There are worshipers everywhere.
All around this city, I suspect, a goodly portion, maybe not a
majority, but a goodly portion of the people in this city and
county today are somewhere worshiping God, at least outwardly. Folks who worship in what's called
high church worship, folks who worship in what nobody except
folks who don't like it would call low church worship. formal
services and contemporary services. They have liturgical services
and services where they wouldn't dare think about following any
kind of plan, set pattern. Churches where folks are very
quiet and reverent, kneel together and stand together, speak when
they're supposed to and silent when they're supposed to be silent.
Churches where folks shout and holler and run everywhere. Churches
that are conservative and churches that are liberal. churches that
are orthodox and churches that are not. In the light of those
things, I have a question. A question which needs to be
answered. A question which if we are serious
about this business of worshiping God must be answered for us.
A question which can be answered only from the book of God. It can't be answered by considering
what we've observed from our parents or our forefathers. It
can't be answered by tradition or experience. It can't be answered
by any observation that men may make. It can't be answered from
creeds or confessions of faith. It's got to be answered from
this book. Here's the question. Who worships God? Who worships God? Everybody says
they do. But if they worship in so many different ways, with
so many different creeds, with so many different notions of
God, who worships God? The answer is found in John chapter
four and verse 24. These are the words of the Lord
Jesus Christ to the Samaritan woman who presumed, though she
did not, she presumed she worshiped God. These are the words of our
Lord to a woman who, though she did not know God, was confident
she did. The words of our Lord to a woman
who, though she did not know anything at all about the worship
of God, presumed that she did. He said, God is spirit. The word a, that little indefinite
article, should not be in the text. In fact, there is no indefinite
article at all in the Greek language. And the word a is added simply
because that is proper grammatical structure. But the text does
not read literally God is a spirit. There are lots of spirits. God's
not just one of them. God is spirit. He is the spirit. the ever-living, eternal, incomprehensible,
pure, holy spirit. God is spirit. And they that
worship him, they that worship him, must. Ain't but one way to do it. Ain't
but one way to do it. They that worship him must worship
him in spirit and in truth. Now this is what that means.
To say that we must worship God in spirit, is to say that we
must worship him by his spirit, and we must worship him in our
spirits, in a spiritual manner, not a physical manner, not an
emotional manner, not in a manner that's pleasing to the flesh,
but in a spiritual manner. And we must worship him in truth. Worshiping God in truth. Means
that we must worship him truthfully, yes, with sincerity. We've come
here to worship God today. Or have we? If we've come to worship God,
we've got to take the mask off. Lindsay Campbell, it's the hardest
thing on this earth for a human being to do. before God to take
the mask off. I don't even like doing it in
front of you, but that's easy compared to this. Before God take the
mask off. No pretense. No hypocrisy, sincerity,
truth. Whether we're talking about public
worship or private. Whether you're talking about
coming together in the assembly of God's saints at one of our
midweek services, a Sunday morning service, or one of the conferences
where lots of folks are at, or whether you're talking about
the lonely watches of the night, in the darkness and still of
the night, when you lay on your bed by yourself, you call on
God, take the mask off! Don't pretend with God. Don't
try to fake anything with God. One of the great blessedness
I see in the Psalms and the blessed hymn book and prayer book of
the church inspired by God is that there we're allowed with
David, the man who is described by God himself as that man after
God's own heart. We're allowed to go with David
into his closet as he pours out his heart to God. And David Coleman, there wasn't
any hypocrisy there. No dissimulation there. No guile,
no deceit. To worship God in truth means
that we must stand before him deliberately naked in truth. Our Lord said in Matthew 15,
this people draw up nigh to me with their mouth. They honor
me with their lips. but their heart is far from thee. And yet there's more than that.
If we would worship God in truth, if we would truly worship God,
we must worship him in accordance with revealed truth. We must
worship him through faith in Jesus Christ who is the truth,
and we must worship him as he has made himself known, and by
the pattern of revealed truth given in Holy Scripture. That
means that we don't worship God by whatever means we take a notion. We don't worship God by sitting
down and deciding what's the best way to worship him. We don't
worship God by getting together with folks and saying, now how
do you think we ought to worship God? We worship God by his word,
but we don't worship him. You know that would just about
eliminate almost all of what goes on in religion today. And
it would wipe it all out. It would wipe it all out. I tell
you what, this message will be going out over the radio, so
y'all forgive me while I talk to folks outside this congregation. Sit down with your church pastors,
elders, and deacons. Sit down with them. And make a covenant with one
another. Anything we can't find in this book, we'll quit doing. That puts all of that out of
business. If we can't find it in this book, we won't do it.
