Laodicea: Spiritually Deluded

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But today we are going to finish up our look at the seven churches in Revelation. We’re going to be in Revelation chapter 3. And the church at Laodicea is the last one we’re going to talk about.

And the church at Laodicea reminds me, honestly, of my dog. Years ago when I was in college, I decided it was time I needed a dog. I wanted a dog and I needed a dog.

Couldn’t decide what kind of dog to buy. And my cousin had a rat terrier that was about a year old. And I fell in love with the thing and decided that’s what I needed.

And so I bought this dog. We actually drove out from the city to Seminole to purchase this dog on Christmas Day, no less. Because I just had it in my mind I wanted a dog, and I was not going to rest that night until I got my dog.

So we actually drove out here and got the dog. Took it home, started raising it, and that dog really, other than the fact that I just wanted a dog and wanted a rat terrier, That dog was purchased with two jobs in mind. I’ve taken excellent care of that dog, and he only had two jobs to do.

Number one, I wanted him to lay at the foot of my bed and keep my feet warm. I was single at the time, and it was cold. I wanted that dog to lay at the foot of my bed and keep my feet warm.

His second job was that we had rats that had moved in under our shed. you would think yes a rat terrier you would think one of the tornadoes that came through destroyed evidently someplace where lots of rats lived and they all migrated our way and so we had rats under the shed and they would dig big holes under there I mean it was just horrifying and so this rat terrier I thought it’s been bred into him for years that’s what they do it’s it’s right there in the name truth in advertising you would think right terrorized rats. I’m chasing a rabbit here, but one year for Halloween, I said I was going to dress him up in camouflage and get one of those belts of ammo like Rambo wore and put a ski mask over him and call him a rat terrierist, but I didn’t want to end up on a government watch list for terrorism.

Anyway, he had two jobs. Max, I named him Max. Maxie when he’s good and Max well when he’s in trouble.

He had two jobs, to keep my feet warm at night and to chase rats and kill them. And do you think he did either one? No.

Now, he does now. It has taken us 11 years, 12 years, something like that, to get to this point. 11 years.

To get to this point. And he will now sleep at my feet when he hasn’t decided he wants to just be charla’s lap dog he will sleep at my feet and keep him warm a little bit and we had to we had to bring in my sister’s poodle no less to teach him how to catch rats it took some training but you know what the first year or two we had him I thought this dog is worthless I love him but he was worthless I bought him for these two jobs keep my feet warm at night and help me kill the rats. Hey, I’ll block up all the entrances but one.

I’ll stick a water hose down there. We’ll flood the things out. You just have to get them when they come topside.

Couldn’t do it. Worthless dog. He wouldn’t keep my feet warm.

He didn’t have any cold-blooded killer instinct in him. He was lukewarm and he was worthless. You see where I’m going with this?

I should have. If I had it to do over. And it took, it honestly took a couple years of working with him to realize, hey, there’s more to your life than just laying around on the couch.

Because that’s what he wanted to do. And that’s what he does now. But there are no rats for him to catch.

There’s more to your life than just laying around and being pampered and taken care of. You’ve The church at Laodicea, folks, was in the same boat. Jesus talks about their material comfort and how they put everything else aside to focus on their comfort and their wealth.

That’s what they were focused in on. And he tells them, you’re not hot, you’re not cold, you’re just lukewarm and you’re useless. And so we’re going to look at this church starting in verse 14 of Revelation chapter 3.

And honestly, of all the seven churches, This is the one that I hope as we look at these churches and we look at the things that were going on and how could we apply that to our world today and we hold the mirror up to ourselves and say, okay, these are the things that Jesus points out and says, you’re doing this wrong, you’re doing this right, you’re doing this okay, but you need to do a little better. What are these principles that we can apply to ourselves and hold the mirror up to ourselves and say, what would Jesus tell us to do? What would He commend us for?

What would He rebuke us for? What would He encourage us to do better at if he were to walk in the door today. As we hold that mirror up to ourselves, Laodicea is the one church I don’t want to look like in any way, shape, or form.

Philadelphia we looked at last week, and he had nothing but good to say about Philadelphia. Now, I hope that’s what we look at. I’m not deluded enough, though, to think that every church is going to look like Philadelphia.

The other churches, though, they were a mixture of good things and bad things, and we could probably look and see some of all of those things in our fellowship if we look hard enough. Laodicea, he doesn’t have one good thing to say about them. And it’s not because they’re too little.

It’s not because they’re too old. It’s not because they’re too poor. It’s not because they’re too.

. . Folks, it’s because they’re too focused on their own comfort, and they’re They’d forgotten the reason behind it.

They’d forgotten their first love. And yet they still were doing things to serve God. They’d just forgotten the love of God behind it.

Laodicea had not only forgotten their first love, but they’d forgotten to do. . .

They weren’t even doing good things as a habit anymore. They were just kind of doing what they wanted to do. And so chapter 3, verse 14 says, And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write, These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God.

It’s interesting to me how Jesus identifies himself differently to each of these churches, and it seems to tie in with what he’s going to be talking to that church about. When he says the Amen, he doesn’t mean the end of the prayer. We say that word Amen, or Amen, or however you pronounce it.

We say that at the end of the prayer, and we think it’s just, okay, that’s just what you say. That’s just the word that ends the prayer. it’s sort of like saying the end that word means let it be so the things that I’ve said let it be so it reminds me of the Pharaoh in the movie the ten commandments always saying so let it be written so let it be done let it be and so when he says I am the amen he’s saying I’m the one who says it and that’s the way it’s going to be we don’t necessarily like And I don’t mean we as in this church.

But we in the world today don’t necessarily like this view of God that says he’s the one who says it and that’s the way it’s going to be. We want to have a discussion. We want to have a vote.

We want to have an appeals process when God says something because we don’t like the way, we don’t like what he said. I read an article yesterday about a pastor at a church somewhere in Kansas who on January 3rd evidently preached a message where she came out as having been in a same-sex relationship for many, many years. And my first issue was, well, you can’t be shocked because your church decided a long time ago you didn’t like what God said about women pastors.

So you really shouldn’t be shocked. but she came out and basically said God’s word was wrong and we needed to have a better understanding. I’m sorry, and please don’t think I’m getting on my soapbox just about homosexuality, about any sin.

We want to look at it and say, well, God, it’s not really gossip if I say it’s a prayer request. God, it’s not really gluttony if I just do it a few times a week. Whatever sin it is, when God says it, we want to take a vote, we want to have an appeal process, we want a second opinion, but God is the one who says what’s right and what’s wrong. And when he says it, he’s the amen, and that’s the way it’s going to be, whether we like it or not.

You know, there are some things that we don’t change on a majority vote, just like gravity. We could all get together and vote and decide we don’t like gravity anymore, but it doesn’t change what reality is. Gravity’s the law, and it’s going to be the law whether we like it or not.

He’s the amen, and when he says it, that’s the way it’s going to be. When it comes to sin and when it comes to righteousness, when it comes to right and wrong, when it comes to what’s going to happen, he says it, and that’s the way it’s going to be. He’s the faithful and true witness.

You see, it’s not just a matter of not liking what God has to say. Sometimes it’s a matter of questioning whether or not, is that really true? is that really what he meant to say?

well surely we’re too enlightened I know I have ranted and raved about this a little bit in the last few weeks churches that don’t believe in the resurrection or the virgin birth we’re too enlightened to believe these things anymore I’m sorry why are you even having church? honestly the Bible says the Bible says if Christ be not raised your faith is vain your faith is worthless if I didn’t believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ every fiber of my being, I would go home and not do this anymore. It’d be a whole lot easier.

But God’s Word says certain things are true. God’s Word says certain things are true, and God has a track record of being a faithful and true witness. If He says it, that’s the way it is, even if it’s hard for me to believe, because He’s the faithful and true witness.

And yes, sometimes we might tend to think, well, that can’t possibly be what he meant because that doesn’t make sense. No, no, he’s the faithful and true witness. And as the Apostle Paul wrote, let God be true and every man a liar.

If we say that God is wrong, if we put ourselves in disagreement with God, we’re the ones who are wrong, not him. So he’s the amen, the faithful and true witness, and the beginning of the creation of God. Now be very careful here.

This does not mean that Jesus Christ is the first one created by God. Some people and some groups will take passages like this out of context and make it contradict what the Bible teaches that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, always has been the Son of God, has always existed as the Son of God even before there was time, even before there was space, even before there was anything else. He was the beginning of the creation of God means he was the one who started it all.

He was there when it all began. You notice in the beginning of the book of Genesis, it says, let us make man in our own image. Now, that’s not God having a split personality.

That’s not an error in translation. That’s not as these goofballs on the History Channel tell us. It was a group of aliens who got together, and the Hebrews just thought they were God.

Folks, it’s the Trinity. It’s the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit speaking amongst himself as God and saying, let us make man in our own image. The Bible says that by Christ all things were created and all things consist and nothing was created without him.

And so he’s the beginning of the creation of God. And so to call himself the Amen and the faithful and true witness and the beginning of the creation of God is to remind the church at Laodicea that he is in charge. hey church it doesn’t matter how how big you’ve gotten how wealthy you’ve gotten see a church just like a person can get too big for his britches and it doesn’t matter how big you’ve gotten how wealthy you’ve gotten how much you think you’re in control and how much you think you’ve got this you need to remember he says that I am the one in charge what I say goes what I say is true I’m the one who created all of this and I’m the one who will bring all of this to an end and sometimes we forget to have that kind of faith and trust in God when it comes to our own lives and when it comes to the life of a church.

Something goes wrong and we think I’ve got to fix this. I’ve got to I’ve got to figure out a new course. I’ve got to figure out what I can do.

Or in a church we’ve got to call a meeting. We’ve got to start a program. We’ve got to and we forget sometimes to stop and say in our own lives and in our life as a church, okay God what do you want to do about this?

Because we just think I’ve got this. I’ve got this under control. I can take care of all of it.

And in so doing, we become useless. We become useless like the church at Laodicea in God’s service. He says, I know thy works.

He said this to, if not every church, almost every church. I know thy works. He says, I know the way you live your life.

This isn’t just the good works they do in public. This is the way they live their life in front of everybody, and even more frighteningly, when nobody else sees. He says, I know who you really are.

I know the things you do. And usually from there, it goes into a mixture of patting on the back and slap on the wrist. It goes to a mixture of this is what you’re doing well. This is what you’re not doing well.

This is what you need to get taken care of right now. Laodicea, he goes right to, here’s what you need to stop. Here’s what your problem is.

He says, I know thy works, that you’re neither cold nor hot. That thou art neither cold nor hot. I would, thou wert cold or hot.

And folks, there are a couple of different explanations of what he means here that I’ve heard over the years. One of them honestly makes more sense to me than the other. The one I grew up hearing was he was saying, I would rather you’re not on fire for God and you’re not cold hearted toward God.

you’re just sort of somewhere in the middle and you’re indifferent, and I wish you were one or the other. And that interpretation, that explanation does make some sense to me, and yet it’s hard for me to imagine Jesus telling his church at Laodicea, you know, I would just as well you be completely cold-hearted toward God. I would just as well, you know, you be excited about God or be hostile toward God.

Either one, pick one. It’s hard for me to see Jesus offering that second one. Just be hostile toward God as a choice and say, just pick one.

There’s the other explanation that I’ve discovered in the last few years, that Laodicea was surrounded by springs, springs of water, that they would have understood this, that they had people who would go to the hot springs and that water would be useful for bathing, for cleansing, or people would go to the cold springs. And when you go to a cold spring, when you go to a source of cold water on a hot day and you’re thirsty, there’s nothing more refreshing than fresh, cold, clean, pure water. And so both of these, the hot water and the cold water, would each have their use.

And lukewarm water is just not real refreshing. I was taught at an early age, you don’t wash dishes in lukewarm water. You wash dishes in hot water.

And I don’t know about you, but after I’ve been out working in the yard, I don’t want to go in and have a cup of hot water or even really lukewarm water. I want cold water. And so for these uses that they would have used the springs for, the lukewarm water just didn’t have all that much use.

Now, you pick whichever explanation that makes sense to you, that the Holy Spirit impresses on you. Honestly, the one with the springs makes more sense to me. But either way, whether it’s Jesus presenting them with a choice and saying, you either be all the way on fire, or you just reject God outright.

I’m tired. You pick one. Or whether it’s Jesus saying, you know, it’s like these springs that are there by your city.

And the hot ones are useful, and the cold ones are useful, but the stuff that comes out and is just room temperature isn’t any good to anybody. Either way, whichever of those explanations is correct, we still get back to the point that the church at Laodicea was useless. Either because they were not completely on fire for God, and they were just kind of indifferent, they were just kind of floating around out there in the middle, or he’s just describing them as this lukewarm water and saying there’s really not a lot of use for it, and that’s how you’re acting.

We get right back around to the point that the church at Laodicea had become so deluded, so spiritually lost and blinded by their own pursuits of their own comfort and their own prosperity, that they really had ceased to be any use to God in his service at that point. I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot. I would thou work cold or hot.

So then, because thou art lukewarm, neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth. He says, I would spit you out as this lukewarm water. I don’t know about you, but sometimes if I take a drink of something and it’s not what I’m expecting, it’s kind of nauseating to me.

If y’all don’t know already, I’m a little bit of a germaphobe or a clean freak anyway. And sometimes accidentally drinking someone else’s drink will just nauseate me. But even with Charla, I will drink after her.

But sometimes she’ll have a cup of root beer sitting there. and I’m expecting it to be Dr. Pepper, even though I like root beer, if I’m expecting Dr.

Pepper and it’s root beer, it’s going to make me want to spit it out. If I drink it and it’s room temperature, it’s been sitting there for a couple of days, it’s even worse. You’ve got two cups sitting on your counter.

You can’t remember which is the coffee you poured five minutes ago and which was the cup of coffee left from the day before. and you drink the lukewarm one. It’s not going to be pleasant.

We all know this sensation of, oh, what was that I just put in my mouth? That is what Jesus is saying. That church is like to him.

Because they’ve ceased to be of any use. They’re not. .

. Folks will drink hot coffee or hot tea. We’ll drink a cold soft drink or cold water.

And they’re both refreshing and they’re both useful. but that lukewarm is just not pleasant. And he’s saying you’re not useful, you’re not refreshing, you’ve ceased giving any value to your work here.

He said, and because of that, you think you’re wonderful, but if you were water, I’d spew you right out of my mouth. Now some people want to go a little further with the explanation on that than I think the text allows. They’ll say, see, they’re going to lose their salvation.

He’s going to spew them out of his mouth. Okay, you can be sickened by what somebody does, but it doesn’t mean you. .

. He’s not saying anything here about salvation. Sometimes my kids do things that disgust me.

And I don’t mean just being bad. Sometimes there are. .

. Well, y’all have had little kids, and there are diaper things. They do things that disgust me, and it makes me want to be sick, but it doesn’t mean that they stop being my child.

The passage doesn’t say anything about salvation or stopping being his, but it’s talking about you’re useless, you’re like this lukewarm drink. And he says, because thou sayest, here is where he gets into why they’re that way. Okay, we’re lukewarm, I get it.

How did we get that way and how do we stop? He says in verse 17, because thou sayest, I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing and knowest not that thou art wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. I can’t he says their problem is that they are spiritually destitute they are spiritually impoverished they have long ago stopped growing stopped serving stopped walking closely with him they’re just kind of languishing there on the vine and they think that they’re in great shape priest with goods and they have need of nothing.

The church was rich, the church was well, the people were well taken care of, so we’re doing great. All the while they forget that they were withering spiritually. And sometimes you can look very alive on the outside and be very dead on the inside.

Now, I have heard this example from a friend. I, fortunately, have never had to wring a chicken’s neck. And I’m okay with that.

But he talks about growing up and going to visit his grandparents years ago. And his grandma would, he’s a preacher, he said his grandma would wring the chicken’s neck. And when the head comes off, he said that chicken would run around like crazy.

I’ve heard the expression like a chicken with their head cut off. Heard that for years and now I know where it comes from. He said the chicken would just run around like crazy, like a chicken with its head off.

And he said for a little while, that chicken looks like the most alive thing on the barnyard, but really it’s the deadest or most dead, whichever is the correct word there. But you get the point of what I’m saying. It looks, it has all the trappings and features of being alive, but that chicken is dead.

That’s sort of how the church at Laodicea was. They looked like they were, and they thought they were doing well on the outside, but inside they were spiritually dead, and they didn’t even realize it. And so they’ve gotten so wrapped up in, we look good, we’ve got all the money we need, we can do whatever we want because we’ve got the resources, we don’t need anything, nothing to rely on God for, we’re good, we’ve got this.

and they were so wrapped up in building their, what we would call today a cruise ship church, that they forgot about what they were supposed to be doing. They forgot about the service they were supposed to be rendering to God. They forgot about the need to grow spiritually.

They just forgot about everything that they were supposed to do. And the more wrapped up they got in self, the further they grew away from God, the more they withered spiritually, and finally got to the point where Jesus said, you’ve made yourselves useless. And the church at Laodicea, we look at them and Jesus honestly doesn’t have anything good to say about them.

And we might look at a church like that and think there is no hope. They’re just, they’re never going to change. There’s no way forward for them.

They just need to shut it down. But Jesus, in verse 18, just as he does with all the churches with their minor issues, relatively minor, I should say, compared to Laodicea, He gives them a way forward. He gives them a way out.

He says, I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich, and white raiment that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear, and anoint thine eyes with eye salve, that thou mayest see. As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Be zealous, therefore, and repent.

He said, you need to find gold tried by the fire. You need to put away all this temporary earthly wealth, all this gold that you’re chasing here, and you need to invest in something of eternal significance. I’ve watched people doing metal work and refining gold, and they put it in the furnace.

And I don’t know what temperature they heat it up to, but it’s something I wouldn’t want to stand in. And they put it in there and all the impurities, all the impurities are burned off. All the impurities come to the top and are burned off.

And the gold, having gone through the fire, has been purified. That’s what he’s talking about. Burning off all of the stubble.

Burning off all of the impurities. Burning off all the extra stuff that’s in the gold. And yeah, that’s a painful process for the gold to go through, but it’s purified at the end.

And he’s telling them, your gold needs to be tried by the fire. Get rid of all the extra stuff and invest yourself in something of lasting significance. Folks, that’s good advice for us today.

We can get caught up in our money or our job or our. . .

It seems like there are so many more things that we can get caught up in today Where we can forget about doing things that are of eternal significance. Where we can forget about serving the Lord. Where we can forget about serving other people.

We can forget about sharing the gospel with people. Because we’re too busy focused on the extra stuff here. Sometimes we just need to go through and burn that extra stuff off.

And it’s painful. And it’s unpleasant. But what’s on the other side is so worth it.

He says, and white raiment so that thou mayest be clothed. Folks, the only white raiment we have is the righteousness of Christ. And I’ve told you before that as a church, we cannot, any church, but for this church as well, we cannot be focused on how good we are or how good our programs are. Our message, we need to focus in and have one message, which is not how good we are or how good we are at anything.

but how good he is. Because ultimately, what we have to offer, what we can hold in our hands and offer to God is worthless. We want to stand before him one day with the righteousness of Christ in hand.

And anoint thine eyes with eye salve that thou mayest see. You need to open your eyes. You’ve let the things of this world, the church at Laodicea, you’ve let the things of this world blind you.

And you need to get some medicine. He says in verse 19, as many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. And this is a good thing for him to tell them.

If he has any good thing to say to the church at Laodicea, it’s this, I still love you. Yes, I know I said earlier, you make me sick. What you’re doing makes me sick.

But I tell you this because I love you. This is something I did not, my parents would say, and I did not understand until I had children of my own. And I know Benjamin and Madeline do not believe me when I tell them.

But I’m only doing this because I love you. The spanking or the grounding or the lecture or whatever it is, is because I love you. Because I love you too much to let you act this way.

Because I love you too much to let you grow up this way. Sometimes punishing your kids really is harder on you than it is on them. He says, those whom I love, I rebuke and chasten.

If Jesus didn’t love the church at Laodicea, he could have said, just be gone with you. I’m done. Enjoy what you’ve got.

I’m done. But Jesus says there’s something better. There’s something better than even this material prosperity.

There’s something of a vibrant relationship with the God who made you and loved you enough to die for you. And so he says, yes, I still love you. And for that reason, I rebuke you and I chasten you.

He said, you need to be zealous therefore and repent. That idea of zeal in the Bible, being zealous, is beyond enthusiasm. I mean, there’s really not another good word for it.

That’s why the word zealous is a good word. I wish we used it more often. He said, but you need to get back on fire and you need to repent.

And as I’ve explained through this whole series, that word repentance means to change your mind, to agree with God, to get on God’s side about right and wrong and about what you’re supposed to be doing. And because of that, God helps us change course. He says, Behold, I stand at the door and knock.

If any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him and I will sup with him and he with me. To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne even as I overcame and have sat down with my Father in his throne. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.

So this church had become useless. This church had become useless because it had ignored its need for God and its need to serve God and had focused instead on comfort and on material prosperity. And folks, that may be one of the greatest dangers for churches today, especially in America.

Folks, America is a wonderful country. Not only the principles we were founded on, but what they’ve led to, ladies and gentlemen. Even our poor here in America have more than middle class people in a lot of countries.

And surrounded by such prosperity, it’s easy to get focused on stuff. and how much we have, and how we can get more, and how can I be made more comfortable. And it’s easy to bring that attitude into the church.

It’s easy to bring that attitude into our service for God, where we just get totally wrapped up in and focused on those things, and we forget that it’s all about Him. It’s all about how good He is. It’s all about serving Him and leading other people to the cross of Jesus Christ. It’s a huge danger for us.

But it doesn’t have to be the end of the line, and it doesn’t have to be the death knell for a church. we just have to get to a point where we realize that there is an issue with that and we need to repent we need to not say that’s okay God made us prosperous so it’s okay for us to live this way and be comfortable and that’s all that matters we need to realize that God says there’s more that matters and that we’re wrong when we disagree with him and we need to agree with him if we don’t shake off that delusion, if we don’t shake off the delusion that our prosperity, our numbers, our money, any of those things, that those are going to take care of us as a church and instead focus on God and His provision and what He wants us to do, then a church will never be of any use to God and His service.

Our only hope, our only hope is to recognize, as He told the church at Ephesus recognized where we’ve fallen from. And as he told them and as he told them here at Laodicea, repent, realize we’ve been wrong, admit that God’s right and get on God’s side. Now, as I said, I don’t think that Laodicea is necessarily a picture of this church, but I know at times we probably all struggle with this idea of just focusing in on the comfort and the prosperity.

And folks, wherever we find that weed growing, we need to rip it out by the roots. and we need to realize it’s not about my comfort. It’s not about my comfort zone.

It’s not about my prosperity. It’s not about the money or the people or whatever that we have as a church and that we can boast about. It’s about His service and about doing what He’s called us to do with as much or as little as He entrusts us with to be faithful in big things and in small things.