Worship in Spirit and Truth

Have you ever been bored while worshiping? Have you ever found worship to be tired, dull or dry? Now, it's an unfair question. It's a trick question. Because by definition, worship cannot be dull, dry or boring. If you thought you were worshiping and you were bored, you weren't worshiping. Because when we worship, we're coming to the presence of almighty, glorious and holy God. And as one theologian put it, Christian worship is the most momentous, the most urgent, the most glorious action that can take place in human life. So, if you ever found yourself bored, you weren't worshiping. You at least weren't worshiping the one true God who is glorious. As we look at our text this morning, We're going to be studying the topic of worship. We're going to be looking at John 4. We're continuing the story, and I didn't address the section here. We're in John 4. If you're going to use a pew Bible, if you don't have a Bible, please take that with you. It's on page 889. John 4. I just skimmed over this section because it's such a rich section that addresses a topic that needs to have a lot of focus. And so we're going to be looking at the topic of worship from the text. This is not the sermon outline, but I believe these three points give us guidance over what we're going to learn this morning. God is worthy of worship. God calls us to worship. and God changes us so we can worship. God is worthy of worship. God calls us to worship and God changes us so we can worship. While that would be a fantastic sermon outline, it doesn't fit the text. The text is going to determine our outline, which is really who, why and how. Who do we worship? Why do we worship? and how to worship. Now, I'm going to read our text, but I want to give some background because we have some some new folks who weren't here last week. We're looking at the story of the woman of the well. Jesus, his disciples, they depart into the city to buy food. He sits down at a well and he he begins talking to a woman who he's not supposed to culturally speak to. He's a Jewish man. She's a Samaritan woman. As you'll see in the text, she says, you're not supposed to talk to me. And then John makes it very clear with this parentheses, which is a nice study note for us that's inspired. He says, she says, why do you ask me? Why are you talking to me? And he says, if you knew who I was, then you ask me and I would give you living water. And she, she's still like, she's not getting it quite yet. She says, well, you don't even have a bucket. You know, how are you going to get water? Where does this come from? They're talking about two different kinds of water. He begins to explain how it's living water that is eternal life. And it's a well that springs up within you. He's speaking of salvation that comes from above. She still doesn't get it. And then he puts his finger on her sin. Call your husband. She has to say, I have no husband. Jesus points out, you're right, you have no husband. The one you're staying with now, he's not your husband. You've had multiple husbands. The tension was first a social tension. Now Jesus has brought sin to light and that's the tension. And we see the woman quickly retreat back to the social tension. Our fathers worshipped on this mountain. They're trying to bring it back to the Jew and Samaritan difference, and that's where we pick up with Jesus answering her. Bringing it back to the social tension of where is worship supposed to be? What is true worship supposed to be like? We're going to pick up in verse twenty one. After the woman who is thirsty, but she does not know what she's truly thirsty for or how thirsty she truly is. Jesus says to her, verse twenty one woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on 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 the hour is coming and is now here when the true worshippers 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. The woman said to him, I know that Messiah is coming. He was called Christ. When He comes, He will tell us all these things. Jesus said to her, I who speak to you am He. Will you pray with me? Father, we praise you because you have sought us to worship you. We thank you. for calling us to be your worshipers. We thank you for your son that equips and repairs us and makes us worshipers. As we seek to worship you now, as we continue to seek our corporate worship together, help us to hear your word so that it changes us so we more faithfully worship you. In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen. As we look at the bigger context, chapters three and four, they're connected. It's actually a beautiful picture of the gospel proclamation. It begins with the Jews. Jesus first speaks to Nicodemus, a Jew, then he goes to the Samaritan woman and then he goes to the Gentile, the official. You see how the progress of evangelism is going to take place with the church. Jesus is already doing that. John's already demonstrating how the gospel spreads. First, the Jew, then the Gentile. The connection is also important because there's three musts