To Laodicea: I Am Knocking at the Door

As the head of the church, Jesus Christ gives some very serious warnings to the seven churches in Revelation 2 and 3. We've been going through a series of sermons on those seven churches, and we've been looking at what did the message mean to them. Not necessarily, okay, let's look at it and try to decide its prophetic meaning, which we'll talk about in the last sermon we do on this subject, but what did it mean to them.

We've looked at what we know about those churches from the messages given. To them are from other biblical information we have, or some a little bit historical information, but we take and we try to study what were those people like. What did it mean to get this message, and what did it mean when it was read to you, because it was very personal to them. It was very personal to each one of them. And out of the six churches that we've covered so far, we know that five of them received very stern warnings from Jesus Christ as the head of the church.

Each of these messages to these churches begins with a description that Jesus gives about Himself, and that's what's so interesting about this. As I mentioned before, it'd be interesting to take an entire sermon and just cover all those introductions because it's something that Christ is revealing about Himself to us as He reveals them to these seven churches. He told those in Ephesus, repent and do the first works, else I come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place. Remember, they were a church that doctorally had it all right.

They had stood up those who had tried to bring false doctrine into the church, and yet they lost their first law of it. And here He says, I may remove your lampstand. In other words, if you don't repent, you won't be my church anymore. He tells those Pergamos to repent, or else I will come to you quickly.

And here's what's... I mean, this is a church of God. He says, they will fight against them with the sword of my mouth. Remember, we went through that, except for Smyrna. Smyrna was the only church that was not given a warning. They were simply told that they hung up, they were hanging on to the truth, in spite of the fact that they live in abject poverty, and that they were persecuted. Oh, good! You know, the only good church is the one that's living in poverty and being killed, right?

He told the church of Thyatira, which was the most paganized of all the churches, that he would, if they didn't repent, kill their children. This isn't to the world. This isn't a pagan. This isn't to the beast power. These are the words of Jesus Christ to his church. We don't, you know, to read through all these, which a lot of times we pick and choose when we run out of this, and we miss that there's some real important points in here. To the church of Sardis, what he said was a dead church.

He says he would come to them as a thief. They wouldn't even be prepared for him. And in Philadelphia, he said, hold fast what you have, though no man can take your crown. The problem that the Philadelphia church then was dealing with was that people could get offended by other people or mistreat other people or come along with some argument or something that they were letting other people take their crown. It wasn't necessarily, you know, false doctrine.

It wasn't some of the other things like the immorality that some of the churches experienced. But then it was something with each other. He told them, be careful that you don't let another person take your crown. And now we're to the last church on the list, the church of Laodicea. Laodicea, like Philadelphia, was one of the newer churches. Yeah, it had only been around for about 350 years by the time that, or not the church, but I mean the city.

About 350 years when John wrote to them. Now we think, wow, 350 years? That's a long time. But now that was pretty much a new city in terms of how long some of the cities in Asia Minor had been.

And they were famous for three things. Even their name, by the way, is very interesting. Their name is actually a woman's name. There was a Greek king who founded Laodicea. He named it after his wife. So it's, it's, it was his wife's name. But they were known for three things. They were a financial banking center.

Money would come in and out of this city. None of the other cities were a banking center that we've gone through as far as these seven cities of the churches. But this one was a banking center. So you can imagine the wealth that flows in and out of this city. It was famous because around outside of Laodicea, they raised a certain kind of sheep that had black wool. And they would use that wool to create clothing that was imported or exported, I'm sorry, all over the empire. So, you know, there was this famous black wool that they made clothing out of that they made enough that they exported out. And of course, another way that they became a wealthy city. And then they were also known as a medical center.

And they produced two things that once again they exported. An eye salve and an ointment for the ears. Two different kinds of ointments they created. One for the eyes and one for the ears. And they found some of the old coins from the ancient time of Laodicea. And of course, on the front it's always going to be Caesar, right? Usually the back of a coin would have the local leader or a temple, usually one of the gods or goddesses on it, they would have one of their doctors on it. So they had doctors' names on some of the coins. So it was a medical center. And they were known for making this special ointment for your eyes and for your ears. They also had a large Jewish population, although that doesn't seem to have, you know, the message given to Laodicea, they're not mentioned at all. So let's go to Revelation 3. Revelation 3. Let's look at the message to the church in Laodicea. What can we learn about who they were? The first people who received this. And then what's important for us? Because remember, all the churches are supposed to read all the messages all the time.

