Jesus on Worship

Introduction

Welcome back to our building for worship.

I’ve been tested and it came back negative.

I had been exposed by 1 and possibly 2 people so with your health in mind I felt we needed to not meet in person last week.

But we are back this week!

We a new series on worship by looking at Isaiah 6.

Isaiah was worshiping in the temple and had a vision of God sitting on the throne with all the praises from the angels

He confessed his sins to God as he realized he was unworthy to be there

God responded by forgiving him of his sins

Then when God asked for someone to go, he volunteered.

Worship from that perspective is simply a dialogue between and almighty, holy, awe-inspiring God and his creation a human.

We need to look at this topic because there is an epidemic of wrong worship in the world today.

A 1978 feature article in Harper’s Magazine, entitled “Trendier Than Thou” told how the Bishop of California, Kilmer Myers, welcomed Bay Area transcendentalists to Grace Cathedral for light shows, guitar liturgies, nature festivals, and pagan ceremonies.

In 1971, during one nature ceremony in the cathedral, a decidedly ecumenical audience watched reverently as the poet Allen Ginsberg, wearing a deer mask, joined others similarly garbed to ordain Senators Alan Cranston and John Tunny as godfathers of animals (Cranston of the Tule elk and Tunney of the California brown bear).

The cathedral dean was dimly seen through marijuana smoke, wrestling atop the high altar to remove a cameraman, while movie projectors simultaneously cast images of buffalo herds and other endangered species on the walls and ceilings, to the accompaniment of rock music. Although Episcopal priests had protested that this vigil would be a “profane employment of this sacred house of worship,” Bishop Myers joined in nonetheless and offered prayers for a “renaissance of reverence for life in America.”

I know that’s an old example, but things are not any different when it comes to the confusion of who, where, and how to worship much less Christianity in general.

Today, I’d like to look at what Jesus said about worship.

It’s found in John 4 and His encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well.

For fun later today look at Nicodemus’ encounter with Jesus in chapter 3 and compare and contrast it with this one.

A little background

The Samaritans had been around for a long time and the two groups despised each other.

Their origin dates back to the time of the first exile of Israel.

The Samaritans’ religious practices were similar to the Jews with a few major exceptions—mainly, the Samaritans thought of Mount Gerizim, not Jerusalem, as the proper place of worship.

The Samaritans, like the Sadducees, were more “conservative” than other Jews in that they rejected the authority of the prophets and writings, and relied exclusively on their edition of the Pentateuch (Samaritan Pentateuch).

Their differences with the Jews are highlighted here in this encounter between Jesus and the woman.

Jesus stops at the well, sends the disciples to town to get some food, then he asks the woman for some water.

They have a discussion about living water that Jesus offers

He then asks her to go bring her husband back here

She says “I don’t have a husband” and Jesus knew that she’d had five and was living with another.

She then turns to the subject of worship and it’s here that we’ll pick up the scriptures.

John 4:19–26 CSB

19 “Sir,” the woman replied, “I see that you are a prophet. 20 Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews say that the place to worship is in Jerusalem.” 21 Jesus told her, “Believe me, woman, an hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know. We worship what we do know, because salvation is from the Jews. 23 But an hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and in truth. Yes, the Father wants such people to worship him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in Spirit and in truth.” 25 The woman said to him, “I know that the Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When he comes, he will explain everything to us.” 26 Jesus told her, “I, the one speaking to you, am he.”

Why To Worship?

Let’s look at the why first.

Verse 23 says the Father seeks your worship. (John 4:23)

Now, why does God seek your worship?

Does worship add anything to God’s changeless glory?

Do you think that your worship makes Him any more glorious?

You can’t make Him more glorious, for He says, “I am the LORD, I change not.” (Malachi 3:6)

Does he need his ego boosted, or does He have an insecurity problem?

No! God is completely all-glorious and self-sufficient.

God does not want worship for what worship does for God, but what worship does for you.

Worship changes you like nothing else.

It is a known fact that we become like what we worship.

You worship money, power, pleasure then that’s what you’ll become and money hunger, power hungry, pleasure seeking person.

When we worship God as we ought, we become like Him.

2 Corinthians 3:18: “We all, with unveiled faces, are looking as in a mirror at, the glory of the Lord and are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory; this is from the Lord who is the Spirit.”

We would be better if we worshiped better.

To worship Him as we ought is to become as we are.

There is no way that you can become like Jesus without worshiping Jesus.

“The Father wants such people to worship him.” (John 4:23)

Reality of Worship

Look again in verse 23.

Jesus is talking here about true worship, not false worship.

Worship is not necessarily church services.

You can sit in a church service and never worship.

Worship is not primarily Bible reading.

You can read your Bible and not worship.

When I study for the sermon, I’m doing everything but worship.

You can even pray and not worship.

Jesus spoke of some who prayed and they thought they were heard for their much speaking, but they were not heard. (Matthew 6:7)

What is real worship?

Real worship is the adoring contemplation of God through Jesus Christ.

