The following is a manuscript of the sermon presented by Senior Pastor Dr. Roger Patterson on Maundy Thursday, April 6, 2023 at our West University Baptist campus. To view the sermon in full, check out the link below.

Andrew Murray once wrote, “The lack of humility is the sufficient explanation of every defect and failure.”

The lack of humility is the sufficient explanation of every defect and failure! There is such wisdom in those words.

Another way to verbalize this thought is this:

Pride is the root of all destruction.

Do you see destruction? If you dig deeper, you will find pride.

Do you see love? If you dig deeper, you will find humility.

One of the things that is so special about a service like this is that we can come out of the world for just a few moments and step into the church to hopefully be reminded that there is another way. This service is a Maundy Thursday service, and it commemorates the last supper and all that took place in the upper room.

More specifically, this service has a focus on the “New Commandment” Jesus gave to His disciples.

Christ’s “mandate” is commemorated on Maundy Thursday—“maundy” being a shortened form of mandatum (Latin), which means “command.”

This new commandment comes from John 13:34-35

John 13:34-35

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. ³⁵ By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

The word “New” here means, “new in experience, fresh.” It is the opposite of “worn out.”

There is a newness, a freshness we are to find – to both give and receive – when we obey the command of Christ.

This new command is to love one another as Christ has loved us. And as I said a few moments ago:

• Do you see destruction? If you dig deeper, you will find pride.
• Do you see love? If you dig deeper, you will find humility.

We have been asking the simple question, “Why did Jesus come to die?”

Here is what we have learned so far…

The Top 5 Reasons Why Jesus Came To Die

#5: To Show the Wealth of God’s Love and Grace for Sinners

#4: To Cancel the Legal Demands of the Law Against Us

#3: To Ransom People from Every Tribe and Language and People and Nation

Tonight, on this Maundy Thursday, this moment where we reflect on the new commandment that Christ has given to us, we see this reason to add to this list.

The Top 5 Reasons Why Jesus Came To Die

#5: To Show the Wealth of God’s Love and Grace for Sinners

#4: To Cancel the Legal Demands of the Law Against Us

#3: To Ransom People from Every Tribe and Language and People and Nation

#2: To Call us to Follow His Example of Lowliness and Costly Love

That’s the essence of John 13:34.

John 13:34

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. 

You see, we step out of the world :

• a world full of pride, s
• elf-love,
• self-service,
• and ultimately, destruction,
• and we step into the church – a place where we can gather with our brothers and sisters and look at the way of Jesus and discover how he has loved us.

You see, key to living out this new commandment is understanding the way of Jesus, because the way of Jesus is a different way… It’s LOWLY… and IT’s COSTLY!

And here is how I want to lead us tonight as we look at this costly, lowly way.

The way of Jesus…

1. Has a Higher Perspective
2. Has a Lower Posture
3. Has a Lasting Impact

When you examine the Upper Room narrative from John 13, you can’t help but notice how intentional these final moments in Jesus’ life were.

Notice How…

I. The Way of Jesus Has a Higher Perspective

Look with me at John 13:3 and verses 31-33.

John 13:3

Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going back to God…

Here, John, the Apostle, who was reclining at that table that evening, and he notes the different perspective from which Jesus lived. We also see this in verses 31-34.

John 13:31-33

³¹ When he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him. ³² If God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself, and glorify him at once. ³³ Little children, yet a little while I am with you. You will seek me, and just as I said to the Jews, so now I also say to you, ‘Where I am going you cannot come.’

Jesus, very clearly is saying,

“Guys, this is my farewell for now. I’m living out a different agenda than you think or even realize.”

Warren Wiersbe says…

Jesus knew that “His hour was come.” More than any of the Gospel writers, John emphasized the fact that Jesus lived on a “heavenly timetable” as He did the Father’s will. Note the development of this theme:

John 2:4 – My hour has not yet come…

John 7:30 – His hour had not yet come

John 8:20 – His hour had not yet come

John 12:23 – The hour is come that the Son of Man should be glorified.

John 13:1 – Jesus knew that His hour was come.

John 17:1 – Father, the hour is come.

What was the divinely appointed hour? It was the time when He would be glorified through His death, resurrection, and ascension…He would soon leave this world and return to the Father who sent Him…having finished His work on earth.”

Jesus knew His hour had come. He also knew that Judas would betray him, and He knew that the Father had given Him all things.

Wiersbe says…“Because Jesus knew who He was, where He came from, what He had, and where He was going, He was complete master of the situation.” He then adds, “You and I as believers know that we have been born of God, that we are one day going to God, and that in Christ we have all things; therefore, we ought to be able to follow our Lord’s example and serve others.”

We need to be reminded of that higher perspective:

• …that we are the Lord’s
• …that we are in God’s hands
• …that the angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him
• …that nothing can separate us from His love

The way of Jesus tells me that I don’t have to fear and panic though the earth give way around me.

And when I have this understanding, it frees me to serve Him by serving others.

Notice this second principle about the way of our Lord.

The way of Jesus…

1. Has a Higher Perspective
2. Has a Lower Posture

II. The way of Jesus has a Lower Posture

Notice this in John 13.

John 13:3-5

Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going back to God, ⁴ rose from supper. He laid aside his outer garments, and taking a towel, tied it around his waist. ⁵ Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him. 

Here is what is so compelling about the way of our Lord – it is out of his riches, not poverty, that He served those disciples.

You see, not even Jewish servants who were working off debt would wash another’s feet – that was reserved for Gentile slaves.

