3. I Worship the Father
Audio Only:The story of the woman of Samaria is found only in John’s gospel. Consider that, at the time, this incident likely had little meaning to John, because not many months later, he was proposing to Jesus to call down fire from heaven and burn up the Samaritans.
Jesus’ rebuke to John and his brother James, however, did have an impact on John, more than it would have on most. “You do not know of what spirit you are. I did not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them.” There is no doubt that John pondered these words for decades and thus included the incident of Chapter 4.
Give Me to Drink. But John was not at the well to overhear the conversation between Jesus and this woman. Again, this speaks to what we know of John, that he would not have been satisfied until he had wheedled the conversation out of Jesus and out of the woman. John would not be turned aside; knowing Jesus was his life. And, of course, the woman was telling everyone what Jesus had said to her.
You know, I’ve never thought about Jesus’ first words to her, “Give Me to drink.” Jesus always drinks us into Himself first, that we might then drink of Him.
The Lowest Place. We cannot drink of Christ except He first drinks of us. Salvation always belongs to God, never to humans.
As I am pondering things, I realize that this setting is important for what Jesus was about to say. Why a woman and a Samaritan? Arrogance and contempt rule human practice, all coming out from the refusal to be the image of God in weakness. In the eyes of the Judeans of that day, and especially the Pharisees, there could be no lower place in society where Jesus could place Himself than to serve a Samaritan woman whom He knew was an adulteress.
Arrogance versus Humiliation. This is age-unfolding life, to know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent (John 17:3).
The truth is, this is the most ‘blasphemous’ statement in a chapter filled with ‘blasphemy.’ The carnal mind, whether Christian or non-Christian, sees any grandiose ‘claim,” that, “I know God the Father,” as the height of human arrogance. And so, here in Chapter 4, Jesus is showing us the Father, that is, humbling Himself, that is, showing us the Father, by placing Himself beneath of the lowest of the low. There is no other way to know the Father.
I Drink. The statements of faith from Chapter 4 divide easily into three groups. The first is drinking of living water, the second is worshipping the Father, and the third is doing the Father’s desire. Here are the statements of faith for drinking of living water.
- I know the gift of God; I know the One who is speaking to me. I ask You, Jesus, give me living water to drink.
- I drink from the water Jesus gives me. I drink and never stop drinking. I never thirst again.
- The water I drink of Jesus becomes in me a spring of living water bubbling up continuously into age-unfolding life.
- Springs of living water are always arising inside of me, out from my heart, out from my innermost being.
- I am filled to overflowing with the water of life. The spring of water inside of me is the source of life.
The Mediator. This is an extraordinary concept, for Jesus is the Mediator, the In-Between in both directions at once. Just as we humans know nothing about coming out from God through the good-speaking of Jesus, so God knows nothing of His thoughts concerning us as personal to us. To God, those thoughts are Himself. And so, just as Jesus is the channel through which the intimate knowledge of a Personal God enters into our knowing, so He is also the channel through which the intimate knowledge of you and me, humans, weak and sometimes frightened, strong and often foolish, enters into the knowing of the Father.
Never Stop Drinking. Just as Jesus takes the Father into our knowing, so He also takes us into the Father’s knowing. Through Jesus, God’s thoughts concerning us return to Himself, no longer as God, but as us, living and personal.
Shall never thirst again. I’ve wondered at that statement for years, for I knew that I always thirsted. Did that mean that I was not drinking of the living water Jesus gives? Technically, it did. But neither does it mean that in knowing the Father, we have no desires whatsoever. We do not thirst because we never stop drinking.
Into Our Knowing. Springs of living water is the knowledge of God my Father arising inside of me, now part of me, my very life, and Personally sharing my life together with me, and I personally sharing His life together with Him. Springs of Living Water, then, must be the first box on the page of The Jesus Secret, and I will reword the above sentence, just a bit, as its start.
Then, to fully develop the meaning of this incredible word, I will pull in from a breadth of gospel truth across the New Testament. The entrance of the knowledge of God into our knowing is what everything is all about.
Drinking of Living Water. I ask You, Jesus, give me living water to drink. I drink from the water Jesus gives me. I drink and never stop drinking. This water becomes in me a spring of living water, the knowledge of the Father, bubbling up continuously into age-unfolding life. Springs of living water always arise inside of me, out from my heart, out from my innermost being. I am filled to overflowing with the water of life.
This is an expression of the real meaning of being conceived of God, that the knowledge of God arises inside of us every moment through our continual acknowledgment.