Because these are problems. Whatever church that existed at that time, these are problems that could be in the church of God at any time. In fact, as a pastor, I could say I've been in churches where it was like I was in three or four of these churches in one congregation. You know, the pluses and the minuses, the strengths and the weaknesses. I mean, I still can't wrap my mind around how Thyatira was praised by Jesus Christ for their faith. More so than most of the other churches. For their faith and their good works, and then condemned for their absolute heresies that they believed. You start to realize each of these churches developed differently. And each of them had their own problems. Verse 14. Verse 14.

And to the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write, these things says the Amen, the faithful, the true witness, the beginning of the creation of God. Once again, Jesus Christ, revealing as the messenger here to these people. He said an angel, but He's the messenger. And He says, here's who I am. I know your works that you're neither cold nor hot. I could wish that you were cold or hot. So then, because you are lukewarm and neither cold or hot, I will vomit you out of my mouth.

You stop and you think about that. It's an odd imagery, right? You're neither cold nor hot, so I'm going to spit you out. But it's a very frightening warning. What He's saying is, I'm going to throw you out of my body. So there's a threat here to the Laodiceans that they could end up outside of the body of Christ. Because they're neither cold nor hot. Now, over the years, I have read a lot of explanations of what that means. And I've heard a lot of sermons, whether it's the radio church of God, the worldwide church of God, the United Church of God, on what that cold and hot means. Okay? What does it mean to be lukewarm? And sometimes the explanation is, well, the lukewarm is you're just sort of not paying attention. You're just walking through life in a stupor, basically, you know, not really caring. But you know, when we read through these churches, that describes Sardis, the dead church, the dying church, where they didn't even know they were dying. When I look at this today, what I want to look at is a specific statement we're going to get into as we go through it. And what does that mean? Okay? Because I mentioned one of the sermons that the Laodiceans didn't have heresies like some of the other churches. And I didn't have a couple of people come to say, well, they had to have heresies. They said, oh, yeah, they do. But they're not the same as the other churches. Their heresies come from a different place. They don't have the immorality of the Nicolaians. They're not condemned for that. So what is their problem? Are they the dead church? No. So what does it mean to be lukewarm? And I'm going to talk about that later. If you look at this other plausible explanation, okay? That's what we're going to look at. If you look at Colossae, Colossae, we have the book of Colossae written to Colossae. Colossae wasn't that far away. And it's about 10 to 12 miles away. Areopolis is about six miles away. Now you think, okay, there's two cities close by. But Laodicea did not have a large natural water supply.

It, you know, there wasn't some huge lake, you know, or a huge river running through. I mean, they had water, but not enough for this growing city. So what they did is they shipped water from those other two places in. Now that's what the Romans, this was one of the greatest engineering feats of the ancient world, aqueducts. Now you think about Areopolis six miles away. You've got to get water six miles. And it's not straight, and it's not downhill, right? Up and down and all over the place. You've got to cross mountains and valleys. And they built those aqueducts so they could start water at one place and it would move, push itself up, push itself down, and get to where they wanted it to go. Once they got the water moving, as long as you pumped water at the other end, it would end up at the far end. And Colossae was between 10 and 12 miles away. It was amazing. They pumped two water supplies into the city. Now the water supply would come in. The rich people, by the way, did have indoor plumbing, indoor water supply, but the average person didn't. Water would come into great big pools where they'd pump the water into.

The water came from two different sources for two different kinds of water. One was a very cold water, and the other was a very hot water.

