A First Century Message to Twentieth Century Christians

Chapter 9 of A First-Century Message to Twentieth-Century Christians by G. Campbell Morgan. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Marianne. Chapter 9. The Laodicea Letter. And to the angel of the church in Laodicea write, These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God. I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot. I would that thou wert cold or hot. So because thou art lukewarm and neither hot nor cold, I will spew thee out of my mouth. Because thou sayest, I am rich, and have gotten riches, and have need of nothing, and knowest not that thou art the wretched one, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked, I counsel thee to buy of me gold refined by fire, that thou mayest become rich, and white garments, that thou mayest clothe thyself, and the shame of thy nakedness not be made manifest. And I salve to anoint thine eyes, that thou mayest see. As many as I love, I reprove and chasten. Be zealous therefore, and repent. 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 will sup with him, and he with me. He that overcometh, I will give to him to sit down with me in my throne, as I also overcame, and sat down with my father in his throne. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches. Revelation chapter 3, verses 14 to 22. This last of the letters to the churches is in some sense the saddest of them all, yet in other respects it is most full of exquisite beauty. In every other epistle we find some word of commendation. Here there is absolutely none. This very fact seems to account for some of the tenderest and most wonderful words uttered by the Lord in the whole series. It is impossible to study this message without seeming to feel the heartbeat of the Son of God, and in none of the letters has there been more evident the yearning compassion of the divine heart. Very little is known of the church at Laodicea. We have no account of its planting, but there are certain references to it in the New Testament which may throw some light on its history. It is certain that the church was known to Paul, and it is most probable that he visited it. The latter position is of course open to question, very much depends on the view taken concerning his imprisonment. If the confidence expressed in the letter to the Philippians was fulfilled that he would again visit his children, it is quite probable that among the rest he would see Laodicea. The references he makes to the churches are most interesting in the light of this message of Jesus. In his letter to the church at Colossae there are no fewer than four references to the church in Laodicea. First, in the second chapter, verses 1 to 3. For I would have you know how greatly I strive for you, and for them at Laodicea, that their hearts may be comforted, they being knit together in love, and unto all riches of the fullest assurance of understanding, that they may know the mystery of God, even Christ in whom are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge hidden. It is thus evident that while writing to the church at Colossae, he has in mind the church at Laodicea. In the fourth chapter of the same epistle, in referring to Epaphras, the Apostle says, For I bear him witness that he hath much labor for you, and for them in Laodicea. It is well to remember in passing that the labor of Epaphras was that of prayer. In the fifteenth verse of the same chapter he writes, Salute the brethren that are in Laodicea. And yet again in the sixteenth verse, And when this epistle hath been read among you, cause that it be read also in the church of the Laodiceans, and that ye also read the epistle from Laodicea. Now these references show us clearly one or two things. The Apostle was acquainted with the church, and undoubtedly was interested in it. There was some kind of connection between it and the church at Colossae. In all probability they were geographically contiguous. It is quite conceivable that they were related to each other as mother and daughter, the church at Colossae founding the church, at Laodicea, or being founded by it. It is moreover evident that there was interest and fellowship existing between them, so that when Epaphras, a member of the church in Colossae, labored in prayer, that they of the fellowship might stand perfect and complete in all the will of God, he also included in his petitions the sister church at Laodicea. Moreover, it is probable that the Apostle wrote to the church at Laodicea a special letter, which has not been preserved, having most likely no perpetual value, for he distinctly charges the church at Colossae that the letter to the church at Laodicea is to be read to them also. The Apostle's interest in the church at Laodicea is marked in the first place by his prayer for them, as for those at Colossae, that their hearts may be comforted, they being knit together in love and unto all riches. The one great peril threatening the church at Laodicea was its wealth, and it may safely be inferred that