in John three and four. The first one is found in verse seven of chapter three. You must be born again. That's the work of the Holy Spirit. Verse 14, Christ must be exalted. He must be lifted up. And so the Holy Spirit can regenerate us as we see him in his glory. And then verse 24, we must worship in spirit and truth. The first two are salvation oriented. Now the last is what we do now that we are saved. As I said, the outline of our sermon this morning is who, why and how. Who do we worship? Why do we worship? Why do we worship him? And then the very important, how do we worship? The first question Who do we worship? Who we worship? It's the Father. This is fairly radical here. Only when Jesus comes do Jews, does the world begin to call God Father. You see, she has asserted that her fathers worshipped on Mount Gerizim. Jesus responds by focusing on who will be worshipped. It's the father. Notice that verse 21 of verse 23, he is the object of worship. And then in verse 23, he is the one seeking worshippers. The one true God is set over against the traditions. He reveals to the woman a new way of knowing and worshipping God. She's been worshipping in ignorance. They worship what they know. Now, this is the state of all of us. We all are designed to be worshipers. Everyone who is created is created to be worshipers. The problem is we worship in ignorance. We do not worship the one true God. We are naturally inclined to worship anything and everything else. We are not inclined to worship the one true God, even though that's who we were designed to worship. Our sin has corrupted us. And Jesus. Our worship leader, he has come to correct us, to lead us in true worship. Now, who we worship, Father, is important. John typically records Jesus referring to God this way. Jesus always calls God Father throughout the text. He introduces this way of speaking to God. He introduces this way of praying to God. Now, we're used to it because we've grown up praying the Lord's Prayer, where he taught us first to pray to the Father. Jesus presented in every gospel is God, but here Jesus is. There's a strong focus. Jesus calls God father and he is called the son of God. The whole point of John is that we will believe that he is the son of God. This father son language, the paternal filial language, it's important. Jesus is God, specifically the son. The father is God, specifically the father. There is one God who exists forever as father, son and Holy Spirit. Significance of the Father is that Jesus knows him perfectly as the Son and allows us, when we believe in Jesus, to become sons, to know God as Father. You see, he comes to us now as a close, intimate, personal, loving God who we know as Father through Jesus, where at one point he was the holy and distant God. If you go back to the Old Testament, we were just in Exodus within the year, but a while back, it feels like when Moses is worshiping on the mountain, everybody else was distant from God. They were terrified of his holiness. But now, as we sang before, we get to know him personally. We get to draw near because we get to share in the perfect forever love that exists between the father and the son. He's not a distant God. He created us to be near him, and he has sent his son to draw us back near to him. A key question for you this morning, is God distant? Does he feel distant? He has sent his son to draw you near so that you can know him and know his presence and behold his glory face to face. Does he feel distant? And if you're a Christian and he feels distant, you have allowed your sin to keep you from knowing and experiencing the glory of God. If you're a non-Christian, if you're not a Christian this morning. You should praise him that he feels distant because if he drew near to you, you would feel the full wrath of a just and holy God. It's actually a praise that he feels distant from you if you not believe in Jesus Christ, because if God drew near to you and your sin is counted against you, which we are all guilty, if your sin is counted against you, the wrath of God would be upon you. See, Jesus Christ came to die so that our sin would be counted against him if we believe in him. That's why we as Christians, we can draw near our sin no longer is counted against us. So we're called to go in to his presence. If you're not a Christian, it's good that you feel distant to God, that God feels distant to you. But I have to tell you, one day that distance will not exist. One day you will see the holy and righteous and just God and his wrath will be known to you very near. The only way to have that wrath removed is if you believe in Jesus Christ. If you believe that your sin was counted against him and then his righteousness is counted to you and now you are forgiven. If you believe in Jesus, that he died for your sins, that he rose again, that is your gift. Now you can know God and worship him. If you think about worship and who we worship. We get to draw near, but there's two other ways that I want us to think about worshiping the father. First, he's glorious above. We get to go into