This message was given at Grace Community Church in Minden, Nevada. At the end, we will give information about how to contact us to receive a copy of this or other messages. We're going to take a little break from the book of Genesis and today we're going to be in the gospel of John chapter 4...gospel of John chapter 4. And for our Scripture reading, we'll read verses 21 through 24. Jesus said to her, Woman, believe me, an hour is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know. We worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. For such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. God is spirit and those who worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth. This is the word of the Lord. Well, we are entering into summer and over the summer we're going to be teaching on worship. And these messages hopefully will help those of you who are newer to our congregation understand what we believe about worship and why we worship the way that we do. And then hopefully for those of you who have been around for a while, you will be strengthened in your resolve to worship. So we're going to be covering today worship in spirit and truth. In the Sundays ahead, we'll look at corporate worship, our day of worship. We'll even look at missions and worship. And today what we're going to do is we're going to begin with a classic text on worship which is with Jesus at the woman at the well. And we're going to actually just kind of get the flow of context because it is...it is really...it's really one of the great episodes in the life and ministry of Jesus. I mean, this is really one of the most memorable encounters that he has. And the background is in verses 1 to 6, and we're just going to go ahead and read some of these passages so that we can get the context. So starting in verse 1, it says, Therefore, when the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John, although Jesus himself was not baptizing, but his disciples were. He left Judea, went away again into Galilee, and he had to pass through Samaria. So he came to a city of Samaria called Sychar, near the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph, and Jacob's well was there. So Jesus, being wearied from his journey, was sitting thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour. And so, we have the background to this great passage in verses one to six. And Jesus leaves Judea for Galilee. And of course, Galilee is where his hometown is located. And of course, on that journey, they have to pass through Samaria. You might remember that the Samaritans come into existence after the Assyrian invasion of 722 BC. And what would happen is the Assyrians would come in, there would be massive deportations, prisoners of war taken to various lands, but then there would also be other POWs, as it were, who would then be brought into a conquered land And the idea was if you take other people and bring them into a conquered land, they'll intermarry and in a sense breed out the patriotism and the nationalism of a given people. That's the Samaritans. They are the result of the Assyrian invasion. They were considered to be half breeds, if you will. They were also considered to be not only racially inferior, but also religiously inferior. Religiously inferior because the Samaritans only accepted the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Old Testament, as inspired. Everything else was no good as far as they were concerned. And so the racial and religious tension between Jews and Samaritans was intense, and in fact this is even brought out in the passage where in verse 9 we have a little parenthesis where the Jews had no dealings, did not associate with the Samaritans. And so, Jesus never allowing racial or religious tension or division to deter him, they stop in a Samaritan town. We don't know this for sure, but I would bet that some of the disciples, especially those who are a little more nationalistic and zealous, probably would have complaint about having to stop. Jesus though stops in a town called Sychar. Now Jesus is tired because this is basically, I don't know exactly where he was in Judea, but from Jerusalem to Galilee is a three days journey. And so he's tired and he stops at a historical landmark. The Samaritans held that the tradition was that that well in Sychar was actually given by Jacob himself. Dug by Jacob and given by Jacob to his people. And so it is the noon hour. Very important. Now what happens next is of great interest. Verse 7, there came a woman of Samaria to draw water. Jesus said to her, give me a drink. For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. Therefore the Samaritan woman said to him, how is it that you being a Jew ask me for a drink since I am a Samaritan woman? For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. Jesus answered and said to her, if you knew the gift of God, And who it is who says to you, give me a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water. And what ends up happening is at noon, this Samaritan woman comes to draw water. Now, the timing is actually very significant. Because in the ancient Near East, there were two things that you could count on in any given village. And that is one, actually three things. The women went to draw the water. Okay? And