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Sermon #1152

True Worship

A Sermon on John 4:13-14

Originally preached Nov. 6, 1966

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Scripture

John 4:13-14 ESV KJV
Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” …

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Sermon Description

What does it mean to worship the Lord in spirit and in truth? How does this look in the life of a Christian? These are both very important and relevant questions that the Christian should be asking themselves. Listen as Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones addresses these questions through the story of the woman at the well in John 4:13­–14 in this sermon titled “True Worship.” He begins by defining worship as an act of bowing down, which means that Christian worship should move them to fall on their knees in awe before the Lord. Worship is when adoration of the Lord and Savior is all that can be done. He goes on to express how the Christian is moved to this kind of worship when they spend time in prayer and submit themselves completely to the teaching of Scripture. God is the one who teaches how to worship and He leads in that worship. He concludes by challenging with these questions: “are we worshiping ignorantly? Do we truly know the God we worship?” The Christian must guard against ignorance and truly seek after the God they worship. Because while worship is an external act, it is most importantly a reflection of the internal state of being in awe of God.

Sermon Breakdown

  1. Worship is bowing down before God and adoring him for who he is. It is not the same as prayer, Bible reading, singing or listening to sermons. Those should lead to worship but are not worship in themselves.

  2. We must submit ourselves entirely to the teaching of the Bible concerning worship. We must not rely on our own ideas or add things to worship.

  3. The story of Korah's rebellion shows that God instructs us how to worship. We must worship as God commands, not as we think best.

  4. Jesus told the woman of Samaria that the Jews knew how to properly worship God. We must follow the teaching of Jesus and the Bible.

  5. God is spirit. He is not confined to any place. We cannot limit God to buildings or locations.

  6. Although God is spirit, he is also personal. He is our Father. Jesus revealed God as our Father.

  7. We have been adopted as God's children. We can come before him with confidence as our Father.

  8. We must remember who God is before we worship him. He is the Creator, all-powerful and all-knowing, yet he cares for us.

  9. God dwells in us and walks among us. He has chosen us to be his people.

  10. God is not ashamed to be called our God. He cares for us. We can cast all our cares on him.

The Book of John

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (1899-1981) was a Welsh evangelical minister who preached and taught in the Reformed tradition. His principal ministry was at Westminster Chapel, in central London, from 1939-1968, where he delivered multi-year expositions on books of the bible such as Romans, Ephesians and the Gospel of John. In addition to the MLJ Trust’s collection of 1,600 of these sermons in audio format, most of these great sermon series are available in book form (including a 14 volume collection of the Romans sermons), as are other series such as "Spiritual Depression", "Studies in the Sermon on the Mount" and "Great Biblical Doctrines". He is considered by many evangelical leaders today to be an authority on biblical truth and the sufficiency of Scripture.