Ye worship ye know not what; we worship what we know, for salvation is of the Jews.
The woman had raised the old argument between Samaritans and Jews about the right place to worship. Jesus moved the question from place to knowledge, and gave one reason for the difference: salvation comes from the Jews.
Jesus tells the woman that her people worship what they do not know. One writer says such worship is not merely empty. Something else stands behind it.
So the Samaritan worship was all wrong. Their break from the worship carried on at Jerusalem had no authority behind it. Salvation was from the Jews. It had to come through them, and not through those who kept up the Samaritan split — and a split is a fair name for it. Besides, they worshipped what they did not know. What a solemn statement! False worship has another being behind it than God. Demons are there, not God (1 Cor. 10:20).
The two halves of the verse do two different things to her. One disowns her religion; the other exposes her own condition.
By saying, "You worship what you do not know," He disowned that worship. By saying, "salvation is from the Jews," He showed her that she was not saved. She stood among the Gentiles — "strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world" (Eph. 2:12). So even while they discussed worship, His words went like a blade to her conscience.
Jesus says "we," putting Himself with the Jews. Their advantage was not something they invented. God gave it to them.
In verse 22 the Lord makes one conclusion impossible for the Samaritan. She might have argued that, since only Christian worship was about to be acceptable to God, and place and race no longer counted, Samaritan worship had been just as good as Jewish. It was not. The Samaritans worshipped what they did not know; the Jews knew what they worshipped, "for salvation," He added, "is from the Jews." They had "the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises. To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen." (Rom. 9:4-5.)
Samaritan worship copied the real thing. It rested on part of the Bible, and it began for a reason that had nothing to do with faith.
The king of Assyria had deported the whole population of the northern kingdom of Israel. The Samaritans were the direct descendants of the people who took their place. They thought it wise to keep the god of that country happy, so they began to copy the worship of the Jews. They had the five books of Moses in a version still called the Samaritan Pentateuch. This was Samaritan worship, and it was a counterfeit worship of the God of Israel.
The little word "for" carries the argument. Knowing God depends on salvation, so where there is no salvation there is no true worship.
Compare the Jews with the Samaritans, and the Lord could say nothing else: "We worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews." Worship always matches the revelation God has given. So what could worship be where there was no salvation? Jewish worship was set out in pictures and shadows. Salvation was still a hope, not a relationship and a possession they already held.
That reason is not just about history. It decides how anyone comes to know God.
"We worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews." Do you hear that, dear friends? We come to know God, and to know the Father, through salvation. Do you not see that unless we know God as a Saviour-God, we do not know Him at all?
Where Jesus said this matters as much as what He said. He was among people who resented the Jews, and He still defended Israel's place.
There was presumption and ignorance in Samaria, and the Lord does not hide the advantage Israel had in every way. But notice that Jesus only says this when He is outside: He defends the Jews while He stands among their rivals, and while He Himself is rejected. What grace! ... The rejected Lord does not deny what truly had honour, even though it was now working against Him. He does not belittle the line of promise.
Salvation started from one nation, but it was never meant to stop there.
"Salvation is from the Jews" (John 4:22), but now it was to be carried to the ends of the earth. So God woke Cornelius, a Gentile, to want the full blessing as it flowed out, and brought him to know forgiveness through the name of the Lord Jesus.
- Source. Salvation has a channel — it came from the Jews, along the line of promise, and the Christ came from their race.
- Knowledge. The Jews knew whom they worshipped because salvation was among them. Worship always matches the revelation God gives.
- Ignorance. Samaritan worship copied the real thing without the revelation. False worship has another being behind it than God.
- Grace. Jesus defended Israel's place while He stood among their rivals, and while Israel was rejecting Him.
- Reach. What began with one nation went out to the ends of the earth, and reached Gentiles like Cornelius.
But [the] hour is coming and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth; for also the Father seeks such as his worshippers.