that just seems strange to me. We need lots of water. Women, you know what you're supposed to do. Go draw the water. So this was the woman's work. Second thing is that they would always go in groups. The women of the village would go together to the well to draw water. But the third thing is, is that they would go either in the morning when it was still cool, or in the early evening when it was getting cool. You didn't go at noon. And so the fact that this woman is by herself at the well at noon actually indicates to us that she was probably somewhat of an outcast in her village. There's Jesus, he's by himself, the disciples have gone to get supplies, and Jesus asks the woman for a drink. Now the woman is stunned. And she's stunned for really sort of a number of reasons, but the primary reason is that he's obviously a Jew and I'm a Samaritan. How in the world are you, a Jew, asking me, a Samaritan, for a drink? You have to understand that according to Jewish custom, the minute that that Samaritan woman dropped that bucket down into the well to bring it back up and to give the Lord a drink, those half-breed hands would have contaminated the vessel from which he would drink. You have to understand, from a Jewish mindset, you were always doing what? You were always washing. You go into the marketplace. The first thing you do when you get home is you do a ceremonial washing. Why? Because you may have inadvertently touched something that a Gentile had touched, and therefore you would be ceremonially unclean and, in fact, contaminated. And so the woman is absolutely stunned. Here's a man who's by himself asking me, a woman, a Samaritan woman, for a drink. And then Jesus beautifully points her to the living water. If you knew who it was who was asking you, you would ask Him and He would give you living water. What Jesus is referring to here is a gift from God which is nothing less than God himself. In fact, in Jeremiah chapter 2 and verse 13, the prophet says, Be appalled, O heavens! Be appalled, O earth! My people have committed two evils. They have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and have hewn out for themselves broken cisterns which hold no water. So God himself is the living water. God himself is that which satisfies the soul thirst. But there's even more to it than that. And that is this idea of abundant living water is a picture of the satisfaction that was to come in the messianic age. In fact, for instance, Zechariah chapter 14, I believe around verse eight, talks about this idea of the abundance of water in that day. And the idea is, is that once Messiah comes, once the age to come has arrived, there would be an abundance that would satisfy the soul thirst of God's people. Now, Jesus is basically saying, that the gift of God, God Himself, the living water, the abundance of the age of the Spirit which is to come, is standing right in front of you. And if you would simply ask, He would give you living water. Now, the woman is perplexed. She's intrigued, of course, because after this offer, she says to him, verse 11, Sir, you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where then do you get that living water? You're not greater than our father Jacob, are you, who gave us this well and drank of it himself and his sons and his cattle. Sir, I perceive that you have no bucket. Where are you going to get this water from? It certainly won't be from that well, and if you aren't going to get it from this well, you're not greater than our father Jacob who gave us this well, are you? And so here she is, she's perplexed, she's intrigued, and our Lord Jesus then turns around and says in verse 13, Everyone who drinks of this water, probably pointing to the well, will thirst again. But whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst, but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life. What a glorious passage. What an absolutely glorious passage. When Vic and Bertie and I were in Israel, one of the things that is very obvious is, for instance, when you're going across the plains of Moab, there is absolutely no signs of life, whatever. and a well is life. Water is life. But you have to understand that in scripture, there is this sense in which thirst here is now turned into, as it were, a metaphor for desire and longing and an intense craving, just like a person would thirst in a dry desert land, so the soul has a thirst. It has a desire, it has longings, it has intense cravings, and so the water that Jesus gives will cause those who drink of it to never ever thirst again. In other words, Jesus says, you drink the water that I'm talking about, and that soul thirst of yours will be forever satisfied, forever quenched. In fact, it would become a fountain springing up from you, springing up to eternal life. In other words, you're not only going to drink and be satisfied, but you in turn will end up being a source of being able to give that water to other people as well. The imagery, by the way, comes from Isaiah. And so Isaiah 55, 1, ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters. And you who have no money, come buy and eat. Come buy wine and milk without money and without cost. Isaiah chapter 12, with joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. Isaiah 44, I