Thought for Today
Genesis 22:5 Then Abraham said to his young men, "Stay here with the donkey; the boy and I will go over there; we will worship, and then we will come back to you."
Exodus 20:2 I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; 3 you shall have no other gods before me.
Luke 4:8 Jesus answered him, "It is written, 'Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.'"
John 4:21 Jesus said to her, "Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem . . . 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 seeks such as these to worship him.
Our New Testament reading tomorrow will include John’s story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well. As I have thought about that pericope this week, I have thought a great deal about ‘worship.’ What did Jesus mean by “true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth?” What does it mean to talk about ‘true worship?’
“Worship (From Old English weorthscrip, ‘worth-ship”) The service of praise, adoration, thanksgiving, and petition directed toward God through actions and attitudes.” (Westminster Dictionary of Theological Terms, pg. 307)
The first thing I notice about that definition is that it does not place any restrictions of time and/or place on “the service of praise . . . through actions and attitudes. I suspect that most worshippers think about worship as that which occurs during 1 – 3 hours on Sunday mornings. Unless, that is, one happens to be Jewish or Islamic.
“Jews typically go to synagogue on the Sabbath, which begins Friday night and continues until Saturday night. Additionally, Jewish prayer services ae held three times a day – morning, afternoon, and evening – on weekdays as well.” (Chabad.org)
“Muslims primarily go to the mosque on Friday, which is considered the holiest day of the week. On this day, they gather for Jumu’ah prayers, a special congregational prayer that is obligatory for adult male Muslims and optional for women. While Friday is the main day for mosque attendance, Muslims also pray five times a day and may visit the mosque on other days as well.” (whattovisitwheretotravel.com)
What constitutes ‘true’ worship? Are those formal services on Sunday, the Sabbath, or the Jumu’ah prayers the only times of ‘true’ worship? Must ‘true’ worship occur in a church, a synagogue or a mosque? If so, in which? Is worship in the church ‘truer’ than worship in a synagogue or mosque? And, would the answer to that question be dependent on whether one is a Christian, a Jew or a Muslim?
I am a Christian. I am a Christian minister. I certainly do consider the Sunday services I lead each week to be services of worship. You may have noticed above that I wrote “1 – 3 hours on Sunday.” Our formal ‘worship service’ does not last 3 hours (although it may seem like it to young children or bored adults). I firmly believe that our Coffee Hour, which sometimes lasts longer than the ‘worship service,’ is a form of ‘true’ worship. We also share a meal following the ‘worship service’ on the last Sunday of each month. Our shared table fellowship is also a form of ‘true’ worship.
Does true worship, worshiping the Father in spirit and truth, by definition mandate some sort of corporate service performed in a dedicated space? Jesus’ words to that Samaritan woman, “the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem” reflects the then-current beliefs of the Jews and the Samaritans. Jews believed ‘true’ worship was restricted to Jerusalem. Samaritans that it was restricted to Mount Gerizim.
I do not believe there are any time or place restrictions on worship. I believe that the children of God are called to worship our Creator God continuously and everywhere. Our actions and attitudes, all of them, should reflect our individual, personal service of praise, adoration, thanksgiving, and petition directed toward God. When they do, when we love God and love our neighbor, they will hasten the fulfillment of the Kingdom of God. They will bring about that condition for which we pray, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” They will be ‘true’ worship in the fullest sense.
Stay safe, worship in spirit and truth, trust God,
Pastor Ray