Christ Lutheran Church
Cleveland, Ohio
March 8, 2026
by: Rev. Dean Kavouras

Lent 3A
Worship God

But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and Truth. For the Father seeks just such worshipers to worship him. God is Spirit and those who worship him must worship him in Spirit and Truth.” (John 4:23-24 DKV)
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Today our Lord teaches humanity about its chief duty, the one that precedes and supersedes all others; and that is to Worship God. However that little phrase “worship God” is one of the most elusive in Christian vocabulary.

But let us be sure today if we have not been before, that to “worship God” is essential to being human – and minus our desire to know our God we are in danger of becoming insentient. Dumber than a bag of rocks because Jesus said that if the people did not praise him that the very rocks would rise up to do so. Do you doubt it?

If so one need only open the Bible to the first page, first sentence to find these words, “In the beginning God.” If we do the first thing we notice is that there is not a blank line there where a person might insert his own name; or that of some person, place or thing that provides you with peace and security, “when every earthly prop gives way.”

“In the beginning God” is what it says, just like Jesus says to Satan after his 40 day temptation in the wilderness, “Get away from me, Satan. For it is written, you shall worship the Lord your God and Him only shall you serve.” (Mt. 4:10)

And so the seamless truth of Holy Scripture insists that we seek out the true God and how to worship him. Nor are we left to our own devices to choose some “version of God” that we like. Often when a clergyman is out in the public people want to assure him that they “believe in God, and that they pray to him.” So far, so good!

But rarely do they know who the true God is, what his name is, why he might want to answer their prayers, or where one can locate him to offer him their actual “prayer praise and thanksgiving.” And so let us now hear this priceless gem of truth from the mouth of the Son of God. From the lips of the One who says, I am in the Father, and the Father in me” (John 14:11) that we must worship the Father in Spirit and Truth.

Yes, God is Father. Not in a vague sense as the first causation, though he is that. But he is THE Father, and to properly worship him we must believe that he is the Father who presents himself as such in Scripture. Or said another way, “God the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth and of all things visible and invisible.” If one’s god is anything less than the God of the Nicene Creed, then he is not a true worshiper of the one true God.

The next thing we learn from Jesus in today’s gospel is that: God is Spirit. A divine teaching that has given way to every kind of theological misunderstanding.

Let us know clearly that the word “spirit” does NOT mean that our God not simply an idea. Or that he is invisible, or immaterial, or in some other way less than physical. There are many proofs of his physicality such as the appearances he made in the Garden. Or to Abraham when the Three Blessed Persons Of The Holy Trinity came to visit him in the form of 3 men.

But more to the point we need to take seriously the words of Genesis where God says, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” (Gen 1:26). How did our Maker come up with the human form? In the same way he came up with the giraffe, or the parakeet? No! But he says, “in our image, after our likeness.” We must not take this as figurative language.

Nor is it only figurative when the Psalmist calls on God to: stretch forth his arm to save or, open his ear to our prayers, or to see the deeds of the wicked? Not at all. When Jesus says that God is Spirit it means that he is not bound by human limitations. He doesn’t always need to occupy space or time or allow people to see him when he doesn’t want to be seen.

And, you can be sure that if God were ever to come to earth that he would look just like we do. Oh … wait a minute! God did come down, didn’t he? And not as a hologram, or in the form of a bird or a camel, but in our form, because that is his natural form too.

So, yes, God is Spirit and thus he seeks people to worship him. And what does that mean except to participate in his unimaginable and resplendent glory.

But pay close attention here because the term “in Spirit and Truth” does NOT INDICATE THE MANNER of our worship. It has nothing to do with bubbly feelings, or a sincerity we must experience. But “Spirt and Truth” have to do with LOCATION, not MANNER IN WHICH.

Do you remember what Jesus told the Samaritan woman when she engaged him in theological discussion as to whether God is rightly worshiped in Samaria or in Jerusalem?

What was the Lord’s reply? “Woman! Believe me! The hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father.” But instead the true and new location of worship is in the Person of Jesus himself. That is the “where.” And as far as the manner one must worship in this manner; “in Spirit and Truth.”

By this maxim our Lord means that our worship of God must proceed from the Holy Spirit, “who proceeds from the Father and the Son,” and who seized us up in baptism with his indestructible love.

Yes, true worship is only rendered by those who have been apprehended by the same Holy Spirit that “descended and remained” on Jesus (John 1:33). And that Jesus “handed over” to the world with his dying breath in John 19:30. And whom he and the Father poured out upon the world at Pentecost. The Spirit who calls us the cancel all falsehood, and believe the Truth that Jesus is. And without which no man can ever come to the Father (John 14:6) in any event.

Without the blood and water that our dear Lord poured out for us from his riven side: and without his Holy Spirit who wakes us up from our “woke” condition, we have nothing.

But with it we have everything. And we can worship God in Spirit and Truth in this house. And from this “House of Prayer” in the world at large. As God’s true worshipers who live the baptismal life each day wherever we may find themselves no matter how outlandish! Indeed the more peculiar the place or time – the more that God’s love must be demonstrated, by us. This, too, is to worship in Spirit and Truth. Amen