00:00
00:00
00:01
Transcript
1/0
And the sermon text this evening
is from John's Gospel, chapter 4, verses 19 to 26. John 4, verses
19 to 26. Part of the account of the Lord
Jesus Christ's visit to Samaria and the woman whom he addressed
by the well The woman saith unto him, Sir, I perceive that thou
art a prophet. Our fathers worshipped in this
mountain, and ye say that in Jerusalem is the place where
men ought to worship. Jesus saith unto her, Woman,
believe me, the hour cometh when ye shall neither in this mountain
nor yet in Jerusalem worship the Father. Ye worship ye know
not what we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now
is, when the true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit
and in truth, for the Father seeketh such to worship Him. God is a spirit, and they that
worship Him must worship Him. in spirit and in truth. Thanks be to God once more for
this reading from His own inspired and inerrant Word. Now we are coming this evening,
congregation, to one of the most necessary subjects, I believe,
to which the modern church of our 21st century should give
its great and earnest attention, the subject of Biblical worship. And I propose this evening to
begin a short series of expositions of various passages of Scripture
on the subject of how should we worship God. The first one
being this evening from the very text that we have just read together
in John's Gospel chapter 4 verses 19 and following, The Principles
of Biblical Worship. Now as I say, I believe that
this is one of the most important subjects to which the church
today should be giving its whole attention. It is of paramount
importance for every believer and every congregation to be
sure that the worship of God is being conducted according
to his own mind and his own revealed will. And in a very real sense
there is no subject more important in the Christian life. Even the
great, late Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones on one occasion
asked a question to an assembly of ministers gathered in London? What is the highest and most
important activity that any company of God's people may ever engage
in?" asked Dr. Lloyd-Jones of these men. And he answered his own question,
to worship God and to offer to Him the praise which is acceptable
to Him. And you may be aware that the
great John Calvin in the 16th century also placed the worship
of God as the prime and most important area to which we should
give our whole attention. And therefore I come to you this
evening in these words of introduction to say without any qualification
that worship is not an optional activity for God's people. It
is not simply one interest, for instance, that they have a man
among many other interests. It is not something that we might
think appeals to some, but does not appeal to other people in
the church. It is not something that some
may specialize in, and others may neglect, and so forth. It is a universal obligation
upon all who profess the name of Christ. It is a commandment
of the living God Himself that He is to be worshipped in the
way that He alone has appointed. We, of course, are reminded of
this in different ways in the Bible, especially by the Lord
Jesus Christ, as you may remember in His temptation in the wilderness
recounted in Matthew chapter 4 as Satan came to him and tempted
him in answer to one of those great temptations of Satan the
Lord Jesus answered that it is our duty to worship the Lord
our God and to serve Him alone and you may remember that the
Apostle Paul in Philippians 3 and verse 7 when he describes the
nature of true believers in the Lord Jesus and the nature of
a true Christian church put worship as the first of three great marks
of God's people when he wrote, we are the true circumcision
who worship God in the spirit who rejoice in the Lord Jesus
and who have no confidence in the flesh. Worship being the
first and primary mark of a true and faithful and living Christian
and of a Christian assembly. And so therefore I am saying
to you this evening that this subject is not optional. It is
of the greatest importance for each of us and the earlier in
our Christian experience that we begin to grasp the importance
and the wonderful nature of biblical worship, the more glorious will
be the living of our Christian lives. So we come this evening
to the question of the principles of biblical worship. Now there
are many sources of course to which one could go on the subject
of worship. Many passages of scripture Many
good and even excellent books have been written on the subject
of worship and many of course but are far from good and helpful. We could go to the Puritan John
Owen for a definition of true biblical worship or to John Calvin
whom I've already quoted this evening or even to A. W. Tozer, a man who lived within
the generation of some of us here this evening. But I have
chosen to turn to John chapter 4 one of the most important passages
in the whole of the Gospels on the subject of the principles
of Biblical Worship. Where the Lord Jesus Christ,
we will notice this evening, gives crucial teaching about
the basic nature of what constitutes Biblical Worship. And what He
taught, the woman of Samaria, we will see this evening, enables
us to steadily build up a definition of the basic biblical framework
of worship. Now I'm suggesting to you this
evening that there are at least four principles in these great
words of the Lord Jesus to the woman of Samaria that we read
earlier in the service here. And the first is this, that worship
is a fundamental concern of the Lord Jesus Christ. Verse 19 of
John 4 and following. Now you remember the context
where Jesus was speaking with the woman of Samaria at the well
of Syca. And as the conversation goes
on you remember she is amazed that he a Jew is speaking to
her a Samaritan for the Jews had no dealings with the Samaritans. in the time of Jesus. And perceiving
the woman's great spiritual need, she was an adulterous woman very
clearly. The Lord Jesus offered her water,
the living water of eternal life. As one has said, she asked of
him, she was amazed that he would offer her water. She wanted water
from the well. He offered her water that was
not in the well. and perceiving his authority
and his divine perception of her own condition and need she
said to him in verse 19 Sir I see you are a prophet our fathers
worshipped on this mountain and so forth now what is happening
here is an underlining for the second time you notice of the
gulf that separated between the Samaritans and the Jews Earlier
on, you remember, when Jesus asked for a drink, she said,
I am a Samaritan, you are a Jew. Jews have no associations with
the Samaritans. And here, she chooses to expand
the subject into the area of worship, very significantly. We say one thing about worship,
you Jews say something different. We say that we are to worship
in Mount Gerizim and this is where the temple is to be honored. You say that worship should only
be conducted in the city of Jerusalem. Now we need to remember that
the gulf between the Samaritans and Jews was deep and important. It was based on three things.
