piper on worship

Jn 4.23-24, "The hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for such the Father seeks to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth."

In Desiring God, chapter 3, Worship: The Feast of Christian Hedonism, John Piper writes:

Sometimes spiritual sleepers need to be shocked. If you want them to hear what you have to say, you might even need to scandalize them. Jesus is especially good at this. When he wants to teach us something about worship, he uses a whore!

"Go call your husband," he says to the Samaritan woman.

"I don't have a husband," she answers.

"That's right," Jesus says, "But you've had five, and the man you sleep with now is not your husband."

She is shocked. We're shocked! But Jesus simply sits there on the edge of the well with his hands folded, looking at the woman with razors in his eyes, ready to teach us about worship. The first thing we learn is that worship has to do with real life. It is not a mythical interlude in a week of reality. Worship has to do with adultery and hunger and racial conflict.

Jesus is bone-weary from the journey. He is hot and thirsty. He decides: "Yes, even now, just now, I will seek someone to worship the Father-a Samaritan adultress. I will show my disciples how my Father seeks worship in the midst of real life from the least likely. She is a Samaritan. She is a woman. She is a harlot. Yes, I will even show them a thing or two about how to make true worshipers out of the white harvest of harlots in Samaria."

...

"Worship is a way of gladly reflecting back to God the radiance of his worth. This cannot be done by mere acts of duty. It can be done only when spontaneous affections arise in the heart."

...

The real duty of worship is not the outward duty to say or do the liturgy. It is the inward duty, the command-"Delight yourself in the Lord!" (Psalm 37:4). "Be glad in the Lord and rejoice!" (Psalm 32:11).

The reason this is the real duty of worship is that this honors God, while the empty performance of ritual does not. If I take my wife out for the evening on our anniversary and she asks me, "Why do you do this?" the answer that honors her most is, "Because nothing makes me happier tonight than to be with you."

"It's my duty," is a dishonor to her.
"It's my joy," is an honor.

There it is ! The feast of Christian Hedonism. How shall we honor God in worship? By saying, "It's my duty"? Or by saying, "It's my joy"?
Worship is a way of reflecting back to God the radiance of his worth. Now we see that the mirror that catches the rays of his radiance and reflects them back in worship is the joyful heart. Another way of saying this is to say

The real duty of worship is not the outward duty to say or do the liturgy. It is the inward duty, the command-"Delight yourself in the Lord!" (Psalm 37:4). "Be glad in the Lord and rejoice!" (Psalm 32:11).

The reason this is the real duty of worship is that this honors God, while the empty performance of ritual does not. If I take my wife out for the evening on our anniversary and she asks me, "Why do you do this?" the answer that honors her most is, "Because nothing makes me happier tonight than to be with you."

"It's my duty," is a dishonor to her.
"It's my joy," is an honor.

There it is ! The feast of Christian Hedonism. How shall we honor God in worship? By saying, "It's my duty"? Or by saying, "It's my joy"?

Worship is a way of reflecting back to God the radiance of his worth. Now we see that the mirror that catches the rays of his radiance and reflects them back in worship is the joyful heart. Another way of saying this is to say:

The chief end of man is to glorify God BY enjoying him forever.

Amen.

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