Where Should God's People Go To Worship?
Jesus was weary with a journey on foot from Jerusalem to Galilee and sat on a well as
his disciples went into the village of Sychar to buy some food. When a woman came to
draw water from the well, Jesus asked her for a little of it. This startled the Samaritan
woman because Jews didn't normally have any thing to do with Samaritans. Jesus told
the woman that if she knew who it was she was talking to, she would have asked him for
the living water which he gave. She wanted to know then, how did he propose to get
that water out of the well when he didn't even have a bucket. Jesus responded that he was
speaking of spiritual water, water which would forever quench the thirsting of the soul
for God. Missing the point, she asked for some of his mysterious water that makes a
person never thirst again, so that she wouldn't have to keep straining to pull buckets of
water out of wells. Jesus then revealed that he knew some details of her past life, and
she perceived that he was a prophet. And as soon as she caught on to the fact that he
was involved in the things of God, she wanted to quarrel with him concerning holy
places. "Our fathers worshipped in this mountain", she said, "But you
[Jews] say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship." Jesus
said to her, "Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when ye shall neither in
this mountain nor yet in Jerusalem worship the Father.... The hour is coming, and now
is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in Spirit and in truth, for the
Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a spirit, and they that worship him must
worship him in Spirit and in truth."
For centuries, there had been a controversy between the Jews and the Samaritans over
the right place to worship. The Jews had been right to say that the temple in Jerusalem
was the only acceptable place to worship the Father. In Jerusalem was the legitimate
ministry, the truly anointed of God. The Samaritans never received that truth,
contending that if Abraham and Isaac and Jacob worshipped in the hills of Canaan, then
it was acceptable to God for their descendants to do the same. This "headless woman"
was defending that doctrine to Jesus. He was not impressed with her biblical knowledge.
What Jesus was suggesting to this woman was that in order for a place to be acceptable
as a place of worship, it must be holy. That is, it must have the sanctifying presence of
God there. When Solomon dedicated the temple in Jerusalem, the presence of God
so filled the temple that not even the priests could enter in for a while. It was
overpowering. God made it a place acceptable for worship by honoring that building
with His holy presence. Jesus was implying to the woman that God's sanctifying
presence would shortly be taken away from Jerusalem's temple (as it had long ago
departed from the high places where Abraham worshipped), thus making her controversy
over holy places altogether irrelevant to anything in the kingdom of God.
The only place, Jesus said, which would in this New Covenant be holy and acceptable for
worship would be within people's hearts. In other words, God would indwell and
sanctify individual people, making the bodies of men His temple.
"Know ye not", asked Paul, "that YE are the temple of God, and that
the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" "As God hath said,
`I will dwell in them, and walk in them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my
people.'"
Worship of God is the most common thing on earth. God is worshipped by the most
sophisticated of mankind and by barbarians in even the most remote corners of the
globe, but it is all unacceptable if it is not sanctified by the Spirit of God,
through Christ Jesus. Paul said his mission in life was to make the worship of the
Gentiles acceptable with God "being sanctified by the holy Ghost"
(Rom.15:16).
Without the holy Ghost, all the glorious houses of worship which men build, all their
beautiful hymns, all their gorgeously decorated robes, all their meaningful ceremonies,
and all their intricate theological works are as filthy rags in God's sight as the
bloody rags which are discarded by women after their menstruation periods (Isa.64:6).
Just because men call it "Christian", does not mean that God has sanctified it. In fact,
those places which are called "Christian" are usually the most filthy of all, and that is why
God is calling the holy Ghost baptized saints OUT of Christianity!
And when God opens our eyes to see the vain, lovely styles of worship which men have
invented as God sees them, we will reject every manner of worship which
omits the Spirit of God, or relegates it to a secondary position, as women discard their
filthy rags (Isa.30:21-22). Those who truly know God, know that He is supremely
unimpressed with man, his works, his words, and his thoughts.
What we often fail to grasp, however, is that as a part of this, God is also utterly
unimpressed with
man's worship. Without the holy Ghost leading, praise of God is just as dead a work as
is digging a ditch. God is a spirit, Jesus said, and they who worship Him
MUST worship him in Spirit and in truth. Otherwise, they worship Him in vain. So
superstitious are we that, in general, we seem to think that any worship of God is
acceptable with Him, that any praise is good, that any hymn is holy. But God is not
a beggar, taking in anything sent His way. He is not the father of Christianity, Judaism,
Islam, or any other of man's religions. Theirs is the spirit of whoredom, receiving
into their numbers anything or anyone that will increase their coffers or submit
to their ungodly tenets. God is not a whore. God is holy, and it is a privilege for people
to be sanctified by His Spirit, so that their worship may be accepted by Him.
The truth is, there is no such thing as a "holy place" to worship on this cursed planet,
and the only holy people that exist are those who have been
sanctified by the holy Spirit of God. It is only
God's Spirit that makes anything holy. And God does
not give His Spirit to trees and streets and
buildings. "God does not dwell in holy places
made with men's hands", the Bible tells us. He
dwells in the hearts of humble men (Isa.57:15).
And where God dwells is holy. In this New
Covenant, Israel is not a geographic place; it is
a people, the people in whom is the Spirit of
the living God. Outside of the person who is
filled with the Spirit of God, there is no holy
place on earth, because there is no place on
earth where God dwells. And there is none holy but God, Jesus said. Because that is
true, there is no place holy except where God's Spirit dwells.
Christians have decreed
that Capernaum on the north shore of the Sea of Galilee is a holy place. They will not
even allow pilgrims to enter its "hallow" grounds if that pilgrim is dressed in shorts, as if
doing so will desecrate that holy dirt. But when Jesus himself was here, he didn't think
so highly of the place. He cursed it, and consigned its inhabitants to hell (Mt.11:23).
I visited Capernaum recently, and as I thought about Jesus' words and learned anew the
reality of the fear of God. The inhabitants there, are still cursed with bondage to the
same self-willed, over-religious
demons that caused Israel long ago to reject the only hope of eternal life that
the nation ever had, the One who loved her as no other ever has or ever will. And
God's own people in this New Covenant era are just as superstitious--calling their steeplehouses "the house of God" and calling their
meeting places "sanctuaries"! All men on this miserable, sin-sick planet, need
desperately to cease these futile efforts to appear holy, and to submit to the only source
of true holiness there is now or ever will be: Jesus Christ of Nazareth, the Son of the
living God.
The truth is, that the only holy place there is NOW, and the only place JESUS will call
holy, is in the heart of the person who
has received the baptism of the holy Ghost (with the evidence of speaking in other
tongues). How you receive that truth will reveal how much you truly love Jesus, despite
how holy you claim to be. And if the Spirit of God does not abide in you, no matter
where you go, it will never be the right place for worship despite how holy it looks.
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