the Apostle saw the peril, and prayed that, their hearts might be comforted, they being knit together in love and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, that they may know the mystery of God, even Christ. That is to say, he desired for them that they might have the true wealth, knowing as he probably did, that they were already possessed of much earthly wealth. In the authorized version we have another reference to the church at Laodicea, which has been omitted from the revised. It occurs at the close of the first letter to Timothy, and is of the nature of a note, the first to Timothy was written from Laodicea, which is the chiefest city of Phrygia, Beccatiana. That note, of course, presupposes that Paul was set free from the imprisonment during which he wrote, and that he visited this church. And while among them wrote to Timothy, who subsequently joined him, having been left in charge of the church at Ephesus. Our revisers have omitted that statement, believing that there is no sufficient authority for it. This much, however, is certain, that the church at Laodicea was known to the Apostle, that he was deeply interested in it, and that it had some intimate fellowship with the church at Colossae. In addressing himself to this church, the Lord uses descriptive words, which at once arouse interest and arrest attention. These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God. Here is nothing which symbolizes his manifested splendor. This is rather a declaration of his essential glory. The description creates a contrast. To abject failure he addresses himself as the one incapable of failure. The statement is threefold, positive, relative, and declarative of authority. It is a profound proclamation of authority based upon the facts which are the cause and reason of all things. First, the positive statement. These things saith the Amen. Secondly, the relative declaration. The faithful and true witness. Thirdly, the authoritative proclamation. The beginning of the creation of God. He that is the Amen. This word has come from the Hebrew without translation, and to understand its value we must seek to know its original meaning in that language. The root meaning is that of nursing or building up, and the derived meaning in perpetual use today is that of something established, built up sure, positive. The word therefore takes us back to God as the nursing mother, and expresses the truth of the absolute stability and actual correctness of everything that God has thought, spoken, and done. It is an essential word, the Amen. All truth lies within its compass as to certainty. As a title of Christ, it is equivalent in value to the statement which he made when he said, I am the truth. It must ever be remembered that he did not say, I teach the truth, nor, I declare the truth, nor, I explain the truth, but, I am the truth. Here we have the same thought put in a form almost more august and splendid. He that is the Amen, the essential truth, truth expressed in a person, truth from which there can be no appeal. The Amen is the conclusion, because it is the finality of nourishment, the perfection of edification, the last word, the end, to which nothing can be added. So Christ approaching this church declares in the first phrase of declaration that from him there can be no appeal. This is the certainty, the finality, the ratification, the ultimate authority, the Amen. Then follows the relative statement of the same great fact. He is the faithful and true witness. He is that, because he is the Amen. He is that, because he is the truth. He is the Amen, even though he never speak. He is the truth, if he utter no word. But now that the truth has been spoken by him, it is a faithful and true witness that he has born. He is the faithful and true witness of God and of the church. When he speaks, there is no exaggeration and no minimizing. What he says is faithful and true, because he is faithfulness and truth. What he says will be exactly true, because he is in himself absolute truth, and there is nothing beyond him in all the realm of truth. The witness concerning all things in him will be faithfulness and truth. He is the only one through whom this perfect witness can be spoken. The church at Laodicea had failed in witness. Its condition had eclipsed the essential light that should have been shining in the darkness around, and the master comes to it and addresses it as the faithful and true witness. He is about to strip it of all the false appearance which deceives the eyes of many, but which cannot deceive him. As in the old economy, by its last messenger, Jehovah said he would be a swift witness against the sorcerers and evildoers, the witness of truth against evil, the one who would drag the evil into the light of truth. So here, as he comes to unmask the failure of the Laodicean people, he announces himself as the one who will neither exaggerate the condition nor permit anything of it to remain hidden. Then the last phrase brings us back into the sublimity of majesty. As we read it, we