will pour out water on the thirsty land and streams on the dry ground and I will pour out my spirit on your offspring and my blessing on your descendants. And it's that very connection with the spirit that causes Jesus on the last day of the great feast to lift up his voice and say, if anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink, and I will give him rivers of living water that will well up, springing to eternal life, and then, of course, we are told that that water, that living water, is none other than the Holy Spirit Himself. Now, this poor woman Probably didn't get too many stars in Sunday school. She is still clueless. Verse 15, Jesus makes this marvelous statement in the woman. Verse 15 says to him, Sir, give me this water so I will not be thirsty nor come all the way here to draw. This sounds like a great deal. If I get this water, I don't have to come at noon carrying these heavy buckets. She's thinking about it so pragmatically. If I get this water, wow, that'll save me a lot of work. That'll save me a lot of muscle aches. I mean, could you imagine hauling that water all the way back to your home? And she thinks this is the deal of the century. Jesus then turns around and says to her something that's completely unexpected, and what on the surface doesn't look like it's connected with the water, but is incredibly connected with the water. He said to her, verse 16, go call your husband and come here. And the woman said, answered and said, I have no husband. Jesus said to her, you've answered correctly. I have no husband. For you've had five husbands. And the one whom you now have is not your husband. This you have said truly. The woman said to him, sir, I perceive you're a prophet. When the woman responds in verse 15 with sort of this incredible interest, but still very, very clueless to what Jesus is talking about, Jesus then turns the conversation to what might seem like to some a cruel direction. He says, go and call your husband. John Piper says, the quickest way to the heart is through a wound. I have no husband. Now you know what this is, this is clearly a diversion. Right? She wants this conversation to stop. And so the best way for her to stop this conversation and this line of reasoning is to turn around and just to simply say, I don't have a husband. It's an evasive maneuver to cut the conversation off right there. And then Jesus turns around and what he does is he exposes the woman's sin and her brokenness and her own endless pursuit for satisfaction. That's exactly what he does. This question has everything to do with what well you're drinking from. And so she turns around and says, I, I, you must be a prophet. You got that right. Supernatural. Now there's a good chance that there's a play on words here that actually end up depicting a worse situation than what we normally perceive. Because the Greek term on there can mean both husband and or simply man. And it could be very well that Jesus, when she says, I have no husband, he turns around and says, you're right. You've had five men. And the one whom you have now, the man you have now is not yours. In other words, it may be that he belongs to somebody else. So the picture is this woman who has gone from man to man to man. And in fact, the man that she has right now is not her man. No wonder she's at the well at noon all by herself. The women of the village want absolutely nothing to do with her. They have words for her. They describe her in ways that are, let's say, unflattering. And Jesus says, the one you have now isn't yours. She says, you're a prophet. Let's talk about worship. Think about how funny this is. It's another diversion as far as she's concerned. You're a prophet. Let's stop talking about the men in my life and let's start talking about worship wars. Now, if this was us, if we were talking to the woman at the well, we would say, hey, hey, hey, hold on, not so fast. I know what you're doing. It's like John Piper in Desiring God. In this chapter, he says that a trapped animal will chew off its own leg, right? Well, this is what the woman at the well is doing. She's trapped and now she's trying to chew off her own leg. And she wants to immediately change this conversation. And so she turns around and says, let's talk about worship. And Jesus doesn't say, hey, not so fast. I'm not done talking about your husbands. He actually takes that and turns it magnificently into a personally relevant topic for this woman and for us, and so the conversation then in fact turns to worship. And she says, now you know, the Samaritans, we worship on Mount Gerizim, and there was actually a Samaritan temple, and now you Jews say you have to worship in Jerusalem, and so obviously these are the worship wars, you know? It would be something like, you guys sing hymns, you guys sing choruses, you know, why do you do it differently? Jesus responds and says, An hour is coming. An hour is coming. What he means by that is he's talking about the eschaton. He's talking about the end of the age. An hour is coming. That is, there is coming the dawning of a brand new era in which God is going to break through. There is coming an hour when worship won't be restricted to, quote, holy mountains or sacred space. There's coming a time where it won't matter what mountain you're on. There's coming a time where temples will become irrelevant. And then he puts it so bluntly and he tells the Samaritan woman, you guys worship what you do not know. Now if you think Steve was mean, You know, there are certain things that polite people don't criticize. You don't tell somebody, at least in our day and age, you worship in ignorance. You don't know what you worship. And the reason that we don't do that, of course, is because we live in a very pluralistic society, and how in the world can you criticize somebody's worship? I mean, that's a private matter, and I mean, after all, you know, as long as the person's sincere, that's all that matters, right? And for Jesus, that wasn't true. had no reason to doubt the sincerity of the woman at the well, no reason to doubt the sincerity of the Samaritans. And he just says, you guys don't know what you're doing. You don't know who you're worshiping. So much for respecting multicultural pluralism. And then he turns around and he says, but we know who we worship. And the reason we know who we worship is because salvation is from the Jews. In other words, salvation finds its root and branch in the Jewish people. In particular, salvation finds its root and branch in Jesus Christ, who is a Jew. And so on this great worship question, Jesus says very clearly, we're right, you're wrong. Oh, that we had such boldness today. Oh, that we had such boldness. And then Jesus turns around and he makes four profound statements on worship, all right? The first is this. Notice the language, an hour is coming and now is. You get that? An hour is coming, and now, and is now. So, the idea is, remember, the coming hour is the coming of the eschaton, the coming of God breaking in to this present age, ushering in the age to come, and Jesus says, an hour is coming, and now is. In other words, that coming messianic age, that coming age of the Spirit is coming, but it is also right now. Jesus is actually saying something that would absolutely transform the way the New Testament writers perceive this present age, and that is we are living in the presence of the future. The coming age has invaded this age. How has it invaded this age? Through the death, the burial, the resurrection, ascension of Jesus, and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, so that the already and the not yet overlap. That's what it is, an hour is coming, and now is. As the children of God, we now live in the age to come, which has invaded this present age through Messiah Jesus. An hour is coming and now is second profound truth on worship, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. And so Jesus says that hour which is coming, but it's right now. That hour is going to be the time when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. True worshipers, simple inference, right? You have true worshipers and what? and false worshipers. True worship and false worship. This isn't rocket science. This is actually really simple. You have true worship and you have false worship, and there are people who are true worshipers. That is, they are authentic worshipers. They are genuine worshipers. And what is it that makes them genuine, that they worship? No, what makes them genuine is who they worship. You have to understand when you came out of your mama's birth canal and shot into this world, you emerged from that place as a worshiper. Every single one of us come into this world as a worshiper. The question is who we worship. And so true worshipers worship the Father. The Father is, in other words, the object of all true worship. So in order to be a true worshiper, you have to have a relationship with the Father and you have to know who the Father is. You can't worship an unknown God. You can't just worship, you know, just some ambiguous, ethereal, higher power. watching some dumb movie the other night, and I don't even remember what it was, and there's this girl, and the other one says, what are you doing? She goes, I'm praying. She goes, who are you praying to? She goes, whoever will listen. That's the way so many people think. Well, you know what? I'm just, I'm thankful. Thankful to who? Well, to whoever deserves to be thanked. I'm just, I worship. Whom am I worshiping? Well, whoever whoever might need to be worshipped. Maybe it's Gaia, maybe it's Mother Earth, maybe it's some Hindu deity, maybe it's just my own personal idea of who God is. Let me just say that Your own personal idea of who God is isn't worth anything. You are a creature. You don't get the right to define the creator. You got it backwards, okay? God himself gets to define who he is, and he does so in the Bible. And Jesus says, so true worshipers worship the Father. Andreas Kostenberger says, no matter how ceremonially rousing or sermonically eloquent worship that is not offered from a proper understanding of who God is just falls short. And so as we gather, we are worshiping the God who has revealed Himself in creation, but more especially in the Word of God. And He is the God who is holy. He is the God who is powerful. He is the God who is transcendent. He is the God who draws near. He is the God who is tender. He is the God who is loving. He is the God who is good. He is the God who is all-wise. He is the God who has revealed Himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. He is the God who has actually manifest His own glory. in the person of His Son. That's the Father. And so what that means is that the Father is specifically the first member of the triune Godhead, which also means that He is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which also means that the Holy Spirit, who is the third member of the eternal Godhead, proceeds from the Father and the Son, and with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified. which means if you are not worshiping the triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, you're worshiping an idol. Don't buy this nonsense that what unites great religions is monotheism. It's not what unites great religions. There are no great religions. There's great revelation from the triune God. And so, true worshipers worship the Father, the true God, and then notice this, in spirit and truth. Now, here's the question. Is this capital S, or is it small s? Now, almost all translations take it as small s, spirit, except one. New International Version. Couldn't believe it. Now, obviously the idea is worship in spirit, that is either the human spirit or Spirit, capital S, the Holy Spirit. Now, guess what John doesn't have when he writes? He doesn't have uppercase or lowercase. When John originally writes the Gospel of John, he writes everything, by the way, in uppercase. with no spaces between the words to boot. So there's no way to tell from the Greek text whether this should be a capital S or a small s. And I think, this is my conviction on this, that is that John oftentimes will be intentionally ambiguous to do what? To imply more than one thing. And I think that that's what is happening here. I think that when he says in spirit and truth, he's talking about both the Holy Spirit and the human spirit so that to worship in spirit, capital S slash small s, spirit is the opposite of external formal worship. So we worship God, when we worship God in spirit, that is we worship God with everything that is within us, spirit, which includes the affections, the heart, the emotions, the mind, but it's not simply the human spirit that is worshiping, it is the human spirit which has been renewed and indwelt by the Holy Spirit via the new birth, John chapter three and verse six. So to worship in spirit is to worship, as it were, with everything within you that has been renewed and empowered by the Holy Spirit. And to worship in truth, is to worship in conformity with the eternal word, Jesus Christ, who is the truth, who is the only mediator between God and man. To worship in truth means we worship in conformity to the truth that he has revealed, and so we worship God as he has been revealed in the Bible, according to the way he's revealed it in the Bible. And both of these things come together, spirit and truth. Our worship is not just simply empty emotionalism, that could be construed worship in spirit, but neither is it just a dead formalism that has all the orthodoxy right, which would be considered worship in truth. It's worship in spirit and truth together. And so John Piper says the fuel of worship is a true vision of the greatness of God. The fire that makes the fuel burn white hot is the quickening of the Holy Spirit. The furnace made alive and warm by the flame of truth is our renewed spirit, and the resulting heat of our affection is powerful worship. And here's the third amazing thing that Jesus says about worship. For such people, the Father is seeking to be His worshipers. It's an amazing statement. The Father is seeking worshipers. Think about this for a second. This really is a stunning thing, isn't it? The Father is seeking worshipers. Now, remember, as I said, we're all worshipers, and we're either idolaters or we're true worshipers, and God is seeking true worshipers, that is, spirit and truth worshipers. Now, this sounds, this sounds on the face of it, somewhat narcissistic on God's part. I'm looking for people who will worship me. It makes it look as if God is groping around saying, can I find somebody to give me an amen? But it's not narcissistic on God's part because, first of all, God is truly worthy of our worship because he is in himself infinitely glorious. And in fact, he is the only infinitely glorious being in all of the universe so that if God permitted us to worship anything other than that which is true God, God would be giving his stamp of approval on idolatry. That's the very definition of idolatry, is worshiping anything other than that which is true God. And so here, God is not just simply saying, worship me because I'm so needy. Praise me. You like my shoes? Do I match? Give me a compliment, please. It's not at all. God is actually saying, listen, I am the most infinitely glorious being in all of the universe. I deserve your worship. I'm worthy of your worship. And in fact, it's actually morally right that I seek people to worship me. Do you get that? It's morally right for God to seek people to worship him. Now, the second reason this isn't narcissistic is because it is only in drinking at the fountain of living water that we ourselves then end up being truly satisfied. So God is seeking true worshipers in order to satisfy thirsty sinners. You better get that. God is seeking worshipers in order to satisfy thirsty sinners. The hunt that he's on is not just a hunt for his own praise. The hunt that he's on is so that he would satisfy people like that woman at the well, who were trying to find their satisfaction in man after man after man, and actually just drinking at the broken cisterns that hold no water. And the father is saying, as it were, to us, I have something so much better for you. I have myself. I have me to give to you to quench your soul thirst so that you stop looking for it and all the other stuff that you worship. And then the fourth thing, just the summary statement, God is spirit. Those who worship him must worship him in spirit and truth. So Jesus brings us all the way back around, but he says something again profound. God is immaterial. God is spiritual in nature, which means, by the way, true worship can never be merely external or merely located in a geographical location because since God is spirit, all true worship must be in spirit and in truth. At the end of the passage, Jesus identifies himself to the woman at the well. And she in turn goes and tells everybody that she's found the Messiah. Now, I want to just make two points of application. First, if the father is seeking worshipers, that means that he's seeking you to be his worshiper. He desires that you would today turn from your idols, which don't satisfy, and turn to Him who alone gives life and satisfaction because He Himself is living water. That's what He wants. He's seeking you to be His worshiper. Because some of you don't know Him. Some of you don't love Him. Eternal, infinite God is worthy to be known and loved. Right? And you don't know Him, and you don't love Him, therefore you don't worship Him. And if you're not worshipping Him, you're actually robbing glory, which is due to Him. Okay? And the Father is zealous for His own glory. He's seeking you to be a worshipper. He's seeking to turn you from that heart of yours, which is an idle factory, and to turn it to Him so that you would become a true worshiper. Because right now, some of you, you worship money, and you worship sex, and you worship yourself, and you worship your phone. Phone worship is a real thing. It didn't used to be when you used to have to stick your finger in a round thing and turn. But man, it is now. It is now. Why, why, why worship that which cannot satisfy? Why drink at those wells which cannot quench your thirst? Why pursue the idols that are only gonna leave you empty and longing for something different? There's a reason why she had five and she was on the one that wasn't hers now. Why? Well, because if relationships could satisfy, she'd have been content with number one. And so the Father is seeking to deliver us from our idolatry and to come to Messiah, to come to Jesus, to come to the one who knows your heart, and to come to the one who knows your wounds, and to come to the one who knows your sins, and to come to the one who knows your idols, and to say, here, drink this living water that I'll give you, and you will never be thirsty again. You will be cured from having to jump from idol to idol to idol to satisfy your thirst. You will be cured from having to stick your face down into the muddy sediment of broken cisterns that don't hold any water. I'll set you free from that. And you will realize this is the fountain of living water. This is where I need to camp. This is where I need to live. I can stop looking, praise God. Some of you just worn out. looking for the next fountain, looking for the next drink of sewer water to quench your thirst. You're worn out. There's a fountain of living water. Satisfy your thirst today. And the father seeking you. The second point of application is this, if the Father is seeking worshipers, that means that you and I should be true worshipers who worship in spirit and truth, who are men and women, who worship with head and heart, mind and affections. Listen carefully. If you are saved, God saved you to be His worshiper. He didn't save you so that you could carry around a fire insurance policy in your back pocket and say, you know what, if I get smoked on the way out of church, I've got fire insurance, I'm not gonna go to hell. Okay, glorious benefit, not going to hell, right? Okay, I'm happy about that. I'm like exceedingly happy about that. But God didn't save me just to keep me out of hell. He saved me in order to be his worshiper. So the children of Israel are delivered from the house of bondage through the Red Sea. And when God delivers them after the Red Sea experience, you know the very first thing they do, Exodus chapter 15, they worship. So they did, they had a big old worship service right there on the beach. And they said things like this, I will sing to the Lord for he's highly exalted. Who is like you among the gods, O Lord? Who is like you? Majestic in holiness, awesome in praises, working wonders, and they're declaring God's praise as dead Egyptians are floating by. Our worship should be filled with joy. When we consider who God is, and what He has done for us through His Son, we should burst. How? How is it possible for you to take the words of the most glorious truth and the most glorious event ever to happen and not be filled with joy? How can you even