If we can't find it in this book, we won't teach it. If we can't
find it in this book, we won't practice it. Only what God says
will we do in God's name. If we worship God, we must worship
Him confessing our sins like the publican in truth. Trusting
the Lord Jesus Christ, His blood and His righteousness as our
substitute, calling on the name of the Lord. That's where it
is to call on the name of the Lord. Folks, whoever shall call
upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. The word means that
whoever worships God, whoever worships God, he'll be saved.
Who worships him? We must worship him upon an altar
of earth without any steps. That means by pregress of love.
And I mentioned this a couple of weeks ago, but turn back to
Exodus 20. I want you to see this for yourself. In the giving
of the law, God set before Moses his strict righteousness, justice,
and truth, and set before us that standard of absolute righteousness
by which all men must be judged, either damned or accepted, according
to strict justice with no leniency and no mercy whatsoever. And
then he tells us how we must worship him. In verse 24 of Exodus
chapter 20. The Lord God says, an altar of
earth shalt thou make unto me, and sacrifice thereon thy burnt
offerings, and thy peace offerings, thy sheep, and thine oxen, and
all places where I record my name, I will come unto thee,
and I will bless thee. Well, that's not much impressionism.
That's not very much impressive to me. An altar of earth? Scrape together some of that
old red clay you get down in North Carolina and Georgia and
put a little water on it. Make an altar of earth. Well
surely we got to have some diamonds in there. Surely we need to overlay
this thing with gold. Surely we ought to get a fine
artisan who can come and with his woodwork make a beautiful,
beautiful, beautiful altar and then cover that thing with gold
and trim it out in silver and sparkle it with some precious
stones here and there. Surely that's your great concern
and respect for God. You show respect to God, buddy,
by doing what he says. An altar of earth? What's that
mean? An altar you ain't got anything
to do with. An altar you didn't produce. An altar made by God's hand. Read on. And if thou wilt make
me an altar of stone, he anticipated the time of the building of the
tabernacle in the temple. He said, if you'll make me an
altar of stone, okay, that'd be all right. Not just a dirt
altar, get one that's hard and solid. Many an altar stone, thou
shalt not build it of human stone. Don't do that. Don't do that.
Well, how are you going to get an altar stone? Go get some rocks
that God made. There's his altar. Boy now, preacher,
what can be wrong with taking a chisel and a hammer and going
to work on that rock and taking some good, fine, fine paper and
polishing that rock and shining that rock up? What can be wrong
with that? Look at it, look at it. For if thou lift up thy tool
upon it, thou hast polluted it. What on earth is God saying?
Exactly what you think he's saying. You put your hand into the business
of salvation. You put your hand into the business
of finding acceptance with God. You put your hand into the work
of coming before God Almighty. Put your hand there. You put
your hand there. And you polluted the whole thing.
And Gary, it doesn't matter where you put it. Look at the next
line. Neither shalt thou go up by steps. You wanna go up to the altar?
You just scratch together and pack together some dirt and a
rag and walk up that thing. Don't you build any stamps? Cause
if you do, you show your nakedness. Neither shalt thou go up by steps
unto mine altar, that thy nakedness be not discovered thereon. You
show your shame. Show your shame. I'm certain,
I don't have any question about it. He's talking about something
specifically related to gospel truth. To worship on God's altar
is to worship God on the merit of Jesus Christ alone. That one
who comes to be God and man in one glorious person. That one
who comes to make a sacrifice for sin by which we alone can
be accepted of God. That one in whom alone we have
righteousness. And we come to God without lifting
our hands, not even putting our will to his work. What's your
salvation? Christ. What's your hope? Christ. That's all. That's all.
Christ. Christ! That's all. Just Christ. Then we find our acceptance only
in him. But now once we're saved, you
know, we have steps. by which we ascend into greater
spirituality and greater holiness and greater acceptance with God.
It's called legal works. It's called sanctification. It's
called earning reward. You lift up your hand on God's
altar and you've polluted it and you've shown your shame,
your nakedness. Well, preacher, The way you talk,
the only way a man can truly worship God is to worship God
being given faith in Jesus Christ alone. You heard everything I've
got to say. That's it. That's exactly what
I'm saying. The only way any sinner can ever
come to God, the only way any sinner will ever have him and
worship him, that altar of God's making, without lifting his hand
and polluting it, without ascending his steps and showing his nakedness. The only way you'll ever trust
Jesus Christ, the Lord, is if God brings you to trust him.
And the only way you'll ever come to God is trusting Christ
alone. The Lord Jesus declares now,
the Father seeketh such to worship him. You interested in worshiping
God? God's business is seeking sinners
to worship him upon the basis of blood atonement. by the power
of his spirit with heart, faith, looking to Christ alone for access
to and acceptance with him. Our text declares, the Lord Jesus,
the Son of God declares, God is spirit, and they that worship
him must worship him in spirit and in truth. But that's so contrary to human
nature, isn't it? It's contrary to your nature
and mine. Now, let's be honest. Oh, God, help us to be honest.
