Well, good morning, my friends, and welcome to the Heritage Hour. I’m Mark Gonzales, your pastor and courager here in Southwest Florida, and I’m so delighted to be with you on air, online, and in media ministry for 35 years now.

So thank you for sitting with me at the feet of the Lord to listen for His heart to touch our hearts. Well, if you’ve been with us, you know that we just got through doing a lengthy series on the self-proclaimed portraits of God. I see portraits of God throughout all the scripture and give them my own two-word titles.

And so last week, the Lord put it on my heart just to do what I’m calling a new series called Passion Week Portraits of God.

Because Easter was very early this year and I want to finish out the month. And full confession right here, we’re not going to end. I thought I could do this in a couple of broadcasts, but this is just so rich. There are so many portraits of God we see in Passion Week.

We’re just going to take a nice slow stroll through it. I don’t know how many weeks it will be. We started with Palm Sunday and briefly went through Tuesday when he was our thorough teacher with parables and insights. Anyway, we’ll go over that in a moment.

But I’m just telling you we’re going to be going through this for quite a while because it’s such a wonderful journey of seeing so many very deep portraits of God.

And so, yeah, I just don’t want to rush that.

So we’re going to be continuing our journey. We’re at Maundy Thursday, and if you have your Bibles, we’re going to be in John chapter 13, 14, 15, 16, and 17. Certainly not just today. It’ll go for several broadcasts for sure, and then we’ll head to Good Friday and Easter Sunday.

And as you’re making your way in your Bibles over to John 13, just a quick reminder that all of these broadcasts are archives on my website at markpg.org. I call it Helping You Hear God because that landing page has several types of resources for you to access to see the heart of God. And if you will just click on the broadcast box and then the next page, just click on Portraits of God, then you have a list of the most recent 27 broadcasts that I been sharing working backwards and you have a ton of things to choose from So that markpg helping you hear God I hope you check it out Well, as is our custom, as we get ready to take our journey today through the scriptures, the Lord’s love letters to us, oh, let’s just go before the Lord and ask Him to speak, shall we? Well, Lord, I’m just so honored to be able to come together with my brothers and sisters.

We love sitting at your feet. We love gazing into your eyes. We love listening for your heart to touch our hearts. And wow, Lord, as we’re going through Passion Week and see so many portraits of your heart, your character, your ways.

Well, thank you that we can go through it slowly and not feel rushed.

Because you were doing some extraordinary things then. And of course, you’re doing extraordinary things now as all of these portraits remind us of ways to abide in you, to bear much fruit and to get to know you better and better and better.

So thank you, Lord, for the privilege of going through your love letters together while we sit at your feet and listen for your heart. Oh, thank you, Lord. We love you, Lord. We pray this in the powerful name of the Lord Jesus Christ, by his precious cleansing and healing, transforming, empowering and forgiving blood.

Amen, amen and amen. All right, my friends. Well, we started last week with Palm Sunday. And just briefly, the portraits that we saw there was how he is our humble king.

Now, Palm Sunday, different groups of people were viewing him very differently, and it’s just that way today. People view the Lord very differently. Yes, he was the king who was riding into Jerusalem, but some saw him as our humble king. He was entering Jerusalem.

He was riding on a donkey. He was seeing them as sheep. We talked about all of that. He was seen by some as our celebrated king.

He had adoring followers, and there were some miracle watchers. There were some Messiah waiters who really believed this was the coming Messiah and they had the palm leaves out and put their clothes on the road there for him to enter.

But then there were others at the same place, at the same time, who didn’t see a humble king or a celebrated king, but they saw him as a rejected king. They rejected him. The outraged Pharisees rejected him. The fearful rulers rejected him. the scheming killers rejected him and of course the Lord saw the hearts of all of these sheep all of these people and to me the portrait that emerged was that he is our anguishing king Oh the Jerusalem hordes the blinded souls and his anguished cheers as he wept over Jerusalem and led him to the cleansing of the temple.

That episode, which some see him as uncontrollable anger. No, no, no. It was an anguished savior. He is our anguished Savior who said, No, what are you doing in here? This is a house of prayer and you’ve made it a den of thieves.

Then we looked at what I call Teacher Tuesday. This is where he is our thorough teacher talking in parables and insights as he’s getting ready to leave this earth, giving them a wonderful, wonderful journey through parables and insights, woes and blessings, prophecies and promises. and then we came to woeful Wednesday when he was betrayed our betrayed Messiah Judas Iscariot making a deal selling his soul behind the scenes and he’s going to highlight that here on Maundy Thursday where we’re taking our journey to now last time we talked about how he is our Lord’s Supper with the bread and the cup his body and the blood our call and hope and then we ended on how he is our foot washing Messiah.

