doing the dishes

So living in an apartment without a dishwasher has made me realize something: Jesus would do the dishes.

(This is kinda cheesy, but if you look past the cheesiness it makes a point)

            It’s Passover, Jesus and his twelve disciples come to you hose to celebrate the Passover. They sit down and eat their meal, you overhear them talking upstairs, most of which is confusing to you. After they talk for a while and one guy leaves early. You over hear this: Jesus gets up and takes everyone’s dirty dishes he walks into the kitchen and starts cleaning the dishes along with the pots and pans. Your house doesn’t have a dishwasher. Every dish need to be hand washed in scorching hot water, rinsed and the dried. You get up to help Jesus wash the dishes, but your spouse tells you that something important is taking place and you shouldn’t interrupt. Jesus goes through each pot and each pan and wipes away the backed on grime, he scours with all his might using the steel wool to get the loaned baking pan -your pan- back to it’s original shine. He starts to clean the individual disciples plates. As he begins he can her them laughing and having fun in the dining room. He cleans off a few when Peter walks in. Peter tells Jesus he’ll finish up the few dishes left. Jesus tells him he does not understand. Peter replies that he can finish up the few left. Jesus tells him that he must finish the dishes, and that he cannot receive help. Peter tells Jesus to clean all of his dishes. But Jesus tells Peter they are already clean, but not all of the disciples are.

            Jesus did the lowliest of the low. He washed the disciples feet, something left for the lowest servant to do. Even we leave the dishes for a machine to do. I feel in modern times Jesus would clean a lot of dishes. He was always serving others, always doing the dirty work. I think that we as Christians need to do more dishes. We need to find those jobs that everyone hates to do and do them in service for others. We need to clean the dirty bathrooms. We need to clean up the throw up, the trash that missed the trashcan, the trash that’s nowhere near the trashcan. As Christians we are called to sweep, dust, mop, scrub, rinse, wipe, sponge, etc. etc. etc. I think if more Christians got down on their hands and knees and worked hard with others, instead of sitting on our butts in a pew, a lot more people would see and know Christ. 

A little hard work never hurt anybody, but a life of it may save somebody.

When he had finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place. “Do you understand what I have done for you?” he asked them. “You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and rightly so, for that is what I am. Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.

John 13:12-17