the presence of the glorious and holy God to be able to sing before the throne of God above. I have a strong and perfect plea. I have confidence to draw near. That's radical because I'm a sinner who's guilty and I should not be able to go there. I get to go to the presence of the glorious God. When people go to the Grand Canyon, they don't go so they can think, wow, look, I'm standing over this great gulf. I feel so superior. No, you go to places like that so that you feel overwhelmed. That's why we like to go into the mountains, because they help us see how small we are. When we go into the presence of God, there's a sense in which we are feeling overwhelmed. Because we get to go into the presence of the one who is worthy of worship, and we have not worshipped him. It should be an overwhelming sense. The second thing we should see from worshipping the father. Is that he's he's present, he's near us. He lovingly has sought us. We cannot let that little phrase go there. The father is seeking worshipers. He is coming to us to draw us back to him. He's present in his love. The second thing I want us to see this morning is why we worship, why we worship, and here there's there's really two key points that are fairly subtle, but I think we will see that they're they're clear as well as to why we worship. The first one is this. God has executed his plan of grace. God has perfectly executed his plan of grace. You see, the whole debate here between Jesus and this woman is where it was supposed to truly be worshiping. Where is true worship? And Jesus says it's through the Jews. Because they have the fuller revelation and salvation has come through them. There's two things that really stand out about the Jewish people. There's two ways in which they are significant in history. There are special people for two reasons. First, as Paul tells us, they were entrusted with the oracles of God. They were entrusted with the old covenant. They were entrusted with the Old Testament. They got to hear and know the word of God. They got the first promises. Secondly, they are the race by which the Savior of the world we born. Our Gospels are very clear here. Matthew and Luke, especially their genealogies. Jesus came through the Jews. He was born of a Jewish woman. Now, as we think about those two blessings, let's also think about the Jewish people and what they did. They're constantly being accused of ignoring and corrupting and misinterpreting the word of God that was given to them. Secondly, and worse, they killed the Messiah. When he was born to their race, they killed him. And my point here is not to say what a horrible people they are, but to actually help us reflect, they in every way represent who we are. We receive great blessing and we take it for granted. We receive great blessing and we corrupt it for our own selfish ways. That's why we all the more praise the God who promises and is faithful, even in the midst of our failure. We see why we worship the God, the father, because he made promises and he kept them. We could go back to Genesis three in the midst of the curse. He promised Eve a son will come. He will be injured, but he will crush the enemy, which we know later is sin and death. He made a promise to Abraham, I promise son will come to you. He blessed Abraham in an unusual way in an unusual season of his life. We then see a great, great grandchild of Abraham, Judah. He's promised that he'll be the king in Genesis 49. Then we see David, a king. We promised to him someone of his line who was on the throne forever and will be a son of God. And then the revelation comes fuller as they have 53. This king will suffer for sinners. He'll be counted as a transgressor for our transgressions. So I'm just barely hitting some high points of revelation. God has made all of these promises and we see them all fulfilled in Christ. The father has perfectly executed a plan of salvation through the Jewish people who were unfaithful to him. But yet he was faithful. Now this is significant while he's speaking to a Samaritan woman. Why is he telling the Samaritan woman this? He's not just claiming privileged position. It's because salvation is ultimately for her as well. Remember Nicodemus? We never know how Nicodemus responds. John intentionally tells us nothing about Nicodemus. How does he respond? We know how the Samaritan woman responds. She goes and shouts. I found a prophet. I found the Messiah. He told me all about my sins. We know how the Gentile response. He has faith. Here we see God is executing his plan that his salvation is for every people, every tongue, every tribe. As you think about applying this specific point, God executes his perfect plan of salvation. It surely encourages to trust his promises more. He is faithful. The one who is promised. When we're in the midst of trials and difficulties, we were burdened to recognize and see how weak our faith is and the way to build up our faith is to see how faithful he is to go back into the promises of God and see how he has ordered all things, even controlling evil for the benefit of