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Revelation 3
14 "To the angel of the assembly in Laodicea write: "The Amen, the Faithful and True Witness, the Head of God's creation, says these things:
15 "I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were cold or hot.
16 So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will vomit you out of my mouth.
17 Because you say, 'I am rich, and have gotten riches, and have need of nothing;' and don't know that you are the wretched one, miserable, poor, blind, and naked;
18 I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, that you may become rich; and white garments, that you may clothe yourself, and that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed; and eye salve to anoint your eyes, that you may see.
19 As many as I love, I reprove and chasten. Be zealous therefore, and repent.
20 Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, then I will come in to him, and will dine with him, and he with me.
21 He who overcomes, I will give to him to sit down with me on my throne, as I also overcame, and sat down with my Father on his throne.
22 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the assemblies."
Amen – Faithful and True Witness
Though much of this was reviewed in chapter 1, it is relevant to remember this in the context that it is our days that is being addressed particularly in this message. Amen means to affirm, to second what someone else has said, to join in thought and intent with others. Jesus is the affirmation of the truth about God He came to make plain us. This is amplified in His assertion that He is the Faithful and True Witness, the only valid and complete revelation of God desperately needed at the end of this world's history filled with lies and confusion about Him. This is the same message as found in Hebrews 1:1-3.
This also alerts us to the reality that in our day there is little faith left on the earth (Luke 18:8), making it difficult to find truthful witnesses particularly when it comes to knowing the truth about God. There are no shortage of opinions and assertions from people claiming to promote what they call truth, but John points out that we need to test every spirit (1 John 4:1). Revelation is full of vital information about the lying and deceiving nature of counterfeits, so it is important to be reminded in this last message from Jesus to the assemblies, that the way we are to test every spirit is to know the original truth as it is only in Jesus as the standard of measurement by which to test every other spirit.
Head of God's creation
This come from the Greek word arche meaning commencement, head, ruler, beginning, origin, corner, power. There are many who argue that Jesus/Son of God was the first to come into existence before any others in creation – begotten of God. I don't want to make it a contentious issue, yet as I try to see the reasoning behind what they teach, there are too many gaps and assumptions I can't get past in the reasoning relied on, along with ignoring a lot of passages that raises serious doubts about this.
Out of the list of words defining arche, I believe origin and head fit best into the context. Jesus knew this would be a divisive issue in our time, which is represented by Laodicea, when a heavy emphasis on God-denying evolution is making serious inroads into the thinking even of Christians. Thus the emphasis here and in the first angel's message in Revelation 14 on creation is a reminder that Jesus is the originator of all creation and is thus the head, whether He is recognized as such or not.
Keep in mind however, that just because He is the head, the idea of headship from heaven's perspective is something very different than how we often perceive it today. Even a number of years ago, and still in other languages, the meaning of being head is strikingly different than how it is understood in our culture. The true meaning of headship – what Christ does for the church and what the man is supposed to be for the wife – is not about domination, control or anything of that sort. It really means supporter, supplier, meeting the needs of another and making sure they are not lacking in anything. In short, the true meaning of being the head is all about serving, not a ruling over others like many insist today.
This should make sense after our dark thinking about God becomes cleared up a bit. God, and love itself, is all about serving and attending to the needs of others, not ruling over. Jesus made this explicitly clear to His disciples, yet it is one of the most overlooked and ignored passages in Scripture because it directly contradicts our penchant to be in control. We have the same problem the disciples had who were ever wrangling over who was the greatest even on the cusp of the impending death of their beloved Friend and Leader. They were so blinded to the danger of their desire that they could not perceive many things Jesus had to share with them. So too in our day, which is why Jesus is trying to alert us to our true condition that is opposite of what we imagine it to be.
Another central issue in the war that has long been ignored, is the importance of who is the representative for all humanity to the rest of the universe. Satan occupied this position for a long time, making things very difficult both for our planet as well as for God's efforts to reverse the curse after our first parents abdicated their dominion to Satan. Because of the cross and what it did for the credibility of Jesus, that position was lost by Satan and the authority was given to Christ. Because Christ overcame death itself and is now completely beyond its power for all eternity, there is no chance of His ever losing that role to anyone else like it was lost by Adam. This is one of the major themes we find in the NT, yet is tragically underrated and ignored by most people in our day.
Here Jesus is reminding us that He is now the head, not Satan, and that as our head as well as the origin of all life and the sustainer of all creation, He alone knows our true needs and our true condition. Because of this He alone can offer us the needed perspective and the remedy we must have in order to join Him in the benefits of being salvaged and restored back to our original design for joy.
you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were cold or hot
What do cold and hot represent? I think it is safe to say they relate to how we think and feel about God, about our spiritual condition and our zeal for knowing God and sharing the Good News with others.
