John 4:24
I’ve had discussion after discussion recently about why studying the Bible in context is important. I mean I just finished an e-course on it, so I kinda love the topic. But, today I read an old story that I have read a million times. The story of the Samaritan woman at the well and once again I was FLOORED by a new TRUTH.
I have never noticed what Jesus says to the woman AFTER he confronts her sin and offers her living water that will quench her thirst for eternity.
She asks Jesus about WHERE she is supposed to worship. She is caught up in an argument that the Samaritans and Jews had been having. The big argument between them is the location of the Chosen place to worship. Where am I supposed to worship? What is the RIGHT answer? Essentially she is asking is my lifestyle right? Is the way I worship right?
Instead, Jesus tells her, “…true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be his worshipers. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship I’m must worship in spirit and truth.” (John 4:24)
They go hand in hand. As Jesus said to the Samaritan woman in this passage, we must worship in, “spirit and truth.”
Although the Samaritan woman would have been expecting a Messiah, they rejected the rest of the Old Testament besides the first 5 books of the Bible, the Mosaic Pentateuch, so her understanding would be limited. They had their own place of worship and they didn’t associate with the Jews. Yet, Jesus stopped to minister to this Samaritan woman because he cares and loves for everyone. But, what does he tell her? He tells her that soon we will worship in BOTH Spirit and Truth.
As a baby Christian, my Faith was based mostly off my emotional experiences. I had an emotional connection to the Word of God, and I felt the Spirit continually working, this was not wrong, but I didn’t know much about the truth. I was still growing and learning in the Father, as I’ve continued to grow, I see the same old passages becoming clearer, and every time I look at the passages the truth is more evident to me. As I’ve grown, the more I realize that the Spirit and Truth go together, I am led by the Spirit with urges and convictions INTO truth and truth leads me to the Spirit.
![I have changed the way I talk about salvation to my children and new believers. I do not ask them whether they want JUST a personal relationship with Christ but if they want to join the body of believers and have a new family!
"Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God!" (1 John 3:1-2)
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Is having a “personal relationship” with Jesus biblical?
I read an article that said this terminology is entirely unbiblical.
But, I feel to the detriment of our theology, we often RUSH to create a click-bait article that does not handle the nuance and goes from one extreme to the next.
I would argue that we have BOTH a personal and communal relationship with Christ.
The truth is our personal relationship correlates with our communal responsibility. The more we get to know Jesus personally, the more we see His desire for us to treat people with care.
The profession of our Faith is an individual decision as we choose to trust in Christ as our Savior. But that does not mean that our Christian Faith is privatized. God is personal in the way he communes with us and speaks to us through the power of the Spirit but we also pray communal prayers like “Our Father.” (The Lord’s Prayer)
Central to our Christian ethics is how we treat our neighbors. Living out our lives in community helps leads to our person/spiritual formation.
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