the well-being of his people. It's also important to hear from others testimonies. to hear how others have been carried by God through difficult times. I witnessed this this past week. A dear sister was in a trial. She was wondering about her faith and another brother came along and he reminded her of how God, how he experienced the same struggle in faith and how God proved himself faithful. That's why the gathering of Christians together is so important that we share each other's burdens, that we encourage one another in the midst of our trials. As Paul says in second Corinthians one, we have been comforted to comfort one another. Another application of this as Jesus is telling the Samaritan woman, we need to praise God for our diversity and pray for more. I want Jefferson Park to look like what it's going to look like in heaven. I want us to sound like what it's going to sound like in heaven. Every nation, every tribe, every tongue. We need to be reflecting the true heavens and their worship as we gather. And that's by being more diverse. And we have to remember this. We're longing for diversity because we have one thing in common. It's Jesus Christ and his salvation. We are built upon his word and being led by him alone. There's one other clue here that I want us to see in terms of why we worship him. Jesus says an hour is coming. An hour is coming and is even now here. When he was at the wedding at Cana, he said, My hour is not yet come when asked by his mother to turn the water into water to supply the one. We see in John 3, John 13, a key transition of the book, I'll read it, John 13, verse 23, and Jesus answered them, The hour has come for the son of man to be glorified. Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone. But if it dies, it bears much fruit. The hour Jesus constantly refers to in John is the hour of his death. That's where he is glorified. That's where he dies so that he can bring in more sons and daughters into the kingdom. As we've already mentioned, we're not able to worship God alone on our own. We need to be fixed, corrected, changed. We must have our guilt and our sin removed so that then we can go into his presence. We are guilty and should be terrified to approach God. But because of his death, because it was sufficient to take away every sin now that we are counted perfectly innocent. We know that we can go into his presence boldly. Our last point, and really what we're driving at, who we worship determines how we worship, why we worship determines how we worship, how we worship in spirit and in truth. Let's read verse 23, 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. Now, spirit of truth, that's not two ways to worship. That's two characteristics of true worship and it's true worship of the father. We need to see that together. These are, these two are being emphasized together as part of true worship. And I want to make this point very clear. True worship is God centered. We are looking to the father. We are worshiping the father and we are worshiping him in spirit and in truth. And we'll we'll get into what these words mean specifically, but spirit, I believe, is absolutely connected to the Holy Spirit. The truth is absolutely connected to Jesus Christ. We worship the father in the son through the spirit. This is the amazing thing about worship. God wills us to worship and then changes our will through the Holy Spirit, through the Son, so we can worship. He's seeking worshipers. None of us know how to worship. None of us can worship until God comes and does a mighty act in our hearts. The beauty of worship. We worship God and he leads us in that worship. Praise God that he willed for us to worship him and that he changes our will so that we can worship him. Let's look and see what it means to worship him in spirit. One of the first clues as to what this means, one of the first things we need to see that he grounds this declaration in the very nature of God. Look at verse 24. God is spirit and those who worship him must worship him in spirit and truth. There's a grounding there. The basis, one of the basis of worshiping in spirit is the fact that he is spirit. Now, again, the context, Jesus is arguing against a certain place, right? It's not that mountain. It's not this mountain. It's not this place. It's not that place. God is to be worshiped in spirit. The Old Testament really does have a strong focus on holy place, right? The Garden of Eden, a holy place. Adam sinned, he's kicked out. The temple of God, a holy place. Mount Sinai, a holy place. These are places where people can't come in and just barge in because they're holy. The burning bush, take your shoes off. This is holy ground. The Old Testament is focused on holy places where God would come down. The New Covenant. Declares all space. every place, Holy space, everywhere we are, because we're the people of God and 12 of the Holy spirit everywhere is Holy space. God is a spirit, which means he's not limited temporally or corporally. We have bodies. We're limited. I can't be here. And they're the same time you're