If this is the case, doesn't it seem a bit strange for Jesus to say that He would prefer anyone being cold rather than lukewarm? It would seem that being lukewarm means you have at least some interest in knowing God, that you are not completely against him, fighting against truth and love with abandon. Why would Jesus say it would be better to be all out for evil than to be a mixture of good and evil?
What about passion? We think of being hot as full of passion. This fits perfectly with the biblical definition of God's wrath and fire, one of the most misunderstood metaphors in Scripture and something we need to understand in our study of this book of Revelation. In fact, the word wrath itself is translated from the word orge which literally means great passion. The imagery of intense flames and rivers of fire are used in Scripture to describe what comes directly from the throne of God, and also what is in the eyes of Jesus. This is the cause of the torment in the last lakes of fire.
Again, I think it would be safe to say that passion correlates to hot. We think of red-hot passion. But there is hot passion involved while falling in love. We say a woman looks really hot, meaning she has a body figure that can arouse intense desire for her in a man. Whether or not this is healthy or proper is beside the point here. What I am pointing out is that the word passion alone does not define whether it is a passion related to desires for evil or for good, it is merely an amplifier in need of a correlating term as to what it references to before we can understand how to best interpret it.
If passion is connected to what Jesus has in mind when He talks about hot or cold, then is cold the lack of passion? Or might lukewarm be the absence of passion while cold might describe a harded heart, devoid of genuine love, hard as steel? A cold heart is capable of passion, though likely a calculating passion to exploit others, to commit acts of violence, to suck the life (heat) out of others. If this is so, why would Jesus prefer a person to be cold, devoid of love, compassion, mercy and humility rather than a mixture of warm love and coldness? We imagine a cold-hearted person as hopeless, impossible to save, beyond repentance, immune to the drawing grace of God. And while there is a point of no return beyond which an individual has so destroyed their capacity to respond to the mercy of God that it is impossible to reverse the character they have formed over their lifetime, I think Jesus is talking about those who have not yet crossed that divide.
A cold person might be what John talks about in this passage.
There is a sin leading to death. I don't say that he should make a request concerning this. (1 John 5:16)
It appears that Jesus views a mixture of hot and cold to be more dangerous that living full-out in opposition to God. Yet if we are honest, doesn't lukewarm describe many? I know of very few who are full-on passionate either for or against God. Saul of Tarsus exhibited being passionately opposed to anyone who was responding to the graciousness of God as seen in Jesus, using every means possible to use violence, intimidation and law to deter as many as possible from participating in the kingdom Jesus came to set up. Yet after being confronted personally by Jesus in the way to Damascus, filled with intent for further violence against believers, Saul over a two or three year period became transformed by Jesus into Paul the persecuted, an unstoppable passionate confessor of the goodness and kindness of Jesus, a fearless witness in defense of God who sent Jesus to reveal His heart to the universe. Do you think maybe Jesus had Paul in mind when He said these words to John about it being better to be hot or cold rather than lukewarm? That is possible.
It is helpful here to recall what James says about being double-minded. That could be a part of what it means to be lukewarm, a mixture of hot and cold, a condition we might feel very comfortable, safe, balanced, in the middle, not too extreme in any direction. These ideas appeal to us as reasonable, appropriate, desirable. Yet Jesus says it would be better to be extreme one way or the other rather than to play it safe in the middle. Does this mean that safe might be something different than what we have assumed? James says a double-minded person is unstable in all their ways and it is impossible for them to receive anything from God. That should be a wake-up call for us, a reality check. It certainly should raise serious questions for a professed believer if they are unable to receive anything from God. Yet does that not describe the frustration many of us have already?
I confess that much of my life has been spent in frustration with God because it seemed He didn't listen to many of my prayers. For years I felt like I was in competition with God in some cosmic contest to see who could win (winning for me meaning my getting into heaven). Yet it felt like God was doing everything possible to have excuses to exclude me from heaven, while Jesus was supposedly in between us mediating for me against God while I was supposed to work as hard as possible to get my act together so Jesus could convince God to let me somehow slip into heaven in time to escape the fires of hell. I viewed religion, God and life all from this perspective for much of my life, and frustratingly I still find this perspective still lingering in my subconscious reactions too many times.
Like many others, I can feel that somehow God seems to be against me rather than for me as Paul describes in Romans 8. Like others, I can wonder why my cries to God seem to go unnoticed, or worse yet ignored or maybe even scoffed at by God. I know this may sound harsh, yet I have to be honest as I resonate with the feelings and frustrations of others when it comes to seeking a 'successful' relationship with God who is supposedly passionate love, yet seems so often not to do what I imagine needs done to save me from apathy, depression or the ever-present potential for lust in various aspects. Why does it seem that God refuses to magically remove these things from my heart, like I hear as happening to others? Is God really as impartial as He says He is in Scripture, or am I the exception to this? I know that many people share at least some of these feelings and struggles, trying to make sense out of the gospel and how to relate to love. Yet is this merely a symptom of living in a lukewarm condition, where mixed feelings about God prevent me from living in His hot passion of love because I still have too much fear, preventing me from receiving what I desire to experience?
