06. The Welcoming of Love
Monday 19th Feb
(for more details see here)
Pause:
Your love, shining like the sun
Pouring like the rain
Raging like the storm
Refreshing me again
O, I receive Your love
Your grace, frees me from the past
It purges every sin
It purifies my heart
And heals me from within
O, I receive Your grace
Pour over me, pour over me
Let Your rain flood this thirsty soul
Pour over me Your waves of love
Pour over me
I come and lay my burden down
Gladly at Your feet
I'm opening up my heart
Come make this joy complete
O, I receive Your peace
Pour over me, pour over me
Let Your rain flood this thirsty soul
Pour over me Your waves of love
Pour over me
STUART TOWNSEND
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Kneeling in front of us, towel around His waist, and bowl in His hands, Jesus is silently saying to us - to you and to me:
You have to let me love you.
As in - really love you.
Don't forget - I know you. As in really know you.
I know you better than anyone else - even yourself.
I know how strange this feels to let me see what you would rather remained hidden
to touch the dirtiest part of you
to wash the ugliness away from you
But you have to let me
You have to let me love you
As - really let me love you
Which is hard because I know your heart will squirm around in grace much more even than your foot in cold water
Feeling unworthy, fearing rejection
Wanting first to cover up, or settle a debt knowing you have insufficient funds
But this is love - applied right where it is needed most
Not love as a word - I never intended it to be the platitude it has become -
But love willing to go to even the most profoundly painful places
Because unless you let me hold your most filthiest regrets, your utter shame, your deepest embarrassments...
And though it is true that I already know them all - there is a beauty and power in giving them over to me...
Unless there in my hands you allow me to see
How will you fully know what is the deepest truth about you:
You are fully known and...
You are fully loved
Don't try and wash yourself before you come to me - there are stains only my nail-pierced hands can remove
You have to let me wash you
You have to let me love you
You have to let me in
As I come to you, towel around my waist, bowel in my hands
My work of love for you
My work of love in you
Will you let me see you?
Will you let me wash you?
Will you let me love you?
Will you welcome my love?
Reflection: The Welcoming of Love
"Unless I wash you, you have no part with me."
JOHN 13.8
Peter is so often the spokesperson for the group.
He so often voices the unspoken thoughts.
He so often speaks for me.
"You Lord?!" he blurts out - more of a raw reaction that considered response:
"No, no, no, no - this is all wrong! You, of all people, can't wash my feet..."
It wasn't necessarily coming from an awful place - in fact, Peter says this because of how highly he holds Jesus... but Jesus won't let even that define the kind of relationship He desires with us.
Close enough to serve even our most menial and degrading of needs.
That's where He wants to be.
I know that will jar with us, so let me say that again:
Close...
Close enough to serve...
Close enough to serve even our most menial...
Close enough to serve even our most menial and degrading of needs...
That is right where He
wants to be.
Questions for today:
What I am hiding from Jesus?
What do I recoil from Him seeing and knowing, and touching and cleansing?
Can I welcome His more and more of His love today?
Prayer:
"Those who have had a bath need only to wash their feet; their whole body is clean."
JOHN 13.10
Many have seen this as a picture of us having been bathed (or baptised) and "washing our sins away" (Acts 22:16) returning to Jesus, not needing to start all over again, but simply to wash our feet. Our feet here perhaps symbolising of that part of us that comes into contact with the world more than any other.
As we pray today,
Imagine Jesus' hands open before you
Remind yourself that there is nothing He didn't already about you when He chose to die for you
What will you place into His hands today?
Where will you welcome His love?
Most merciful God, we confess that we have sinned against You in thought, word, and deed,
by what we have done, and by what we have left undone.
We have not loved You with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves.
We are truly sorry and we humbly repent.
For the sake of Your Son Jesus Christ, have mercy on us and forgive us;
that we may delight in Your will, and walk in Your ways,
to the glory of Your Name.
Amen.
BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER
Now hear afresh the promise of God:
If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.
But if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
1 JOHN 1. 8-9
Welcome His love
Know that you are known
Know that you are forgiven
Know that you are purified
Know that you are His
Know His Presence
Know
Welcome His love
I prayed this.
My prayer for today: (if you would like to, please feel free to add your own prayer here):