The 4th chapter of John’s Gospel contains one of the most commonly used passages of Scripture when it comes to worship. It was Jesus who said, “Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 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 spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.”
Jesus is very specific when it comes to the way we are to worship – This is how you MUST worship God. Yet if we as the church, as the radiant body of Christ , don’t have an understanding and a revelation of what it means to worship in Spirit and in Truth, then trying to be obedient to this command would be like trying to push water uphill with your nose – a pretty impossible task.
So what does it mean to worship God in Spirit and in Truth?
Let’s look first of all at what it means to Worship in Spirit.
I believe the Word ‘Spirit’ refers to the Holy Spirit. The Living Bible translates a portion of John 4:21 this way. “…For it’s not where we worship that counts, but how we worship – is our worship spiritual and real? Do we have the Holy Spirit’s help?
One of the great ministries of the Holy Spirit is to help us, guide us and minister to us as we Worship God. In Romans 8 we are taught by the Apostle Paul, “In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express.” Prayer is simply communication with God – and so is worship!
I’ve been in many worship services where God has supernaturally touched people during the worship. It’s not uncommon for someone to come up to me on a Sunday and say Paul, during the worship today I just couldn’t stop crying – it was beautiful. We hear other testimonies on a regular basis of how people have been physically healed, or set free of some addiction during worship. Just recently a person in our church gave testimony of how they were completely healed of crippling back pain during the worship. I am totally convinced that the Holy Spirit is not only passionate about our worship, but also passionate about connecting with us during our worship.
Secondly the word Spirit refers to our human spirit. The Bible teaches that we are tripartite beings made up of body, soul and spirit. Our spirit is that ‘God conscious’ part of our make up. It is that part of us that is alive and open to God. I’m sure you’ve heard it said that the ‘Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.’ That is often so true of our worship – the spirit is willing and desperate to worship God yet our flesh man and our soul man may not be so eager!!!
Worshipping in Spirit involves a process. It’s a process where the desires of the flesh and the soul come into alignment with the desires of the spirit. The reality is that sometimes we know we should worship God but for whatever reason we just don’t feel like it. Perhaps we feel tired, maybe you feel you’re under attached from the enemy, you may have had some bad news or perhaps you’re just having a “bad hair” day. Yet I like what King David says in Psalm 42: 5…
Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Saviour and my God.
Even King David – the ‘legendary Psalmist of the Old Testament’ – would experience times when he just didn’t feel like worshipping God. In those times however he would command his soul to worship – “…for I will yet praise Him…” He was determined to worship and praise God despite how he was feeling.
Many times our feelings, our emotions, and our negative experiences take the edge off our extravagance in worship. Yet John 4 reminds us that God is looking for people who will worship Him regardless of experience. It’s what the Scripture calls a sacrifice of Praise. Of course anything that is sacrificed is dead, and so there are times when we need to die to the desires of our flesh so that we can truly worship God in Spirit.
In closing, let me encourage you to adopt the posture of a worshipper – despite what your feelings, emotions and personal circumstances might be saying. You may not feel like it, but lift your hands, sing a little louder, be a little more extravagant in your expression of worship – and you watch what God does – because that is the type of worship that brings pleasure to the heart of God.