Probably mineral springs. I mean, it just came up out of the ground. Which, you know, mineral water doesn't always taste that good, but you know, you get hot water running over miles through stone aqueducts and cold water running many miles through aqueducts. And coming in and being dumped into these pools. That stuff must have tasted terrible. It would be tepid. It was just terrible tasting. And that's why this would have meant something to them. I taste your water and I go, I spit it out. Probably that happened all the time. Visitors would come in to Laodicea, go out to one of the pools, get a drink of water, and spit it out and say, this is the worst water I've ever had. So there's something here that means something to these people. So hot and cold may not mean, you know, I remember hot was, I heard a sermon years ago, where hot meant on fire to do the work of God and cold meant unconverted. The only problem I find with that is if I had a big gulp of very hot water, I'd spit it out. So is that what it meant to these people? I mean, we can make analogies that are maybe accurate analogies. I'm not talking about accurate analogies. I'm talking about what did it mean to these people, okay? And it meant that we live in a city where people spit our water out because it's tepid. It's neither hot. You know, it's not the hot springs where people go probably to, you know, health conditions. You go to hot springs. They do that today. And it's not the cold refreshing water that comes this way. They all come together. What create, what is created is the worst water around. But it's all we have to drink. So then we have to figure out what the lukewarmness is. Okay? So why does he describe this as lukewarmness? So let's go to verse 17.

Verse 17. He says, now remember, I will vomit you out of my mouth. So I'm going to spit this out. This tastes really bad. Christ's reaction to that is, it, you taste bad to me. He says, because you say, I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing, and do not know that you're wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked. Now, it'd be easy to spot, I guess, Alayna C. And just look for any poor, blind, naked person that says they're rich. And that's Alayna C. So obviously, I'm going to spit this out. So obviously, this isn't a physical description, right? Spiritually, they look at themselves and say, I am rich. I can see. I have righteous clothing on. And this is their problem. So we all do, you know, like I said, I have commentaries. I have whole books written on this part of Revelation. I have what I've heard in the church over the years. And it goes all over the place. But what did they read? The thing that would have jumped out to them was the problem is, is how you see yourself. The problem in Laodicea is how they see themselves.

We're going to have to go through and describe, well, how did they see themselves then? Well, obviously, they think they're rich. In other words, Laodicea wasn't somebody like in Sardis where you go into the church and it's like, man, these people, they're not much different to the world. They just sort of, you know, you go to their services, there's no energy, there's not a good message, the people don't even talk about God, they just talk about what's happening at work. There's no camaraderie. No, that's Sardis. That's not Laodicea. Laodicea knows they've got it all together. They know they've got it all together. They know we know the Bible, we know the Scripture, we do what's right. And yet God looks at them and says, Christ says, no, you're naked. In fact, it's very interesting that in this, in this, what Jesus says here, you know, what were they famous for? Banking center. He says, you think you're wealthy and you're not. They're famous for making this fine clothing that's sent out, exported all over the place. You think you're wearing fine clothing, you're naked. They're known for ice, ISAF, and we're going to see where he even brings that in. In other words, he had, he goes at them, and I think there must be a reason here. The very pride of their city is why he goes after them. And that is important for us to understand. That's important for us to understand. Once again, they know there's nothing wrong with them. There can't be. Verse 15. What we're looking at are people who are incredibly self-sufficient and self-satisfied when they look at their righteousness. And they would appear righteous to other people.

So I would have known later to see if I'd have walked in that place, I'd have recognized that attitude right away. Probably you would not have. You would have said, wow, these people have it all together. So, verse 18, he says, I counsel you, Christ says, to buy for me gold refined in the fire, that you may be rich, and white garments that you may be clothed, that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed, and anoint your eyes with eyesave that you may see. See where he goes right after the things, the three things they're so famous for in their city? Which I believe, and I'm just extrapolating something out of this. You know, sometimes you have to speculate a little bit. Part of their problem was they were really proud to be Laodiceans in their communities. I mean, they had quite a city. And I think this is important for us as Americans. We sometimes impose into the Bible American ideals that are not biblical ideals. We're proud to be Americans because, let's face it, in all of history there's been no place like this. For all of its problems and its evils and its, you know, it's still been the best place to live. But we have to be careful just because we have lots of wealth, we export lots of things, we have all this science that we're so proud of, that doesn't mean we impose that on the Bible. And I really think that's part of the problem of Laodicea. But why? Because why would he go after their city? You know, he doesn't go after the city at any other of these messages, but he goes after their city. The three things they're famous for. It says, no, you're not wealthy. Spiritually, you're poor. And you think you dress nice, you are naked. And you think you can see my way. He says, you're absolutely blind. You're absolutely blind. Verse 19 then, As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Therefore be zealous and repent. So here is their call to repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come to him and dine with him, and he with me. That's most that statement right there. We can zip through and miss what Jesus Christ is saying. This is the church of the people who know they've got it right. And to all, if you saw them, you would say, these people have it right. This is the way God's church should be. And Jesus Christ isn't in the church.