John MacArthur said that “worship is all that we are responding to all that He is.”

That’s what worship is.

All that we are—with my whole heart, with my whole being, with my mind, my emotion, my will, my strength—all of it responding to all that God is.

The word worship and worth-ship go together: we worship Him because He is worthy of worth, our worship.

Illustration of lady rescued in burning fire.

Prayer

Praise

Worship - married

Thank God for prayer that says, “Lord, help me.” Thank God for praise that says, “Thank you, Jesus.” But thank God—thank God—for worship that says, “Lord, you are my all and in all; and, Lord, I share my life with you on the most intimate terms.”

Jesus’ Requirements

In explaining to the woman that the place to worship doesn’t matter or is irrelevant.

The Samaritans worshiped in Shechem on Mount Gerizim.

The Jews worshiped in Jerusalem at the Temple.

Now Jesus was saying that believing in Him we receive the Spirit and everywhere is a place to worship.

In Spirit

First, we must worship God “in spirit” because God is spirit.

One must be genuinely converted to Christ.

Born of the Spirit - John 3:5, “Truly I tell you, unless someone is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.”

When a person becomes a Christian, they receive the Holy Spirit as 1 Corinthians 12:13, says, “For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and we were all given one Spirit to drink.”

We all have access to the Father through Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit as Ephesians 2:18 tells us, “For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father.”

But not every Christian stands ready to worship God.

If the believer in Christ desires to express His adoration and praise, he must be “filled with the Spirit” (Ephesians 5:18).

All believers have the Holy Spirit living within their physical bodies (1 Corinthians 6:19–20), but sometimes, due to sin, believers walk in the power of the flesh, not the Spirit.

That is, they do not allow the Holy Spirit within to control them absolutely.

In that state of carnality, the believer seeks to worship God in vain.

But when he confesses all known sin and asks God to fill him afresh from within with the Spirit, his worship becomes acceptable.

In Truth

Jesus taught secondly we must worship Him “in truth.”

That simply means that we must worship God biblically.

Any form or expression of worship that cannot be substantiated by Scripture should be avoided.

When someone tries to offer God praise in a manner not mentioned in the biblical text, he is akin to the sons of Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, in the Old Testament, whom God killed because they “offered strange fire to the Lord which He had not commanded” (Leviticus 10:1).

Sometimes people will try to worship the Lord in an unscriptural way and then claim that they were being “led by the Spirit.”

But the Holy Spirit was the one who inspired the Scriptures, and He would never lead a believer to do something in worship that contradicted what He set forth in the biblical text.

That is why we should not pray to Mary or any other Christian who has preceded us in death.

That is also why people should not claim that God has supernaturally anointed their hands with oil or gold dust, or that He has sprinkled the altar of their church with angel feathers.

People who bark like dogs, roll in floors, and jerk uncontrollably should not blame God for such fanatical behavior because the Bible never sanctions or suggests such activity.

Worship that is truly “in spirit” will also be “in truth.”

The Word of God must dwell in you richly.

The Word of God is the basis of all true worship.

If you worship in the Spirit without the Word, you will become a fanatic.

If you worship in the truth without the Spirit, you’ll become a Pharisee.

But if you worship in spirit and in truth, you’ll become a true worshiper.

How Do I Worship “In Spirit and Truth”

Verse 23 again says, “Yes, the Father wants such people to worship Him.”

The central reality in worship is not that we are seeking God, but that he is seeking us!

This is a totally Christian idea.

The Jew never thought of God this way.

That is a wonderful thing about worship—the expectancy within us is just a shadow of God expectancy!

Are we worshipers who worship him “in spirit and in truth”?

It is possible to attend a church from our youth, to fall into the habit of the liturgy (and every church has its own liturgy), to be a fairly diligent reader of the Word, and to do so for fifty or sixty years, and yet never once worship God the way Jesus described it.

Tragic!

The Samaritan woman had no such privileged history, but she worshiped.

The Samaritans had a belief that a prophet like Moses was going to be raised up and that he would explain the Law.

As a result the woman openly speculated about whether Jesus might be he.

The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.” (v. 25)

In other words, “Are you the Christ?”

Then Jesus declared, “I who speak to you am he.” (v. 26)

Whether it was then or sometime in the future, that woman began to worship “in spirit and in truth”—she believed what Christ said.

Perhaps it has never been your experience to actually worship “in spirit and in truth.”

The first thing you need, of course, is the Messiah.

You need to receive him just as that woman did, in the revelation of the truth of what he is—the God who holds the universe together, the God who became man and died and rose again for you.

You need to be born anew.

When that happens you will be able to worship “in spirit and in truth.”

Whatever our condition, God wants us to be men and women who really understand how wonderful he is.

God wants us to stand at his feet and be amazed at who he is and adore him in his awesome majesty.

He wants to be worshiped “in spirit and in truth.”

There is nothing more important than what we think of him and how we worship him.

May we hear his words and worship him “in spirit and in truth.”

Prayer