Spirit and Truth

 Well, good morning to everybody that is watching and connecting with us. Whether you're here at the CrossPoint campus, or you are at Lockport or Niagara Falls or Cheektowaga, good morning to all of you. Those who are watching online, good morning to you as well. Many of you know that I have been to Israel on a number of occasions. Have done touring and teaching there on a number of occasions. Many of you have been with me, which was a real joy. We're looking forward to maybe being able to go back next year, potentially as things have settled down. And I've taught in a number of places, including Bethlehem. Now, at that site, there is a church that is built over the grotto. You can see a picture of it right here. It's a church that's built over the grotto, which was the traditional site of where Jesus was born. And inside there, it is controlled by three different primary Christian groups. The Greek Orthodox, the Armenians, and the Roman Catholics are who control it there, but also the Coptics and the Syrian Orthodox also have privileges within that site as well to perform acts of worship. You may know this, you may not, but through the course of a number of years, there have been documented many brawls that have happened between these denominations. And when I say brawls, I mean them; like full on, we're going at each other, that's what's happening. Perfect, right? Just what you hope for at the birthplace of Jesus; a bunch of people fighting about the Prince of Peace. Nonetheless. So this happens, and the argument is who gets to worship where and when and all of that kind of stuff. But that's not the only place where those kinds of arguments occur in the Holy Land. There's also a place that I've been to many times, it's called the Temple Mount. The Temple Mount is on top of an area where the Temple of Jerusalem used to be built. It's there on Mount Moriah. And now there is no Temple of Jerusalem, no Jewish temple. What you have is you have an Al-Aqsa mosque and you have the Dome of the Rock that's there, and two is Islamic holy sites that are now on the top of the mountain. And on the other side, on the Western side, you've got what's called the Western Wall or the Wailing Wall, which is a part of the original wall to the temple there in Jerusalem. And it's interesting because it's probably the most contested piece of religious real estate in all of the world. And it's controlled up top by the Muslims. It's controlled down below by the Jews, by Israel. So it's a very, very unique place. And there's continual arguments about what should be there and what's not there. And the temple needs to be rebuilt. And how's that going to be if those other Islamic shrines are there? Are they gonna have to tear them up? Are they gonna build it alongside? And it's an argument about where are the right places to worship. Because the Muslims believe this to be a sacred site for them because of the connection to Abraham. They have a relative to that mountain where Abraham was going to sacrifice Isaac there on Mount Moriah. And it's also the place where they say that Mohammed ascended back to heaven. So they feel like that's a holy space for them. But the Jews are like, "Wait a minute. "This is where the temple is, "where God told us the temple's supposed to be, "and this is a holy space for us." And so it's very contested. People are arguing about the where of worship. Now, what's interesting about both of these scenarios is that the questions that people are asking may not be the best questions. The questions have to do with where they should be worshiping. And really what we know now is that where is actually pretty irrelevant. And in fact, Jesus is who taught us that in this really interesting story that we find in John's gospel, chapter number four. I would encourage you to look inside of a Bible, if you have one, and be able to find your place there, because we're gonna walk through this story in John 4. And I want you to see what Jesus teaches us, because He's going to lead in this story, in His conversation with this woman, He's actually going to lead us into a space where we better understand worship. So the story begins in John 4, beginning in verse number one. And it says, "Now Jesus had learned "that the Pharisees had heard "that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John, "although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, "but his disciples. "So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee." Listen to this statement. "Now he had to go through Samaria." Now, Samaria, just that word alone drew contempt from the Jewish people. When you heard Samaria or Samaritans, it drew the ire of anybody that was a part of the people called Israel. They would do everything that they could when they were traveling to not have to go through Samaria as a Jew, because they felt like it was defiled land in terms of who they were, what they did, and some of their religious practices. So they would often just avoid the region like they would a plague-filled land. And that's really how they thought of Samaria. There's a long history there. Leon Morris, who's a New Testament scholar, filled in some of those gaps and talked to us about how Assyria, when it had taken captive that whole area