are impelled to worship. The Beginning of the Creation of God. Having noticed the reference to Laodicea in Colossians, it becomes interesting to read Colossians in light of Laodicea, and to notice how this very expression, the beginning of the creation of God, is one of the pillars upon which the truth of the Colossian epistle rests. In that sublime and matchless statement concerning the glories of Christ, occurring in the first chapter of Colossians, verses 15 to 18, these words occur, Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation, for in him were all things created, in the heavens and upon the earth, things visible and things invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers, all things have been created through him and unto him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together, consist. This betokens rank and right lying behind all other. If the heart ever questions the deity of Christ, it is well to go back and ponder this great statement. It is impossible to retain this in the Bible if Christ be anything less than God, and all the sublimity of these declarations lies in the suggestion within this title. Approaching the church at Laodicea, he comes as one whose rank is infinitely beyond that of priest, prophet, or king. He speaks with the authority of cause and creation. Wherever the eye rests, or whatever the mind is conscious of, is as to first cause the work of Christ. His footprints may be tracked through all creation. Every blush of beauty reveals the touch of his finger. There are no flowers but have in them witness to him. No marvelous and majestic landscape entrancing the vision of men, but that sings the solemn anthem of his power and beauty. In all the precision of created things, the rolling seasons, the dawn of day, and the westering of the sun, in the emergence of spring from its garment of winter, its procedure into the splendor of summer, and its gorgeous robing in autumnal glory, is to be discovered the power of the Christ. Thus coming to a church conceited because of its wealth and independence. He sublimely announces his wealth and independence. If this church had but ears to hear, how it must have blushed with shame as the tawdryness of its wealth became apparent in the blinding splendor of his, and as the blasphemy of its independence was manifest, as the only one of independence declared himself as the origin of all things. He speaks to them not as the king of a section, not as the one who enunciates laws for one realm of the universe, but as the beginning of creation, the cause and the creator, who is king of all creation, and enunciates for all the laws which condition life. To the church at Laodicea, lifeless, indifferent, cool, he speaks as the one who is the source of all life, the infinite energy, the beginning of the creation of God. In this capacity of infinite majesty, he speaks no single word of commendation. Many are the words of hope, he utters. He has not lost all hope even for this fearful failure at Laodicea, but there is no commendation. His counsel and complaint run close together, alternating through all the message. Let us select the complaint, considering it first, and then passing attention to his counsel. Three brief statements indicate the Lord's complaint. First, Thou art, and then, Thou sayest, and yet again, Thou art. In the first he describes the general condition of the church, in the second he describes the church as the church thinks it is, in the third he reveals, in minute and detailed truth, the actualities. First, his vision of the church as to its spirit, and not as to its externalities, then a revelation of the church's belief concerning itself, and then the contrast, terrible and startling, of his view of the church, even as to details. I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot. Such is the spiritual condition as he declares it. Thou sayest, I am rich, and have gotten riches, and have need of nothing. That was their consciousness. Thou art the wretched one, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked, and thou knowest it not. That is their detailed condition, in contrast with their supposed condition. These descriptions form our Lord's complaint. Thou art neither cold nor hot. Thou art lukewarm. Let us take these words and attempt to see what they really indicate. Cold. Frozen. The thought of temperature lowered by evaporation lies within the word. Thou art not frozen. The church was not characterized by utter indifference. Hot. Boiling. Thou art not boiling. The church was not characterized by fervent heat. It was not utterly indifferent. It had no fervent zeal. What then is the condition? Lukewarm. And we may with perfect accuracy render the word tepid. Thou art not frozen. Thou art not boiling. Thou art tepid. If there is anything abhorrent to the heart of Christ, it is a tepid church. He would rather have the church frozen. I did not say that. He did. I would thou wert cold. He would rather have the church boiling. I would thou wert hot. But this condition