Jesus Christ is standing outside the church, knocking on the door, and they can't even hear him. They're having such a good time. I never thought of Laodicea quite that way before, did you? Jesus Christ is knocking on the door.

Yes, he's not even in the building. That's the imagery that's here. I'm not even in the building. They've locked the door on me.

And that's why he gives them such a strong condemnation that he was going to rebuke and chasten them. Now, they don't get the same condemnation, by the way, as some of the other churches. Some of the other churches get hit a lot harder than this. You know, what Christ says he's going to do if they don't repent. But he tells these people, I am going to correct you because you're going to have to change. So remember, they think they're spiritually complete. Now, what happens when you think you've got it all together?

You look at everybody else and say, well, you don't have it all together. When you think you have it all together, when I think I have it all together, it's just human nature. You look at everybody else, okay, but that person may have it together, but that person doesn't. That person doesn't have it all together. They don't have it all together.

They don't know what I know. They're not as righteous as I am. They're not as strict as I am. They're not as good as I am. Now, I want to make this point. This doesn't mean we accept each other's sins. In fact, we're supposed to go talk to each other about our sins. If you know someone who's got an alcohol problem and they've gone off the wagon, you're supposed to go talk to them about it. That's what Scripture says. You're supposed to go talk to them and try to bring them back. Get them back on track. So no, it doesn't mean we ignore each other's sins. And it sure doesn't mean we ignore what's the sin in the world. Well, okay, it's okay. We just love everybody, so it really doesn't matter. And of course, that's the New Age Christianity. We all just love one another, so what you do doesn't matter. And of course, anyone who has read Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John would know that is the exact opposite of what Jesus Christ taught. So when they call it Christianity, they're wrong. Because either what Jesus said is true about himself or he's insane. That's why Christians need to read Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John before they decide if they're Christians or not. Because either Jesus said certain things that are true, in which your actions do matter, certain things are condemned, and he is the Son of God, and he is the only way to God. You know, the New Age Christianity is there's all religions lead to the same God, and Jesus said that's not true. Either what he says is true or he's nuts. I mean, it's that simple. He's either insane or he's true. What he's talking here is, is that the Laodiceans, as we go through this, will see. What they do is they look at everybody else that are Christians, and they're always measuring themselves, because they're so self-sufficient. They're so self-satisfied. Self-sufficiency is good if you're going to go out and work, have a job, take care of yourself. Self-sufficiency, which is a lot of what our countries build on, is not good spiritually. You can't be spiritually self-sufficient. You can't. By the very definition of what it means to be, biblical definition of what it means to be spiritual, how can you be spiritually self-sufficient? You'd have to be God. Only God is spiritually self-sufficient. You and I aren't.

But what do we know, then, about Laodicea? Not much. We can put through a little history of it. We can go and show how many different armies marched through and who some of their governors were, but we really can't tell you about the Church except in one place. Let's go to Colossians. Chapter 4.

Colossians 4. We'll come back here towards the end.

