"Why a set of mismatched towels?" In my home, such a grouping might be hurridly set out for an unexpected houseguest. Zaccheus might have had the same joy and predicament when Jesus looked up in that tree and invited himself over. On each of these towels, the small print reveals these references:
FACE Cloth
"But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by men but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you." (Matthew 6:17-18)
"They said to him, 'Then how were your eyes opened?' He answered, 'The man called Jesus made clay and anointed my eyes and said to me, 'Go to Siloam and wash'; so I went and washed and received my sight." (John 9:10-11)
HAND Towel
"So when Pilate saw that he was gaining nothing, but rather that a riot was beginning, he took water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, 'I am innocent of this man's blood; see to it yourselves.' "
(Matthew 27:24)
"Now when the Pharisees gathered together to him, with some of the scribes, who had come from Jerusalem, they saw that some of his disciples ate with hands defiled, that is, unwashed. (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they wash their hands, observing the tradition of the elders.)"
(Mark 7:1-3)
FEET (bathmat)
"Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going into his hands, rose from supper, laid aside his garments, and girded himself with a towel. Then he poured water into a basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which he was girded. He came to Simon Peter, and Peter said to him, 'Lord, do you wash my feet?' Jesus answered him, 'What I am doing you do not know now, but afterward you will understand."
(John 13:3-7)
" And behold, a woman of the city, who was a sinner, when she learned that he was at table in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster flask of ointment, and standing behind him at his feet, weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears, and wiped them with the hair of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment." (Luke 7:37-38)
BODY (White bath towel with scalloped edging. Tag reads: Jordan River Towel Co., Ltd.)
"In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers at their business. And making a whip of cords, he drove them all, with the sheep and oxen, out of the temple; and he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. And he told those who sold the pigeons, 'Take these things away; you shall not make my Father's house a house of trade'..."
"but he spoke of the temple of his body." (John 2:14-16, 21)
"Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God? You are not your own..." (I Corinthians 6:19)
"Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a clear conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ..." (I Peter 3:21)
"You are already made clean by the word which I have spoken to you." (John 15:3)



