type who has followed Jesus and you continue to sin against him. Can I tell you that Jesus is still willing to serve you? Jesus wants to wash away your feet because he loves. It is easy to think that God is almighty, all-powerful, all-knowing, all-holy, and those things are all very true. And we cannot beat God in his holiness. We cannot be better than him in his power. We cannot be stronger than him or wiser than him, but we cannot be more humble than God himself.

The Humility of God

Look at his humility, the humility of God that so many religions cannot accept. They believe that God can be all-powerful, but far be it from him to serve us. And when I look at the face of Jesus, I see a humility that defies human logic. I see a love that defies all human rationality. Here is God, divinity clothed in humanity, coming to serve even his enemies. How he deeply loves. And I pray that you would know him. You would know that love. You would experience that love, and you will be transformed by that love. Who is Jesus? He knows all things. He loves deeply. He is humble, and he has come to serve us.

Our Identity in Christ

The second question I want to ask is, who are we? If that is who Jesus is, if that's who the God of the universe is, we see the very divinity of God in Jesus, and we see who he is and how he serves. Then the second question becomes, who are we? How do we relate to Jesus? Look at verse six with me. He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, "Lord, are you going to wash my feet?" Jesus replied, "You do not realize now what I am doing, but later you will understand." Verse eight, "No, you shall never wash my feet." Jesus answered, "Unless I wash you, you have no part with me."

Cultural Reflections

I think when you look at this image coming from the East, whenever we leave the house, it is always the youngest person in the house that actually brings our shoes and puts them in front of us. The least person in the house is supposed to do these kinds of works, like washing someone's feet or bringing water so you can wash your hands before eating or putting your shoes in front of you. This is the work for the most undignified person in the room. It embarrasses me. I know that I am from that culture, but I've lived here for over 20 years, and when I leave my parents' house, my sister still brings my shoes in front of me. It embarrasses me. I don't want her to do that because it doesn't feel right. And I think Peter, in some ways, is feeling the same thing. He doesn't think it is quite right for Jesus, as Master and Lord, to wash his feet.

The Correct Posture Before God

I think the religious instinct in Peter is correct. We are supposed to serve God, right? God is not supposed to serve us. We are supposed to serve God. And so the religious instinct in Peter is right. He is supposed to wash Jesus' feet, and yet Jesus is coming to him and saying, "I am going to wash your feet." And Peter says, "Lord, are you going to wash my feet? You do not realize what I'm doing," Jesus tells him. "You will understand in time. You shall never wash my feet." I think this is not fake humility on Peter's part. He genuinely feels this. And usually, our most religious instincts are generally wrong when it comes to God. We want to serve God. We want to do something for God. We want to... Jesus says, "Unless you allow me to wash your feet, you'll never have a part in me. Unless you allow me to wash your hearts, you will never have a part in me. Unless you allow me to take the dirtiest part of you and wash it and clean it, you will never have a part in me."

The Message of the Gospel

This is the message of the gospel. You can come to Him the way you are, and He will wash you. He will cleanse you. He will transform you. There's something essentially wrong in the human heart, isn't there? There's something essentially wrong with us. We sin. We do wrong things. Do you remember the little bit from Shakespeare in Macbeth? When Macbeth kills the king with her husband, she always thinks there's blood on her hands. She washes her hands multiple times, but she feels like she's killed someone. Of course, this is the psychological drama that Shakespeare so beautifully portrays in Macbeth. There's blood on her hand, and she's going mad. And so Macbeth brings a doctor, and he asks the doctor and says, "Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased? Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow, raze out the written troubles of the brain, and with some sweet oblivious antidote, cleanse the stuffed bosom of that perilous stuff which weighs upon the heart." I know you guys are very excited about hearing about Shakespeare again. Probably reminds you of high school all over. And I was as excited about Shakespeare as you are right now. But listen to what he's saying. He's saying, "Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased, doctor? Can't you do something when the mind has lost itself, when it becomes diseased, when it becomes darkened? Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow, raze out the written troubles of the brain. Can't you do something about her situation and with some sweet oblivious antidote, with some kind of medicine, cleanse the stuffed bosom of that perilous stuff? Don't you have some kind of a medicine that can wash away the heart from that poisonous stuff which weighs upon the heart?" And the doctor says, "Therein the patient must minister to themselves." And I think that is so abjectly wrong. The patient, if it could cleanse its own mind and cleanse its own heart and heal its own sorrows and its heart, they wouldn't need a doctor. There's something wrong about the mind. Something has gone wrong. And this is what Carl Jung calls the shadow self, which each one of us is haunted by. We pretend to be so very good, and yet in the darkest moments of the night, sometimes we know exactly who we are. We are full of sin, full of pride, and so many things haunt us, things that no one else knows about, and if they were to know, they would never, ever talk with us. I know these things about me, and you know those things about yourself. What do we do with that? Where do we go? How are we going to be cleansed of that perilous stuff, that poisonous stuff that weighs upon our heart?