I confess the Spirit has been speaking with me for weeks about this message to Laodicea and I have been taking it seriously, longing to move into a deeper intimacy with God, to become hotter instead of feeling like I am merely treading water. I look at my very small church and wonder why it seems to not move forward or backwards with my leadership. I cling to a promise given me years ago by the Spirit that God is going to do something here someday so big and amazing that I cannot begin to imagine it, and if I want to participate in it I need to stick it out until it comes. Yet years have passed and there seems to be little evidence of a revolution, though I have been seeking to share honestly and openly what God is teaching me. Is the problem that my lukewarmness blocks God from being able to release the mighty power of the Holy Ghost among us? Is God waiting for someone else to come along and move things beyond what I am capable of handling? How can I take seriously the words of Jesus here and move to hot from lukewarm as I long to do? Are my fears of change so deeply entrenched in my subconsciousness that secretly I am continually held hostage by them and thus block God from having His way even in other people's lives?
What I have been and continue to do every time I think about it, is to intentionally ask God to give me the offered solutions outlined in this message. I know all too well how I have been conditioned throughout my life to be afraid of emotions, yet at the same time being taught that we are supposed to be passionate in our zeal for God. This resulted in a condition of double-mindedness that still plagues me and I realize only God can cure me. Yet I need to participate, to give Him authority to do whatever it takes to break this logjam, the stalemate, the impotence of living double-minded because of opposing priorities. I must be saved from the fears that block me from moving into the unknown, enjoying the high risk adventures where love is unpredictable and cannot be managed or controlled, but also requires trust in God's heart. This is the future Jesus invites all of us to plunge into, leaving behind our elaborate systems of checks and balances and cautions designed to keep us centered in logic, often giving systematic theology higher priority than embracing God's passionate love for us personally.
I will vomit you out of my mouth
An interesting thought came to me recently. If something is vomited out of the mouth, it had to have already been inside previously. That implies that to be in this danger, one would need to have already been ingested by Jesus but are causing Him too much discomfort and indigestion.
The phrase out of my mouth also alerts us to one of the key symbols in Revelation, that of what comes out of the mouth of various entities. In most places what is seen coming from His mouth is a sword, highly significant both in the real meaning of sword from heaven's perspective as well as where it is located. Yet here we find something quite different about to come out of His mouth.
We would do well to ponder this things, not just establish some tidy interpretation and move on like we have it under our belt now and don't need to think about it any longer. This is not merely interesting theology or prophecy to solve, it has to do with our own destinies in a very real way.
You say..., but you do not realize... (NIV)
You were wearied with the length of your way; yet you didn't say, It is in vain: you found a reviving of your strength; therefore you weren't faint. Of whom have you been afraid and in fear, that you lie, and have not remembered me, nor laid it to your heart? Haven't I held my peace even of long time, and you don't fear me? (Isaiah 57:10-11)
I am rich, and have gotten riches, and have need of nothing
Behold, you are wiser than Daniel; there is no secret that is hidden from you; by your wisdom and by your understanding you have gotten you riches, and have gotten gold and silver into your treasures; by your great wisdom and by your traffic have you increased your riches, and your heart is lifted up because of your riches-- therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: Because you have set your heart as the heart of God, therefore, behold, I will bring strangers on you, the terrible of the nations; and they shall draw their swords against the beauty of your wisdom, and they shall defile your brightness. They shall bring you down to the pit; and you shall die the death of those who are slain, in the heart of the seas. Will you yet say before him who kills you, I am God? but you are man, and not God, in the hand of him who wounds you. (Ezekiel 28:3-9)
What does this mean, that he set his heart as the heart of God? Insisting that God is like him? This description of Lucifer turning Satan is highly significant, for the same things that poisoned the mind and destroyed the love of Lucifer is what he uses to do the same to us. And everything he invented as part of his alternative reality to replace God's design counterfeits the true principles of creation.
Are we not to set our heart on God, to be transformed to have our heart as the heart of God? Why would this be a problem for Lucifer if it is something we are designed to so to glorify God? Or is this a case of needing to go deeper into a passage beyond a simply surface reading?
you are the wretched one, miserable, poor, blind, and naked
Why is it so difficult for us to see our own actual condition? Why does God have to spell out our condition to us so clearly and yet it continues to seem unreal? What is it that so blinds us that we read these words of warning by Jesus for years and still are not affected by them at a deeper level? How do we perceive the attitude of Jesus and His motives for saying this about us?
Possibly the most dangerous condition to be in is to believe one is safe, secure and comfortable when in reality they are quite the opposite. Complacency is possibly the most fatal condition to experience, for it robs us of any useful incentive to change or believe we have a need for it. Yet what is it that works effectively to accomplish changing this condition? Threats, intimidation, enticements of rewards combined with threats of severe punishments? What does it take to get a warning through to those who feel that only others are in danger but they are the exception?
