People of the Bowl and Towel

One of Laura’s and my all-time favorite movies is “Forrest Gump.” We stumbled on it the other night when we were unable to find anything on regular television. We have seen it many times, if you haven’t seen it, I certainly recommend that you do. I understand that it was a fairly low budget film. In fact, Tom Hanks helped fund it. The writers and editors did a really creative job placing Forrest and Jenny, our two main characters in historical news film footage. Through the events of their lives, we revisit some of the most memorable and turbulent times of the 1960’s and 1970’s.

We remember several great lines from this movie:

Me and Jenny goes together like peas and carrots. Stupid is as stupid does. My mama always said, “life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you are going to get.” My mama always said, “you have to do the best with what God gave you.” What’s normal anyways? Mama always said, “dying was part of life,” I sure wish it wasn’t. My name is Forrest Gump, people call me Forrest Gump.

Growing up Forrest and Jenny started out “like peas and carrots.” However, each of them soon got swept up and away in America’s 20th-century cultural events. Though on totally different paths.

Forrest’s path was pretty much classically American: going to college, playing football for Bear Bryant, serving his country in Vietnam, starting his own business, and going to church.

Jenny, on the other hand, dabbles in counterculture: dropping out of college, becoming a beatnik, then a hippie, joining anti-war protests, indulging in sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll of the 1970’s.

In these two characters, we can see a reflection of today’s America with one side supporting the American tradition and the other opposing it. Jenny’s path finds her used and abused multiple times, first as a sex worker and then as a girlfriend. While she experiences momentary freedom as a hippie, she eventually devolves into a groupie who steals from musicians she sleeps with. She hits her lowest point when she attempts suicide.  

Forrest never stops loving Jenny, no matter how much their paths deviated from each other. He gets rejected by her multiple times. He remains there for her through everything- never imposing, never selfish, never angry, always altruistic. It’s precisely because of Forrest’s love that Jenny is able to find happiness at the end. This my friends, is what I would like to talk about this evening. Unselfish, serving love.  

As Forrest said, “I’m not a smart man, but I know what love is.”

I believe Forrest gives a tangible example of the kind of love John wrote about in his Gospel:

Jesus said after He had washed His disciple’s feet, put his robe back on and returned to the table, “Do you know what I have done to you?”

“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”

Jesus said a “new commandment” We get “Maundy Thursday” from that statement. The word Maundy comes from an old Latin word maundatum, which means commandment. It was the word in the Latin Vulgate translation of the New Testament which recorded Jesus words: “A new commandment I give you: Love one another.”

Down through the centuries, the church has associated the washing of feet with Jesus’ command to love one another, in the Upper Room immediately after He took off His outer garments and washed the feet of the disciples. This is the eve before His Crucifixion, in fact, just hours before. Jesus is engaged in lengthy conversations with His disciples about his going away and what will become of them. These verses have come to be known as The Upper Room (Farewell) Discourse. In dramatic fashion we are called to follow Christ’s example as a servant-we are called to be people with a bowl and a towel. He tells us, if we are to be his followers, where we must begin, what qualities must be in our lives, and what we must do.

 There’s one thing for sure: It is a lot easier to say that we love than to actually live it out! Perhaps we have forgotten both what it means to really love each other, and to demonstrate the humility and security that love brings by being able to humbly wash each other’s feet.  That is those whom we love and those whom we don’t; the easy ones and the difficult ones. In the Upper Room Jesus knew that His hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. He knew that the devil had already done his work in the heart of Judas son of Simon Iscariot to betray him. He knew that even those closest to Him would deny knowing Him, or by running away afraid in order to save themselves.  Jesus loved them to the end, all of them! (Please don’t miss this most important point) He loved all of them!

Here we are in the final hours before He would be abandoned, arrested, tried, abused and crucified, He showed them how love was to be lived out.

Jesus’ week began with joy, celebration & outpouring of love when he arrived in Jerusalem on Sunday. His week ended hanging on a cross! None of it came as a surprise to Jesus, none of it out of His control.

The job of washing of dirty feet was the job of slaves and servants. A job certainly well below the disciples. Afterall several had been arguing which one of them was the greatest!

In Jesus’ day and culture, there were few Roman roads paved with stone- people walked on dirt roads. Puffy clouds of dust rose with every step. So, obviously by the time you reached your destination, your feet were in need of a bath, so upon arrival, as a gesture of hospitality, your host would instruct servants to take a basin and wash your feet, drying them with a towel.

So, I ask you this: when we do live it out what does it look like?

Laura and my son, Zach, and his wife Kristy have 4 biological children and 3 former foster children now their adopted children. 8-1/2 years and 48 kids. They are also an emergency placement home for the foster system in the Gainesville area. Many times over the past, while we are all asleep they will receive a call with children that had been removed from their homes needing a place to stay. Tuesday night at 10:30 they received one of these calls. Here is a portion of Kristy’s message to us in their support group: Friends Pray, I can share nothing except evil exists and the kids who just arrived in our home have been in the hands of it. Undone and broken for many things many of us will NEVER see in this life. Pray for our family. Pray for the Children. Pray for the case workers, the law enforcement, for justice. And most of all pray for Jesus to be near to us all. Break our hearts, Lord. Keep breaking them. And keep giving us the courage to walk boldly into the darkness with your light. Come Jesus come.

Jesus said in verse 17, “Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.” I am not saying that we are all called to be foster parents. I know that I am not. But, I do know that we are called, even commanded to be a people with a bowl and towel. Foot washing in Jesus’ day was dirty work. It can be the same for us. It certainly may mean getting your hands dirty.

How do we become people of the bowl and towel? First, we must observe and understand the marvelous example of our own foot-washing Lord and Savior. Then, listen to His challenge: “Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet.” Perhaps, most important it has to do with the quality of a Jesus heart. “Having loved his own who were in the world, he now showed them the extent of his love.” Our Lord saw himself as King of Kings, and He washed the disciples’ feet. He washed our feet as well. He washed our feet even knowing that we have and will deny Him. Jesus told us that when we do the same we will be blessed!

Although many times rejected Forrest Gump continued loving Jenny. His love for her made it possible for her to finally find happiness in the end. I’m quite sure that we are not all called to be Foster Parents, however, we can support them. I invite you to look around, who is it that is struggling, lonely, afraid, grumpy or in need of a simple favor? Perhaps, being driven to an appointment or even the grocery store? Who is it that the Holy Spirit has put on your mind that you just might reach out to? You or I may be just the one, the only one to share this kind of love to someone else.

In my office directly behind my desk sit a bowl, pitcher, and towel. All gifts given to me by you all here at Good Shepherd at the Celebration of my New Ministry the day after my Ordination. These stand as reminders to me that I am called first to love through acts of service.

We are all called to the same.

Let this be the time, that we all become, People of the bowl and towel!

AMEN.