of the world, where Israel was, Samaria was, people who were worshipers of Yahweh alone as God, Assyria does something, they were really a brutal empire. And what they would do when they would take over a place is that they would come in and they would deport a lot of the people that were originally from there and exile them. And they would bring in a whole lot of people from the remaining parts of their controllable empire, so that there would be this intermixing. And what would happen is even though in Samaria they were worshiping Yahweh, they would now bring into that a bunch of other gods that would be associated with their worship. And it was really just a mess. What would happen over the course of time in history is that you would have an intermingling and an intermarriage of those who were from outside of Israel and those who were a part of that Samaritan land, and you would have this intermixing of religious and cultural backgrounds. And it would be a bunch of truth and error mixed up in a toxic stew is what you would find in Assyria. Now, over the course of time, eventually the other gods began to fall away and Yahweh still remained as the God that was there in Samaria for the Samaritans. But that's with a limited scope because the Samaritans only took for themselves the first five books in the Bible as their manual for worshiping God, which is what we call the Pentateuch. And so, because they only had the first five books of the Bible, they had a very limited view of God. It was Yahweh, the God of Israel, that they were choosing to worship, but they were doing that in very limited and unknowledgeable ways; and sometimes mixing that with degrees of error that had gone on through the course of their religious history. That's why Jews didn't want any part of what was going on in Samaria, because it felt to them like it was a perversion of the truth of who God really was: because they didn't pay any attention to the prophets; they didn't pay any attention to the Psalmist; they didn't pay any attention to any of that. It was just about the first five books, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Those were the books that they embraced and the rest they did not. And as a result, it led to some very interesting things happening. For instance, it led to the Samaritans building their own temple. You see, what they knew from Deuteronomy 12, among other places, is that the temple of God is only to exist in one place. But they decided that they were going to build a temple as opposed to the one that the Jews had built in Jerusalem. They were going to choose a place that felt sacred to them. And they chose Mount Gerizim. Mount Gerizim was a place that was known spiritually because of Abraham's involvement there, Jacob's involvement there with his well, and those types of things, as well as where the blessing of the people who were coming into the promised land occurred. So they thought to themselves, based on what they knew from the first five books of the Bible, "We're gonna choose Mount Gerizim as our place of worship." And so they did. And in 400 BC, they ended up building a temple in Mount Gerizim. But in 128 BC, the Jews tore it down. You can imagine that there's some hostility between these two groups of people, right? It is a long standing group of hostility. In fact, the Jews looked at the Samaritans as half breeds and even called them dogs. I don't know that you're gonna make friends and influence people this way, but this is how they viewed one another. It was an ongoing battle. In fact, much later on, after Assyrian captivity and the Babylonian captivity, when the Jews were getting out of the Babylonian captivity, the Samaritans actually offered to help the Jews rebuild the temple that they were going to rebuild. And the Jews rejected that offer because they didn't wanna mix those two things and felt like that would make it defiled or unclean. So there is a long history here of staying away from all things Samaria and from everybody who is a Samaritan. And interestingly enough in our story, Jesus, who is going to be going on His way, I hope that you caught what we read just a moment ago in verse number four. It says, "Now He had to go through Samaria." He had to. Is that because there's no way, other way around? Oh no, there's other ways around. It's longer, but that's what Jews do all the time. Whenever they're traveling in those areas, they avoid the Samarian areas. Jesus could have done the same thing, but it said He had to go through Samaria. You see, what this tells me early on in the story is that there's a divine initiative to what is about to happen with Jesus. The Father is actually directing the affairs of the Son in terms of what He's going to do. And He had to. He was compelled to by the Father to go through Samaria because of what was about to happen. You see, John is gonna help us to understand that this Gospel and this joy of worshiping the Father is not just for the Jews alone. It's actually for those that are outside of that bandwidth as well; for those that are Gentiles, those that are non-Jews, or even those who are called half breeds, that this Gospel is for everyone. And Jesus is going to help us see that very clearly. Look with me as we pick up in the story in verse