Ordinary

'I have washed your feet that you might wash one another's feet' John 13:14

It was on the Thursday that he broke bread in that Upper Room, it was then, together, they remembered the Passover; as they gathered around that table they did what they had done many times but this time was to be the last time.

This time he lifted the cup and promised them 'a New Covenant', one sealed in blood, one marked by sacrifice, the bread that he broke that night would add to the great story of grain and grape, promised land, manna in the wilderness, the feeding of thousands on the countryside, the extravagance of Cana - only three years before. The cup that they all shared from would soon be his to drink from alone, hours later in Gethsemane he would wrestle with that cup in the darkness yet choose still to push it to his lips and drink deeply from it.The disciples had a glimpse of this, they had even offered to share in it, yet there time would soon come when thier strength of will would be tested to breaking point and they would run.

As they shared in bread and wine that night they would have been giddy with the symbolism of all that they had witnessed, a succession of events that would end with an arrest in the garden and when the fight was up a time to flee and hide in the shadows.

But where had it started? In the midst of all that they had found shocking, it started in that upper room, no not with bread and wine and words of covenant and sacrifice. It actually began with a simple act, an act undertaken every day by the servant of the house. A bowl of water and a towel, a bending of the knee and the back before another, to wash the grime of dusty streets, to make clean that which had been sullied by a day's travelling. An ordinary, daily, duty.

But this was no ordinary day and this act was one more of love that of duty. It was Jesus, the master, the teacher, the rabbi who stooped at their feet to show them one way that they might demonstrate their love for one another. One way.

Not all could follow in the footsteps of this man who had set his face like flint and would push on to the end, not counting the cost. Yet each one of them could do this, should do this, an act of love in something 'everyday', a service to those whom you travel with, something useful, practical. A simple act of kindness in something ordinary.

Ordinary