here. You can't be somewhere else. We're limited. God is not He is everywhere at all times, and he is to be worshiped everywhere at all times. This sets him over, especially the pagan gods who are territorial. Everyone believed that a god was over one territory, another god over another territory. God said, no, I conquer all other supposed gods because I am the one God of all creation. I have no boundaries. What this means for us is that we are to worship God everywhere at all times. Everywhere at all times, all of life is worship. If we are believers in Jesus Christ, we are always involved by the Holy Spirit. We are always being led into the presence of God by Jesus Christ. Our lives are being played before God as he is our audience that we are glorifying with every word, action, thought and affection. Everything we do should be worship. This means we worship at home. This means what we do in our privacy, it's supposed to be worshiping God. We worship at work. It changes our work ethic. We worship in recreation. It changes how we spend time. We worship in every relationship. It changes how we treat others. It's important for us to say this, and I'm assuming most of us know this, but I want to make sure it's clear. We do not come to church to begin worshiping. Worship didn't begin with a call to worship. It doesn't. It's not going to end with the benediction. We came here to worship together. That's what's beautiful. The church gathered. We came here just to worship together so that we can go out and worship wherever we go with other Christians, Lord willing. This is a high point of worship is commanded by God. It's important. It's so sweet to hear the church gathered singing. Encouraging one another in song that way, I want to emphasize this because we're all Westerners. Well, most of us are Westerners. We have this horrible tendency to separate sacred and secular. There's horrible tendency to think this is what I'm doing for God and this is what I'm doing for me. No. At all times and in all places, we are God's people and we are to live for God. We believe the lie that some things are ours and be used for our pleasure when the truth is every good gift comes from above and is meant to be used for God's glory. Another unhelpful divide people have put on worship. Is that the singing portion of the sermon of the service is worship? over against the other parts. You know, we call this way praise and worship songs. The singing prepares us for the Word of God proclaimed. We are a people of the book. This is the high point of the corporate worship service. The entire service is worship. Our prayer, our reading of Scripture, all parts. Now, notice the context. The woman is focusing on her traditions from her fathers and Jesus corrects her for having ignorant worship. Now, that ignorance, it may be because of Samaritans. They only had the first five books of the Bible. They only claim to have those books, whereas the Jews, they have the rest of God's revelation. If we're honest with ourselves, we all have our mountains like that. The things that we say they're from our fathers, our traditions, we have to do them. We all have those mountains, really they're molehills that make into mountains. And the charge against us would not be ignorance, it'd be selfishness. Let me give an example. There was a special event here at the church and there's a lady and she said, Pastor, never get rid of the pews. A church must have pews. And I was on good behavior this day. I smiled and nodded. Thank you for that. But as I thought about it more, the word must. Really, you want to use and apply the word must for a church to something like pews. And maybe think of why we go into the store with my daughter. She likes to look at things and say, I need that. No, you like that. We need to make sure we're separating what I like and what I need. You see, we so often put our preferences into the must category. You see, I could have told the woman, no, a church must have beanbags. That's what we need to work, we must have beanbags. And I have as much authority to say that as someone has authority to say pews. None whatsoever. See, I hear these things, we need pews or chairs, we need a dress code, we need a particular service, we need a coffee shop. Now, that's a good idea, but not a need. The most demanding confusion of category between must and like has to do with singing. We must have a choir. We must have a worship band. Those are the two extremes. Sadly, music is what we're most childlike and not understanding what we need, what we like. I challenge you. If you place a must on music that would make most Christians throughout history and around the world feel excluded, it's not a must. Until the seventh century, most Christians sang a cappella. That's why I had them cut the piano out so we could hear each other's voices, as most Christians, I think, have probably sung. We need to think about what we say is a must in worship. and realize that we're really looking at things through a very small lens, and it's our own desires. One of our college students