say the words, the lamb has overcome and not want to just burst out of your skin with praise? We should be, we should worship with our affections. By the way, if our affections are not engaged in worship, it is dead worship. There should be a sense of contrition. What does God desire? A broken and contrite heart. Oh God, you will not despise. There should be a sense of awe. There should be a sense of wonder. There should be a sense of yearning and desire. One thing I've asked from the Lord, that would I seek, that I would dwell in the house of the Lord to behold the beauty of the Lord and to meditate in his temple. There is something in me that says, you know, God has satisfied my soul thirst and the only thing that I want in this life is more of him. And so the Psalms are filled, sing for joy to the Lord, O you righteous. Praise is becoming to the upright. When you stop and think about where God has brought you, what he's plucked you up out of, how can you not say with the psalmist, he brought me out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay. He set my feet upon a rock, making my footsteps firm. He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and will trust in the Lord. You go, well, I'm just not that kind of person. You may be right. You're the Grinch. Your heart is ten times too small. If you've been liberated by the blood of Jesus and the Spirit of God has opened your eyes to see who God is and has given you a new heart, how can you not other than pulsate with praise and joy? Okay? You don't have to all express it the same way, okay? So, I mean, some of you, you get to, the Lamb has overcome, you're just like, yes, yes. Others of you, a little more absurd, yes, yes. Others, yes, yes. And others of you, I thought Chad's hands were gonna go up, but Rebecca would have slapped him right down. I mean, it was just like, I knew that Chad wanted to just go, yes, the Lamb has overcome. So let me just. Let me just be mean in a nice way for a second. If you claim to be a Christian. And you can't open your mouth in praise to God. Then either you don't grasp who you were. And what God has done for you in Jesus Christ. Or your heart is just way, way, way, way too small. I want to call out the men. Some of you don't sing because you don't think it's cool. Shame on you. Our Savior sang. Too good for that? Well, I don't sing that well. Who cares? Who cares? Stand next to me on a Sunday morning. I'll hit notes, all right. Okay, I will. But here's the thing, if you're a man and you're too macho to sing, you're too macho to actually go to heaven. Why? What will be the eternal employment of the saints of God in heaven? Singing God's praise forever and ever and ever. Men, open your mouths. If you claim to follow Jesus, open your mouth. For God's sake, open your mouth. For your own sake, open your mouth. When you come here, what are you coming for? Years ago, I had a lady, she said to me, can we just like do the sermon first and then sing afterwards? That way I can just leave right after the sermon and not have to waste my time singing. Dead serious, dead serious. She lives in a different state now, but she listens regularly and I know I'll get an email from her and she'll say, you were talking about me, weren't you? And the answer is yes, yes. I said, what's the problem with singing? She says, it's just so boring. I said, oh sister, you're going to be so bored in heaven. No preaching in heaven. Praise God, I'm out of a job. No preaching in heaven. Why? You won't need anybody to preach to you. You'll be in the presence of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and your eyes will be open like never before. We'll be perfected. We won't have somebody to teach us anymore. We won't have somebody preach to us anymore. In fact, believe it or not, we won't even need our Bibles anymore. The God that we will know in heaven will be the God who is unmediated through Scripture and unmediated through preaching and unmediated through all of these means that we use now, and we will be singing forever and ever. Singing is praise. So you better get used to singing now. You better start liking it now. Because you're going to be doing it forever. Now there is a place where there is no singing. I don't recommend choosing that place. Worship God in spirit. truth because the Father has sought to make you such a one. Let's pray. Father, we pray for those that aren't worshipers yet. Oh, they worship, but Lord, they don't worship you. We pray that you would do a mighty act of deliverance today. Deliver them from their idolatry. Show them the fountain of living water. Satisfy their soul thirst and give them eternal life. Father, we'd be so delighted to hear that You saved people today. Father, for the rest of us, remind us that our highest priority as redeemed people, the very purpose for which You saved us, is to be in spirit and truth worshipers. God, may we not hold back. Father, You've delivered us from so much. You are so worthy to receive our praise. May we give it to you with wide open mouths and full hearts. In Jesus' name, Amen. We hope you've enjoyed this message from Grace Community Church in Minden, Nevada. To receive a copy of this or other messages, call us at area code 775-782-6516 or visit our website gracenevada.com.