Title: God Wants Us To Be . . . A Church That Worships
Series: The Church God Wants Us To Be, Sermon # 2
COPYRIGHT © Joe La Rue, 2008
Text: John 4:19–24
Date Preached: January 20, 2008
Introduction
A. The Apostle John tells us in Revelation in the Bible about a series of visions he was given. He saw into heaven’s throne room, and witnessed the glory of God seated on His throne. He saw Jesus, appearing at times as a Lamb slain for God’s people, and at other times as a great Conqueror, waging war and riding upon a white horse followed by the armies of heaven. He saw strange images of beasts and dragons, bowls and trumpets, all signifying and symbolizing the gargantuan struggle taking place between the forces of God and the forces of Satan. He saw the end of earth’s history, when Satan is defeated and vanquished for all time, and he witnessed the new heavens and earth where God’s people will live in happiness forever. And when John was shown this final scene of God’s ultimate triumph and the joy of God’s people, he was so overcome by emotion that he fell down to worship the angel who had been showing him all these things. But the angel said, “Do not do it! I am a fellow servant with you. . . . Worship God!” (Rev 22:9)
B. If we were to summarize the teaching of the Bible in just a few sentences, one of them would be this two-word sentence spoken by the angel to John: Worship God! The Bible presents God as the one who is worthy of worship, and repeatedly calls us to give Him our worship.
C. Today we continue with a series of teaching which attempts to define the type of church God wants us to be.
1. Last week we saw that the Bible identifies five characteristics of the New Testament Church which God wants every church to possess: worship, discipleship, fellowship, ministry, and evangelism.
2. This morning we’re going to discuss what is involved in the first of these, worship, by looking at John 4:19-24 in the Bible. In this passage, Jesus was talking with a woman from Samaria, and the woman asked Jesus to settle an argument about where people should worship. Instead, Jesus talked about the type of worship that pleases God. Look at John 4:19-24 with me:
“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.” Jesus declared, “Believe me, woman, 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 spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.” (John 4:19–24, NIV).
D. Trans: Let me share two truths about worship with you this morning. First, and foundational, notice that Jesus says that
I. It’s Not Just God That We Are Worshiping; It’s The Father
A. “Father”was the preferred name that Jesus used when talking about God.
1. For instance, in the Sermon on the Mount He said things such as, “Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven” (Matt 5:16; NIV) and he told us that “your Father knows what you need before you ask him” (Matt 6:8, NIV), and promised that “your Father in heaven will give good gifts to those who ask him” (Matt 7:11, NIV). He taught us to pray by saying, “Our Father who art in heaven” (Matt 6:9, King James Version) and promised that if we forgive others, “your heavenly Father will also forgive you” (Matt 6:14, NIV).
2. There are many other examples, but these suffice to show that Jesus tended to call God “Father” when he was speaking about Him. And here, when speaking with this Samaritan woman, Jesus used this “father language” to talk about God. “A time is coming when you will worship THE FATHER neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. . . . The true worshipers will worship THE FATHER in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers THE FATHER seeks.”
B. Now, at first glance this may not seem like such a big deal, especially to those of us who have been in the Church for awhile, because we’ve grown so accustomed to hearing it. However, calling God “Father” in Jesus’ time was a huge deal. It was even somewhat scandalous, because it implied a closeness and familiarity with God that the teachers of the law said was beyond our ability to experience.
1. We are temporal, they said, and God is eternal. We are weak, and God is all-powerful. We are limited, and God has no limits.