of being tepid is utterly repugnant to Him. No emotion, no enthusiasm, no urgency, no passion, no compassion. I am not sure that the condition of the church might not be expressed in a phrase I once heard fall from the lips of one who called himself a Christian. Said he when raising a protest against evangelistic work with a very evident assumption of superiority and self-complacency. You know, I am thoroughly evangelical but not evangelistic? Exactly. Tepid. Evangelical but not evangelistic? It is a lie. No man is evangelical without being evangelistic. A man tells me that he is evangelical, that he believes in the ruin of man and redemption provided by Christ and in man's responsibility, and yet is not evangelistic. Then he is the worst traitor in the camp of Christ, and that is why Christ hates tepid men and tepid churches. It was that condition that drove John Wesley into the lines of irregular itinerancy, which became the regular march of the armies of God. It was that same condition that drove William Booth out into the work of Christian mission, which developed into the Salvation Army. I remember him once telling the story how he was made an enthusiast for salvation. Said he, I was made a red-hot salvationist by an infidel lecturer. That lecturer said, If I believed what some of you Christians believe, I would never rest day or night telling men about it. That sentence was the great sentence. William Booth heard, believed, acted. It was like a fire in his bones, and drove him out from that which was tepid to that which was boiling. Tepid is that condition in which conviction does not affect conscience, heart, or will. The cross is not denied, but it is not vital. The cross may have been worn as an ornament, as, alas, it is too often worn today. But these sleek saints had never themselves been nailed to a cross. The silver cross, the golden cross worn as an ornament upon the breast, creates a pleasant sensation. A wooden cross, and iron nails, and agonizing death is a different matter. When the cross is an ornament there is no death in it, but then there is no life in it. When the cross ceases to be an ornament and becomes the death, then there is a passion that eventuates in contagious life. Sin? Oh, certainly the fact of sin was admitted, but there is no hatred of sin. They would speak of sinners as persons to be pitied, but no finger would be lifted to save them. They would speak of sin as something objectionable, perhaps as a moral defect, or an obloquity of vision, but never as a damnable poison, rotting the foundations of life and bringing down into awful cataclysm all fair and lovely things. They were tepid, lukewarm in their creeds, and neither hot nor cold in their conduct. Is it any wonder that Christ sighed over them? Ay, would thou wert cold or hot! In the light of this pronouncement, the declaration of the Church's opinion of itself is terrible. Hear the language as Christ construed it, remembering he was the faithful and true witness, and this is no exaggeration, but inward conviction. I am rich, possessing abundantly. I have gotten riches, the language of perfect self-satisfaction. I have need of nothing, independence. If we had visited the Church at Laodicea, in all probability they would have shown us the Church premises. They would have told us how much they paid for the property, how much the Church cost. They would have said, whatever we want, we have. If we require new premises, we build them. We are independent. Did you suggest some form of service that would create new spiritual power? They would have been astonished. Did you propose a mission? No, certainly not. We do not want a mission here. We have need of nothing. A series of meetings for the deepening of spiritual life? Oh, no. Hold them in some other district. We have need of nothing. A time of special humiliation and prayer? We have no need of humiliation. We have need of nothing. That was the condition. They needed nothing because they had everything. Now listen again. Christ gives his view of their condition. Thou art the wretched one, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. First, wretched, and the simple meaning of the word is oppressed with a burden. The burden they carried was the very wealth which they imagined carried them. Instead of wealth helping and lifting them, it hindered and grated. As he with eyes of fire looked over the churches, of the one that was perhaps the wealthiest, he said that it was a heavenly burdened one. How different from the popular estimate! We have often heard of a church being heavily burdened with debt, but the Master speaks of one heavily burdened with wealth. Again, thou art miserable, and the word here means pitiable. The heart of the Lord was moved in pity toward them. He had no congratulation to offer them. His feeling toward them was one of commiseration. Thou art poor, and the word means poor, as a pauper by the highway side is poor. From his standpoint of wealth, the church was a cringing beggar, possessing nothing worth the having. Thou