John 13: Loving Anyway Those Who Hurt You

Introduction

"It's so much easier to love people when they love us back. It's much, much harder to love the ones who have hurt us, betrayed us, misunderstood us, or simply made life a little more difficult for us." Kookie Mudere, a member of the team at Gas Street Church, continues the church's series with these words. The previous week was about hope. This message is about love.

The question is simple and daunting: how do you love anyway? To answer it, Kookie Mudere opens John 13, on the night of the last supper, when Jesus washes the feet of disciples who are about to betray him, deny him, and abandon him. Three truths come out of this passage, and they make possible a love that our own strength cannot produce.

Outline of the message

1. When a colleague accuses you falsely

• A few years ago, Kookie Mudere receives a message from a colleague: "If you're free a little later, before you leave, can we catch up?", followed by a smiley face. Nothing alarming.
• In the meeting room, the director is there too. The colleague takes a deep breath: "I've figured it out. I know what you're doing. You're trying to push me out of my job." She accuses Kookie Mudere of pretending to help her in order to note her mistakes and use them against her, of lying, of manipulating.
• None of it is true. The director, just as stunned, finally says "that's enough" and ends the scene.
• The hardest part comes afterward. On the outside, everything stays professional. On the inside, the struggle is real: resisting the urge to let the door close in her face, "just a little bit," or finding something kind to write on her birthday card instead of "I think you're rude."
• "In the moment, I found it really hard to love her the way Jesus calls us to."
• We often hear 1 Corinthians 13: love is patient, love is kind. But Paul does not say that love is patient as long as the other person doesn't take too long to change, or that it keeps no record of wrongs as long as the hurt isn't too painful. "There are no conditions attached."

2. What loving anyway does not mean

• In any congregation, experiences vary widely. So Kookie Mudere wants to be clear: loving anyway does not mean tolerating abuse or mistreatment.
• Nor does it mean going back into physically or emotionally dangerous situations, or turning a blind eye to injustice.
• Loving anyway means choosing an inner posture of love toward people, even when their behavior gives us every reason not to.
• "It's not about proximity or access to our lives. It's about refusing to let other people determine the posture of our heart toward them."
• Jesus loved this way. He talked about it a great deal, but above all, he showed it.

3. John 13: Jesus washes the feet of those who will betray him

• Before the feast of the Passover, Jesus knows that his hour has come. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end (John 13:1). For Kookie Mudere, this love "to the end" does not only reach to the end of his life or ministry: it is the full measure of his love.
• Normally, the lowest-ranking servant of the household washed the guests' feet. That evening, no one does it. So the King of kings and Lord of lords gets up, takes off his outer clothing, takes a towel, lowers himself, and washes his disciples' feet, one by one, around the table.
• "Jesus did not wait for the disciples to come to him. He went to them." They had nothing to do except receive.
• What struck Kookie Mudere this week is who Jesus does this for. He knew that Judas would betray him, that Peter would deny him, and that the others would scatter and abandon him in the garden of Gethsemane. "He knew who they were. He knew everything they were going to do, and he loved them anyway."
• Admiring Jesus when his love benefits us is no problem at all. The difficulty begins at verse 15: "For I have given you an example, that you should also do as I have done to you," then at verse 34: "Just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another."
• This love extends to the manager who complicates our lives, to the community that did not stand up for us when we needed it most, to the family member who never has an encouraging word, to the friend who let us down.

4. First truth: you can love because the Father loves you

• In verse 3, Jesus knows that the Father has put all things into his hands, that he came from God and is going to God. In verse 4, he gets up from the table. His service flows from what he knows about himself and his relationship with the Father.
• What he does is not determined by how the disciples treated him, but by what the Father gave him, did for him, and wanted to do through him.
• "What if our measure for loving others was not their love or lack of love for us, but entirely the love God has given us?"
• In New York, for a conference at the United Nations headquarters, Kookie Mudere loses their wallet, passport inside, the day before the flight home. Without ID, there is no way into the building, and the hosts at the entrance burst out laughing.
• A security officer finally says: "Come with me." The officer takes them through the checkpoints, opens conversations that would have been impossible alone, leads them down unfamiliar corridors, all the way to a small room where a man takes out the wallet: "Is this what you're looking for?" The anxiety, the fear, and the dread vanish all at once.
• "The security of knowing we are loved by God can expand our capacity to love others far beyond what we could do by our own strength." It gives the courage for certain conversations and the freedom to forgive when our validation comes from the Lord, not from the other person's response.
• Are you secure in the Father's love? Maybe you have no relationship with God, or you have drifted away. Maybe you struggle with guilt and shame. God has already proven what he thinks of you: "But God commends his own love towards us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8).
• "Before we even try to love in spite of what is difficult in others, we need total confidence that God loves us in spite of everything that is difficult in us."