At a well, a Samaritan woman has just asked Jesus where people should worship — on her mountain, or in Jerusalem. His answer sets that question aside and announces an hour when the Father Himself goes looking for worshippers.
Her question assumed that worship needs a sacred address. The Lord's reply removes it:
First, our Lord here plainly teaches that from now on there would be no special place of worship on earth. Jerusalem had been the sacred place where the temple of God stood. His people travelled there year by year from all parts of the land. But along with the rejection of Christ, their house, until then the house of God, was left to them desolate. Never since that time has there been a material house of God upon earth. The Church is now the dwelling place of God through the Spirit. Our place of worship is now inside the torn veil, in the immediate presence of God.
The change is not only in the place but in the One worshipped. Jesus names Him the Father. One writer shows how startling that was for a woman with her past:
We might have pictured the Almighty as needing to be appeased first. Only then would He accept the honour due to Him as Creator, from people who begged for permission to offer it. But now she learned that He is the Father, and that as the Father He is seeking worshippers. Men and women like her, who deserved only everlasting ruin, could worship Him in that relationship. This was new indeed, and full of grace.
Each of the two words has a definite sense. Together they rule out empty ritual, and any thought of God that stops short of how He has revealed Himself:
To worship "in spirit" is to worship according to the true nature of God. It is worship in the power of the communion the Holy Spirit gives. It stands in contrast to worship made up of forms and ceremonies, and to the religiousness that human nature can produce. To worship "in truth" is to worship God according to the revelation He has been pleased to give of Himself. So it would not be worship "in truth" now to worship Him only as "a great God," "our Maker," and "a great King above all gods," as in Psalm 95. He has chosen to reveal Himself in another light, as "Father" to those who are His.
The verse ends with a reason, and it reverses the usual direction of religion:
In this hour it was no longer a question of what man ought to be for God, but of what God is for the sinner. "The Father is seeking such people to worship Him." As for man's worship, it was all worthless. You can build a machine to perform ceremonies if you are clever enough to make one… This is not God demanding worship. As man's duty, worship is quite right. But the Lord is here in grace, and out of the abundance of His heart He says, "The Father is seeking" worshippers. He is not looking at forms of worship; He is seeking vile, broken-down sinners to make them worshippers.
So can anyone start worshipping at will? The word true stands in the way, and one writer ties it back to the woman herself:
It is worse than useless, "in the hour that now is," to pretend to worship our God and Father unless we are genuine worshippers. … Adam had become conscious of his sin. So when he heard God's voice in the garden, he hurried to hide from Him. So would all uncleansed worshippers, if they heard His voice today. It is not a question of sincerity, but of salvation. Cleansing by the blood of Jesus is absolutely necessary. We cannot worship Him in spirit and in truth until we know Him by faith, as revealed by and in His Son. And we never know Him like that until His word convicts us of what we have done and what we are, as it convicted the Samaritan woman.
Jesus does not push this hour into the future. He says it has already arrived:
Worship is the outgoing of the heart in heaven. Worship for us now is real. It is the greatest privilege the Christian is brought into while on earth. A Christian in this way anticipates the mind and occupation of heaven. He will still be a worshipper when glorified; but he is a worshipper here, for the hour "now is when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Father seeks such to worship him."
- Seeking. The Father is not waiting to be found. He is out looking — and He looks for broken-down sinners, not for people with impressive forms.
- Finding. What He finds, He first makes. The woman was convicted, then cleansed, then a worshipper. Nobody worships "in truth" without coming to know God through His Son.
- Freeing. Because He seeks worshippers, no mountain and no building owns worship. Since Christ's rejection, there has been no material house of God on earth. Believers now worship in God's own presence.
- Filling. "In spirit" means worship that matches God's own nature and rises by the Holy Spirit. "In truth" means worship that matches how He has revealed Himself — as Father, not only as Maker.
- Now. The hour is not pending. Worship is heaven's occupation, started early. It is the highest privilege open to a Christian on earth.
God [is] a spirit; and they who worship him must worship [him] in spirit and truth.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.