number five, it says, "So Jesus came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, "near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. "Jacob's well was there, "and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, "sat down by the well. "It was about noon. "When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, "Jesus said to her, 'Will you give me a drink?' "His disciples had gone into the town to buy food. "The Samaritan woman said to him, "'You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. "How can you ask me for a drink?' "For Jews do not associate with Samaritans. "Jesus answered her, 'If you knew the gift of God "'and who it is that asks you for a drink,'" you would have given, "'you would have asked him "'and he would have given you living water.' "'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?' "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.' "The woman said to him, 'Sir, give me this water "'so that I won't get thirsty "'and have to keep coming here to draw water.' "And he told her, 'Go, call your husband and come back.' "'I have no husband,' she replied. "Jesus said to her, "'You are right when you say you have no husband. "'The fact is, you have had five husbands, "'and the man you now have is not your husband. "'What you have just said is quite true.' "'Sir,' the woman said, "'I can see that you are a prophet.'" Now, Jesus is traveling and He's tired. Many times in the gospels, we get wonderful pictures of Jesus' divinity, don't we, of His healing ministry, of His divine insight. And we see all of that. But here we see the fullness of His humanity. He's been traveling and it's really hot and He's really tired, and He's really thirsty. It's noon; it's in the heat of the day. And as He is seated by this well, a woman comes up and Jesus asks her for a drink. Now, what's interesting is the woman is there by herself. And there's a reason for that because most of the people never came to the well during the middle of the day, it was too hot to make that journey. So she was coming in the middle of the day because she didn't want to be around all of the people. Because all the other women that would come, they would come early or they would come late when it wasn't in the heat of the day. And there was a reason for that because this woman probably saw the gazes that these other women would give to her about her reputation and her life, that was unknown to Jesus, well, known to Jesus at the time, but He hadn't revealed that. And so she's there and Jesus says, "Will you give me something to drink?" Now, in doing that, He's breaking all kinds of barriers. You do understand that, right? Jesus is absolutely blowing apart a bunch of barriers. He's blowing apart a geographic barrier. He's already in Samaria. He's a Jewish rabbi in Samaria, geographic barrier gone. He's also detonating a racial barrier. Samaritans are looked at as half breeds. Jews didn't want anything to do with them. And Jesus blows that barrier away with His interaction. He's blowing away a social barrier. This was a woman, and rabbis weren't supposed to be alone with women at any point, it looked really bad socially, and they weren't supposed to do it, let alone a woman of some reputation. But He's also disintegrating a religious barrier. He asks a Samaritan woman for a drink and He Himself does not have a vessel with which to do it, to put it into the well, to bring it down and bring it up and drink from. So He basically says, "I would be willing to drink from "what is considered a defiled vessel of the Samaritans "as a Jew." He is destroying all of these barriers for what purpose? To get to this woman's heart. That's what He's doing. This is the kind of Savior that we have, my friends. He'll break any barrier necessary to get to your heart. And that's what He's doing in her life. He wants her to experience a living water. The interesting thing is she keeps thinking literally about it all. He says, "You'd be asking me if you knew the gift of God. "You'd be asking me and I would give you living water. "And you would have that welling up in you "for eternal life." And she says, "Would you please give me this "so I don't have to keep coming back to this well?" Jesus is like, "That's not what I mean. "That's not what I mean." This isn't about literal water at this point, but Jesus is helping her understand the conversation. And she's politely avoiding the depth of conversation. Have you ever been in a conversation where you've just determined you're gonna keep it at the surface level? And maybe somebody's probing and they're trying to go deeper and you're like, "Nope, nope. "We're staying right here. "Right here." And that's where she's at. She's trying to keep it at this level. Jesus is beginning to probe deeply and she's not buying in. She's just thinking literally. Jesus is talking about the depth of her soul, living water, eternal life, and she's like, "Give me some of that "then I don't have to keep coming back here, "to keep coming back to the well." And then Jesus says, "Well, go, call your husband." You see, He's not gonna let her just stay here at superficial level. "Go, call your husband." She tries to politely avoid the whole topic by saying, "I don't have a husband," thinking that ends