INTRODUCTION: TURN TO John 4 This week we will be looking at John 8-9 As Jesus is revealing to the people that He is the Son of God, that God is His Father Jesus is accused of being demon possessed After Jesus heals a blind man, He is accused of being a law breaker because He healed the man on the Sabbath And we will see a very interesting passage of scripture where the Pharisees ask Jesus are we spiritually blind? Jesus answers, if you were blind you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains As we look at our nation today, 90% of Americans claim to believe in God and yet only 37% of all Christians claim to be born again So America is without excuse when it comes to God, we claim to see As we look at the riots in the streets, what we see is the failure of man to keep the law and the failure of the law to change the heart of man There is only one solution to save America and that is Jesus Christ So come and join us for an exciting time in God s Word this Thursday at 7 pm at the HUB as we begin our study verse by verse through John Today I want to look at worship In chapter 4 Jesus has an encounter with a Samaritan woman It s really an incredible story of grace and I would encourage you to go calvarysanclemente.org and listen to the study in John 4 But at one point in the encounter, the Samaritan woman challenges Jesus with a religious debate... where is the right place to worship God And out of this religious debate, Jesus brings an incredible teaching on worship John 4:20 24 (NKJV) 20 Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship. 21 Jesus said to her, Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews. 23 But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. 24 God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.
To understand this passage, let s review history When Israel crossed over into the Promised Land, God told Joshua to go to Mount Gerazim and Mount Ebal At Mount Gerazim and Mount Ebal, God would renew His Covenant with Israel in the Promised Land After Solomon died, Rehoboam became King and because of his lack of wisdom the kingdom was divided and Jeroboam took the Northern tribes and formed the nation of Israel Jeroboam didn t want the people going to Jerusalem to worship so he said it s too far to go to Jerusalem to worship the Lord and He instituted a new religion a mix of idolatry and Judaism The Northern tribes of Israel never worshipped the true and living God they worshipped idols and thus they were the first to go into captivity 538 BC, descendants from the Northern tribes of Israel were returned to Samaria by Shalmaneser and they become the Samaritans When the Temple was completed in Jerusalem in 538 B.C., the Samaritans made Mount Gerazim their holy mountain, not Mount Moriah in Jerusalem because Jeraboam said Jerusalem is too far away The Samaritans began to circulate a revisionist view of history saying Abraham went to sacrifice Issac on Mount Gerazim, not Mount Moriah Thus the Samaritans celebrate Passover on Mount Gerazim to this day o It s similar to what Muslims do by saying Mohammed ascended into heaven from Mount Moriah (Temple Mount) o Even though Jerusalem was never recognized as a holy site until it was captured in 638 AD (6 years after Mohammed s death) By 500 B.C., we have 2 sects of Jews who have irreconcilable differences because the Samaritans rewrote history into a lie and also intermarried with Gentiles, ending their connection to Messiah So we have this deep seated racist divide and in John 4:9 we read the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans So the Samaritan woman confronts Jesus with this age old religious debate who is right about God? You or us? This debate continues today is Buddha right? Are the Muslims right? Are the Christians right? Who is right? Within Christian circles we debate about the right way to worship Pentecostals criticize others because their worship is dead Liturgical churches criticize others because their worship isn t reverent
Evangelicals criticize other because their worship isn t biblical It s all disagreements and debates over religion Jesus boils it down to this all religion is manmade, man s traditions, man s effort it s of earth, not of heaven John 4:21 (NKJV) 21 Jesus said to her, Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father. The first thing I want you to notice is worship is personal Worship is not about religion, God is not interested in religion Worship isn t about what church you go to it s about who you worship Worship is personal we worship the Father Notice Jesus didn t even use the generic term God He used the personal term Father in the Greek it s Patri, in the Hebrew Abba Our worship is to be like the love between a daddy and his child I remember when my kids were little they would sit on my lap, give me a big hug and say daddy I love you! That is what our worship is to be like we come in and say Jesus I love You, Oh how I love You, You are the One my heart adores Now this was revolutionary to everyone Not one religion teaches that God loves you, they all teach that You must make God happy through sacrifice and devotion Only Christianity teaches that God loves us and He gave His only begotten Son Jesus to die on the cross for our sins and all who believe in Him will not perish but have everlasting life!!! So our worship is filled with gratitude and love for what Jesus has done The second thing I want you to notice is worship is intelligent John 4:22 (NKJV) 22 You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews. The Samaritans didn t know why they worshipped on Mount Gerazim They didn t even know who they were worshipping Jeroboam made a golden calf and said this represents God So the Samaritans worshipped a thing, not a person
