Not Knowing Worship

"You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth." (John 4:22-24)

I have continued to ponder the deeper meaning of this phrase you do not know. I don't want to just stop at a surface reading of this assuming that Jesus was only talking about the fact that this woman was a Samaritan and therefore needed her theology changed because she belonged to the wrong church. It was true that her theology was less accurate than the Jews. However, the evidence seems very strong that very many of the Jews also seemed to be missing the boat when it came to true worship.

I suppose that some people would seem it silly to spend so much time on a few verses about worship. After all, what's the big deal with worship anyway? You show up at church once a week, go through some exercises and formalities and you have put in your time, fulfilled your worship obligations, right?

So maybe the argument is about which church has “better worship” than the next church. This generally is decided much more on the basis of personality and preferences than on a careful comparison about how a church aligns with the standard of the Word of God. And nearly all churches are going to fail that test when it is brought into closer examination.

But what if a church does actually follow the Bible truth as far as one can tell? Is it still possible that many people in that church may still be worshiping what they do not know? And is it even necessary at all to go to church to be a true worshiper? I know that can certainly arouse a great deal of heated discussion, but I still believe that it is a valid question that deserves much more exploration than most religious people are willing to give it.

I had this discussion just a few days ago – in church no less. I told some friends that I cannot find anywhere in the Bible that we are supposed to show up each week in a designated church to go through the routines that we label “worship” in order to be in compliance with the will of God. I am not asserting that this will not take place in the life of a true worshiper. But I am simply saying that we are basing a great deal of our assumptions about religion on traditions far more than on a careful reading of the Word.

Along this line I remember what one respected teacher shared about his own experience and beliefs. He said that when he came under conviction to take serious the call of God to follow Him that he decided to start reading the Word for himself and see what it really said and did not say. He came to some strong conclusions that were not in line with some of the traditions of religion that he incorporated into his own life. For instance, he said that he could find no evidence whatsoever for the practice of folding the hands, closing the eyes and bowing the head whenever a person prays. These routines appear to be totally based on culture or traditions and so he decided that if it was not in the Word then he was not going to do it.

This kind of out-of-the-box thinking and living generally puts other people around in a position of awkward discomfort. Because a respected leader and recognized authority on the Bible does not comply with what almost everyone accepts as standard religious behavior, one is forced to either want to pressure him to comply with what we “feel” is supposed to happen or we are forced to reconsider the basis of our own practices – which is not something most people relish doing.

I sense that it is much harder to challenge our own assumptions and traditions than most people are willing to do under normal circumstances. It is often not until a crisis event that exposes some of our false ideas about God or about worship that we are forced to reconsider what feels so familiar and comfortable to us. And I believe that God allows us to come into just such circumstances in our life to do that very thing, to flush us out into a place where we have to realize how faulty and shallow our ideas about religion and life really are.

I suspect that a person who worships what they know not as this text states, will usually not realize very clearly that they don't know what they worship. I suspect most of us think we are worshiping God when we go to church or other kinds of worship activities but I really wonder how much of what we call worship is true worship. And I believe that until we are willing to honestly ask that question and allow conviction to take hold of our hearts that we will continue to worship what we know not without knowing it – which is the same thing I suppose.

But just because I am convinced that the church I attend likely has the most “truth” as far as Bible accuracy is concerned does not mean that I still am safe from worshiping what I know not. Just having more truth does not guarantee that one is going to be one of His worshipers. We can be so smug in our possession of truth just like the Jews did that we completely miss the importance of our need to worship in spirit like God intends for us to worship. This passage makes it very clear that much of what passes as worship may not be seen that way from heaven's perspective.

I believe that the only way we can come to realize we are in fact worshiping what we know not is through a revelation or conviction by God Himself. Then if we don't resist that conviction but are willing to open up to God's Spirit, He will reveal to us the shallowness of our religion, the misguided focus of our worship and will come to realize our need to get past the outward formalities and begin to learn how to really worship God both in spirit and in truth.