it. "Oh, okay, cool, you don't have a husband. "Never mind" Jesus says, "No, you're exactly right, "you don't have a husband. "You've had five. "And the one who's now your husband, or you say, "he's not really your husband." And then she says, "I can see that you are a prophet." In your mind you're going, "You don't say." Right? But here's why that's so interesting because Samaritans only acknowledged one prophet, Moses, because they only held to the first five books, the Pentateuch. The only prophet that they acknowledged was Moses and the one that Moses said was coming. Deuteronomy 18:18 tells us that, "I will raise up for them a prophet like you," Moses, "from among their fellow Israelites, "and I will put my words in his mouth. "He will tell them everything I command him." You see, even back in the time of Moses, there was embedded in that a reminder that there's a Prophet that's going to come who's going to be unlike anyone that has come before Him. And this was what we would know to be the Messiah. So when this woman says to Jesus, "I perceive that You are a prophet," she's getting closer. You see, Jesus is stripping away the superficiality of what's going on in this conversation. And He is starting to dive deep, and He's looking into her soul, and He's exposing her heart right there in front of her. And she says, "I can see that You are a prophet." She is moving ever closer to understanding who He is. It's actually a remarkable thing. But then pick up with me in verse number 20. She says, "'Our fathers, or our ancestors, "'worshiped on this mountain, "'but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship "'is in Jerusalem.' "'Woman,' Jesus replied, 'believe me, "'a time is coming when you will worship the Father "'neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.'" Neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem. It's a really remarkable statement that this woman does. She's still trying to change the subject, by the way. Have you ever done that? You wanna keep it right here, "Nope, nope, we're just staying right here, superficial." And then it's like deep dive and you're like, "Whoa, whoa-hoo-hoo." And then it's exposing some things in your life. And then you just blurt out, "Trump or Biden." You just change it into some controversial subject immediately. "Are you vax or no-vax? "Tell me now!" 'Cause I've gotta change the subject, make it some controversial subject, it's gonna get me off of all this stuff, because right now it's making me real uncomfortable. He's looking into my soul, he's exposed my entire life and now I'm gonna change the entire subject. So she's still trying to do that. Jesus is not going to allow just that thing to happen. 'Cause you know how controversial that subject was between Samaritans and Jews: Which mountain is the right mountain? Where is the right and acceptable place of worship? Is it Mount Gerizim like her fathers had said, or is it Jerusalem like the Jews had said? And she says... Maybe it was honest, maybe she thought to herself, "This guy has incredible prophetic insight. "I'm just gonna ask Him. "Maybe He can clear it up for me." Maybe it was an honest thing. Or maybe she was just trying to avoid the whole conversation altogether. I don't know exactly. What I do know is that what she's doing is she's appealing to where her father's worshiped and Jesus is appealing to the Father being worshiped. She's appealing to where and Jesus is appealing to how and whom. It's a fundamental difference. Then Jesus goes on to tell her this in verse 22, "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 him "in the Spirit and in truth." You see, after Jesus, noting to this woman that the where question related to geography when it comes to worship is really immaterial. It's actually an irrelevant question now when you're asking about geographically, what mountain should we be worshiping on? And with Jesus, maybe even giving us some sense of prophecy when He says, "Neither of these places are gonna be a place "where people are worshiping the Father," maybe He's hinting at the destruction of the temple of Jerusalem, which He prophesies about later on anyway. But Jesus is taking the question and the impetus off of the geography. And He's introducing her to a concept that's new to her. Listen to this. He's introducing her to the concept of what a true worshiper is. This is what Jesus is saying to her. This is what a true worshiper is. And what does He say? Well, write this down, I'm taking it, lifting it right from the text. The true worshipers the Father seeks must worship Him in spirit and truth. This is what Jesus is teaching to her and by extension to us. The true worshipers the Father seeks must worship Him in spirit and in truth. That phrase "in spirit and truth," that's what we need to pay attention to here. That phrase "in spirit" can be translated like it is in the NIV, "in the Spirit" with a capital S, or in some of your translations, depending on what you're reading, it's translated "in spirit" lowercase S. The difference there is Jesus talking about in the Spirit, in other words, that we're talking about the Holy Spirit, or is He talking about in spirit as in what's inside of us, the authenticity of our hearts when it comes to worship? And the truth