art blind, that is opaque, seeing nothing clearly, seeing nothing afar. Nearsighted is the word which perhaps most accurately expresses the thought, lacking vision, lacking light, devoid of the sense of the far distances, confined within narrow limits. And thou art naked, nude, stripped of the clothing of glory and beauty, which ought to adorn the church as the bride of Christ. To other churches he has spoken of white raiment. This church has none. Presently the garments of purple and the jewels of gold will become moth-eaten and tarnished, and the church will be seen in the light of the eternities with no robe of purified service to cover it. Let it be specially noted that all these words which Christ uses to describe the church are words of pity. There is not an angry word among them. He is not angry with the condition of the church. All that he is able to remedy. His anger is that they are satisfied with these things. Read the words yet once again, and note how they pulsate with the pity of his heart. Wretched, the condition that ever appeals to the sympathy of the tender-hearted. Miserable, in such a condition as to touch a sympathetic nerve. Poor, a beggar by the highway side, to whom you can hardly refuse help. Blind, one groping the way, stretching out hands that seem to compel you to stretch out yours in guiding kindness. Naked, making you long to fling some garment of warmth around the denuded form. Such people are saying, We are rich, and have gotten our riches, we do not need anything. And in that very fact lies the deepest note of misery that calls most loudly for a yet deeper compassion. I believe that Christ's attitude to the church was one of profound pity. It was Keith who wrote of this church. Sooner would a man in Sardis have felt that the chill of death was upon him, and have cried out for life, and called for the physician, than would a man of Laodicea, who would calmly count his even pulse, and think his life secure, when death was preying on his vitals. This is a true picture of Laodicea. I am rich. Thou art poor. I am increased with goods. Thou hast nothing. I have need of nothing. Thou art pitiable, blind, naked. O the revealing Christ! With what heart-searching does the infinite light of His infinite love fall upon the assemblies of His people? Now turn to our Lord's counsel to the church, and in it even more supremely is His heart revealed. First, His wish expressed, I would thou wert cold or hot. Secondly, His declared intention, I will spew thee out of my mouth. Lastly, His immediate advice, By of me. His wish expressed, I would thou wert cold or hot. Is that not a strange thing for Him to say? We could have understood it better if He had said, I would thou wert hot. And yet a deep abhorrence of the condition is revealed more forcefully by what He actually said. He would rather have had them cold. There is infinitely greater chance for someone who is cold than for someone who is lukewarm. There is more hope of the man outside the church, in all the desolating dreariness of the coldness which is lack of life, and therefore of love, than for the man within the church, who is near enough to its warmth not to appreciate it, and far enough away from its burning heat to be useless to God and man. A greater chance for the heathen who has not heard the gospel, than for the man who has become an evangelized heathen, if he disobeyed the claims of the evangel. It is impossible to read this epistle without a sense throbbing through the heart of the wail of, I would. We have heard Him say it before. While yet upon the earth, with a voice full of emotion, as He looked on Jerusalem, He cried, How often would I have gathered thy children together, and ye would not? I would thou wert cold or hot. He would infinitely rather have to do with a frozen people, clamoring for warmth, than with this crowd of lukewarm rich folk, which having everything, had need of nothing, and having nothing, had need of everything. Then follows His declared intention, I will spew thee out of my mouth, or very literally, I am about to spew thee out of my mouth. This is not a question of casting a Christian from relation to himself. It is the casting out of a church from her position of witness bearing. Christ amid the lampstands is speaking to the churches in their capacity of light bearers in the darkness of the night, and He says, I am about to reject thee from this work, about to spew thee out of my mouth, about to put thee away from the place of witness and testimony. In the form of this statement there is at once a declaration of a decision arrived at, and the intimation of a possible escape from the judgment pronounced. I am about to do it. It is a sentence pronounced, it is a doom descending. I am about to do it. It is not yet done. The blow has not fallen, the light is not yet extinguished. All this lends urgency to the actual words of counsel, as he now utters them. I counsel thee to buy of me gold refined by fire, that thou mayest become rich, and white garments, that thou mayest clothe