The Power of the Gospel

The message of the gospel is, who are we? We are sinful. We are sinful. What do we do with our sin? We can bring it before Jesus, who wrapped a towel around Himself, and He washed His disciples' feet, and He's willing to wash us and cleanse us and make us new. Isn't that good news? Isn't that great news? It is the most beautiful news that I know of. I cannot bring you any other news. In the whole entirety of the universe, there's nothing bigger and better and sweeter and more remarkable in this news that I can come to Jesus. He loves me despite the fact that He knows me. He loves you in spite of the fact, precisely for the fact that He knows you deeply, and He still deeply loves you. Oh, that we would know this love. Oh, that we would be loved, and we would allow ourselves to be loved by Jesus. There's nothing like it anywhere else. You cannot find this hope, this message, this possibility of living the next year in this kind of love anywhere else.

The Invitation of the Gospel

So what I am trying to tell you is that you could not have gone anywhere else this morning that would have been better for you, because you would not have heard a message better than this, the message of the gospel, the message of the love of God.

Understanding Jesus' Love and Our Response

And finally, if we see who Jesus is, He loves, He's humble, He serves, He's all-knowing, He's all-powerful, all authority belongs to Him, and we see ourselves, we are sinful, we are full of things that are wrong, and we can come to Him. What does He call us to do? And that is our last point. What am I called to do? As we look at the year ahead, what does Jesus call us to do?

Let's look at verse 10. Jesus answered, "Those who have been bathed need only to wash their feet, and their whole body is clean. And you are clean, though not every one of you." For He knew who was going to betray Him, and that was why He said not everyone was clean. When He had finished washing their feet, He put on His clothes and returned to His place. "Do you understand what I have done for you?" He asked them. "You call me 'Teacher' and 'Lord,' and rightfully so, for that is what I am. Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him."

The Call to Respond

Now listen carefully. Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you just read them. Is that what it says? Do you have the word open with you? Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you just feel good about having heard it. It doesn't say that. What does it say? "Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them." Jesus does not save us for this just to save us. He does save us, of course, but what is the purpose of all of this? What is the purpose of life? Now that I'm a Christian, what, am I supposed to just wait until I die? No, He calls us, He saves us, He cleanses us so that through us, He can show His own love to others. I, who am your master and teacher, have washed your feet so that you would have an example of what you are supposed to do.

Reflecting Divine Love

When we look at life, there's a beautiful story from the East. Let me share that with you, and we'll end with that. There's a story of two kings, two great friends, and one king is going to the kingdom of his friend, and he wants to take a gift with him. He wants to take a gift with him to the king, to his friend. And he thinks and he thinks and he thinks about what to bring to a king. What do you bring to a king who has everything? And on the last day, he finally figures it out. He comes to the king, his friend, and he says, "I could only think of bringing you one thing. I could only think of bringing you one thing. I've brought you a mirror as a gift so whenever you look at yourself, you can remember me." The only gift that he could give to a king was a mirror in which he could see the reflection of his own glory and his own beauty. That's a story that's written in Rumi, a Persian poet.

Our Purpose and Identity

But when we look at the Word of God, when we look at what the Word of God tells us, isn't that kind of ring true of what happened to us? Who are we? Why are we here? When we look at the eternality of the Trinity, the Father loves the Son, the Son loves the Spirit. There's unity in the Trinity. It is all sufficient. God does not create us because He needs to. You realize that. God didn't lack love, and so He created you to love Him. He didn't lack worship or glory, and so He created you so you can give glory. He is all-glorious. He is all-loving. He is all-sufficient. But for this reason, for some reason, and the reason we read in the Word of God is this, God gives His Son, He creates humanity in His very image so that we become like the Son of God so that we can grow to be in the image of Christ, the Word of God tells us. So that whenever God looks at us, He sees His own reflection in us. We are the image of God. We believe in that. What is an image supposed to do? An image is supposed to reflect the reality of that which it is reflecting. We who are made in the image of God are called to reflect Him.

Closing Thoughts

I think the kids are done. This is their signal saying, "Let's wrap it up. It's getting too much." We are supposed to reflect the very glory of God. We are supposed to reflect the love and the patience and the humility of Christ, not in our own power because a reflection and a shadow has no substance of its own. It reflects that which it is, reality. And so what we are called to do then, I believe, is that as we look at Jesus, as we are loved by Jesus, as we're saved by Him, as we're washed by Him, as we're transformed by Him, in life we will continue to reflect Him more and more and more, not as a matter of duty and obligation, but as the reality of the core of our being. Does that make sense? I hope it does. I hope that image captures your heart. You're not called to just be religious. You're not just called to do these things because these are obligations on your life. You're supposed to, I am supposed to, reflect the very glory of God and the person of Jesus. That happens when we, the closer we look at Him, the more we allow Him to serve us, to wash us and transform us, the more we are going to reflect Him.

A Prayer for the New Year

I pray that you experience Him in this coming year. I pray that you reflect Him in this coming year. Verse 34 and 35, we'll just read it and leave it at that. This is what Jesus says, "A new commandment I give you: love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this, everyone will know that you are my disciples if you love one another." I pray that we would love one another this year.

Let's pray. Lord, we are so grateful to know that you have loved us from eternity. We are so grateful that our identity can be rooted in You, despite our sins, what you have done. You have given up your very life to wash us from our sins. And I pray that we would be a people that are deeply loved by You. Father, that is our desire: to be loved by You and to love You. And I pray that we would come to know You and know ourselves more this coming year. And I also pray that You would use this church to show Your glory and Your love to the people around them. And I pray all of this in my Savior's name. Amen.