Chapter 1 A Consecrated Life - Far Eastern Bible College

your feet; ye also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have
given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you.
Verily, verily, I say unto you, The servant is not greater than
his lord; neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him.
The washing of feet here symbolises humility and service. Jesus
wanted His disciples to be characterised by this same humility and
service He had. To be a disciple or follower of Christ means making His
desires our desires, making His goals our goals, making His attitudes
our attitudes. And this means that a disciple must also be willing to face
the same kind of difficulties and discomforts that Christ faced in order
to do the will of God. This may mean giving up some privileges and
comforts which we greatly love and cherish. There is a cost to bear in
doing God’s will.
You may be thinking right now, “Oh, that cost is too great for me to
bear. How can I ever attain to the level of commitment that Jesus wants
of me as His disciple?” Dear reader, there is only one way—to love Him
with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind. When you
are constrained by such love, no cost will be too great to bear for Him.
II. We Must Be Available to Do God’s Will
A person cannot follow Jesus if he does not make himself available
to follow him. Actually, availability is very important in any kind of
commitment. For example, a student would like to do well in his
studies, to graduate with first class honors, and get a prestigious
scholarship. But to be good in anything, he has to avail himself to much
reading, studying and practising. What often happens to us is that we
fail to avail ourselves enough to these things because we get ourselves
too busy doing something else.
In verse 59, we find a man who was also busy doing something else
and so was not available to Christ. He said, “Lord, suffer me first to go
and bury my father.” Now this sounds like a very legitimate excuse. But
why then did Jesus reply, “Let the dead bury their dead: but go thou
and preach the kingdom of God”? Was He being unkind or insensitive
to the man’s needs? Not at all. Let us be careful in understanding the
situation. The fact that the man was together with Jesus at this point in
Commitment to Do the Will of God
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