2. And so the very idea that we could have a close relationship with God was scandalous to them.
3. And yet here was Jesus, teaching us to call God “Father.” There is a lot of meaning packed into that word. I recognize that many people have earthly fathers who have failed in significant ways, and so what I am about to say may not be true for everyone here this morning.
a. For many of us, though, when we think of “father,”we think of such adjectives as “provider” and “protector” and “fixer of what breaks”, because that’s what fathers do. They provide for their families and protect them, and they fix stuff around the house.
b. When we think of fathers, we think of men who are interested in our lives and our accomplishments. They burst with pride when we succeed and seek to encourage us when we fail.
c. For many of us, father brings to mind disciplinarians who helped us figure life out, who corrected us when we needed it and set us on a path to have a good, productive life.
d. When Jesus speaks about God as “Father,”it’s those types of activities He was underscoring about God. “God is like the perfect Father,” Jesus was saying.
C. Now, why does that matter? Why does it matter that we worship our Father, as opposed to God? Well, it matters for the very reason we just discussed.
1. God is more to us than some all-powerful being. He is more than some eternal spirit. He is more than some all-knowing entity. He is more than the creator and king of the universe.
2. If that were all we could say God was, there would still be plenty of reason to worship Him. He would still deserve our worship, and we would still have reason to give it. But God is more than that!
a. Not only is He an all-powerful God who created us, He is our Father who cares for us and about us.
b. Not only is He an all-knowing entity who knows us totally, everything about us, even our thoughts, He is our Father who loves us anyway, in spite of what He knows about us.
c. Not only is He the king of the universe, He is our Father who protects us and provides for us and fixes things when they break.
D. And so the reality of who God is changes somewhat our motivation for worship.
1. It’s not just that we worship a king because he commands us to, we worship our Father who cares for us.
2. It’s not just that we worship an all-powerful being who could force us to, we worship our Father who loves us and protects us.
3. It’s not just God we’re worshiping. It’s the Father, with all that word entails. And when we reflect on that—on who it is we are worshiping—well, it changes our view of worship from an activity that we have to do because God has commanded it, to something we get to do because God loves us and we want to thank Him and honor Him and praise Him.
E. Trans: And this leads us to the final truth about worship that comes from this passage before us this morning:
II. It’s Not The “Dressings of Worship” That Are Important; It’s The Attitude Of The Worshiper That Matters
A. The woman in our passage mentions a debate between the Jews and the Samaritans that had been going on for four hundred years by the time of Christ, and that debate centered around the question of where was the proper place to worship God.
1. The Jews said that the proper place for worship was the Temple in Jerusalem, while the Samaritans taught that God wanted to be worshiped on top of Mount Gerizim, a mountain of Samaria.
2. They were both hung up on what I’m calling “the dressings of worship.”—the external, outward signs of worship that we tend to think must be present in order for worship to occur: things like church buildings and singing songs and preachers preaching and things like that.
a. Now, these things are nice, don’t get me wrong. But they aren’t what make worship, worship. In fact, you can have all these things and still not have worship. And, conversely, you can have none of those things—no church buildings, no songs being sung, no sermons being preached, and still have worship.
b. ILL: Maybe an example will help us get at this. I could dress like a doctor and put on a white coat and wear a stethoscope around my neck and carry a medical chart in my hand, but if you were to have a medical emergency right now, you would not want me to work on you. Why? Because I’m not a doctor! I haven’t been to medical school, I don’t have the right knowledge and skill-set. And dressing me up as a doctor doesn’t make me one.
By the same token, we could have a doctor in the auditorium this morning. Perhaps he or she is not dressed like a doctor—they aren’t carrying a little black bag, they aren’t dressed in a doctor’s coat, and there are none of the things you expect to see when you see a doctor, and yet, if I were to have a medical emergency right now, that would be the person I would want to come help me—even though they didn’t look like I would expect a doctor to look. Why? Well, because they are a doctor, even if their clothes and appearance aren’t as I would expect. They have the right knowledge and skill-set, even if they aren’t wearing “doctor’s clothes.”
c. In the same way, it’s not the dressings of worship that make worship—the church building and the songs and the sermon. There’s something more than that which is necessary in order for worship to take place.
