John 4:21

John 4:21. Jesus saith unto her, Believe me, woman, an hour cometh, when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, shall ye worship the Father. The woman can hardly have doubted that the decision of a Jewish prophet would be in favour of Jerusalem, but the answer of Jesus sets aside all ideas of sanctity of place. With neither of these two most hallowed spots shall the thought of true worship be bound up. In saying ‘an hour cometh,' Jesus shows that He is not repeating a truth belonging to the revelation of the past, but is proclaiming a new order of things. Yet the chief characteristic of the new order is, after all, not the equality of places where men worship, but the clear knowledge of the Being to whom worship is paid: from this the former flows. Samaritans shall offer worship in spite of Jewish exclusiveness, for they shall worship the Father . ‘Israel is my son, even my first-born,' were God's words to Pharaoh; but now He offers the name to all, and the words of Jesus imply the abolition of every distinction, not of place only but of nation, in the presence of God, and for the purpose of true worship.