has really been encouraging me. I won't tell you which one. He doesn't like hymns. He's told me, I just, I can't get into the hymns. I said, well, that's fine. Do you know the person next to you? They really enjoy the hymns and they don't like the songs you like. They said, really? Yeah. Have you ever looked at them? Have you ever thought about why you don't like me? So I don't know them. And so I encourage him. I'm going to start giving you a bulletin before the worship service and you start reading the words of the hymn so that you can sort of join what you're singing and so that you can join together with that brother who's 50 years older than you and you can sing together and realize, yeah, that's what worship supposed to be like. It's not about what I like, it's what we can do together. He got it. We're supposed to be worshiping, singing together, one collective voice with all kinds of opinions and music we listen to at home. But we come here to sing together. As we think about the ideas of must, we need to make sure we have priorities set against preferences. We must hear the word of God because God commands us to hear the preaching of his word. We must read God's word. We must sing his praises. The must come from here. God tells us what we must do, and then we try to facilitate it as much as we possibly can. We still need to determine what it means to worship in spirit. So worshiping God who is a spirit means we worship at all times, all places. The whole service is worshiped collectively, and then we're going to go out and we're going to continue to worship. But what does it mean that we worship in spirit? That particular phrase. Now, there's two options that I found. One, it refers to the spirit of man. That's why it's not capitalized in most of your Bibles, in the ESV especially. It refers to the spirit of man. It focuses on our internal nature, that soul or that spirit or heart that is bent toward God when we're worshiping. The whole point here is it's not the physical, it's what we do internally. It's setting our affections, our deepest desires upon God. The second option is that it refers to the Holy Spirit. Some people may have a capital S. The. spirit, and there's a burn of the third person. Trinity, you must worship in the spirit. Now I had a real theological dilemma this week because I trust two men primarily when I'm trying to figure out a dilemma like this. Once the Carson was John MacArthur, they disagree. And so I had a real theological limo. When these two disagree, I don't know what to do. But as I wrestled with it, I think the distinction of either or is unhelpful. Because our spirits are only turned to God when the Holy Spirit turns them. That internal nature of ours, it's sinful and corrupt. And so to make a distinction between our spirit and the spirit, our spirits aren't turned until the spirit turns it. You see, the Holy Spirit, He comes and helps us, changes our will, our desires, so that we are turned to adore and revere the Father, which we are not naturally prone to. I asked earlier if you've ever been bored in worship, and I'm going to assume most of you thought of a church service setting. I ask you, if you're in a church service and you were bored, you found it dull or tired, Do you quickly say it's the preacher's fault or the music leader's fault? If I'm boring to you, is it my fault? If you find a boring speaker, is it his fault? I am certain of this. Worship is not caused by the kind of music or the quality of the speaker. Worship takes place when Christ is exalted and the Spirit moves us to worship him. The dullness is usually found in our own hearts. Are our hearts being prepared for worship? A hard heart is not easily stirred to worship. We quickly accuse others of being culpable for why I was bored or I found something dull when all along it may have been how dull and tired and bored our hearts are because they've been set so much on the entertainment of sin in this world God is boring because they're so used to the entertainment of lust and pride. They're not ready. For worshiping, we're ready to come to worship together, we must prepare our hearts, we must get our hearts ready. Let me ask you, do you prepare your hearts to be stirred? Do you prepare your hearts? To be stirred the Holy Spirit coming upon us, it doesn't mean it's a completely passive act upon us. We have to respond when the Holy Spirit illuminates sin, we must repent. Another question, do you pray that God would make you ready? Have you prayed this morning, God speak, prepare my ears, prepare my eyes, prepare my heart. Prepare my mind to hear something that will make me a more faithful worshiper. Do you read the passage ahead of time? Prepare to hear what God will say to you from the passage. And finally, this is helpful as we have our college students back, do you go to bed early enough to be awake and alert and ready to listen? I'll say it again, you can nudge the person next to you. Do you go to bed early enough to make sure you're alert and ready to listen? Two ways that we worship in the spirit. One, have