This is contrary to our nature, James. We've been blessed with
the ordinances of divine worship, but rather than using the ordinances
to worship God in spirit and in truth, our tendency is to
pervert the ordinances, make them ceremonies and rituals.
Ceremonies and rituals, we can perform just as well without
God as with him. That's our tendency. We're going
to do this whether God wills it or not. We're going to do
this whether God manifests it or not. That's ritualism. That's ceremonialism. That's
idolatry. Oh no, these ordinances. Baptism,
the Lord's Supper. These are ordinances to be performed
more continually by faith. Worshipping God. Constantly turning
our hearts to him. Constantly turning our hearts
inside out. Constantly causing us to examine ourselves before
him. God's to be worshipped in spirit and in truth, but we content
ourselves with bodily exercise. The exercise of outward worship
and neglect the internal spiritual reality of worship. We love images
and Symbolisms and beads and organs
and incantations and choirs and entertainment. We love to be
impressed. We do. Some of the most impressive
architecture in the world in history is religious architecture. Really is. Really is. The most
beautiful building I've ever seen in my life personally, the
most beautiful building I've ever seen in my life personally,
He stayed out in Little Rock, Arkansas, going around the interstate.
Shelby and I passed by it several times to drive him. It is a huge,
beautiful, beautiful Pentecostal church. Used to be an idolatrous, idolatrous
place. No gospel, no God, no worship,
no knowledge of God, no truth at all. But beautiful? Man's
impressive. Man's impressive. We come in
buildings and we look at their pipe working you know. Man, a
lot of that impresses. That impresses. As if God's impressed. We're impressed because it cost
a lot of money. I had all the greats of the day
at Children's Museum. They got one over there made
out of plastic pipe. Sounds just as good. Just as good, that's
exactly right. But we're impressed with what
impresses men. We watch a man go through some
kind of silly incantation, put on a costume he wouldn't be caught
dead on Halloween wearing, and walk out in public. Everything
is, oh, that's spiritual. God have mercy on us. That's
our only hope. Paul said this, bodily exercise,
the mere outward motions of divine worship, profiteth little. But godliness, now that's where
it is skipped. Godliness. In here. Godliness is profitable in all
things, having promise of life that now is, and of that which
is to come. You and I are impressed, pleased
with, and dedicated to outward religion. We like plays and programs and
stay busy. One of the religious slogans
back when I was a boy, folks come in church and say, use them
or lose them. Use them or lose them. Gotta get folks busy or
you lose them. If you got them, you do. Ah, but Merle Hart, if God's
got you. It's a different story. Different story. And I'll be
honest with you. And I'm not being mean. I'm not
being hard. I'm not being hard-nosed. I have no intention of ever compromising
anything to get or keep anybody. Nothing. I mean nothing. How
come? Because if God hadn't got you,
we're better off without you. If God hadn't got me, you're
better off without me. That's exactly right. That's
it. We're not here trying to impress men. If we are, oh, God
shut this place up today. I'm as serious as I can be. But
what are you here for? To worship God. To worship God. That which is highly esteemed
among men. Might be. So what he said is
it. It's an abomination to God. It's
an abomination. You can just make on it. Now
you can just, you can kettle on this. You can kettle on this.
Anything. Anything that has to do with
religion that you see on Nightline tomorrow night is an abomination
to God. Anything, anything that you see on national television
has to do with religion, then, oh, look at this. It's an abomination
to God. Anything, anybody. That which
men esteem, that which men applaud, that which men praise is an abomination
to God always. Understand what I'm saying? Outward
worship and outward service to God must never be neglected. Never. Never. I'm not going to let it happen.
God helping me, I'm not going to let it happen. Nothing's going
to keep me from worshiping God. Nothing. There's not anything
very important. There's not anything very important.