Colossians 4, verse 16. Remember, Colossians not too far away. Now, this is written around 60 AD. So this is a long time before. It's 40 years later, over 40 years later, that John writes Revelation. So we're going back in time. But he says to the people in Colossians, in verse 16 of chapter 4, Paul writes, Now, when this epistle is read among you, see that it is read also in the church of the Laodiceans, and that you likewise read the epistle from Laodicea. Now, we don't have the letter. God did not choose to say Paul's letter that he wrote to Laodicea. All we have is the one to the Colossians. But both of them were to read it. And as we go through this, what we're going to see is the concerns that Paul had, he's really concerned about these two churches, are based on the same thing. So we can go back in time and know a little bit about the problems and issues in Laodicea 40 years between John writes. Now, I'm not saying you can take now everything in the book of Colossians and imprint it on Laodicea. What I'm saying is historically, we can go back and say there were foundational flaws in the Laodicean church 40 years before John wrote. We can say that much. So by the time John writes, they're probably worse. By the time Jesus inspires him and says, here's what I want you to tell them. They're probably worse. So if we look at Colossians, it's a very interesting letter that Paul writes here. It's very concise. Some of his letters aren't so concise. It's a very concise letter in so many ways. If you go through chapter one, chapter one is one of the most complete explanations of Jesus Christ. He makes four major points in Colossians 1. Jesus Christ is the firstborn from the dead. Jesus Christ is the creator. So he existed before he came to earth. He is the head of the church. He stresses that. Remember last week I told you to remember the Philadelphia church, they had the key of David, which is the authority of Jesus Christ. So they were submitting to Jesus Christ. A problem in Colossians was they didn't totally appreciate Jesus Christ as the head of the church. We can assume then that is part of the problem in Laodicea. Once again, that's an assumption. And he came into flesh and died to reconcile us to God. The first whole chapter explains all of that in a very concise way. So he introduces this. You have to understand who Jesus Christ is. And he introduces it with, this is the mystery. Now that's a very important word in Greek culture because by this time you have the protodacistic concepts coming along because the Greeks believed the foundation of everything is knowledge. It's the foundation of education, which in our country today is the foundation of education. The Jews have a different viewpoint. Foundation of knowledge is wisdom. I mean the foundation of education. I'm sorry, foundation of education is wisdom. There's a difference between the foundation of education is knowledge and the foundation is wisdom. It's two different approaches. So the Greek said it's knowledge. And you know what? The more knowledge you have, the more superior person you are, and the more secret knowledge you have, and now that got into Christianity, the better the Christian, the more secret knowledge you have, the more understanding that you have that nobody else has, only you and a few others. So even though you're part of a very select group, you know, I'm part of the Christian church. Well, there's not that many Christian churches around. Well, I'm part of this congregation. Well, there's only 50 of us. Yeah, but I'm part of the eight that have the real understanding. You see, that's the problem with gnosis. When you see everything founded upon knowledge. Now let's get to Colossians 2 verse 1.

Paul says, For I want you to know what a great conflict I have for you and those that lay in Asea. And for as many who have not seen my face in the flesh. So he specifically says, I'm in conflict here. I worry about you because of what's happening. What's happening? Verse 4. Now this I say, lest anyone should deceive you with pervasive smart words.

He says people are going to come along and try to deceive you. So there's a deception going on. Verse 8. Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ. He keeps bringing it back to the mystery. This is the core, most important things. But somehow in Colossae, and must be a lady to see it, Christ wasn't enough. There was a greater mystery we had to know. What is the greater mystery? You see Paul dealing with some Corinth because of the Greek culture. He talks about the wisdom of men, the wisdom of God, and how these things clash. They were looking for deeper understanding than what was given to them.

So what's very interesting is when we go down to verse 16. I'm not going to go through verse 16 and 17 the way we normally read them, because what we do is we go through this section because verse 16 and 17 is used so many times in part of the Protestant world to prove that you don't have to keep the Sabbath and the Holy Days. We've covered that many times. You can study that or give a sermon on it sometime or whatever. But it's an important part of understanding what it really means. They had to be keeping the Sabbath and the Holy Days where this even makes sense. So I'm not going to go through the explanation of this. They had to be keeping them. I want to go through the real problem that's happening. Verse 16. So let no one judge you in food or in drink or regarding a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath.

