In Spirit and Truth

John 4:23:  “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.”

What does it mean to worship “in spirit and in truth?”  Spirit and truth are two inseparable characteristics of worship for the true worshipper.  To worship God in spirit is to die to our flesh by not allowing temporary physical pleasures pull us away from God’s eternal perspective in our lives and allow our created, eternal spirit to connect with God.  To worship God in truth is to hold nothing back from Him when we come to Him; to give up all that we are and all that we will ever be just because of who He is and what He has done. 

The true worshipper cannot worship in just spirit or in just truth; both must be applied to our worship, or it is not worship at all.  Rather, it becomes a temporary escape from reality, from the reality of God and what He wants to do in our lives.  We deny Him the right to come in and take control of the things in our lives that our pulling us down or holding us back.  Reality can only be found in worshipping through spirit and truth.

The reality of God’s love ought to compel us to worship Him, to give back to Him, to love Him, in the same way that He loved us.  Because of Christ’s love for the Father, that love spilled over to us, cleansed us, and made us holy and capable of individually worshipping God with all that we are.  When Jesus worshipped with the Father, He and the Father were One.  Jesus said,  “I and the Father are one.”  In other words, Christ was always one with the Father, because everything that He did was for the Father’s glory.  They were one in spirit and in truth. 

That is how we ought to worship.  True worship is becoming one with the Father, allowing His love and His presence to fill us by giving Him all that we are.

—Mark

Maxim of the Moment

If the shoe fits, you are not allowing for growth. - Vernon Law