that the Samaritans had become racially a mixed race following
their captivity into the land of Assyria and then spiritually
there were profound differences but above all theologically there
were great differences between the Samaritans and the Jews for
instance the Samaritans did not accept much of the Old Testament
scriptures but only the five books of Moses they rejected
the Psalms and the Prophets and the historical books and they
believed as we have seen that the temple should be built on
Mount Gerizim where they had indeed their own temple and that
Jerusalem was not the place that had been chosen for the center
of God's worship and so on there were great differences and the
great point of the discourse in verse 19 is whether Gerizim
across from Shechem where Abraham and as she reminded Jesus many
of the fathers Abraham Isaac and Jacob had lived and conducted
much of their lives whether Gerizim should be the right place for
the worship of God or Jerusalem now we see Jesus response now
do you notice what he says that worshiping God is not about these
issues of place and circumstance and he goes on to expand his
teaching on worship as he says in verse 21 you notice woman
the hour is coming says Jesus when ye shall neither in this
mountain nor yet at Jerusalem worship the father And again
in verse 23, But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers
shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father
seeketh such to worship him. Now do you see what Jesus is
doing? He is taking the woman's thinking
a great step forward. She is interested in the place
and the circumstances and the ritual or the lack of it. he
is interested in the essence of worship itself. And I want
you to notice that. Now it's a very interesting word
of course the word worship both in Hebrew and in Greek and it
has its root meaning in our term and word worth or value or quality
We could almost render the word in our modern parlance, WORSHIP. What we do when we worship God
is to recognize the great worth of the object whom we are worshipping. His rightful place, His sovereignty
in our lives, and a great emphasis upon the glory and the majesty,
the worth of this great God who is the object of our worship. And Jesus' central focus, do
you notice? His fundamental interest, as
I said, is not in the place and the circumstances, but in the
act of worship itself. Now, that is my first point from
this passage. Worship is of prime importance
to the Lord Jesus, and should be of prime importance to us. What concerned the Lord Jesus
about this woman is not the place, important as that was, where
God was to be worshipped, for his word is always to be followed,
not the Samaritan's own ideas, but the centrality of his concern
is in that great act of worship. self-humbling of the worshipper,
putting the worshipper, as it were, in the lowest place so
that God is exalted to the highest place. And we can say at the
beginning of our definition of worship this evening, to worship
God is to humble ourselves before the great majesty of God and
bring him the honor and praise which belongs to him alone. Jesus
emphasis on the sensality of worship itself. Now the second
thing I want to bring to your attention is that worship is
to be offered through the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Again,
verse 21 and verse 23. Jesus brings the woman to the
point of all Christian worship. In other words, and what is central
to it. Now this is very interesting
because you know some of the modern translations of these
verses, verse 21 and verse 23, do not do justice to the original
Greek text. For instance, the New International
Version does not accurately render these verses. it says believe
me woman a time is coming when you will worship the father neither
in this mountain nor in Jerusalem in other words a time is coming
in verse 23a similarly a time is coming and has now come now
I believe with very good authority but the King James version is
far better and far more accurate when Jesus says believe me the
hour cometh and verse 23 the hour cometh and now is when the
true worshippers shall worship and so forth the hour and why
I emphasize this is that the hour in John's gospel is used
in a very special and almost technical sense throughout the
gospel you may be aware Jesus says my hour is not yet come
as in John 2 when he spoke to his mother and rebuked her at
the marriage feast at Cana my hour is not yet come he said
and you have this all through John's gospel until finally in
John chapter 17 Jesus says Father the hour is come now I emphasize
this you see because what Jesus is doing with this woman is speaking
about himself that chiefly through his life and ministry and above
all his death through worship will become possible will come
into its fullness into its great orb it is his work in other words
on the cross supremely which makes both Gerizim and Jerusalem
now redundant it's no longer the place or the ritual attached
to either Gerizim or Jerusalem that is important All of these
considerations, says Jesus, are shortly to become obsolete. And the reason is, the place
where every redeemed sinner from now on will meet with God in
true worship is through me. My life, my ministry, my death,
my resurrection must be risen and ever living Savior. and that of course is what Jesus
says in John 14 verse 6 one of the best known verses in the
Gospels I am the way no man comes to the Father except through
me now do you see what I'm saying to you that Jesus is teaching
that He is the true temple He is the only effective and efficient
sacrifice He alone is our true priest who gives us access to
God. Worship is to be offered from
now on through the person of the Lord Jesus to the Father
himself. So we can add to our first definition
of worship and now say to worship God is to humble ourselves before
his great majesty and bring him in and through the Lord Jesus
the honor and praise which are his alone. The second thing. So we come to the third thing.
