Denominations and Feet Washing

Adventists practice open communion and foot washing.

in Christ,

Bob

 

Foot washing was a symbolic gesture, denoting servanthood leadership,

but

some churches have taken the foot washing of John 13 as to be a church ordinance or something like that.

 

This was the celebration of Passover by Christ and his disciples -- He replaced the animal sacrifice symbol with OTHER symbols. The bread is a symbol, the wine is a symbol the foot washing a symbol.

No question about it.

in Christ,

Bob

 

Bob, we can easily see that eating the bread (the body of Christ) is the Christian counterpart of eating the lamb in the Passover. It's also fairly obvious that the wine (the blood of Christ) is the Passover blood of the lamb sprinkled on the door posts. But I can't see the symbolism of foot washing. Please enlighten me and perhaps others on this board.

 

It is a reference to baptism and the continual need to "die daily" to bring our sins before Christ and have them washed away.

Recall that when Peter refused - Christ said "you can have no part with Me" - so Peter then said "Fine then not only my feet but my whole body" and Christ said "that one who has been baptized does not need the whole body washed" because that ceremony does not reflect conversion - but rather our ongoing need of repentance and forgiveness.

in Christ,

Bob

 

So are churches commanded to wash feet today?

 

Are Christians today commanded to do footwashing? No. Can they do it? Yes.

Is "communion" an ordinance that Christians are commanded to do? No. Can they do it? Yes.

When Jesus ate the his last meal with his friends, he was fulfilling what had been foreshadowed to the Jews for centuries. They had been performing this ritual religiously. Jesus had been telling them that he was going to die and be the Lamb that takes away the sins of the world but they didn't get it. He tells them, when you do this "Think about me" not Moses, Pharoah, and Egypt.

It is a wonderful story that helps us mortals understand Gods provision for escaping death. By faith we are covered by the blood. That is what we need to remember. Performing the ritual of "communion" is not a commandment that one is in sin if he doesn't do.

Footwashing is the same. It is a wonderful picture to us mortals and can or can't be practiced. This is a great example of people imposing their understanding and practices on others and dividing or carnal ordinances. I would add headcoverings, days to "worship", and water baptism.

"But why dost thou judge thy brother? or why dost thou set at nought thy brother? for we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ."

Now everybody can take aim and fire. :type:

 

I know this is popular language, but believers do not need to die daily. Jesus died once. I died once with him. Jesus rose and I have risen in newness of life because of Him. I need to live.

I think Paul's words in I Cor. 15 are taken out of context and used to support the deeper life Christian teaching that says that we we need to crucify ourselves daily. Paul was merely referring to his having to face being martyred over and over again. Having faced the lions in Ephesus gave him a perspective on life and death that I don't quite understand. He had taken up his cross and was willing to die on it. However up to this point he had been spared.

And why stand we in jeopardy every hour? I protest by your rejoicing which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily. If after the manner of men I have fought with beasts at Ephesus, what advantageth it me, if the dead rise not?

 

I've seen foot washing practiced in a Free Methodist Church. I believe the Church of the Nazarene continues the practice as well.

 

Here is a 100% full proof test of whether 'feet-washing' is Scriptural or not: Whatever in the Scriptures Roman Catholicism has a counterfeit for, Scriptures will have the pure of, and the simpler in the Scriptures, the more perverted will it be in Roman Catholicism.

This ‘Easter-weekend’ again, the Pope gave everyone in the world the perfect illustration of his corruption of ‘Feet-Washing’. So the genuine must be found in the Bible, come on folks! Wake up!

 

'Feet Washing' is no 'third sacrament' or 'service of humility' like the Seventh Day Adventists make of it.

Feet-Washing is one element of the Lord's Supper which consists of Bread, Wine and Washing of Feet. These three and only these are found in the Gospels the one as much as the other the One Institution of Jesus Himself. Going without any of the three, it no longer is the "Lord's, Supper". By the Washing of Feet one as much 'partake' of Jesus Christ as would he by the bread or by the wine: Note well: not by either, by itself, but by the Word the Lord pronounced on each unequivocally as clearly as on the one as on the other of all of the three elements.