July 29: True worshipers

But an hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. Yes, the Father wants such people to worship Him. God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.    (John 4:23,24 — Holman Christian Standard Bible)

This passage is part of a conversation that Jesus had with a Samaritan woman at a well when He and His disciples were passing through Samaria. (At that time the nation was divided into Judea, Samaria, and Galilee.) This woman was shocked that Jesus, a Jew, dared to speak to her, a Samaritan, and even asked her for a drink of water. 

In those times Jews and Samaritans despised each other, and Jews would refer to Samaritans as dogs. Samaria was made up of Jews that had intermarried with people from other nations in violation of Jewish Law, and so they were considered spiritually inferior and unclean. For the most part they had given up worshiping idols and at the time worshiped the God of Israel. And yet, they were not welcome in Jerusalem’s Temple and were forced to build their own temple to God on Mount Gerizim.

This is why Jesus speaks about true worshipers, and worshiping in spirit and in truth. Samaritans had been accused of being false worshipers because they were worshiping God in the wrong place. But He explains that His presence in the world was ushering in a new age where worship would not be centered around a building or place, but around spirit and truth. In fact, God allowed the Jerusalem Temple to be destroyed some 40 years after Jesus returned to heaven as a sign of this new age.

Today our bodies are the temple of God, and the worship that God desires is one that involves the mind. Our mind is linked to the spirit, just like our heart is linked to the flesh. Reason that’s based on God’s Word leads to spirituality, whereas emotion based on what we see and hear and feel leads to worldliness. And so, worship in the spirit is not based on goose-bumps and chills, or on feelings, but rather on God’s promises. Whether or not we feel God’s presence, we know from His Word that He’ll never forsake us, and so we have faith to trust and believe in salvation and a better life.

Worshiping in spirit and truth involves reason and the Word of God. Emotions may be a part of it, but worship cannot be based on feelings. It is based on His eternal promises and faith in what we do not yet see. And though songs and prayer do count as worship, the highest form of worship is for each one of us to bear fruit that will prove to this dark, unbelieving world that God is alive and at work today.