So I’m just going to say one more thing about that and well, then we’ll keep going over in John 13, as we read about how the God who became flesh and dwell among us chose to humble himself by being the foot washing servant on that day, just absolutely shocked his followers.

And so much so, Peter was refusing. He says, okay, no, no, no, Lord, don’t. You can’t do this. Don’t do this.

No, no. In fact, let’s just pick it up over in John chapter 13, if you have your Bibles or your device. And it tells us in verse 4 that Jesus got up from supper and laid aside his robe and took a towel and titered around himself. And next he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet and to dry them with the towel tied to him. Again, that was one of the most lowly jobs of a servant in a place where there was wealth and servants were doing that.

Most of the time people just provided a basin and water and a towel to their guests and they washed their own feet.

But here he’s showing God’s style leadership, servant leadership in a dramatic way And when he came in verse 6 to Simon Peter who asked him Lord are you going to wash my feet And the Lord answered what I doing you don understand now but afterwards you will know By the way that one of my favorite statements from the Lord Jesus Christ. It gives me so much encouragement. There are so many things in this life we just can’t understand. I mean, from geopolitics, to family feuds to marital struggles to parenting woes.

I mean, all kinds of things. We just struggle with our own hearts. How can we potman know our own hearts? We can’t.

We need a savior. We need friends to help us. And the Lord is encouraging us here, I believe, saying, look, you’re not understanding stuff now, but afterwards you will know. And you know, that’s like a pressure release valve, isn’t it?

I mean, it’s like, I don’t have to get my head around this. I don’t have to understand all the details. The Lord doesn’t have to give me all of the projected outcomes up front. In fact, it’s better if he doesn’t.

I prefer being on a need-to-know basis. That, my friend, is what builds trust in the Lord himself. Not in what we think he is going to do. certainly not in what we think we’re accurately discerning what he’s going to do. If you’re anything like me, in all my decades on this earth, there are so many times I think I know where the Lord’s going with something, and boy, are there curveballs along the way.

Friends, it’s okay. We don’t understand these things. We frequently don’t understand these things, because these are infinite, eternal things that the Lord is doing, and we’re so finite and temporal. And this is when he says, it’s okay.

It’s all right, you know. what I’m doing, you don’t understand now, but afterwards you will. Oh, hang on to that, my friends. Well, Peter was going through that right here with his whole foot washing thing.

So in verse eight, he says, you will never wash my feet ever. Peter said, and Jesus replied, if I don’t wash you, you have no part of me. Simon Peter said to him, Lord, not only my feet, but also my hands and my head. And Jesus said, one who has bathed doesn’t need to wash anything except his feet.

But he is completely clean.

Now let me stop there a minute. This is a great metaphor for salvation. Once we’re saved, once we come to that place where we say, I do, to the Lord’s invitation to marry him, to a covenant with him. when he gives us that proposal and we say, I do. And he says yes.

And we become covenant or married or one with him, born again, saved. The Bible puts it in so many ways. That’s the miracle. For bathing, He’s completely justified us and sanctified us.

We’ve talked about those words in previous broadcasts about being made righteous because of the blood of Christ and becoming one with Him. And then there’s a sense that we are completely sanctified in spirit. That’s a done deal. That’s why we are guaranteed heaven and being with Him when we die.

But we are experiencing another kind of sanctification, which is progressive sanctification, while we’re still on this earth in its manifested form here on this earth. We’re creatures in process, right?

So our spirits are completely sanctified, but our souls, mind, will, and emotions are being progressively sanctified or made holy as unto the Lord, clean unto the Lord. It’s a process. We are growing in the grace and the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. And this metaphor is saying, look, when you walk along the dusty roads of this village, of this town, and you come into a house, only your feet have gotten dusty and they need to be cleaned.

Well, that’s kind of like our soul. It’s our body, soul, and spirit. We get, you know, seduced by the enemy. We sin.

That doesn’t make us a sinner. It makes us saints who sin. We make a mess because we’re works in progress. And the Lord said, that’s okay.

I’ll wash your feet. I’m going to wash you, you know. I’ll keep progressively sanctifying your soul, even though your spirit is completely sanctified. You’re bathed.

And that’s why he’s saying, well, one who is bathed doesn’t need to wash anything except his feet. Look, you’re done. You’re in. You’re one with me.