is, is scholars are torn as to what the proper translation is. But here's the good news. I think Jesus will affirm both. And I actually know that because if I look backwards slightly, just one chapter backwards in John 4, there's a conversation that Jesus is having with a Pharisee named Nicodemus. Remember, Nicodemus came to Him under the cover of darkness and was asking some questions and was moving in the direction of belief. We like to refer to it as Nick at night. That's what you call a bad joke. That's how you define it. When four people think it's funny, that's how you define a bad joke. It's a Nickelodeon reference for virtually everyone that didn't get it. Nonetheless. Nicodemus comes to Him under the cover of darkness, is asking in the direction of belief to Jesus. And Jesus tells him, "Nobody enters the kingdom of God "unless they're born again." Nicodemus is thinking literally again. "Do you mean like... "Like how does a man get back in his mother's womb? "Come on." Jesus is like, "Yep. Nope. "Not what I'm talking about. "That's gonna happen in a few days "when I'm at a well with a woman, "who's actually gonna think "that I'm talking about physical water, and I'm not." But then Jesus says this, John 3:5. Jesus said, "Very truly I tell you, "no one can enter the kingdom of God "unless they are born of water and the Spirit." You see, there's Jesus affirming the fact that the only way that people can enter the kingdom of God is by being born of water, born of a woman, but also being born again by the Spirit of the living God. That when we put our faith and our trust in Jesus, that now the Spirit of the living God comes to live inside of us, and we are baptized into the family of God. This is the only way that we can actually worship God truly is that we worship Him in the Spirit. But Jesus also affirms in spirit when we worship. Because Jesus was having a conversation with some unbelieving Pharisees in one of the other gospels and listen to what He said. He said to them, "You hypocrites! "Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you: "'These people honor me with their lips, "'but their hearts are far from me.'" And as a result, what did He say? "'They worship me in vain; "their teachings are merely human rules.'" He said, "Their lips are for me; "their hearts aren't. "They are not worshiping in spirit." And that is vanity. That's worshiping in vain. That's not real worship. So Jesus would affirm both: that to worship in the Spirit is mandated for us if we want to truly worship God, and to worship in spirit is also something that is a part of what it means to be a true worshiper. But what does God also say? We worship in spirit and in truth. You see, God gets to define how He's worshiped. That's His prerogative. We don't get to make those rules. And God says there are certain ways that worship is true, and certain ways that worship is not. This goes back all the way to the Book of Genesis. You remember this, right? Abel and Cain, brothers; born of Adam and Eve. They both offered worship to God. And what transpired? Cain's was rejected; Abel's was received. See, there is a to worship God and a way not to. We see that when we see the setup of the tabernacle in the temple, we see that very clearly. Here's what happens. God says, "This is the manner "in which the priesthood is going to be. "These are the people that can be priests. "This is the way in which they will go about their worship." And it's very detailed, because God says, "This is how it's supposed to be." And then when we get to the prophets and we see Israel, who's not honoring that kind of worship, God speaks through the prophets to the people of Israel and corrects them, because God is the one who says, "This is how we're supposed to be worshiping." In fact, He does that with the Prophet Malachi. I know many of you from here in Buffalo thought it was Malachi the Italian prophet, but it it's Malachi. Now, that's called a funny joke. Everybody got that. Everybody got that one. It's also called a dad joke and it was also stupid. But everyone laughed at that one. Malachi, God speaks through Malachi to correct His people. And here's how He does it related to worship. He first talks to them about how their worship is apathetic. Apathetic. Listen to what he says, Malachi 1, beginning in verse 10, "'Oh, that one of you would shut the temple doors, "'so that you would not light useless fires on my altar! "'I am not pleased with you,' says the Lord Almighty, "'and I will accept no offering from your hands. "'My name will be great among the nations, "'from where the sun rises to where it sets. "'In every place incense and pure offerings "'will be brought to me, "'because my name will be great among the nations,' "says the Lord Almighty. "'But you profane it by saying, "'"The Lord's table is defiled," "'and, "Its food is contemptible." "'And you say, "What a burden!" "'and you sniff at it contemptuously,' "says the Lord Almighty. "'When you bring injured, lame or diseased animals "'and offer them as sacrifices, "'should I accept them from your hands?' says the Lord." I mean, this is apathetic worship. They are supposed to... It's very specific what God says in terms of the worship of, and the sacrifice of animals. They're to be unblemished. He