Sermon series: WORSHIP IN THE TRUTH (First sermon) John 4 :19-24

 

WORSHIP IN THE TRUTH (First sermon) John 4 :19-24

In the Bible there are two major kinds of words for worship. The first means to bow down, to kneel, to put one’s face down as an act of respect and submission. Our body language is saying, I will do whatever you want me to. I am ready to listen to your instructions and I am willing to obey. The other kind of biblical word means to serve. It carries the idea of doing something for God — making a sacrifice or carrying out his instructions. There is:

1. worship that involves speaking
2. worship that involves listening
3. worship that involves doing

There is a worship that expresses the heart, and worship that involves the mind, and a worship that involves the body. There is a worship that is giving praise upward, a worship that is receiving instructions from above, and a worship that carries out instruction in the world around us. We need all three types of worship.

Similarly, all talk and no action does not show God the respect he deserves. Actions speak louder than words, and if our behavior isn’t changed by God, then our actions are saying that God isn’t important. Worship should affect our behavior.

Response with all our being

We can’t know God’s worth, much less declare it, unless God reveals himself to us. So God initiates worship by revealing himself to us. The more we grasp his greatness, his power, his love, his character, the more we understand his worthiness, the better we can declare his worth – the better we can worship.

Our worship is a response to what God has revealed himself to be, not only in who he is, but also in what he has done and is doing and will do in the future. Worship includes all our responses to God – including a response with our mind, such as our belief in God’s worthiness, our emotions, such as love and trust, and our actions and our words. Our heart expresses itself in words and songs; our mind is active when we want to learn what God wants us to do, and our bodies and strength are involved when we obey and when we serve.

Both Old Testament and New Testament tell us that our relationship with God should involve our heart, mind, soul, and strength. It involves all that we are. Worship involves heart, mind, soul and strength, too.

In the words we say to one another, in the prayers we say to God, in the songs we sing, we can declare that God is worth more than all other gods, worth more than all other things.

We can worship God all by ourselves. But it is also something we do together. God has revealed himself not just to me, but to many people. God puts us in a community, he reveals himself to a community and through a community, and the community together responds to him in worship, in declaring that he is worth all honor and praise.

Music is important, but worship is not just music – it involves our entire relationship with God, all our heart, mind, soul, and strength – it involves all the ways in which we can respond to God, all the ways we can praise him by what we say and do, all the ways we can demonstrate that God is worthy of all praise and honor and allegiance.

Introduction Message on sunday

What do you purchase as a gift for the person who has everything? Perhaps you have faced that dilemma and walked with frustration through stores hoping to find a special gift that communicates your love and meets a need in the life of the one receiving the gift.

Apply this situation to our attempts to offer God a gift He desires. God knows all things and possesses all the treasures of heaven and earth. He does not need anything. But, there is one commodity that God longs to receive from His followers. God desires for His children to freely, boldly, and passionately worship Him in spirit and truth. John 4 reveals that almighty God possesses an unceasing desire for true worshipers.

I. Reject strongholds (John 4:19-20)

As this insightful conversation develops between Jesus and an immoral Samaritan woman, we learn about strongholds or obstacles that often prevent individuals and churches from experiencing true worship. She struggles with the penetrating issues raised by Jesus by hiding behind the barriers of places and programs. What is that thing to which you are struggling to hide behind? Is there anyone who is your excuse from worshipping God? Or anything; your lack of Job, your husband or wife, your work or business, your children? What is that thing? Or you say in that church they don’t love me, they don’t give me the opportunity to serve God. I said one day that no one can stop me from serving God even the EP cannot stop me.

Many Christians have settled for cheap imitations of true worship. Some relegate worship to a particular event or building. Often, worship is considered to be the music in a corporate service that is followed by the preaching. An entire style of music has been labeled "praise and worship" in an attempt to distinguish music from traditional hymns.

While music is an integral part of worshiping God, we should note that Jesus does not mention singing. When the apostle Paul spoke of Christ-honoring worship in Romans 12:1, he challenged believers to become living sacrifices. True worship rejects the strongholds that prevent followers of Christ from responding to God with heart, soul, mind, and strength in loving recognition of God's glory and love.

 

Worship before the time of Moses

Before Moses we read of several forms of worship that the patriarch exercised. In Genesis 4 we here that Cain and Abel brought an offering to the Lord. We are not told why they did. Few chapters ahead we read that Noah build an altar to the Lord and sacrificed an animal on it after the flood.

Abraham made sacrifices where he built an altar in Shechem, another at Bethel, then at Hebron, and at Mount Moriah. As part of his worship, Abraham also prayed, circumcised and tithed. Isaac built an altar at Beersheba and he prayed. Jacob set up a stone pillar at Bethel and poured a drink offering on it, and he poured oil on it as some sort of worship. He built an altar at Shechem, and one at Bethel. He vowed to tithe and he prayed. What conclusions can we draw from this?

• First, no one needed a priest. Everyone built their own altars, sacrificed their own animals and did their own worship. The head of the household acted as the religious leader for the family. We see that in the book of Job, too: Job made sacrifices on behalf of his children. There was no special priesthood. Each person could worship without a priest.
• Second, there aren’t many commands about the worship that the patriarchs did. God sometimes told his people where to build an altar and what to offer, but for the most part, the altars and offerings seem to have been initiated by the people. There’s no mention of special times or special days or special seasons. There doesn’t seem to be any restriction on place, either. The patriarchs stayed away from Baal worship, but other than that, they worshiped the true God wherever and whenever and however they wanted. Before Moses came!
• Third, not much is said about method – the people could pour out wine or oil, totally incinerate an animal, or roast it and eat part of it. Abel, Noah, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were not limited by time, location or method. The key word is flexibility. The detailed rules that God gave through Moses did not apply to the patriarchs. They were not restricted by rules about special places, people, rituals and days.

One thing was important – probably the greatest commandment about worship: You shall worship no other gods.

When God dealt with Jacob, he was not concerned about how he was worshiped – his primary concern was that Jacob worship the true God and no other gods. God demands exclusive worship, 100 percent allegiance. Only that can do justice to his worth. There’s no room for loving any other gods even 1 percent. We cannot allow anything to get in the way of our worship relationship with God. We cannot let money, self-consciousness, busyness or anything else get in the way. Worship is to be our highest priority.

During the time of Moses; You just can’t walk up on God every day. You had to be a very holy person on a very holy day in order to walk into the Holy of Holies, and you had to go through special rituals in order to do it.

There was a priesthood between the people and God. For many acts of worship, the priests had to perform the actions. There were also holy animals and holy plants. Every firstborn animal was holy, dedicated to the Lord. The first-ripe fruits were holy, set apart for worship. There was a holy incense formula, too, and if anyone made the same formula, they were supposed to be expelled from the nation. It was that special. It was reserved for worship. It was holy.

There were holy times. Every week, one day was holy. Every year, some extra days were holy. Every seven years and every 50 years, a whole year was set apart for special use.

Most of those details are obsolete, but the most important principle carries over into today’s worship, too. Only God should be worshiped. It’s not that he should be worshiped more than other gods are. It’s that he is the only God worthy of worship. He is so great, nothing else is even close. There is no god like our God. Nothing can compare with him, so we give him exclusive worship. We do not divide our loyalties between him and Baal, or between him and Mammon, or between him and self. All allegiance and all worship go to him alone.