thyself, and that the shame of thy nakedness be not made manifest. And I sath to anoint thine eyes, that thou mayest see. He now addresses himself to the church as he sees her, not the church as she thinks she is, and he confronts her in all fullness as the one possessing all she most sadly lacks, and in his counsel there is a declaration of the way by which all that is objectionable to their condition may be corrected. You are poor, buy my gold, that you may be rich. You are naked, buy my white raiment, that you may be clothed. You are blind, buy my eye salve, that you may see. The church says, I am rich, and have gotten riches, and have need of nothing. He says, Thou art miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. Buy gold from me, that you may be rich. They say, We have gotten all we need. And he says, You are naked, buy of me the white garments, that you may clothe yourselves. They say, We have need of nothing. He says, You are blind, buy my eye salve, and anoint your eyes, that you may see. The Lord would teach the church that the true wealth, the true raiment, the true wisdom, the true vision is himself possessed in all the aspects of his perfection. As Paul had intimated in that letter to the Colossian church, which he desired to be read to the Laodiceans also, that their hearts may be comforted, they being knit together in love, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, that they may know the mystery of God, even Christ. If they would be wealthy, they must buy of him gold refined by fire, they must be rich with what he is. If they would be clothed, they must be with white garments, which are woven out of loyal service rendered to him, and in the strength of his love. If they would have wisdom, they must seek from him the eye salve, by which they may see things in their true values and perspective. So he approaches the church that he is about to spew out of his mouth in disdain, and opens before them the storehouses of his infinite riches, and says, If you are only conscious of your poverty, I have riches. If you are but conscious of your nakedness, I have clothing. If you are but conscious of your blindness, I have eye salve. All that can hinder the church will be continuance in the vain delusion that she is rich and increasing with goods and has need of nothing. The way back to blessing will be that the church should get down into the dust, into the place of humbling, into the place of heartbreak, into the place where she shall indeed say, I am poor, and miserable, and blind, and naked. Then he will comfort with his own heart's love, and enrich with his own untold wealth, and clothe with his own white raiment of reward, and anoint with his own inspiration and vision. How graciously he offers to supply the need, and yet with what tender irony, mingled with mighty compassion, the statement of his ability confronts their false notion of their sufficiency. They said, We are rich. He said, Buy my gold. They said, We have need of nothing. He says, Seek all from me. Then, as in a flash, straight out of his heart of infinite love comes a statement, As many as I love, I reprove and chasten. If he had not loved the church at Laodicea, he would have let her alone. He loved them notwithstanding all their failure, and his love was the reason of his rebuke and of his counsel. And then words follow, full of a great urgency, Be zealous and repent. It is as though the master would do anything to arouse them from their lethargy. He calls them to zeal and to repentance. But how can these people come back? They have not far to travel, though their distance be great, for he is close at hand. Hear the words, the gracious words. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If any man hear my voice, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. What startling revelations lie within the compass of these words. First, he is excluded. They have everything in the church at Laodicea, except Jesus Christ. He is outside the door. We should ever remember that while we have often preached the gospel from this text, and I do not think it is wrong, that the words are first told to the church, and not to the individual. Behold, I stand at the door, the door of the church, and knock, outside it. Oh, this excluded Christ, excluded from his world, for they crucified him, excluded from his church, for he is outside the door knocking. Yet he waits. And for what? For one man to let him in. He is not waiting for a committee to pass a resolution. Then, indeed, the case might be hopeless. He waits for a man. If any man hear my voice, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. I will be his first guest. I will sup with him. He shall be my guest, and he with me. I will sit at the table which his love provides, and satisfy my heart. He shall sit at the table which my love will provide, and satisfy his heart. Supposing a man in Laodicea opened that door, saying as he did so, I am convinced of our poverty, we have everything but Christ. I will admit him, and spread the table