a heart that's moldable to God. Have a heart that's moldable to God. Pray for change. We should desire to be changed. When we're reading God's word at home, when we're speaking to other Christians in fellowship, when we're gathered together to sing his word And praise him. Pray for illumination of sin and the grace to repent. Secondly, have a heart that resists the world. That is what will keep you from worshiping, being too entertained by the sins of this world, being ensnared. We have we are so prone to be ensnared. We must protect our hearts. As we move to the final way in which we worship, I want to point something out in that we worship in spirit and truth. When we worship in spirit, when we're worshiping through the Holy Spirit, the spirit is illuminating Christ. That's what we see the Spirit doing throughout Scripture. You're never worshiping the Spirit in the Spirit without worshiping in Christ. The Spirit has inspired these words for all the church. We worship through him in the midst of studying these words, and it's all an exaltation of Christ. The reason that's significant is if I ever say anything or someone ever says anything that's opposed to the Word of God and they say they sit in the Spirit, it's not the Spirit of God. It's extremely important to recognize when people are saying, claiming to say something in the spirit, it must be in alignment with what God has said. Finally, we worship God in truth. We worship God in truth. I believe the call to worship the father in truth is a call to worship God in light of the revelation of Jesus Christ. The noun truth is found throughout the gospel of John as being intimately connected with Jesus Christ. The prologue already sets this up. Jesus is full of grace and truth. Chapter 1 verses 14 and 17. John bears witness to the truth that Jesus is the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Abide in Christ and you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. Being in Christ is being in the truth. That's John 8, 32. Jesus declares, I am the way, the truth and the life. John 14, 6. Before Pilate, Jesus declares that he came to bear witness about the truth. And that is that he is a son of God who would die for sinners and rise again. The only connection of truth is the spirit of truth and the spirit of the one who's illuminating us that Jesus is the truth. The logical connection isn't hard. John begins. In the beginning was the word. God's declaration is the truth. And we know that declaration most fully in Jesus Christ, who took on flesh. You see, Jesus is the truth because He revealed to us who God is, fuller than anybody else. We have a full revelation of who God is in Jesus Christ. Only in Christ can we see God and know him as Father. We pray in his name. We gather in his name. We are only saved in his name. That's why our worship is centered upon Jesus Christ. We're trusting the Holy Spirit to move us as we're thinking of Christ and as he's being exalted and that Christ will usher us into true worship of the Father. But Christ must be at the center. What we do, we do because of Christ. He's forgiven us. He's freed us. He's given us a new identity. We must see the gospel as central to our worship. The gospel isn't something you just use to enter into the family of God. The gospel is central to everything we do as Christians. It's because of the gospel that we can go into his presence. It's because of the gospel we can go and praise him as father. We must remember constantly it's because of grace and mercy that we have that standing before God. Otherwise, everything we do, we start to build up a self-righteousness. If we don't keep the gospel centered upon in our worship, we sort of think what we do is actually good in itself rather than good, because it's been washed in the blood of Christ. Finally, we see the woman respond, I know that Messiah is coming when he comes, he will tell us all these things referring to worship. Jesus said to her, I who speak to you and he. Jesus has come. to lead us in worship, to teach us about worship. We don't call the folks singing up here worship leaders. I don't like to be called a worship leader. There's only one real worship leader. It's Jesus Christ. He is the only one who can cleanse us. He's the only one who stands the right hand of the Father, who takes us into his presence so that we can truly worship. He is our worship leader. We praise him and we thank him that he prepares us to know and worship the father. That's why we sing praises to the redeemer. We pray with me. God, you are worthy of our worship. We praise you that you have called us to worship, even though we were not worshiping you while we're fighting and cursing you, you come to seek to make us worshipers. What a glorious transformation you have made, Almighty God. Help us, Lord, to praise you all the more for it. Help us, Lord, to worship you because you've made us worshipers. Help us, Lord, to love you because you first loved us. Help us to sing your praise and live for your glory. In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen.