g; and in the midst of much that is
superstitious they have a spark of true hope and longing for redemption.
Jesus shows by the gravity and importance of His answer that He
considered the woman sincere in the statement of her difficulty, and
anxious to know where God might really be found. Perplexed and
bewildered by her earthly experience, as so many of us are, she suddenly
awakes to the consciousness that here, before her, and conversing with
her, is a prophet; and at once she utters to Him what had been burning
in her heart, "Where, where is God to be found?"

And so in reply to the inquiry of one sincere woman Jesus makes that
great announcement which has ever since stood as the manifesto of
spiritual worship. Not in any particular and isolated place, He tells
the woman, is God to be found, not in the temple at Jerusalem, nor in
the rival structure on Gerizim, but in spirit. "God is a Spirit, and
they that worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth." As our Lord
intimates, this was a new kind of worship, essentially different from
that to which Jews and Samaritans, and indeed all men, had hitherto been
accustomed.

The magnitude of the contents of such sayings can as little be
comprehended as their significance can be exhausted. We have first of
all the central affirmation: "God is a Spirit." To fill out this
definition with intelligible ideas is difficult. It implies that He is a
Personal Being, that He is self-conscious, possessed of intelligence and
will; but although Personal His Personality transcends our conception.
So far as regards the immediate application of the definition by our
Lord at this time, it suffices to note its primary meaning that God has
not a body, and consequently is subject to none of the limitations and
conditions to which the possession of a body subjects human persons. He
needs no local dwelling-place, no temple, no material offerings. In
local worship there was an advantage while the world was young, and men
could best be taught by symbols. A house in their midst, of which they
might say, "God is there," was undoubtedly an aid to faith. But it had
its disadvantages. For the more a worshipper fixed his mind on the one
local habitation, the less could he carry with him the consciousness of
God's presence in all places.

Very slowly do we learn that God is a Spirit. We think nothing is more
surely believed among us. Alas! make almost any application of this
radical truth, and we fi