made that patently clear; they're to be unblemished. And they're bringing diseased and lame and whatever. It's just like, whatever. It's apathetic! God says, "No. No." And by the way, it also can't be irreverent. Listen to what he says in Malachi 2. He says, "'If you do not listen, "'and if you do not resolve to honor my name,' "says the Lord Almighty, 'I will send a curse on you, "'and I will curse your blessings. "'Yes, I have already cursed them, "'because you have not resolved to honor me.'" They were irreverent; they were apathetic. They were irreverent. And you know what else they did? The priest were not even teaching the truth of God. Listen to what it says in Malachi 2, a little bit later. "'And you will know that I have sent you this warning "'so that my covenant with Levi may continue,' "says the Lord Almighty. "'My covenant was with him, a covenant of life and peace, "'and I gave them to him; this called for reverence "'and he revered me and stood in awe of my name. "'True instruction was in his mouth "'and nothing false was found on his lips. "'He walked with me in peace and uprightness, "'and turned many from sin. "'For the lips of a priest ought to preserve knowledge, "'because he is the messenger of the Lord Almighty "'and people seek instruction from his mouth.'" He's saying, this is what should happen when we're talking about true worship, that you should preach the truth, that you should communicate the truth of the knowledge of who God is. But instead that wasn't happening. So you had apathy, you had irreverence, and you had not working in the truth. Do you know what that is? That's an example of that God wants us to be true worshipers. And true worshipers worship in spirit and in truth. That's what we are taught in this passage. He wants worshipers who worship in spirit and in truth. Now, look again in verse number 24 of John 4, look again in verse 24, it says this, "God is spirit, and his worshipers," say this word with me, "his worshipers must worship "in the Spirit and in truth." "God is spirit and his worshipers must worship "in the Spirit and in truth." That's a strong statement, isn't it? He didn't say, "It'd be good if you did this." He said, "This is what you must do. "This is what true worshipers must do. "They must worship in spirit and in truth." I realize that maybe when you hear that and we read that, you're thinking to yourself, "I don't know if I can live up to that. "I don't know that I can." You can't. So let's establish that; you can't, I can't. You're going, "Okay, that's a problem." Because what God said, what Jesus said, God the flesh, God in the flesh, what He said is true worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth. How can I do that consistently if I know that I'm not able to do that fully? Here's the good news. God has given us His Son. His Son, that's how we do it, in and through Jesus. Why do I say that? Well, look again at verse number 22, I find something interesting here that you might as well. Jesus says, "You Samaritans worship what you do not know;" remember, it was very limited knowledge, "we worship what we do know, "for salvation is from the Jews." Now, when you read this in the literal translation, there's the definitive article here. And so it would say for the salvation is from the Jews. In other words, what Jesus is helping them to understand is the One that you have thought about, that Deuteronomy 18 talked about, the one Prophet to come, who would be the Messiah, Jesus is fundamentally saying that the salvation, the One who would be able to bridge that gap between people who can't approach God with worthy worship and who ultimately could is because there is One who is coming, who is a mediator, who will provide salvation for His people and all of their sin. And as a result of that, they will then be able to access God. This is what Jesus is ultimately proclaiming to this woman that He is the mediator. Now, listen to this. True worship only comes by way of the True Worshiper. And the True Worshiper, capital T, capital W, is the Lord Jesus. He's the True Worshiper. That's why you and I can become true worshipers in Him because of what He's done in mediating on our behalf. In other words, here's what Jesus has done. He has brought God to people and people to God. This is His role as the Great High Priest, the One who makes mediation for us all. In fact, the Book of Hebrews talks about that idea. It talks about Jesus as the Great High Priest, the One who mediates the covenant on our behalf. But notice what it says in Hebrews 2. "But the one who makes people holy "and those who are made holy are of the same family. "So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters." Listen to what He says. "He says, 'I will declare your name "'to my brothers and sisters; "'I'm gonna bring God to people, "'and in the assembly I will sing your praises.'" "I'm gonna lead people to God." Have you thought about that for just a second when it comes to the idea of worship? That Jesus Himself is in the assembly of His people, leading the praises of God. I'll say it easier. Jesus is the worship leader. Jesus is. He's the worship leader. Not me, not you, not people that are singing; Jesus is the worship leader. He's singing the praises of God. He's leading