What is Love?

A DEVOTIONAL BY GUEST WRITER MARTIN LECKEBUSCH

When he had washed their feet and put on his outer garments and resumed his place, he said to them, “Do you understand what I have done to you? John 13:12

A minor domestic interruption delayed this reflection. A jumper my wife had ordered didn’t match the online details and wasn’t suitable. The sellers have been dragging their feet over return labels and postage. Correspondence has gone on for some days. Today, I have been comparing parcel prices and hunting suitable packaging. As the saying goes, “That’s an hour of my life I won’t get back.” Yet I don’t mind helping someone I love handle one of life’s little problems.

At last, though, I can turn to John 13:1-17. The text may be familiar but I would encourage you to read it again.

The context is Jesus’ final Passover with his friends before his crucifixion. Within an hour or two he will be betrayed, and then arrested. He still has to tell his followers important things they need to hear but have not previously been ready to receive. This is a critical time as well as a precious occasion.

Yet all is not well. No-one has taken on the task of washing these men’s feet, grimy from walking dusty streets. It’s a dirty job, but someone’s got to do it if they are to feel welcome and comfortable. This ritual was part of the hospitality in their culture, so Jesus, dressing like a lowly household slave, becomes a servant to those who call him “Lord” and “Teacher”. His object lesson in love is one he urges them to emulate, as well as a pointer towards the cross with its far greater significance.

The world at large sees love as an emotion; while not denying that, Jesus emphasises love as primarily an action. We might then think of big sacrificial gestures which will long be remembered (like the woman who poured almost priceless ointment over Jesus’ own feet a few days earlier). Yet Jesus’ focus here is different. His modelled definition of love is something inconvenient, uncongenial, humbling and utterly mundane. Astonishingly, it is by such things that discipleship is lived out; and as he says in John 13:35, it is by these things that his Lordship and our allegiance to him are revealed.

Small, inconvenient, possibly unpleasant actions. Things we might not feel like doing, perhaps for people we don’t know – or, know all too well but don’t particularly like. Has Jesus set the bar of love lower than we expect, or higher?

Lord Jesus, show me whom I can love in your name, in your way, and how I can do that today.