True Worship
John • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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· 2 viewsTrue worship should be the priority of every believer because that is what God seeks.
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True Worship John 4:19-24
True Worship John 4:19-24
Years ago, when the eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes died, his public relations officer asked the casinos he owned in Los Vegas to give him a moment of silence as a show of respect.
So for sixty uncomfortable seconds everything in the casinos went silent. Then the pit boss looked at his watch and leaned forward and said, “Okay, he’s had his minute, roll the dice.” And it all started up again.
I can’t help but wonder if that is not the way we treat God sometimes. We interrupt our busy schedules once a week, rush to church and give God His hour. Then we go back to what we were doing. We go home and forget all about Him.
God created us for worship and worship should be our ultimate priority. The West Minister Shorter Catechism puts it like this, “The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” Are you glorifying God today? Are you a true worshipper?
It is no accident that the longest book of the bible is the book of Psalms, and it is all about praise and worship. When we come to the end of the bible we see saints and angels in heaven falling before the throne of God in the book of Revelation. Since worship is a priority in heaven, don’t you think we ought to be practicing it now.
John MacArthur defines worship like this; “Worship is our innermost being responding with praise for all that God is, through our attitudes, actions, thoughts, and words, based on the truth of God as He has revealed Himself”
My personal definition isn’t quite as good but it’s simple. I would say that worship is an attitude of the heart, that shows gratitude and love toward God for who He is and what He has done.
What we learn from this passage is; “True worship should be the priority of every believer because that is what God seeks.”
The woman said to Him, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet.
“Our fathers worshiped in this mountain, and you people say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship.”
Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe Me, an hour is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father.
“You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews.
“But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers.
“God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”
In our passage this morning Jesus is witnessing to a Samaritan woman at the well, and He ultimately leads her to saving faith. Now you might not think of witnessing as the right time to talk to someone about the priority of worship, but Jesus did. He takes her question and uses it to zero in on the gospel. After all the chief goal of our salvation is to turn sinners into true worshippers.
Notice Jesus tells the woman things are about to change. John 4:23 ““But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers.”
When Jesus came into the world He changed the Old Covenant to the New. Under the old covenant the place they worshipped was important. They had to go to the temple. They had to take part in the annual feasts.
But when Jesus came, He became the temple and began to build His temple in us; the church. Today, where we gather to worship is not what matters. But how we worship and who we worship is what’s important.
Unbelievers today are very much like the Samaritan woman in the story. They think that going through the external rituals of worship is what makes them right with God. They believe as long as they go to church and participate in the weekly traditions everything is fine, but they really haven’t dealt with God in their heart.
Jesus teaches us here that the external act of worship is not what matters, but it is what is taking place inside that counts.
We must make it our priority to become true worshippers of God.