But notice how John communicates this to us…

• Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands…
• …that he had come from God and was going back to God…

Those who are assigned to wash feet – they don’t have anything. They have nothing. And they don’t have any options.

Those who were washing feet in that culture…they were nobodies…they had no other choice.

And Jesus takes the posture of a nobody – though he had been given all things into his hands…and that he had come from God and was going back to God…

• It was out of His riches that he took this low posture…not out of his poverty.

The Apostle Paul says that he emptied himself…taking the very nature of a servant.

Philippians 2:5-7

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, ⁶ who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, ⁷ but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant…

The way of Jesus takes a lower posture – because this is the posture of love.

Why did Jesus go to the cross? Why did he willingly lay down his life? Why did he empty himself and become obedient to death on a cross?

The Bible says to us that he did this because of love – He loved God and submitted to the Father’s plan to redeem mankind.

He loved his own – he loved those that God would give him.

It is because He loves us that He took this low posture to serve us by meeting our greatest need – cleaning our lives from the filth of sin and the consequences therein.

John 15:13

Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.

My friends, do you see it? Look around at the way of the world and at the way of Jesus.

• Do you see destruction? If you dig deeper, you will find pride.
• Do you see love? If you dig deeper, you will find

Jesus, in his great love, lowered himself!

The last thing I want to point out to you tonight before we partake of the Lord’s Supper is this…

The way of Jesus…

1. Has a Higher Perspective
2. Has a Lower Posture
3. Has a Lasting Impact

III. The Way of Jesus has a Lasting Impact

I want you to notice something with me here. Jesus absolutely overwhelms his disciples with this gesture. He takes his expectations of them to an entirely different level.

First, notice Peter’s reaction.

John 13:6-10

 He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, do you wash my feet?” ⁷ Jesus answered him, “What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand.” ⁸ Peter said to him, “You shall never wash my feet.” Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no share with me.” ⁹ Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!” ¹⁰ Jesus said to him, “The one who has bathed does not need to wash, except for his feet, but is completely clean. And you are clean, but not every one of you.” 

Peter has been watching Jesus wash the feet of the other disciples, and he just can’t reconcile this with who Jesus is to him. So, he boldly refuses him. The sense of his reaction where it is translated, “You shall never wash my feet…” is probably better translated, “NO! NEVER!”

And notice what Jesus says to him…notice the lasting impact he knows that this moment is going to have on Peter and the other disciples…

Jesus says…

John 13:7

Jesus answered him, “What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand.” 

Jesus is saying, Peter,

“Listen to me…I need you to receive from me right now. What I want to give you will revolutionize your life. I need you to simply receive.”

And Peter says, “NO, NEVER!”

It’s right here where we see Pride and Humility in a confrontation with one another.

• You see, Pride keeps us from receiving. Pride says, “I’m too good for them and too good for that.”
• Humility says, “Ok…but it’s the only way you can have a part of this.”

And notice how Peter is trying to dictate how Jesus loves him…

“Well, okay then…not just my feet, but all of me…my head…my hands.”

And Jesus says,

“You are already clean…don’t tell me how to serve you right now. I know how to serve you. Just receive what I want to give you.”

My friends, do you try to dictate what you will receive from Jesus? He knows how to serve you. And his heart is that you receive from him what you need.

So, what might you need?

1. Some of you need to be washed. Judas wasn’t washed. Though Jesus had washed his feet, Judas had never given Jesus his heart.

Have you allowed Jesus to forgive you of your sin? Have you received his love by receiving the gift of grace He has made available to you?

2. Others of you, like Peter, need to be cleansed today from your sin. You are already clean…you are forgiven. But you need Jesus to cleanse you of your unrighteousness. Maybe you walked around in some filthy places today in your thoughts…your words…your actions toward another. Ask Jesus to cleanse you of your sins…confess them to him.

But notice the lasting impact here.

John 13:12-17

 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? ¹³ You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. ¹⁴ If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. ¹⁵ For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you. ¹⁶ Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. ¹⁷ If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them. 

I love how Wiersbe brings this to life. He says…“The servant is not greater than his master; so, if the master becomes a slave, where does that put the slave? On the same level as the master! By becoming a servant, our Lord did not push us down: He lifted us up! He dignified sacrifice and service.”

Leonardo da Vinci was one of the outstanding intellects of all history:

• he was great as a draftsman,
• an engineer,
• and a thinker.

Just before he commenced work on his “Last Supper” he had a violent quarrel with a fellow painter. So enraged and bitter was Leonardo that he determined to paint the face of his enemy, the other artist, into the face of Judas, and thus take his revenge and vent his spleen by handling the man down in infamy and scorn to succeeding generations. The face of Judas was therefore one of the first that he finished, and everyone could easily recognize it as the face of the painter with whom he had quarreled.

But when he came to paint the face of Christ, he could make no progress.

Something seemed to be:

• baffling him,
• holding him back,
• frustrating his best efforts.

Ultimately, he came to the conclusion that the thing which was checking and frustrating him was the fact that he had painted his enemy into the face of Judas.

He therefore painted out the face of Judas and commenced anew on the face of Jesus, and this time with the success which the ages have acclaimed.

C. E. Macartney says…”You cannot at one and the same time be painting the features of Christ into your own life, and painting another face with the colors of enmity and hatred.”

My friends…

• To show His love, Jesus had a higher perspective…that He was in the Father’s will and plan.
• To show His love, Jesus took a lower posture…to wash his disciples’ feet…
• and this created a lasting impact and a new commandment – a fresh observance – to model this love and create unity together.

John 13:34-35

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. ³⁵ By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”