3. The Jews and Samaritans were hung up on issues involving the dressings of worship: they were arguing over the proper place at which worship should occur. And Jesus said they both were wrong. He said, “a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.” And Jesus was right. Within just a short period of time, Roman armies would put an end to the formal worship of God in both places. Jesus understood that it is not the place that makes the worship. It’s not the dressings of worship that are really important. To Jesus, the place we worship God was not the important thing. He refused to get into the debate about whether they should worship in Jerusalem or on Gerizim.
4. These things with which we dress up worship—the building, and the order of service, and things such as that—those aren’t the important things.
B. For Jesus, it’s not the place that makes the worship—it’s not these “dressings of worship”—rather, it’s the attitude of the worshiper! Jesus said that true worshipers would worship the Father “in spirit and in truth.”
1. This phrase means “worshiping God in sincerity and honesty.” It is to humbly come before Him, offering Him our praise and adoration for all He is and all He has done, and recognize our dependance upon Him for our life, for our salvation, for everything! Worshiping in spirit and truth means that our attitude is right before God.
2. Friends, we can come to a church building, and our worship will still be wrong if it isn’t sincere and honest. God is not interested in lip-service worship, even if it is done in a church building. He doesn’t want us to sing songs or pray prayers while our minds are on other things. He doesn’t want us to take communion when our thoughts aren’t centered on Jesus and our sin for which He suffered. God isn’t interested in our sitting politely while the preacher preaches, when our mind is a million miles away. I may be interested in you sitting politely while I preach, but God isn’t!
3. By the same token, this means that I can worship God, even when I am not in a church building. It means that I can worship God, even if my singing voice isn’t all that great. It means that I can worship God, whether I am with other people or all by myself.
C. Because our worship is not confined to this building, we can—and in fact, we should—worship God daily. You see, we worship God anytime we pause to reflect on how wonderful He is, and offer Him our praise.
1. Every time we sing a song praising Him and really mean it—whether in the church building or not—we are worshiping.
2. Every time we thank Him for how amazing He is to us, we are worshiping.
3. Every time we read His word and draw near to Him with hearts open to hear what He has to say, we are worshiping Him because we are saying to Him that He is important enough to draw near to.
4. Worship is not a Sunday morning activity only, any more than it was a Temple or Mount Gerizim activity only. Worship is about honoring God with our lives by praising Him for how good and wonderful He is to us.
5. And worship should take place every day, because God is good every day! When we save worship for Sunday—when we make worship something that can only occur within the walls of this building—we are falling into the same trap by which the Samaritans and the Jews were snared. And Jesus says, “Don’t be like that! You! And you! And you! And even you! God is seeking you! Worship Him in spirit and truth.”
D. Worship is not tied to a building. Worship is not tied to an event! Rather, worship is tied to a thankful and sincere attitude of praise and thanksgiving that acknowledges God’s greatness and majesty. Worship God.
Conclusion
A. As we close this morning, we’re going to sing a song of invitation. We do this every Sunday, because we believe that God is at work in our hearts and in our lives, and we want to give an opportunity for us as God’s people to respond to what God is doing.
1. Perhaps some here today feel God calling to make a commitment of faith to Jesus in baptism. The Bible tells us that when we come to believe in Jesus and accept Him as our Savior we are to repent of our sins and be baptized—that is, immersed under water as a faithful response to God. In fact, I think it’s fair to say that there is no act of worship greater than that. Perhaps you are ready to make that decision for Jesus this morning. If so, we invite you to come forward as we sing.
2. For the rest of us here who have already accepted Christ in baptism, there may be other decisions that need to be made for God today. May I suggest that we each should use this decision time to evaluate our own level of worshipfulness before God? And, if the Holy Spirit is convicting us that our worship has been lacking, or has been too tied to the dressings of worship rather than to the attitude of worship, let’s use this song of decision as a time when we repent and commit to God to do it better and get it right.
3. Whatever your decision this morning, we invite you to make it as we sing.