I'm honest with you, if my mother would arise from the dead and
come visit us next Sunday, I'd be in the house of God worshiping
him, whether she wanted to or not. I'm not going to let anything
happen to stop it. It's not going to happen. God's
helping me. How come? Because there's nothing more
important. Nothing more important. And yet, if outward worship's
all we have, our worship is unadvantaged. Turn to Isaiah 29 for a second. The absence of heart, the absence
of heart-faith in Christ, the absence of heart-devotion to
the glory of God, makes all outward religion vain religion. Verse 13, Isaiah 29. Wherefore the Lord said, the
Lord said, Lord would be mighty good if folks paid attention
to what the Lord said, wouldn't he? The Lord said. Or our forefathers
said. I don't give a hoot what our
forefathers said. Or our churches always said. Who cares what your
churches always said? Well, we've always believed that's
your problem. The Lord said. The Lord said. For as much as this people draw
near to me with their mouth, come to church every Sunday,
twice on Sunday, And with their lips do honor me, but have removed their heart
far from me. Look at this next line. Their
fear toward me. You know what that word fear
means, Bobby? Their worship of me. Their religion. The whole of it. Their religion
is taught by the precept of men. I received a letter, two letters
this past week asking me why I don't subscribe to any of the
creeds. There's the reason. That's exactly
the reason. Therefore, behold, I will proceed
to do a marvelous work among this people. Even a marvelous
work and a wonder for the wisdom of their wise men shall perish.
and the understanding of their prudent men shall be healed.
Now after Elijah, I want you to read, if you will, Matthew
chapter 15 and Mark chapter 7. In those two passages, our Lord
Jesus applies this text in Isaiah 29 to the Pharisees in his day
and to the Pharisees in our day. He applies it to his generation
and to our generation. And he says, in vain do they
worship me. Teaching for doctrines the commandments
of men. You see, the Pharisees added
to the word of God. Now they never, never did they
say, never did they say, we're going to throw this book away.
We don't believe in the Bible. What fool would go listen to
a lot of preachers if we don't believe in the Bible? Now, we don't believe it all,
but we believe some of it. That helps. But, they're just sort
of, no. They don't believe anything,
we throw it away. What fool is going to listen to them? Pharisees
never threw it away. They just added to it. And I'll
tell you what you do when you add to it. I'll tell you what
you do when you add to it. You make the word of God subservient
to your creed and your confession. I was in a church meeting a few
years ago over in But Gary Catter, I was over there trying to get
rid of a preacher, did. This is what one of the deacons
said. If I'm lying, if I do exaggerate, then I'm dying. I was sitting
on the back pew, he stood up, had some papers in his hand,
and he said, I don't care what the Bible says about election,
this is what we believe. Those were his words. I don't
care what the Bible says about election, this is what we believe. In vain do they worship me. As in service recently, somebody
holding to a more acceptable creed, in his prayer, made this
statement. In his prayer, spoke about their
confession of faith and their creed, and he said, Lord, this
is our guide in worship. And he was telling the truth. He was telling the truth. In
vain do they worship me. The Pharisees perverted the commandments
of God to suit their own self-serving, self-righteous, hypocritical
religion. They would have their poor parents.
This is exactly the example our Lord uses. He says, here are
your parents. God said in his law, honor your
father and your mother. And here's this. And his mom and dad are
hungry. Mom and dad are fixing to lose
their house. Mom and dad are fixing to be put out on the streets.
And this fellow says, he says, well, you know, I love you, mom
and dad. And boy, I'd like to help you, but all I've got is
this gift here, this money that I've dedicated to the Lord. I've taken the vow, I can't give
it to you. Boy, that sounds good, doesn't
it? Tears in my eyes. Boy, I hate
to say this. I hate to say it. But what can
I do? The Lord God said you made the
word of God of none effect through your traditions. Because your
core man is just your tradition. Just your tradition. Now this
is what the scriptures tell us. All merely outward religion,
that which does not involve true heart worship, is vain worship. In vain do they worship man. All acts of divine worship, all
precepts of righteousness, all doctrines imposed upon men and
upon the church by the traditions and customs of men, are just
vain worship. God said their fear toward me
is taught by the precept of men. I would just, I would name, I would
name almost everything that goes on in the name of religion. Almost
everything. Almost everything. It's utterly
without foundation in this book. Without foundation in this book.
and it ought to be thrown in the garbage heap. All true worship, all of it,
starts and is found in its essence in your heart. If thou confess with thy mouth
the Lord Jesus and shalt believe in thine heart that God has raised
him from the dead. The heart, the heart, the heart. Baptism. Unless you worship God in your
heart as you go in the waters, the ordinance is no more than
a ritual, a ceremony, may as well rub rosary beads. We're
going to observe the Lord's table here in a little while. Unless
you eat the flesh of the Son of God and drink his blood by
faith, unless you remember him, who loved you and gave himself
for you. Unless you give yourself to him as you eat the bread and
drink the wine, you may as well throw chicken bones in a fire
and have some witch doctor pronounce some kind of incantation over
you. Just idolatry, just idolatry. It's not bodily exercise or religious
service that God requires, but the heart. God says, my son, give me thine
heart. If he's got our hearts, he'll
accept our worship. And if he doesn't have our hearts,
he won't accept our worship. God is spirit. They that worship
him must worship him in spirit and in truth. Amen. All right, let's end here, men.