Dear ones, I thought I was ready to move on to Message Six, but the Lord is really speaking to me and doing a purifying work in my heart based upon the burden at the end of Message Five. TAS brought up the Samaritan woman’s challenge to the Lord: “Where is the right place to worship – this mountain here in Samaria or that mountain there in Jerusalem?”. TAS also pointed out how utterly profound our Lord’s answer to her was:“
Neither – nor”!
Neither in Samaria
nor in Jerusalem! Neither the way, the preference, and the forms of the people in Samaria; nor the way, the preference, and the forms of the people in Jerusalem. “
Neither-nor”!
All outward ways, preferences, and forms were terminated by our Lord when He terminated the old dispensation and brought in the new dispensation. All of the “handwritings in ordinances” were wiped out by Him! What then are we left with? Simply being gathered together into His Name, with Him in our midst. Simply offering our heavenly Father the worship in spirit and truth that His heart longs for.
A modern-day “Samaritan woman” might ask the Lord: “Most Christians say I can attend ‘the church of my choice’ while the Exclusive Brethren and the Local Church say that I must meet with them on the ‘ground of oneness’. Who is right?” Our Lord would answer now as He did back then: “
Neither-nor”! Neither scattering into so many separate meeting places based upon preference nor insisting that others must come meet with us or ‘they are not the church’. “
Neither-nor”! Why insist on outward ways, outward preferences, and outward forms, when our Lord already terminated all these things long ago? Anything that can be used to limit God’s people to either a certain way or a certain form has already been terminated! Again, all we are left with is the utter simplicity that our Lord gave to us at the very beginning: Being gathered together into His Name, with Him in our midst, to offer to our heavenly Father the worship in spirit and truth that His heart longs for. What freedom! This frees us to be willing to meet with any and all of God’s children, simply as brothers and sisters in Christ. This frees us from the pressure of having the “one right place to meet” and the “one right way to meet”. Our place to meet is Christ and our way to meet is worship in spirit and truth. Hallelujah!!