But Jesus said we worship what we know it s the Greek word to reflect and it suggests that you are thinking about something that has happened to you For the nation of Israel is was God leading them with the cloud by day and the fire by night, God feeding them in the wilderness, God protecting them and God bringing them into the promised land They had a rich experience with God that fueled their worship. For us it s the very fact that our sins have been forgiven, that we have been born again, that God has healed our sick bodies, our sick marriages, our sick minds and given us a future and a hope It s our rich experience with God s love that fuels our worship David wrote Psalm 30:1 5 (NKJV) 1 I will extol You, O LORD, for You have lifted me up, And have not let my foes rejoice over me. 2 O LORD my God, I cried out to You, And You healed me. 3 O LORD, You brought my soul up from the grave; You have kept me alive, that I should not go down to the pit. 4 Sing praise to the LORD, you saints of His, And give thanks at the remembrance of His holy name. 5 For His anger is but for a moment, His favor is for life; Weeping may endure for a night, But joy comes in the morning. David s worship was an intelligent response to God s power and might displayed in David s life When we gather together in corporate worship, we are gathering to publicly say thank you, thank you for saving me, thank you for healing me, thank you for providing for me, thank you for loving me It s God s love for us that is the basis of our worship John wrote 1 John 4:19 (NKJV) 19 We love Him because He first loved us. You can say you love Him by singing, by shouting, by dancing, by serving, by loving one another Or by closing your eyes and in the quietness of your heart tell the Lord how much you love Him and how thankful you are
The third thing I want you to notice is how are we to worship John 4:23 24 (NKJV) 23 But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. 24 God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth. What does it mean to worship in spirit and truth In John 3, Jesus tells Nicodemus, you must be born of the Spirit In John 4, Jesus tells us you must worship in spirit and truth What I believe Jesus is talking about is simply this The only worship the Father receives is the worship that comes from those who are born of the Spirit If you notice in scripture when the demons gave honor to Jesus, Jesus told them to shut up Jesus doesn t receive worship from demons He only receives worship from those who are born again The word used for truth speaks of the quality of worship Not that the worship itself is truthful, but the worshipper believes the truth that God exists, rewards those who honestly seek Him In order to worship God you must first acknowledge that He is the Only One True Living God, He is real and He is here to meet with You Otherwise, worship becomes a religious exercise, a tradition that may have sentimental meaning, but not based in any reality or truth God is not a concept, God is a real person and He has a name Jesus There is a popular belief that we are all worshipping the same God Pope Francis said Christians and Muslims worship the same God The Muslims worship Allah, the moon god a demon Some would even say that the Christian Scientists, the Mormons, the Jehovah Witnesses we all worship the same God Mormonism is based on Book of Mormon given to Joseph Smith by the demon Moroni Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of Christian Science regularly frequented séances and incorporated Hinduism (idolatry) into her religion Jehovah Witnesses reject that Jesus is God which is not truth
There are those who say I m a spiritual person, but I m not part of any specific religion they re like the Samaritans who don t know who they are worshipping So it s not truth, we do not all worship the same God and God does not receive worship from everyone God only receives worship from those who are born again, born of the Spirit and who believe the truth that God is the One True Living God and there is no other that s what it means to worship in spirit and truth At then end of the age, when every knee bows and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord it s not describing a moment of worship It s describing a moment of TRUTH when Jesus is will finally be recognized by all for who He is King of Kings and Lord of Lords Jesus says to the Samaritan woman, this is a true worshipper, God is looking for true worshippers and I ve come looking for YOU In vs. 4, Jesus said I have to go to Samaria and here we see why because He was looking for this worshipper who had gotten twisted up by religion, philosophy, by her tragic circumstances She wasn t looking for Jesus, she wasn t aware of Jesus, she didn t know Jesus, but Jesus knew her and He went looking for her In the same way we weren t looking for Jesus, we didn t know Jesus, but Jesus came looking for us and He found us Like the woman at the well, Jesus isn t interested in debating your philosophy of religion God is looking for genuine worshippers who want to have a direct, personal, real, authentic friendship with the real Jesus Quickly in closing what do we do in worship? There are many different words in Hebrew and Greek that describe what we are to do as we worship the Lord The word Hallelujah means to shout praise to God, other words mean to lift our hands, to kneel, to bow, to dance, to stand reverently In the New Testament the most common word for worship means to lean forward to kiss and it speaks of an intimacy in expressing our love in worship Other words mean to serve or to sing I would encourage you to expand your vocabulary in worship lift your hands, kneel, shout to the Lord when it s appropriate, maybe even dance a little Worship involves our entire being