Okay, see you don't have to keep the Sabbath and the Holy Days. Actually, it's interesting. In food or drink is actually in the Greek is active. In eating or drinking, okay, don't let anyone judge you in your eating or drinking and keeping of the Sabbath. I mean, you can literally translate it that way. But the point thing is, his focal point is judging. Oh, see, don't judge me if I don't keep the Sabbath. That's what they say it means. It's judging them and how they're doing it. He says, which are a shadow of things that come, but the substances of Christ. Now let's go through the rest of what he says here in the next couple of verses, because you'll start to see what he's really talking about.

Let someone, I'm sorry, let no one cheat you of your reward, taking delight in false humility and worship of angels, and truting it to those things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind.

Okay, the problem here is false humility, worship of angels, and I've got it all together.

I know what you don't know. False humility.

You know, over the years of the church, we've always struggled with time and, you know, we will always continue to struggle with these issues because they're difficult. Where is it that what God expects us to do and where is it are we imposing upon it something that we want to do?

And what we know, false humility will drive you to enforce your ideas on everybody else. I remember years ago, a woman coming to me and saying, I cannot sing onward, Christian soldiers. It's an evil song. I sang it in a church I used to go to, and I cannot sing it. I said, well then don't. It's okay. If it's being led, just stand there. Don't sing. If that goes against your conscience, I understand. Conscience is an important thing. Don't sing it. No, everybody else has to stop singing it. I can't be in a church where anybody sings that song.

So she left.

This is what false humility is. I know what's best because I write before God. I got it all together. But it's something that the Scripture doesn't clearly say. But my interpretation of it is such that everybody has to do it. This comes up all the time. And of course, as you know, if I don't have a biblical teaching, I will expound on it some, and then there's a point I'll say, you have to make that call. No. I get that all the time. Should I do this? Well, let's work through the decision-making process and then you're going to have to decide. I can't tell you what to do on this. Now, if you're going to ask me if I steal, I'm going to say no.

This comes up all the time. I have an oven cleaner, and it has some kind of, I don't know what's in it that's used for a leavening agent. Should I throw it out for the days of love and bread? And my answer is, well, do you plan on eating it? Well, no, it'll kill me. Okay. But I still feel I should. The moment they say that, I say then throw it out. Whatever's not of faith is sin. I'll come help you throw it out. It's okay. But you can't make everybody else throw out theirs. They don't plan on eating their oven cleaner. You see? Now, if someone says, I throw out my oven cleaner, nobody should be upset with that. And if someone doesn't throw out their oven cleaner, nobody should be upset with that either. We can't judge each other on certain things. We can judge each other on sin. If you know someone who's gossiping and causing a rift between people and the church, you're actually required to go tell that person, please stop this, because they're doing something against the scripture. But oven cleaner is a personal issue. So many things are personal issues.