5. Second truth: you can love without ignoring what you know

• There are things we know about people that make love difficult: they lose their temper quickly, they talk a little too much about others. Sometimes it goes deeper: they lied to us, humiliated us, judged us, or weren't there when we needed them.
• John 13 shows that there is room for love in spite of all this. Jesus knew, and he loved.
• Loving anyway does not mean pretending not to know. It is neither ignorance nor a lack of wisdom.
• "We can change the boundaries we have with people without changing the posture of our heart toward them." You can forgive and still need distance. You can pray for someone without giving them back the place they once held in your life.
• "We are called to love all people, but not everything they do."
• Kookie Mudere hears the objection: "You don't know what they did to me." That's true, the details of your situation are beyond them. But hard things have been done to them too: there is empathy, and there is good news.

6. Third truth: you can love because the Spirit of God helps you

• During the same meal, Jesus promises: "I will pray to the Father, and he will give you another Counselor, that he may be with you forever" (John 14:16). He knew that we could not produce this love by our own strength.
• Maybe you are thinking of someone who has never apologized, of a brother or sister who turned your childhood home upside down, of words spoken over you that you cannot shake off, of a parent whose choices deeply marked your life. "I can't love like Jesus, it's too painful."
• "I want to tell you today: you can. With the help of the Spirit." The Spirit of God produces the character of Jesus in us.
• At a small gas station in their village, Kookie Mudere watches an employee shout in the face of their sister, wrongly convinced that she was using her phone while pumping gas. The tone rises, someone calls the police, and everyone has to wait.
• When the police officers arrive, everything changes almost instantly. The employee, who had been shouting for twenty minutes, finds a calm voice again. "The presence of someone with authority changed the atmosphere in a way that none of us, in that conflict, could."
• The Spirit of God gives us access to the authority of God. He does not always change people or situations, but his presence changes what happens inside us: he reminds us of what is true, brings a fresh perspective, gives peace, awakens compassion in a hardened heart, and gives wisdom and courage for conversations avoided for weeks, months, sometimes years.
• We can ask him for help at any moment: in the car on the way to see a difficult family, while scrolling social media, walking into church before running into someone who disappointed us, before sending a message or entering a tense meeting.
• "Loving people like Jesus, loving those we have reasons not to love, is impossible by our own strength. But the presence of the Holy Spirit changes what is possible in us."

7. Receiving love in order to give it

• Kookie Mudere invites the congregation to let these truths settle in and to name before God what hurts: someone we cannot manage to forgive, tension in the family or at work, a betrayed friendship. "I don't know what it is for you, but God does."
• Two groups are called to prayer. Those who need a fresh encounter with God's love: "They need to receive it in order to give it." And those who need the strength of the Spirit to love where it is hard.
• Kookie Mudere also shares a memory from primary school: an argument over a pillow that took three years to settle. Some painful situations began with almost nothing and grew out of all proportion. Kookie Mudere prays that God would give wisdom and a strategy to get out of them.

Key takeaways

• The love described in 1 Corinthians 13 has no conditions: it does not depend on the other person's behavior.
• Loving anyway does not mean tolerating abuse or turning a blind eye to injustice. It means refusing to let the other person determine the posture of your heart.
• Jesus washed the feet of Judas, of Peter, and of those who would abandon him, knowing everything. He left us this example.
• You can change the boundaries of a relationship without changing the posture of your heart: forgive while keeping a distance.
• The love that loves anyway is born from the security of the Father's love and is lived out with the help of the Holy Spirit, never by our strength alone.

Personal application

1. Who in your life is giving you every reason right now not to love them? What determines the posture of your heart toward that person today?
2. Are you secure in the Father's love, or are you still looking for validation in other people's response?
3. Is there a relationship where you need to set or keep a boundary, while still choosing to forgive and to pray for the other person?
4. In what area have you tried to love by your own strength, instead of asking for the help of the Holy Spirit?
5. Before which situation this week (a family meal, a meeting, a message to send) will you take a moment to ask the Spirit to help you love?

Verses cited

• John 13:1-15
• John 13:34
• 1 Corinthians 13:4-5
• Romans 5:8
• John 14:16

Frequently asked questions

Does loving anyway mean accepting mistreatment?

No. Kookie Mudere makes clear that loving anyway does not mean tolerating abuse, going back into a physically or emotionally dangerous situation, or turning a blind eye to injustice. It means keeping a posture of love in your heart, without necessarily giving the other person the same closeness or the same access to your life.

What does the foot washing in John 13 teach us?

Jesus knew that Judas would betray him, that Peter would deny him, and that the others would abandon him. Yet he washed their feet, taking the place of the lowest servant of the house. Then he said: "For I have given you an example, that you should also do as I have done to you" (John 13:15).

How do you love someone who hurts you?

Kookie Mudere gives three supports: loving from the security of the Father's love, loving without ignoring what you know about the other person, and loving with the help of the Holy Spirit. This love is impossible by our own strength, but the presence of the Spirit changes what is possible inside us.