Springs of Living Water. The living water continuously bubbling up inside of me is the knowledge of the Father, that is, age-unfolding life. God sent Jesus into me for this very purpose, to cause me to know that I am always coming out from my Father, out from His thoughts concerning me, and that every part of my being exists by the knowledge of God arising out from my heart.
I never thirst again because I am always drinking; I am always acknowledging God my Father as part of my life. The Atonement of Jesus is enough for me; I know and acknowledge God as my Source every moment. Knowing God my Father as my continuous Source, is the fulness of joy, it is overflowing abundance. I live as I have never lived before; I live forevermore.
What Is Worship? Here are the statements of faith for the second part, that of worshipping the Father.
- I am a true worshipper. I worship the Father with intimate closeness.
- I ‘kiss’ the Father; the Father ‘kisses’ me.
- I worship the Father inside of Spirit. I worship the Father inside of truth.
- I know the Father searches for me with great desire, that I would worship Him with kissing.
- Christ Jesus speaks to me.
Your Body. Worship is two things that look very different outwardly, but inwardly are the same. Those two things are the romance of marriage union and the offering of sacrifice. The Spirit of God means BOTH.
– Present your bodies a living offering, holy and devoted to God, well-pleasing, for this is your reasonable service or worship. And do not share the same outward pattern of expression with this age but be transformed, that is, metamorphosed, by the renewing of your mind, into proving out what is the desire of God, that which is good, well-pleasing, and complete (Romans 12:1-2).
Thirst and Desire. Now, this is fascinating, because the thread running through all three parts of Chapter 4 is thirst/desire. In fact, John is preparing us for the big one coming up in Chapter 7, the fulfillment of Tabernacles.
In the first part, we drink of the knowledge of God entering into our knowing. In the second part, we give ourselves to God inside that knowing, to share life with Him in the intimate closeness of romance. And in the third part, we do the Father’s desire, just as Jesus did, that is, And We Also – set forth our souls for – the harvest, that is, for others coming into Tabernacles.
One Theme Repeated. We can see already that this is John’s one theme, repeated over and over, all through his gospel and his epistles. Why, then, would anyone think that John threw all this out in his vision of the revelation of Jesus Christ, and return to no spirit and no knowledge of God under the old? I assert that John’s vision is the SAME theme centered on worshipping the Father in Spirit and in truth.
The first part is the life of God entering into us as divine procreation. The second part is our intimate fellowship with a Personal God inside of us, that is, romance. And the third part is knowing that the Desire of God goes beyond us and into our world, thus, the worship of sacrifice.
Speaking Christ. God my Father searches for me and greatly desires that I would give myself to Him. I worship the Father in intimate closeness, for I am a true worshipper. I kiss the Father; the Father kisses me. We know one another; we love one another. I worship God inside of Spirit; I worship God inside of truth. Christ Jesus speaks to me.
The second box must then be a definition of “worship,” but only partly from Websters, with other meanings as well. Worship inside of Spirit is romance, the worship of marriage union. And worship inside of Truth is sacrifice, giving all inside of all purity. ~ With my body, I Thee worship.
Worship as Romance. I adore God. I admire God extravagantly. I honor His Person; I receive His desire. I open my heart to His Word that God might plant His Seed, the Lord Jesus, into my heart. I receive into myself all that God speaks.
I give myself, spirit, soul, and body, to God, to be Himself in me as He desires. I devote myself to God with all abandonment. I pray continuously; I exalt His holy name. I tell everyone how wonderful God is to me.
Worship as Sacrifice. I honor God with all honor, respect, and service. I honor God with complete honesty; I never pretend in His presence. I acknowledge God with me in all things. I give God all place in my life.
I offer my body to God as a living sacrifice, not only to receive His Seed and to bring forth His life, but also to be His own body, that He might walk this earth with me. I offer my soul to God, my story of self, that He might join together with others, here inside my heart, that we together might set others free, that we together might love.
The Father’s Desire. Here are the statements of faith for the third part.
- Christ Jesus speaks to me.
- My food is to do the desire of the One who sends me and to complete His work.
- I complete the Father’s work; I fulfill all His desire.
- I see the fields, white for harvest. I reap and gather into age-unfolding life.
- I sow and others reap. Others sow and I reap. We rejoice together.
Fields for Harvest. To understand the full meaning of this part, we must return to the arrogance and contempt against which Jesus showed us the Father by humbling Himself. The “fields white for harvest” are NOT speaking of the lost receiving Jesus as their Savior, that is, what is called “evangelism” in evangelical Christianity. They are speaking, rather, of the entire Church of Jesus Christ, already pure, already complete, yet having refused to enter into the knowledge of God, into the full expression of Tabernacles. And why have they refused?