for him. What would happen? The moment a man should open the door to Christ, the excluded Christ, and Christ should pass to communion and fellowship with that man, then that man in communion with Christ would excommunicate the church. We have often heard of churches excommunicating men. It is quite possible for one man to excommunicate the church by passing into the place of communion with the Lord. Then how may the church return to fellowship? By joining Christ and that man. Just as the one man came into communication with Christ, so also must the church, by including him who so long has been excluded. In the Old Testament there is a remarkable illustration of this truth. There was a day when Moses, by taking up the tabernacle of the Lord of hosts, and pitching it without the camp, excommunicated the whole nation from the covenant. To that new center he called those who sought the Lord into a new position of separation, and as the people returned around that center in obedience, they were received back into fellowship. There came a day when Christ excommunicated the whole Hebrew nation, and the whole world. It was the day on which he suffered without the camp. Passing outside the camp he rent the veil and called men to the inner place of worship by calling them back to himself. Those following him entered the holy of holies. So this man in Laodicea, who should open the door to Jesus, would set up a new standard of life and power, and the only way for the excommunicated church to return would be to take the same position as that man. It is a solemn and awful crisis in the history of a church when in response to the patient calling of the excluded Lord, one man shall open the door, and including the Christ, exclude those that have lost their loyalty to him. There is but one way for such to return, and that is by coming to that man's position. We read once in the life story of Jesus of how they excommunicated a man. So angry were they with the testimony that he bore to Jesus that they cast him out of the synagogue. When Jesus heard of it, he found the man and said, Dost thou believe on the Son of God? And the man said, And who is he, Lord, that I may believe on him? And the reply fell with strange strength and sweetness upon the listening ear of that excommunicated man. Thou hast both seen him, and he it is that speaketh with thee. And the man said, Lord, I believe, and he worshipped him. They cast him out of the synagogue, the place of worship, but he found the one center of worship. It may be that the Laodicean church will exclude the man who includes Christ. Then let that man have no sorrow in his heart save for the folly of the church. If there be no other way to find Christ than by leaving the Laodicean church, then the it be left, the better. To find him is to find gold refined by fire, and clothing, so that there may be no shame of nakedness, and eyesalve, which broadens the outlook and creates all visions. O, behold the vision! Apostasy confront with fidelity, falsehood confront with truth, decorated poverty face to face with infinite wealth, lukewarmness and hypocrisy with compassion and devotion. Behold I stand at the door and knock. What dost thou want, O crowned one, knocking? A man, one man who will open the door that I may come in and sup with him, and he with me. The last thing to be noticed is a promise to the overcomer. For these people the hardest battle had to be fought, and therefore the greatest reward is promised. The Lord seems to recognize that the difficulty of such life in such a church as Laodicea is the most terrible the saint ever has to fight, and so he makes to them the most gracious and remarkable promise. He that overcometh I will give to him to sit down with me in my throne, as I also overcame and sat down with my father in his throne. Beyond this promise neither hope nor imagination can go. Is there not a suggestion here of the peculiar temptation that Jesus had to meet, as I also overcame? How did he overcome? What can he mean? A hundred answers come to our thoughts, but do they fit the occasion? There seems to be but one that unlocks the mystery. He is talking to people whose supreme wrong is that they are attempting to take everything easily. They have no compassion, no enthusiasm, and he says to them, Overcome, as I also overcame. Is there not here every evidence of his remembrance of the subtlest temptation that came to him? The enemy in the wilderness said, All these kingdoms will I give thee by an easy way, without the cross, without the passion, without crucifixion. His own disciple brought to him the same suggestion, Spare thyself. What need for all this outpouring of life in a great passion and compassion? And even in Gethsemane we catch the echo of the tempter's voice. I say this with all carefulness, ever remembering that temptation is not sin. I speak only of the echo of temptation as I seem to hear it in his prayer, Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. The enemy was ever saying to him in one way or another, Spare thyself. Why