We don’t need to do the whole salvation thing again. We just need to do the daily sanctification thing.

Because in this life, we get dusty feet. We get dusty hearts.

But not dusty spirits. Our spirits are completely clean and done. And of course, one day then, we will be glorified. And all will be well.

All will be clean. We won’t get dusty, even our feet, anymore. when we’re with him forever and ever. Is that just cool or what?

So he is our foot washing Messiah. He is demonstrating this stunning act of humble service to show us what God’s style leadership looks like. It’s servant hearted. We here to pray and to love and to serve You want to boil down the Christian life to three words That a pretty good sequence Pray ongoing communion with the Lord serve Him and one another, love.

Yeah, that’s what it looks like. God-style leadership. Foot-washing Messiah. Foot-washing disciples.

Are you washing people’s feet? metaphorically, of course, serving them, looking to their needs more so than your own. Or are you proud, puffed up, thinking of yourself more highly than you ought to think? Oh, that’s a recipe for being miserable in this life because the world will never revolve around you, my friends. We’re here to serve.

We’re here to love. and we get that the more we pray oh i just love that well in that same sentence he says something that pivots us to the next portrait that’s phenomenal it’s actually striking it’s incomprehensible to them now and it’s just unfathomable to us now how can this happen back to chapter 13 verse 10 jesus again in context is saying one who has bathed Jesus told Simon Peter, doesn’t need to wash anything except his feet, but he is completely clean, completely saved, all in, no problem. You are clean, but not all of you. What? Wait, we have our 12 disciples here.

We’ve been following you for three years. And Jesus is saying, actually, not all of you are clean, saved, one with me. verse 11 for he knew who would betray him this is why he said you are not all clean verse 12 when jesus had washed their feet and put on his robe he reclined again and said to them do you know what i’ve done for you you call me teacher and lord well that is well said for i am so if i your lord and teacher have washed your feet you also ought to wash one another’s feet for I have given you an example that you also should do just as I have done for you for I assure you a slave is not greater than his master and a messenger is not greater than the one who sent him and if you know these things you are blessed if you do them now I’m not speaking about all of you I know those I have chosen but the scripture must be fulfilled The one who eats my bread has raised his heel against me And I going to stop right there because before we go on to the Judas Iscariot thing I want to comment on what he’s saying about washing one another’s feet.

The thing is, is when we come to that place where we’re washing each other’s feet, not because we have to, but because we want to, we’re getting what the love of the Lord looks like. We’re getting how the love of the Lord frees us up and brings us joy because you can serve as often as you like from the heart and the joy that that will bring you. It’s the same kind of joy we get on Christmas Day once we get older. Think about it.

When you’re a little boy, little girl, you look forward to Christmas because you’re going to be getting some gifts.

Okay, well, we understand that. That’s how a child thinks. The more we get, the more happy I am. And then for a season, yeah.

But then when you get older, you become a teen. You begin learning what it is to find just the perfect gift for mom or dad or a brother or sister. And you just know they’re going to love it. I’ll never forget as a teen years ago, my brother came up with the perfect gift.

And he would tell us, I got a perfect gift for dad this year. And boy, I said, well, what is it? Yeah, I’m not going to tell you. Everybody’s going to be surprised. and he just would not let the cat out of the bag.

But he was just so excited for the two or three weeks leading up to Christmas for dad to open up the gift that he was going to give him. His joy, now that he was an older and becoming more and more of a man and seeing that giving is way better than getting, he was beside himself. And sure enough, that Christmas morning, he saved that special gift to the last. It was almost like we were all just kind of treading water, opening our own gifts and seeing the other gifts because we’d heard so much about this special gift he had from my dad.

And so when my dad opened it, this was back in the days when videotapes were first coming out. And we had these old movies that were on the old eight millimeter films when we were kids back in the 60s, back in family vacations and stuff. my dad opens up this thing and it’s a videotape and we had just gotten a video recorder a month earlier and player and it said this is your life and he said what what do you mean this is your life and my brother jumped up took it out of his hand put it into the machine turned it on and there are our family movies from when we were little kids and he going what how can this videotape have that Well we know now very easily my brother had just collected all of those old 8mm tapes taken them to a particular service, had transferred them onto a videotape, so you can just pop them in and watch a history of your life unfold. And we were just all so delighted in seeing those films from days gone by, but even more delighted seeing the joy my brother had by coming up with a perfect gift that he knew would delight my dad and the rest of the family. The joy of giving.

The joy of serving. And you can do that as often as you like. You can control that in a sense.

But if you’re waiting to get and get and get and be served, be served, be served, be followed, be followed. And people aren’t revolving around you. They’re not getting you what you want. They’re not doing what you want.

They’re not treating you like you like. And that is where you’re basing your happiness. You’ve missed it. And that’s the whole point of this foot washing Messiah portrait.

Amazing. He is our foot washing Messiah. And he would have us be foot washers as well.

But now we’re getting a picture of our betrayed lover. He is our betrayed lover. He’s sitting here at this marvelous Last Supper explaining all these things all week long to his disciples.

But there’s something he knows that the rest of them don’t know. And that’s one of them is going to betray him.

So let’s pick it back up again. Verse 18, I’m not speaking about all of you. I know those I have chosen, but the scripture must be fulfilled. The one who eats my bread has raised his heel against me.

I got to stop there for a moment. Did he choose Judas Iscariot? Well, yes and no. He chose 11 of them to be his eternal sons. Salvation.

But he chose Judas Iscariot in a different way to be the one that would put the eternal plan of his work on the cross into motion. It’s a different kind of choosing. And it’s a prerogative of the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, the preexistent God of the ages as the Holy Trinity from the get-go knew how this would play out with God becoming fleshed. among us, allowing himself to be put on a cross, needing someone to betray him. Judas Iscariot had a part.

It was just a very, very different part than the other disciples. And this is what he’s giving us a peek at here in this extraordinary reality that’s hard for us to grasp.

But remember what we said over here. We just have to trust him. He knows what he’s doing on the eternal stage, on the infinite stage. And we’re so finite, we can’t totally understand it, but one day we will.

So he goes on in verse 19 and says, I’m telling you now before it happens, so that when it does happen, you will believe that I am he. I assure you, the one who receives whomever I send receives me, and the one who receives me receives him who sent me. And then verse 21, when Jesus had said this, he was troubled in spirit and testified, I assure you, one of you will betray me. The disciples started looking at one another, uncertain which one he was speaking about.

One of his disciples, the one Jesus loved, this is John referring to himself was reclining close beside Jesus And Simon Peter mentioned to him to find out who it was that he was talking about so he leaned back against jesus and asked him lord who is it And Jesus replied to John, He’s the one I give the piece of bread to after I’ve dipped it. And when he had dipped the bread, he gave it to Judas, Simon Iscariot’s son. And after Judas ate the piece of bread, Satan entered him.

Therefore Jesus told him, What you’re doing, do quickly. And none of those reclining at the table knew why he told him this. since Judas kept the money bag, some thought that Jesus was telling him, we’ll buy what we need for the festival or that he should give something to the poor. And after receiving the piece of bread, he went out immediately and it was night. Wow.

All right. Well, this would be a whole sermon in and of itself, but this is just a mystery of the unfolding plan of God and how the Lord has the prerogative to use people in different ways. And he allows the enemy to prowl about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour And here the thing The Lord can play trump cards anytime he wants but the Lord also has put into play free will And you can constantly trump free will because it would stop being free will.

So this calibration is something we’ll never be able to grasp as finite human beings, my friends. Stop trying.

Because we tend to want to live in the myth that we can accept and follow and be at peace with that which we can understand, that which we can explain, that which we can reconcile. This is because we are children of the Enlightenment, the age of reason, and we live in the illusion that all the decisions we make are based on reason, calculation, well thought through. That is absolutely not the case if we were to get very honest with each other. We are so emotionally based creatures.

We see things so skewed with glasses. You know, we don’t operate according to the truth. We operate according to our perception of the truth. And that can vary day by day, even moment by moment when we get triggered and we just lose all sense of reason.

That why we need a Savior That why we going to see in John 15 that the only way to deal with this craziness is to abide in him to bear much fruit my friend so when we read this incredible eternal plan unfolding and how the enemy enters the heart of Judas Iscariot to betray Jesus who had been walking with him for three years and you’d think he would have been faithful to the end and yet somehow some way in this outworking there’s confusion there is bewilderment there is maybe even good intentions but nevertheless it was sin. And we have a betrayed lover. And that will happen to us, my friends. We’ll be betrayed by friends from time to time.

We’ll have to deal with pain.

But we’re called to love in the midst of it. Wow. Just like the Lord. Lord, we thank you for this journey we’re taking during Passion Week.

Thank you for being our foot-washing Messiah and beloved lover. In Jesus’ name. Amen. Well, I’m Mark Gonzales, and I hope or check out my website at markpg.org for more.

Oh, until next time, savor these portraits of God.