The “Sin of Pride.” I am reading a book of historical fiction, set in the Wars of the Roses in late 1400’s England. These are all “Christian” men, speaking constantly of God and of Bible things, yet the arrogance and contempt in which they move towards one another and towards all the “peasants” is overwhelming.
Here is a quote from one “nobleman,” a bishop, that is, a minister of Christ in the church, speaking to his brother. “God will hear your prayers, Richard. Beyond that is a sacred mystery. It would be the sin of pride to think that you could discover God’s plans for us…”
Burned at the Stake. In other words, “You CANNOT know God, and those who think they know God are ARROGANT.” Yet these same men destroyed the lives of those whom they held in contempt in a blind pursuit of POWER!
I am always impressed with the fact that Michael Severus taught knowing the Father through Christ inside of you, just the same as I do, and that John Calvin, the greatest arguer of Nicene theology, burned him at the stake for the wickedness of blasphemy and arrogance. This is the context of – My food is to do the desire of the One who sends me and to complete His work.
In Great Distress. Jesus humbled Himself to show us Father, that we also might know our God in intimate closeness, yet Jesus was executed for the wickedness of arrogance in claiming that He knew God, that God was His Father. Yet it was in His great distress in “completing the Father’s work” wherein Jesus set forth His soul for us, that we might be joined together with Father inside of Him.
The reason God’s people have not entered into Tabernacles, and into the Holy of Holies, is all the preachers lined up with their backs towards the knowledge of God, telling them that “knowing God” is arrogance.
The Father’s Work. Out from this worship, then, my food and strength is to do the desire of the Father who sends me and to complete His work. I complete the Father’s work; this is what I do. I fulfill all His desire. I see the fields white for harvest, for the ingathering of Tabernacles. I work with others to gather into age-unfolding life. We rejoice together.
And so the third box must be – “I Do the Father’s Desire.” Again, this is Tabernacles, this is bringing all who belong to Jesus into the turned around acknowledgment of God through them, of God sharing their lives with them.
Desire Fulfilled. I acknowledge that God’s deepest desire inside of creation is that all would know Him. I do the Father’s desire by first knowing God all through my own life and then showing the simple human joy such a way of living really is.
I acknowledge that Father’s work is to reconcile all to Himself, that all might live their lives together with God in intimate closeness. I gain all the nourishment and strength I need by first sharing my life with Father and He with me and then showing to others the great value and goodness of this way of living.
Together with Father, I direct all things into goodness.
Something Brand New. There is so much more in this chapter than I had thought. It would be easy to write three more lessons going further into depth on each of the three parts. Yet I have cast this wondrous worship of God into the hatred of the world against God. And that is what John does, all the way through – the world HATES you.
To drink of living water, to worship the Father in Spirit and in truth, to do all the Father’s desire, is to join that company of people who are the witnesses of Christ, commonly known as “martyrs.” Yet through us is coming something brand new.
Reading for Next Time. The next lesson/page will be “I Possess Life.” For that, read Chapters 4 and 5 in the Jesus Secret Version.
To possess life means clearly, to possess an intimate knowing of the Father, sharing our lives with us. This is John’s theme, from beginning to end, from “those who are conceived out from God” to “the Spirit and the Bride say, ‘Come.’” This is God’s great metaphor of the reproduction of life, God revealing His life through us into creation.
Just as the Father possesses life inside of Himself, so also He gave to the Son to possess life inside of Himself, and He gave to Him authority to execute judgment…
Let’s Pray Together. After making this word personal to ourselves in our prayer, let’s then direct our prayer towards one person close to us who is being or might be pressed into taking the genetic engineering serum. I will pray for my nephew, Nathan.
“Oh God, our Father, we open our hearts wide open to You to receive Your Seed into our lives, the Lord Jesus, that You might be free to be Yourself inside of us and through every part of our lives and beings. Father, we are so grateful that You desire to share our lives with us and to experience us sharing Your life with You. Father we honor You with all worship, by romance as well as sacrifice.
“Oh God, our Father, we worship You inside of Your great desire to bring all created things into the intimate closeness of knowing You. Father, we give You our bodies and our souls as a living sacrifice, that You might win all desire through us. (Put the one you are praying for in the blank.)
“Father, we pray for those caught inside the horrific press of the beast, that they would stand firm against the awfulness. Father, I pray for my nephew, Nathan , that You would KEEP him close inside Yourself, that You would protect him and his family in these times. Father, I call You into his life. Make Yourself known to Nathan, to his wife and children , in intimate closeness. Keep them from all evil.
“Father, together with You, we turn all this evil intention into unending goodness in the lives of all.”