Worship is informed and directed by God's Word. Verse 22. Ye worship, that is
ye Samaritans worship ye know not what. We Jews, that is know
what we worship for salvation is of the Jews now again it's
interesting that the better translation even better than our King James
Version should be at the end of verse 2 for THE salvation
is of the Jews there is the definite article in the Greek original
before the word salvation for THE salvation is of the Jews
and Jesus is clearly by that statement pointing the woman
to the great hope of the Messiah who of course Jesus was himself
the salvation both of Jews and Gentiles which he was and which
he represented. Now then Jesus then is adding
another truth as I say to our definition of worship. Worship
is to be informed and directed by God's Word. I love the words
of Stephen Charnock, one of the great Puritans. He wrote, it
is impossible to honor God as we ought, listen, unless we know
Him as He is. in other words it is quite impossible
for a company of people even such as ourselves this evening
to bring the great God of earth and to have an honor and worship
and praise if we do not know him as he is ye worship ye know
not what we know what we worship for the salvation is of the Jews
in other words the knowledge of God must always precede the
true biblical worship of God now we need to realize that what
Jesus was doing with the woman here in verse 22 was not making
a racial remark but emphasizing that worshiping God is not a
matter of speculation by men's minds but of revelation of God's
mind. Let me say that again, the true
biblical worship of God is not a matter of the speculation of
men's minds as it was with the Samaritans, but of the revelation
of God's mind supremely in the holy scriptures of his word. we know God, Jesus says, we Jews
know God because he has revealed himself to us in the scriptures
of his word many of those scriptures Jesus is implying that you Samaritans
reject and will not give attention to and will not recognize as
the inspired word of God now let me say that we owe an
eternal debt under God indeed to the Jewish Scriptures because
God has been pleased to reveal Himself in the Old Testament
and in the New Testament how He has sent His Son and how through
Him the Gospel has spread to all the Gentile nations and how
He has revealed in the Jewish Scriptures of the Old Testament
and in a sense Much of the New Testament is also by Jewish writers,
though not all of it. He has revealed there what his
mind and will is concerning his own worship and the obedience
that he expects from us. The Jews, Jesus is saying, stand
inside the stream of divine revelation. The Samaritans, Jesus says, stand
outside of that stream of revelation. You remember how the writer of
Psalm 76 that we sometimes sing in our congregation puts it in
verse 1, in Tudor, God is known. Comparing that great privilege
to the outcast heathen nations around them. That Revelation
congregation is in the Scriptures of God's Word which Jesus would
have known intimately, we believe, have memorized much of the Old
Testament Scriptures and the connection between biblical worship
and the teaching of the Scriptures cannot be over-emphasized and
over-stressed. They reveal the nature of God
and the requirements that bring pleasure to his own heart now
let me pause and say this it's a common thing amongst us today
isn't it to hear people say well I don't come to church to hear
a preacher I just come to worship God and of course it reveals
a profound misunderstanding of both things doesn't it because
we need to hear the preacher if he is faithful in expounding
the Scriptures of God's Word teaching us what God is like,
what He requires even in the area and especially in the area
of our worship of Him in order that we may worship and serve
Him as He desires and commands In other words, worship involves
taking the content of Holy Scripture and turning it into the worship
of the God who is there revealed. Even John Stott, who has wider
views of worship than we would have in our Reformed church and
congregation, in one of his writings says this, Our capacity to worship
God truly is measured by the place Scripture occupies in our
lives. And he could not have put that
more accurately. Our capacity to worship God truly
