of the whole body.  'The face' (Matt. 6:17), 'the hands' (Matt. 15:2; Mark

7:3), 'the eyes' (John 9:7,11,15) and 'the feet' (John 13:5,6,8,10,12,14; 1

Tim. 5:10) exhaust its usage.  Nipter is a 'bason' (John 13:5) not a bath.

There is a verse in Leviticus that uses the three words louo, nipto and pluno

with precision.  We give the LXX version:

'And whomsoever he toucheth that hath the issue, and hath not rinsed

(nipto) his hands in water, he shall wash (pluno) his clothes, and

bathe (louo) himself in water, and shall be unclean until evening'

Let us now turn to the thirteenth of John.  There is wondrous humility;

the Lord of glory took a towel and girded himself, and began to wash the

disciples' feet.  Apparently everyone was held speechless at the wonder of

it, until the Lord reached Peter, and this impetuous man giving voice, no

doubt, to what was passing through the minds of all, said, 'Lord, dost Thou

wash my feet?'  After hearing the Lord's reply, but without stopping to

consider that the act was evidently symbolic, Peter continued, 'Thou shalt

never wash my feet'.  To this the Lord patiently replied: 'If I wash thee

not, thou hast no part with Me'.  We can forgive the sudden rush of feeling;

we can sympathise with the impetuous soul and with his complete volte face,

as he contemplates with shrinking and horror, life having no part with the

Saviour.  Away went every scruple, as he said: 'Lord, not my feet only, but

also my hands and my head'.

Again the patient reply, correcting the doctrine but apprising at its

true worth the love that prompted even the mistake,

'He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean

every whit' (John 13:10).

Let us translate this verse again a little more carefully, paying

attention both to the tense of the verb and of the actual words used for

'He who hath been bathed, has no need except to wash his feet, but is

altogether clean'.

Here we have the important distinction which the Scripture always

makes, but which some teaching concerning holiness appears to confuse,

namely, the complete sanctification of the believing sinner -- holy,

unblameable, unreproveable in the sight of God -- the consequence of the

Offering of the Lord Jesus Christ, and having no reference to merit or

demerit on the part of the sanctified; and progressive sanctification, the

practical outworking of this acceptance in the daily cleansing that goes on

while the believer 'walks in the light', even though walking here below.  He

needs the washing of the feet continually, that is, cleansing from the

defilement of daily contact, but so far as his standing in Christ is

concerned, 'he hath been bathed' and a repetition of that is unthinkable.

Clothing.  The sage of Chelsea, Thomas Carlyle, is not quoted much today, but

some readers may remember his book, Sartor Resartus.  We remember a village

policeman, who would never have been able to tackle Carlyle's book,

nevertheless giving an exposition of Carlyle's philosophy of clothes, saying: