Our Worship must be Genuine

 Read John 4:1-26

We started this journey with words about putting the words of Jesus into practice. I told you that you could go wrong with the words of Jesus. How?

By knowing what he said to do and not doing it.  That’s a life lived on shifting sand.

Jesus challenged us to ask, seek, and knock as we go after the things that we need to bring glory to God’s name.

We examined 3 parables about lost and found and we found that God has a heart to seek us, receive us, and welcome us as one of his own as soon as we turn around and come back to him. We should have a heart for rescue.

Now we come to a well at Sychar in Samaria. Jesus is tired and wants a drink. The disciples had gone into town looking for food and a woman approached the well.

Jesus said that he would like a drink and the woman responded by asking just what Jewish man would ask a Samaritan woman for a drink of water. The Jews don’t like Samaria. They didn’t like Samaritans, and women were at the lower end of the social structure.

Just who is this Jew to ask me for a drink?

We are comfortable with our social barriers.

We don’t care for you Jews because you hate us. We both believe that there is a God and a Messiah will come but we don’t agree on much else and don’t really want to have a conversation with you anyway. Besides, you don’t even have anything with which to draw water.

Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”

The woman came prepared for a religious and historical and cultural conversation but not prepared to be honest with the Lord himself.

“Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water?  Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”

We know this history. Jacob dug this well. Back in the day—we have all been through Genesis—The Jews and Samaritans were much closer.  It was only after the Assyrians and Babylonians invaded the Promised Land, did they grow to hate each other.  Now, both sides seem content with the status quo.  The two peoples might not be at war with each other, but they were content with the way things were—mutual dislike.

Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

This interested the woman.  Did this man really have water that would make it so she didn’t have to visit this well at noon. Everyone else came in the morning or the evening when it was cool.

As we discover in this reading, the woman probably came at noon to avoid the scorn of the other women. She had already gone through 5 husbands and was shacked up with another man at the moment.

Jesus called her out on this. Jesus said, let’s make this a real conversation. Let’s talk about things that matter.

The woman did not want to examine her own life. She had surely grown accustomed to getting her water at noon and the scorn of her own people whenever she had to cross paths with them.  She decided to give her best effort to changing the subject.

Hey. You know everything about me. You must be a prophet. So enough about me. Let’s talk prophet talk.

So, the woman said.

“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”

The woman wants to change the subject. Jesus came to deliver this message.

“Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

Do you remember verse 4 in this chapter? Jesus had to go through Samaria.  Why? Was the bridge out at the Jordan? Was it tax free day in Sychar?  Why did he have to go through Samaria?

Jesus had a message for this woman, and if you keep reading, we find it was a message for the entire town.

The woman made one more attempt to avoid the conversation. Maybe if she threw in the topic of the Messiah, this prophet would lose his train of thought and just go with it. Maybe the subject of the Messiah would get her out of having a real conversation about her life.

Jesus addressed this issue of the Messiah and the woman’s question from earlier: Are you greater than our Father Jacob?

Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”

This wasn’t the distraction that the woman sought, but it did get her attention.  She left her water jug and ran into town. Someone who spoke with authority just said he was the Messiah.

If we kept on reading, we would see that many people believed in Jesus because of this woman’s testimony. Some people believed after a direct encounter with Jesus and some who believed in Jesus because of this woman, later said they believed because of Jesus and not this wretched woman.

Jesus told this woman that humankind had made a mess or God’s instructions. He didn’t go into detail but did tell her that they had missed the boat on a lot of things.

Jesus didn’t say go back and fix them. He revealed himself to this woman as the Messiah. We will go forward from this point. Do you really want to worship God?

True believers will worship him in the Spirit and in truth.

It’s not about who has the best interpretation of God’s rules. It’s about who is really seeking God and ready to put the words of Jesus into practice.

Seek God and his kingdom and his righteousness first and God will grant you those things that the pagans have made into their God.

What is it to worship God in the Spirit and in truth?

It is to first recognize that the Spirit that lives inside of you is of the sovereign God.  If God is sovereign, and he is, then the Spirit that lives within you is sovereign as well. He reigns.

To worship God in the Spirit and in truth is to know the one true God through his Son Christ Jesus and to put his words into practice. Do you remember that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life?

Worship is the application of the truth, not just an academic exercise. Truth demands application—that we put the words of our Master into practice.

If we can’t do this, we should ask, is Jesus really my Master or do I just give him lip service and do things my own way?

We are often like the woman at the well. We will talk about religious things, but avoid the real conversations of our life that involve our relationship with God. Are we putting his words into practice?

We can post scripture online like crazy, hit like, and then share and think our work is done, but have we put the words of our Master into practice?

Are we being genuine to the calling that we have received to live a life of love that brings glory to God?

The Messiah has come. He has called us to believe in him and receive life.

He has called us to live in truth by trusting him enough to put his words into practice.

We worship with our every breath. Everything that we do is worship.

So is our worship given in the Spirit and in truth?

What about when we come into the assembly to worship? Are we glad to be here? Are we waiting for everyone to get through with the songs so you can sit down?

Are you dreading the sermon? How do I pretend to pay attention when I really don’t want to hear this message?

Is the offering a burden to you?

Are you holding side conversations to help pass the time?

Are we worshiping in the Spirit and in truth?

For all of the things that we are likely to fall short on as we work to put the words of our Master into practice—I’m thinking that love your enemy stuff is going to be a might prickly for many—we want to get this one right.

Worship in the Spirit and in truth.  We must make sure that our worship is genuine.  We must be the real deal in worship.

We are going to get distracted or lazy or forgetful with something that Jesus told us to do.  We should confess and get back in our race of faith.

But we should always be genuine in our worship.

We are not just passing time until we can go to the ball game or hunting this weekend. Our every moment is to be given as worship to God by the very things that we do.

When we gather for worship, we should really want to be here to put a smile on God’s face.

We need to get really good at worshiping in the Spirit and in truth.

True worshipers will worship in the Spirit and in truth.

Amen.