the assembly in acknowledging the worth of who God is. That ought to make us actually participate in a different way. Now, we know that worship is far more than singing, right? We'll bring you more than a song. And I'll talk more about that next week. But it certainly includes it. It certainly includes it. When we gather together and we sing the praises of God, we are mimicking what the Lord Jesus is doing; singing the praises of God. That's a remarkable thing. You see, sometimes we get too consumeristic even when it comes to the idea of singing. Because everybody's got preferences and styles and we can, it's an on-demand world, you can listen to whatever you want to whenever you want to and all that stuff. And you've got your preferences, somebody else has their preferences, I get it. But I've had somebody come to me before, this was years and years and years ago. And they said to me, just out in the atrium, they said, "I didn't really like that song we sang today." And I was like, "Cool, it wasn't for you. "You may have misunderstood that it was for you. "It actually wasn't. "It was for Jesus. "It was for the God of all worth "when we proclaimed His majesty and His glory. "And maybe for you the style wasn't the thing, that's fine. "You can listen to whatever you want to "whenever you want to; that's your whole life." When we gather together, we together can proclaim the beauty of who God is. It's about, listen, it's about our hearts and about the truth of our minds acknowledging the glory of who God is. Styles are far secondary. And you know this, when you go all around the world. I've been all over the world. I've worshiped with my brothers and sisters all over the world. I've been in Ukraine. You couldn't convince me that they were happy about what they were singing. But they were. It was just culturally how they were. And that's fine. Their hearts were in it. Sometimes after the service would come with a tear in their eye, "God spoke to me." And I'm like, "Had you told your face, "'cause I don't think that's true. "You should tell people and tell your face too." But it's cultural; it's cultural. I've been where it's just lively as can be. Man, in Cuba and Jamaica, come on, it was get down on it. Incredible. And then I've been places that have been very stoic and all that stuff. It's not about the style. I've been with my... My brother Larmick is here. Larmick would you stand? He's one of our partners from India. He's right here, down here. We're so glad that he's here with us today. Dear brother, thank you. I've been with he and his wife, Jasmine. And we've been all over the place. We've been in India, we've been all over Southeast Asia, been in Sri Lanka. I don't even know all the places we've been together. Shared so many meals together, so many worship experiences together. We've talked together. Dr. Larmick is a wonderful teacher. He's a brilliant mind. But he's also one of the most joyful people I know. He knows a lot, he has earned, he's got a PhD. He's really, really smart. But every time I'm around him, he's like a joy bomb with the pin pulled looking for a place to detonate. "Oh pastor," that's what I hear every time. And I'm just like, "Larmick, my life just got better "'cause I'm with you." And he worships from his heart and from his mind because it's about spirit and truth. You see, if we have truth when we worship with no spirit involved, we become dry, dead, yet Orthodox, curmudgeons that nobody actually wants to be around. But if we are just about spirit and emotion with no truth, we become frenzied people who can be swayed any direction. Jesus says true worshipers, the ones the Father seeks, worship in spirit and truth. Both at the expense of neither. They both should be a part of how we worship because He is worthy of our emotion when we worship, and He is worthy of the love of the truth of who He is because we are to love the Lord our God with all of our heart, our soul, our mind, and our strength. This is what true worship actually looks like according to Jesus. You do realize that you can't be a true worshiper apart from Jesus. You can't. Let me explain quickly why. Jesus said it, He was talking to His disciples, but look at what He said in Luke 10. He said, "Whoever listens to you," talking to His disciples "listens to me; "and whoever rejects you rejects me;" now listen to this statement, "but whoever rejects me rejects him who sent me." How can you reject Jesus and worship the One who sent Him? Answer; you can't. You can't. You can only worship in and through the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus is the only one, my friends, that can bring us into the presence of God. Just Jesus; He's the only one. Try as you might to get to the presence of God, you cannot. Only Jesus can bring you into the intimate presence of God. That's the beauty of the Gospel, isn't it? That Jesus, and what He did is He came to us, He brought God to us. "In the beginning was the Word, "and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. "And the Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us." He brought God to us and dwelled among us so that He could bring us to God. Through what? Because our sin had separated us from a holy God. So Jesus, the sinless One, the One without