and in truth, for such the Father seeks to worship Him. God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” The point that the author of this letter to the Hebrews is driving home is that Jesus is the Messiah that enables us to worship God in this way.


His work was to make the worship of the temple redundant, unnecessary.


 perfect work of the Saviour would be. Jesus was that Saviour, the Lamb of  the temple worship would be unnecessary and indeed become a blasphemy.  Messiah, Jesus the Christ. And God ensured that it would be so by the provi- dential destruction of the temple in Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 AD. Now when we worship, we do not turn and look to the east where the


 is not bound to one place or to the actions of human priests. God desires that those who worship Him would do so in spirit, a spiritual worship that knows the truth about God and men. God’s Word alone shows us that truth. God’s Word alone shows us Jesus Christ who is the truth and who tells us the truth about ourselves. Jesus teaches us about the spiritual reality of God. So many of our discussions about the worship we offer could be forgotten if we remembered this simple truth. God desires sincerity of spirit. God desires spiritual worship. God does not want us to recreate the temple with an altar  whirling frantic ecstatic mountain top worship of the Samaritans. The key to worship is not where but whom.


Who is able to worship God as God desires to worship? Those whose


              Jesus Christ; men and woman who, by the Spirit of God, have been shown the truth about themselves and the truth of the saving work of Jesus Christ, these may gather together and praise God with sincere hearts. A truthful, sincere, spiritual thanksgiving is what God desires from those who come to worship Him.


Verse 29 The God we worship.


Finally, in verse 29, we are reminded of the holiness of the God we worship. Worship is a dangerous business because we are dealing with a holy God. It is not up to us to decide how we may glorify God. God has told us how we are to glorify Him in His Word. God has decided upon the means for the demonstration of His holiness. As we mentioned earlier in Exodus 19 where Israel received the Law from God, it was in a demonstration of the  of our worship.


It was this new-found awareness that caused Isaiah to fall in fear of his life. Ezekiel, Simon Peter, they all bowed in reverent fear before the holiness of God. 1 Peter 1:17 says: “If you invoke as Father, Him who judges each one impar- tially according to his deeds, conduct yourselves with fear.” We sometimes approach God forgetting who He is. We approach Him in worship forgetting that He is the one before whom angels cover their faces and cry, “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord Almighty.” We forget that God is Jehovah, the creator of heaven and earth, the giver of the Law as well as God our Father who offered up His own Son in love for His people. We are always prone to error. And the error that the church in our time


8


has fallen into is the error of thinking that God is a warm cuddly pushover who will love us no matter how care- less, or unthinking, or sinful we are. In this passage we are reminded that God, as well as being the God who gives us grace to remain unshaken  of Israel at Sinai saw the trembling smoking mountain and feared for their lives before God. Gracious though God had been to them and continued to be they walked in rev- erent fear before Him.


John Calvin says of this verse: “It is expedient that the grace of God should never be promised to us without being accompanied with threatenings; for we are so ex- tremely prone to indulge ourselves, that without the application of these warnings the milder doctrine would prove ineffectual. God omits noth- ing by which he may draw us to Himself; He begins indeed with love and kindness, so that we may follow Him the more willingly; but when by alluring He effects but little, He 


We have a wonderful privilege as a people of Jesus Christ, the forgive- ness of sin, cleansing, an unshake- able Kingdom as our inheritance and so we are to give unceasing thanks to God, acceptable worship. But we are also warned by this passage that we are to be careful, not careless, in our worship.


Acceptable worship is worship that has God at the center. It is worship that flows out of recreated hearts and grateful hearts. It is wor- ship that is mindful of the great and awful holiness of God.


As we give thanks and worship God


 individuals and as a denomination.


Revered Jeff Kingswood is the pastor of Grace Presbyterian Church in Wood- stock, Ontario.


The Associate Reformed Presbyterian


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