Just pondering Judeo- Christian faith, internecine conflicts, spiritual conflict resolution, and peacemaking in Christ. ….
Jews living in the “truth”, i.,e., the “Word” (defined by the OT available at the time of Christ) live Judaism in the literal, physical, ethnic sense. It is a legalistic view of humankind and of worshipping God. Christians living their faith in the “Spirit and truth,” revealed in Jesus Christ’s life, teaching, & legacy in the NT AND the “truth” of OT He lived and taught from, are living into the time and state of worshipful existence Jesus spoke to the Samaritan woman about in John 4:19-24:
“….the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.” “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”
Christ did not say that salvation comes by being Jewish, but that it comes “from the Jews”, as He Himself is Jewish and it is through His spiritual heritage and faithfulness to the truth of the Word as interpreted through the fullness of the Spirit of God in Him that He is speaking. This is clear when He says, “… yet a time is coming when….” and “Yet a time is coming and has come when the true worshippers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth…”. This is speaking of the age ushered in by His Incarnate Being, of being born of “water and the Spirit” (and there are several ways to interpret “water” here… water as in physical birth from the womb or spiritual birth into truth by one’s profession of faith in God through believing in Christ and subsequent baptism).
True Christians honor and understand Christ’s Jewish heritage and tradition AND embrace His fulfilling of its prophetic truths and obedience to its law as interpreted from the higher, heavenly, spiritual, inclusive, peace-giving, Holy Spirit perspective from which He taught, not its legalistic, worldly, exclusionary, political, nationalistic, ethnic and physical perspective promulgated by the religious leadership with which Jesus came into conflict then, and still does today.
If one is not committed in Christian faith to the truth of the Word, as given and revealed by God in the Old and New Testament and desiring to know and grow into learning to love the Lord Our God with all one’s heart, all one’s soul, all one’s mind, and all one’s strength, that person likely will persist in being an immature, perhaps only nominal, possibly double-minded and handicapped believer, unable to experience the fullest extent to which the Holy Spirit desires to abide, guide, and enrich one’s life and becoming a transcendent-living resident of the Kingdom of God, in the world but not of it, for God’s glory, others’ gain, and one’s own good.
I pray for God to give to all a desire His Spirit , to seek His Presence, and to have eyes to see His glory, ears to hear the truth, for minds to know, understand, and obey His Word, and hearts to rejoice in praise and worship of the one true God in all His glory.
CBB 7/22/25