Lent #22: when Jesus washes the feet of the prostitute

Last week I was talking with a woman that I know just a bit.  I like her a lot--she is that beautiful combination of tough and gentle, of warm and rough.  She swears constantly and has a heart of gold. She is super down to earth and works with her hands--she has a farm and likes to garden, she does paramedic work for boating races (who does that?), and she happens to be my massage therapist (see, she really does work with her hands).  This may explain why I like her so much.  When I leave her therapy room, I feel like a different person.  Seriously. It's a small wonder-working miracle.

She's not from any kind of faith background, and I don't go to her to talk. I go to be as silent as possible for one hour.  But she talks to me--for the first 20 minutes--at which point I think she gives up and leaves me be.  I give her only a little to go on ("yes, no" answers) in order to hurry up this 20 minute connection point--so that I can be left in semi-conscious bliss.

However, last week, she discovered that I taught a bible class and then wanted to share with me about a class she took on world religions many years ago.  And then she said this most beautiful and profound thing.  She said, 

"You know that story? The one where Jesus washes the prostitute's feet? That always impressed me."

It caught me off guard and for a split-second my brain was chasing down all the gospel stories--is there one where Jesus washes the feet of a woman who had to prostitute? No, there's not. At least not recorded. But in the next split-second, I know that if I had to pick words to talk about who Jesus is, there could not be a better story. 

I said, "Yes, that's a great story."  

Because it is. As a friend said, it's like 5 bible stories put into one--it's the story of Jesus condensed.  This Jesus who washes the feet of his friends, who eats with sinners, who delights in outcasts, who is drawn to women who have questionable pasts--I really love this Jesus. It's the Jesus who sets it all aside--the whole equality with God thing, the whole Divine Being of the Universe, the whole Son of God deal--and kneels at the feet of a very broken-down, used-up woman and tends her dirty, rotten feet and makes himself a servant of the least of these.  That's truer than true, and deeper than fact.  It's the gospel.   

I consistently remind myself--and whoever else is willing to listen--that Jesus came to planet earth and completed a mission of death not for our most shining moment as a human being. But for our darkest moment and when we are cloaked in the most shadow.  Christ loves us at our worst, our most prostituted, most corrupted, most used-up, most manipulative, most broken moment. 

Jesus tends to our feet and washes them with his tears. 

Who couldn't love a God like that? I think that anyone who really got that kind of love, who had a real glimpse of it in their soul, would embrace it.  We humans, we are drawn to mercy, compassion, grace, and love. It'll get us every time. 

John 12:1-11

¹ Six days before the Passover feast, Jesus journeyed to the village of Bethany, to the home of Lazarus, who had recently been raised from the dead, ² where they hosted Him for dinner. Martha was busy serving as the hostess, Lazarus reclined at the table with Him, ³ and Mary took a pound of fine ointment, pure nard (which is both rare and expensive), and anointed Jesus’ feet with it, and then wiped them with her hair