this strenuous life? Why set your face like a flint toward Jerusalem, and be determined to tread the Via Dolorosa? But he overcame, and sat down with his father in his throne, having taken the only pathway that could issue in the crowning, and now with all the mighty meaning of that fact, he says to the church at Laodicea, to this self-complacent, self-satisfied, lukewarm and tepid crowd, overcome as I also overcame, be zealous, be hot, and you shall sit down with me in my throne. Very few words are necessary by way of application of the message of this letter to the age in which we live. The lessons are self-evident. I propose to do little more than gather them up, indicating each in brief sentences. Lukewarmness is in itself a contradiction of all we profess to believe. I do not think, in the whole scheme of these letters, there is anything of greater importance or anything more needing emphasis today than this truth. The things we profess to believe are of such a nature that we cannot be lukewarm without practically denying them. Better to be cold, be frozen. Better abandon all profession of interest in sacred things than to pretend to believe them and sing about them and yet be lukewarm. We work far more harm to our age by tepid character than by open denial of Christ. It is not the people who are frozen, utterly indifferent, but the people who pretend to love Christ, those, forsooth, who are evangelical, but not evangelistic, who are hindering the progress of his kingdom. Men who theorize around the atonement and quarrel over the forms in which they express the truth and never stretch out the hand to save the lost souls—these are the men who are cursing the church—men who love to split hairs about election and free will and yet let the millions drift and do nothing to rescue them. All the wrath of my heart could not equal the words of Christ to such as are lukewarm. I am about to spew thee out of my mouth. He loathes the impassioned regularity of the man who professes to believe the facts which constitute evangelical faith and does not yield himself to the great claims lying within these truths. Lukewarmness is the worst form of blasphemy. Let the tepid churches call themselves clubs, and we shall know how to deal with them. Let tepid men leave the churches. Let them say they do not believe in Christ, for that is the true statement. Let them say there is no sin, for of that position their actions prove their acceptance. Anything to be rid of the insolent indifference which to Christ and men is calculated cruelty. And yet another thought, appalling and awful, abides with us as we turn from this study. It is that of the excluded Christ. O, how he has suffered, and how he suffers still! Of his own gracious will he was excluded from heaven for the redemption of lost men, and then excluded from his nation by the blindness of that nation, and then excluded from his world by the apparent victory of the forces of evil, and now, alas, so often excluded from his very church by the tepid indifference of those who imagine that they have everything while they have nothing. And yet once more, O the matchless tenderness and patience of this selfsame Son of God! He is the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God. And in this letter where he speaks from the standpoint of these primal facts, more than in any other, is revealed the unquenchable love of the heart of God, insulted, excluded, and ready to spew out of his mouth that which is utterly loathsome. Yet he waits, knocking still at the door, willing to enter into new fellowship with one man. To that simply stated fact, nothing that proves tenderness can be added. Yet we learn, moreover, that the only cure for lukewarmness is the readmission of the excluded Christ. Apostasy must be confronted with his fidelity, looseness with conviction born of his authority, poverty with the fact of his wealth, frost with the mighty fire of his enthusiasm, and death with the life divine that is in his gift. There is no other cure for the loneliness of heaven, for the malady of the world, for the lukewarmness of the church, than the readmitted Christ. Let us listen to the Son of Man as he walks amid the lampstands. Let us beseech him to say to us all he has to say. What he says to us shall be the truth, for he will preface it with the, I know. And so true will be the statement following that initial word, that we shall be compelled to say, This is the word of truth. If he has commendation for us, the uttering of it shall be our chief reward. If he speak words of complaint, heeding them, let us find our way to true and deep repentance. Let us listen principally for his words of counsel, and hearing them, without reserve, let us yield to him our quick obedience. He also says to all the churches, I will. It is the word of his judgment. It is the word of his promise. This we know, that what he wills is best. So to his chastisements we render ourselves that we may find his great reward. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches.