Articles
Worshipping in Truth
The church is often criticised for being hypocritical; Christians for failing to practice what they preach. Sometimes the focus seems to be more on religious practices, rather than obedience to God. Isaiah 66 begins, "This is what the LORD says" and goes on to condemn those who do what is evil yet go through the motions of religious behaviour. Even their sacrifices are an abomination. God declares, "This is the one I esteem: he who is humble and contrite in spirit, and trembles at my word." (v2)
When Jesus entered Jerusalem on the colt of a donkey he was declaring himself to be the awaited Messiah. He did not go to the palace to conquer the Romans, but to the temple to deal with religious hypocrisy. As he drove out the money changers and merchants, Jesus taught from Isaiah 56:7 that the temple was to be a house of prayer for all nations. The temple courts were the place that God-fearing Gentiles could come to worship God and to pray. However, the temple court had been turned into a marketplace: taking financial advantage of pilgrims, robbing the temple of its sanctity and the Gentiles of their place of prayer. These practices had been implemented by the religious authorities to help pilgrims pay their temple tax and to provide animals for sacrifice, but they were not in accordance with the spirit of God's law, which was to provide access to God for all people.
Jesus quotes Jeremiah 7:9-11, claiming the temple has become a "den of robbers" where God's people are exploited. God's people have a long history in putting their faith in the wrong things. The Jews trusted in their being sons of Abraham, or in the temple building, in foreign powers or even in God's infinite patience to protect them from the consequences of their repeated sins. In Hosea 9, God laments that despite such early promise, like early fruit on a fig tree, Israel was ultimately unfaithful and prostituted herself with foreign gods.
When Jesus curses the fig tree (Mark 11) it is a parable of judgement on those who, despite appearances, are unfruitful-lacking visible signs of obedience to God in their lives. Then Jesus goes on to say a puzzling thing, that if anyone has faith, he can command a mountain to throw itself into the sea, "and it will be done for him". (Mark 11:23) This is believed by some to mean we can have anything we want, no matter how outrageous, as long as we really believe it is possible. "The Secret" is a New Age philosophy that is currently very popular and makes similar claims. But the key to understanding these passages about faith that the issue is not how strongly we believe, but in whom we believe. Jesus says in the previous verse, "have faith in God". Faith in God is not a matter of asking for outrageous and selfish things, but in learning God's will and faithfully doing it.
This background is also of great help in understanding Jesus' words to the Samaritan woman in our people of the New Testament study, when he talks about worshipping "in Spirit and in Truth". Worshipping in truth is the very opposite of the hypocrisy that trusts in religious formulas or activities rather than in loving the true God and trusting in his faithfulness to his promises.
Jesus invited his disciples to share in his perfect relationship with the Father and the Holy Spirit. John records Jesus' words, "I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. This is to my Father's glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples." (John 15:5-8)
Paul encourages his readers to live by the Spirit and to show the fruit of life in the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. (Galatians 5:22&23). These are the good fruits that are the signs of a spiritually healthy Christian. Tending and encouraging them to grow in our lives is our true act of obedience and worship, and if we ask God to grow this fruit in our lives, it will be done for us.