John 4:20-26 (NIVUK)
20 Our ancestors worshipped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.’
21 ‘Woman,’ Jesus replied, ‘believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshippers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshippers the Father seeks. 24 God is spirit, and his worshippers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.’
25 The woman said, ‘I know that Messiah’ (called Christ) ‘is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.’
26 Then Jesus declared, ‘I, the one speaking to you – I am he.’
These verses can sound rather cryptic can’t they! What does Jesus mean by worship in the Spirit and in the truth? As you can imagine, many pages have been written to explore this. To me, the essence is about our worship not being tied to a place or ritual or rules, because we have been set free by having the Spirit living in us because of Christ. The Spirit leads us into the truth about God, the world we live in, and ourselves, and this in turn leads us to realise both our need of God and his love of us – the relationship that is at the heart of genuine worship. The Spirit’s presence in us also frees our worship from being tied to any particular location, because we have access to God at all times and in all places in it.
Thank you Spirit for coming to live in us, for the truth you have helped us see, and the constant daily presence with God that you enable us to have.
Photo by Anderson Rian on Unsplash
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