blemish made the proper offering of worship in His very own life to satisfy the justice of a holy God who will and who must judge sin. But instead of it being upon you and I, it was upon Jesus because He willingly took upon Himself on the cross, my sin and your sin to pay for our sin, to satisfy the justice of God so that He could also be the justifier of those who would put their faith in Him. And so through His death and His resurrection, and now His ongoing ministry as High Priest, where He is continually praying for us and ministering to us. You do know that He's doing that, right? Jesus right now is seated at the right hand of the Father, and He is interceding on our behalf in His ministry as the eternal High Priest. What an incredible thing to think about! And He's leading us in the praises and the worship of God. This is a remarkable, remarkable thing. And this, this is where Jesus is leading this woman that He's talking to at the well. This is where He's leading her. He's walked her all through this. And notice how this conversation finishes. "The woman said, "'I know that Messiah' called Christ, 'is coming. "'When he comes, he will explain everything to us.' "And then Jesus declared, 'I, the one speaking to you "'I am he.'" Could you imagine being in that conversation? "I, the one speaking to you, I am he." Do you know what Jesus' answer is? His answer is also an invitation. That's what He's doing for this woman. He's saying to her, "I know you've got a mess in your background, "but I wanna recalibrate for you the new where of worship. "Where is the new where of worship? "It's not in a building over there or over there. "It's not in a mountain over there or over there. "It's me. "I, the one who am speaking to you, I'm he. "I'm the new temple. "I'm the place where the presence of God "dwells in its fullness. "I'm the living water. "I'm the One that can satisfy your thirsty soul. "I'm the true Prophet "who can see into everything in your life "and can peel back everything "and expose all of the sin and all of the mess. "But I'm also the Savior, "the One who died to pay for that sin, "the One who can set you free from the guilt of your past "and the shame that you've been running from. "The reason that you're here at noon "instead of in the early part of the day, "I can rescue you from all of that. "And it's because I'm the truth. "I'm the truth. "No one comes to the Father, except through me." You see, Jesus is the new where of worship. That for me and you should be both an encouragement and an invitation. 'Cause I would ask you, the true worshipers the Father seeks, they must worship in spirit and truth; so what's been hindering you? Is it that you've grown cold? Apathetic maybe? Maybe other loves in your life have superseded your first love, love for the Savior who died to set you free. Is it maybe that you've majored in one thing, spirit or truth, but you've done that to the faint exclusion of the other? Maybe you have made worship more about you than about God. We've been more consumer than we have true worshiper. Maybe we haven't allowed our soul to be uncovered like He did with the woman at the well where it's completely laid bare in the presence of the only One who knows you and who loves you and who can save you. So maybe today, like the woman, you could accept the same invitation to what it means to become a true worshiper of God. Let's bow our heads together for prayer. We'll be gone in just a moment. If you're here and you've never before entrusted your life to Jesus, the invitation is offered to you, just like it was offered to this woman. She took Jesus up on it. It changed her life so dramatically, she actually shared the transformation that happened with her entire village. And she was saying, "Come and see a man "who told me everything I ever did." "Could this be Him? "Yeah, it could be Him; it is Him. "He said it was." And He's here today. So maybe you just need to answer the invitation when He says, "It is I who's speaking to you, "who can rescue you, who can save you." And if you turn from your sin and put your faith in Jesus, He can transform you just like He did with this woman. Doesn't matter what your background is. You say, "Well, I've sinned, I've got some shame, I've got." It doesn't matter. He takes care of it all. That's the power of His blood, the power of His death, the power of His resurrection. So Father, I pray that for each of us, we'd be reminded about what the nature of true worship really is. That Father, You seek worshipers who worship You in spirit and in truth. We didn't even get to ponder and talk about the nature of how You seek them and what You seek them for, for the call that You've placed on their lives, for the obedience that comes in following You. And I pray that You'd help us all to be a people who worship You with the authentic, heartfelt beauty of praise and that we would also be a people who clearly allow the Word of God to take deep root in our hearts and in our minds so that we worship the God we do know. I pray You would help us with this so that the world can see You in Your fullness, You in Your truth, You in the glory of what You have done through Your Son, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And it's in His name that we pray. Amen.