Insightful Musings on the Scriptures

by

Raymond P. Sparre
Northwest University class of '67

Greetings in the morning, dear ones.

I just called Jill a few minutes ago. She said that they’re doing fine where they are in New York…that they have had far worse storms hit their area in the past.

Only a half hour ago, Lindsay dropped off the little boys. They seem all happy to be here again. We’ll let them wake up their dad soon.

Thano’s truck is in the shop with the intermittent fuel problem not yet resolved. And the chimney system for the wood stove in his quarters needs replacing. So besides my long list of other stuff to pursue, there are two additional targets of time and attention for today. So it goes.

Through it all, let’s be worshippers…the real deal type.

Love, Dad/Ray.

The debate over how to worship, when to worship, and where to worship seems to be quite alive and well today among those who are held captive to religious form and tradition. That issue comes up in this exchange between Jesus and the woman he encounters at the Samaritan well. The woman is a bit shaken by the fact that this man (Jesus) knows a lot more about her than any normal person could. She says, “I can see that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem” (4:19-20). It would seem that she purposely shifts the attention of the conversation to this debate so as to side-step the discomfort she was suddenly feeling with too much attention being drawn to her personally. Jesus responds, “Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem…Yet A TIME IS COMING AND HAS NOW COME when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshippers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshippers must worship in spirit and in truth” (John 4:21, 23-24).

There seems to me to be only one way to understand these words of Jesus. He is disclosing to this woman the great theme and objective of the Gospel, indeed of the New Testament—indeed of the entire Bible. It is an internalization and individualization of the Kingdom of God. I believe Jesus is stating, in so many words, that how, when, and where one worships is not so important. That one DOES worship from a sincere heart (HEART AFTER GOD) through the mediation of the redemptive heart-changing work of Christ is very, VERY important.

I hope you will not tire of my repetition, but I think the central idea of Jesus’ words is pretty well summed up in the theme I continually quote—“Christ in you, the hope of Glory” (Colossians 1:27). Think about it.

You really don’t need a fancy new recipe or method for worship. You don’t need to emphasize some special time. You don’t need to run off to some special place. Those are clearly vestiges of religion—religious formalism (superficial legalism). What you need is to simply DO IT. And, DO IT NOW—right where you are—continually.