Worship: The Heart (Part 1 of 3)
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But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth. John 4:23-24.
These verses are Jesus’ very own words on the topic of worship, and they are loaded with information and implications for how we “do” worship. As we know from other biblical sources (cf. Romans 12:1f), worship pervades every area of life, but for our intents and purposes here, the focus will be on corporate, musical worship. Before we can unpack the implications of these verses, however, we need to understand what they’re saying.
The confusion that usually surrounds these verses is the seemingly vague reference to “spirit and truth.” I would venture to say that the reference to “truth” is the easier of the two, since Jesus declares that the truth of the gospel will set us free (John 8:32) and that he is the truth (John 14:6). The truth in which we worship is Jesus Christ and his gospel. Without faith in Jesus and trust in his gospel, we are unregenerate, dead in our sins, and not even able to worship God (Ephesian 2:1ff). We’ll cover the implications of that in the next blog, but here we want to focus on the word “spirit.” What does it mean to worship in spirit?
GOD’S SPIRIT OR OUR SPIRIT?
Is Jesus trying to say that we worship in our spirit, thus stating that it is not our outward worship that is true worship but rather our inward worship? Perhaps. But then, there is the option that he is saying we worship by the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit. Perhaps this take on the phrase is more persuasive. While this verse is often quoted and cherished (for good reason), its meaning is disagreed upon under these two interpretations.
Rather than getting caught up in either/or thinking though, perhaps we should take a both/and approach. I would argue that much of the debate around this verse relies on a false dichotomy: “it is either this interpretation or it is that interpretation.” But the scriptures often speak of our spirit being awakened and quickened by the Holy Spirit, who now fills us. The two are naturally and integrally connected for the Christian. What Jesus is saying here is that we worship inwardly, in our spirit, and that we worship by the power and filling of the Holy Spirit.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN?
With some clarity on what Jesus is saying in this passage, we can now ask the question of what this means “on the ground.” If we are supposed to worship inwardly and by the power of the Holy Spirit, what does that look like? I’ll give some thoughts here as a starting point, but I encourage you to pray and think through what your own conclusions might look like in accordance with the leading of the Holy Spirit.
1. We Don’t Settle for Appearances
What we do outwardly is only worship when it stems from our heart inwardly. Isaiah 1:11-17 tells us of the fact that God is not impressed by our outward shows of worship when our hearts are far from him. This passage makes clear that worship coming from an improper heart, one that loves wickedness and practices sin, is disgusting to God. If we think that we can justify ourselves by how much we give, how loud we sing, or how closely we listen during a Sunday service when all the while we are rejecting God’s leading and living in unrepentant sin, then we are dangerously mistaken.
2. We Come to Receive
Our hearts are inclined to come into a worship service thinking of what we are going to give God. We are going to give of our time, our money, our praise, our listening, etc. However, learning that we must worship “in spirit” reminds us that it is only by the power of the Holy Spirit that our worship can mean anything. With this in mind, we don’t come to service primarily to give to God, but rather to get from God. We come expectant that God will move, because we know that apart from him we can do nothing (John 15:5). We come to hear from him and to reorient ourselves around his love and grace, trusting that he will grant us the strength to do so. Sometimes our most helpless moments result in the most blessed worship because of the fact that we have finally acknowledged that we truly have nothing in our hands when we come before the Almighty.
3. We Admit Our Need
This one is closely tied with coming to receive, but takes a different slant. Once we have refused to settle for outward worship and admitted that we come to receive from God, we will inevitably at some point find that our hearts are simply not into worship on a given Sunday. Since we worship “in spirit”, we take this as an opportunity to ask the Holy Spirit to revitalize our hearts with a love and hunger for God and to ask others for prayer and encouragement. Don’t neglect the body of Christ! All too often we struggle through worship simply because we refuse to admit to another brother or sister in the Lord that we are in need.
WORSHIP FROM THE HEART
Worship is something that we offer up to God with a full heart because he first loved us (Romans 5:8). The gospel is the wellspring of worship unto God. Let our passage from John penetrate your heart and affect the ways in which you worship. Don’t let this suggestive and short list end here. I purposefully made it general and to the point because I believe that these verses in John that we are unpacking have the power to convict on different points for different persons. God is faithful, and while we will never attain perfect worship of God in spirit in this life, we will continue to be accepted and loved because he sees Jesus’ perfect worship in our place (Hebrews 2:11-12).
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