is measured by the place Scripture occupies in our lives. In other
words, it is the living Word of God, energized by the Holy
Spirit, but is the great promoter of true, pleasing, biblical worship,
and who is its chief inspiration. So our definition, you see, of
worship can be enlarged. Again, can it not? As we have
seen already, the two parts of worship to worship God is to
humble ourselves before his great majesty and bring him in and
through the Lord Jesus Christ the honor and praise which are
his alone to which we now add according to the teaching of
the word of God according to the scriptures Now the fourth
and final thing I want to say this evening about our passage
is this, that worship must be in spirit and in truth. Not only
is true worship fundamental in the teaching of Jesus, not only
is it, as we have seen, to be offered through the Lord Jesus
Christ, where it comes truly into its own, not only is it
to be informed and directed by God's Word and not men's thoughts,
and inventions. But fourthly, the constant note
of worship is that it should be in spirit and in truth. Verse 23 at the end. For the
true worshipper shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth,
for the Father seeketh such to worship Him. There is the emphasis
then by the Lord Jesus on the way in which we are to worship
God. Now there is a certain kind of
worship that God the Father is seeking. The Lord Jesus says
there is only one kind of worship in which God the Father takes
pleasure. He is seeking the most vital
thing from any believer who has submitted himself or herself
in worship before. the Lord, and our basic consideration
is what the Father seeks, what pleases Him. Now we're living
in an age, aren't we, when the very opposite so often characterizes
many assemblies of so-called Christian worship. it's no longer
a priority it seems to me to ask what is pleasing to God what
is taught in his word what is required and commanded by him
but instead what pleases me what sends me out of the service with
a glow inside what I find exciting or innovative and there is little
regard it seems in our day for the great fundamental question
which Jesus addresses what is the kind of worship that is pleasing
to God? Stephen Charnock again, when
we believe that we should be satisfied says Charnock in worship
rather than that God should be glorified we put God below ourselves
as though he had been made for us and not we for him which is
to say that biblical worship is never to become a means to
our own ends designing a service that brings pleasure and joy
to our senses or sensual natures and it needs to be said and thrust
into our consciousness and be made one of the deepest convictions
of our lives but there is a worship specified by God which he has
authorized and which brings pleasure to his own divine and holy heart
Biblical worship is never to become a means to the end of
our own sensuality but for God's glory. Now having said that,
of course I'm not implying for a moment this evening that we
should not be delighted and satisfied in the worship of God. Of course
we should if we are worshiping biblically. The Psalms are replete,
they are full with God's promises that those who draw to near to
Him in an acceptable way will find blessing multiplied upon
blessing. in their lives, but this in a
sense is a by-product of Biblical worship, it is not the central
driving force of it. Worshipping in spirit and in
truth is. Well what does it mean, what
did Jesus mean that the Father seeks such to worship Him in
spirit and in truth. By the way, there is clearly
a contrast here as Jesus mentions the Father, you notice, twice
over in these verses. worshipping the father and what
the father delights in. There's a contrast between his
reference to the father and obviously the woman's reference earlier
on when she says our fathers, verse 20, worshipped in this
mountain and ye say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought
to worship our fathers. And you notice Jesus emphasizes
Your concern should not be about the fathers, great as they were
who preceded you, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and so on. But when
we come to the subject of the worship of God, it is the Father's
concern that should be before our eyes. He desires worship
in spirit and in truth. Now what does it mean, as I say?
Worshipping in spirit, and by the way I think our translation
is correct in keeping a small s, it does not mean, I believe,
a reference to the Holy Spirit here, although some have thought
so, but it means spiritual worship, a small s, worshipping in spirit,
as opposed to merely outward practices and professions. This
is something, says Jesus, that is inward, certainly inspired
by the Spirit of God, but nothing outward and external merely. You remember how he taught in
Mark chapter 7 of the unacceptability of the Pharisees and scribes'
worship. as they thought this constituted
the washing of pots and vessels and so on and ceremonial cleanness
or uncleanness and he said of that kind of worship this people
draws near to me with their lips but their hearts are far from
me what he is mentioning here then is the inward worship of
the heart and then his expression in truth is a reinforcement of
what we've already seen in this passage this evening that our
worship is to be regulated by God's Holy Word of Scripture
rather than by any human inventions whatever we worship in truth
in other words in accordance with the teaching of Holy Scripture
itself So then our definition once more grows, to worship God
is to humble ourselves before his great majesty, to bring in
and through the Lord Jesus Christ the glory due to his name according
to the scriptures by inward and spiritual worship. And this encapsulates,
I suggest to you, as we draw to a close this evening, the
biblical principles of worship. Now let me summarize what we
have tried to say this evening in spirit and in truth. Nothing could, I think, indicate
more plainly the essentials of the attitude that God is seeking
among his people as they draw near to him. When this and these
things are absent, all else is in the end in vain. Now let me summarize five of
these principles that we have seen this evening as we prepare
to close. First, the precondition of acceptable
worship is that it must be offered to the Father through the Lord
Jesus Christ. we've seen that great revelation
that Jesus is beginning to unfold to the woman of Samaria remember
his expression the hour is coming and now it is repeated again
in verse 23 the hour cometh referring to his own great fulfillment
of his ministry that he might become the true temple and the
true high priest and the great sacrifice and so forth as I have
been sharing with you, the precondition of acceptable worship that it
must be offered to the Father through the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now it rules out, doesn't it, the acceptability of all other
false worship. Jesus implies this, that it will
no longer be a case of Gerizim or even Jerusalem where the true
worship of God had been conducted up to this time Both would become
redundant. And likewise in our day and age
it is totally and biblically untrue to say that in other religions
there can be the acceptable worship of the true God. It rules out
the acceptability of all other false worship. And the second
principle that we've adverted to this evening is that the focus
of acceptable worship must be on the one we are worshipping
and not upon ourselves. The great question, Jesus says,
is not what is acceptable to you, not your concern, lady,
to honour the fathers of bygone ages, even as great as these
men of God were. The focus of acceptable worship
is to be upon the Father Himself and His greatness and His glory
and His worth in our worship. Thirdly, the test of acceptable
worship is how much it magnifies and honors God in His glory. And I wonder today If we applied
that test to many so-called worship practices and worship services
of many denominations, I wonder in my heart how that worship
would stand up to this great test of magnifying and honoring
God in His glory. when so much, it seems to me,
focuses upon the needs of men and what is acceptable to them
and what might draw in others from society around us rather
than the great concern of worshipping and magnifying and honouring
the Lord in the way that He has appointed. The fourth of these
principles is the quality of public worship is closely related
to the spiritual condition of the worshippers we must worship
in spirit and in truth Jesus says teaching us indeed that
the nature of a worship service is very much affected by the
state of heart of those who come to it there must be no divorce
between our lips and our lives between our speech and our heart and one of the ways you know
in which we can test ourselves is the preparation for worship
on a Saturday evening as we say to ourselves and our families
the great day of the Lord is coming again the queen of days
When we draw near to God in this special and wonderful way under
the ministry of His Word and Spirit, let's prepare our hearts
already for coming into His house that we might be in a fully receptive
disposition and demeanor. Do we prepare on Saturday evenings? Do we honour the Lord with silence
in the auditorium as we prayerfully anticipate? the ordinances of
worship, and are bowed in prayer that God may bless us in those
ordinances? Do we wait after the service,
bowed in prayer for a few moments at least, seeking again that
God's Spirit may apply to our hearts the truths that He has
brought from the Scriptures of His Word? The Spirit in which
we come to worship and engage in worship has a great influence
on the quality of those services of worship in which we participate
and even the minister can sense whether is that expectant and
receptive and worshipping congregation or otherwise. And the fifth principle
is of course the nature and content of our worship will be determined
like everything else in the Christian life by the teaching of Holy
Scripture. what is called traditionally
in Reformed theology the regulative principle of worship. Not what
pleases me, but what God has commanded and required and is
pleasing in his sight. Well, as I finish this evening,
it is in that framework Jesus taught the woman of Samaria that
God is seeking worshipers of this disposition. that is what
must be true for us as well on every occasion when we assemble
for worship remembering that God the Father by his spirit
is present and he is seeking worshippers of this kind alas
so often our attitude today is often like the woman's our focus
on the kind of things that she focused on the place, the externals,
the forms of worship, and ignoring what is the central issue in
all that we have seen this evening. The biblical emphases of inwardness,
a work of grace in the heart, the primacy and centrality of
the Word of God in worship. These are the essential notes
and where they are neglected or absent, all our so-called
worship will be in the end in vain. May God give us grace to
be more and more worshipers in spirit and in truth. Thanks be to Him. We rise for
prayer. Our Father in Heaven, we thank
you for this passage and its great principles from the lips
of the Lord Jesus regarding the worship of God. May our hearts
be searched this evening. May we also be encouraged to
know that still the Father above seeks such to worship Him. And may we have that grace more
and more to worship in spirit and in truth.
Principles of Biblical Worship
| Sermon ID | 994241223310 |
| Duration | 44:47 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Language | English |
© Copyright
2026 SermonAudio.