I catch a lot of flack sometimes because I won't make people's decisions. You know, should I take inoculations or not? And my answer is, I would not take the ones that have fetal, you know, there's there's they actually took C-cells, T-cell from fetuses. There's a moral problem with that. Okay. Should I take them? Well, that's up to you. Well, what advice did you give? None. What's your opinion? My opinion is my opinion. Why are you interested in my opinion? I'm not a doctor. You see what I mean? I can tell you I can help you make decisions. And so some people do and some people don't, and we can't judge each other on that. But in Laodicea, they would, depending on which group you're in, you would judge everybody else as bad as evil. You start to understand this problem. I am rich and accreased with goods in need of nothing. There's the problem. We've made up so many problems with them. And so do so many of the commentaries. Everybody's missing the obvious. I am rich and accreased with goods in need of nothing. And so you have the worship of angels. I'll just mention that once again. Secret knowledge. Angelology has always been an issue in the development of the Church throughout hundreds of years. People get into angels, and pretty soon they're trying to contact angels, or they have different levels of angels, or they talk to angels. They see angels in everything. You know, an angel did that. An angel helped my son hit a home run. Probably not. That's called a movie called Angels in the Outfield or whatever. Okay. Yeah, it didn't happen in your life. I never saw the movie. Is that what the movie's about? Okay, good. I remember my kids seeing it. So one of the problems we look at here, just from looking at what we read at Laodicea, and the little bit we did here in Colossians, read through the whole letter to the Colossians. You know what he ends up with? Let me tell you how to really be a new person in Christ. That's how he ends up. You know, chapter 3 is basically, let me explain what it means to be a new person and let me break this down into practicality. He even gets into marriage before the end of it. This is what Christianity is about, being this new person. And yes, that includes obviously obeying the law of God. So let's, okay, we're looking at around 60 AD and we're looking ahead 40 some years. We're saying, okay, what are some of the things that might have carried over here? Because you see them mentioned. Well, they had a lack of understanding and appreciation of how God's plan of salvation is carried out through Jesus Christ. They believed that Jesus Christ, they talked about Jesus Christ, they would have sung hymns of Jesus Christ, but they really didn't understand what was going on. They didn't understand his centrality as creator. The centrality is the firstborn of the dead, as the head of the church, how his blood reconciles us to God. All the things we talk about and put together through the keeping of the Holy Days. The whole Holy Days sets up that plan, shows it. They don't understand it. Or ancient Laodicea did not. They were spiritually self-sufficient and self-satisfied with their righteousness. They believed they had it all together. That's where their lukewarmness comes from. It doesn't come from I don't care. It comes from, of course I care, and I get it right.

Third, because they were quick to judge others, they would cause disunity of the church. It's interesting, Colossians told him, you shouldn't have this disunity of the church. Yes, there could be disunity if we believe that someone starts teaching that we shouldn't keep the Sabbath because you know why? That's a false teaching. But this was over things they shouldn't have been disunified over. And then fourth, they believed in secret knowledge. They looked for deeper understandings that made them better than others. Now you want to put this into a capsuleized form we can. There is a parable given by Jesus that describes this attitude exactly. Now I read this a couple months ago in a sermon. I'm going to read it again. Let's go to Luke 18. I didn't plan to read it with this sermon, but I couldn't find a better description when you go through what we just covered. And I just scratched the surface of Colossians. You need to read that yourself.

But it is a message to the Laodiceans 40 years before John. I think that laid the foundation for many issues. I know I'm saying I think here I'm speculating a little. I tried to tell you what I am, but if we have a letter that they're supposed to read, there's a reason they're supposed to read it. Luke, back in Colossians, Luke chapter 18, verse 9. This is Jesus. Luke put this little bit of commentary, and he spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others. We see their motivation. Now Luke says that. It's very interesting because Jesus didn't. If I was living in the first century Judea and Jesus started this parable, halfway through I would think he's giving me the perfect example of a good man, and I would have known men like this. So understand. It changes gears in the middle. It goes someplace that nobody hearing this for the first time would have understood. And Luke adds a commentary to like, this isn't going where you think.

Here is the motivation of the people he's talking about. Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee, the other to the tax collector. This isn't the story of a Jew that followed God and a pagan. This isn't the story of a Pharisee and a Roman. This is a story about two people that were practicing Jews, members of the people of God who went into the temple. You are practicing Christians. You are the temple of God. We are brought here together as the assembly of God. So this could be us. This could be us.

And the Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, with himself, God, I thank you that I'm not like other men, extortioners, unjust adulterers, or even as this tax collector. Understand, probably everything he said was true. Now, remember, this is the true story. This is a parable. Jesus is setting this up because there are people saying, I know Pharisees like this. I've known him my whole life. He's never committed adultery. He's always been honest. Jesus doesn't say, by the way, that he is any of these things. Many Laodiceans were not extortioners or adulterers. They're not condemned for those kinds of things like some of the other churches were.

I mean, if you walked into Laodicea, it'd be like, wow, good solid folks.

That's how Jesus saw them. And he says, or even as a tax collector, I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I possess. Remember why in Colossians, the people of Colossae and Laodicea were judging people? Well, you don't keep the Sabbath as strict as you should. You can read through it. I didn't read all of it. I mean, there's all kinds of things that, you know, you don't do this, you don't do that. They're being judged for all these standards made by these people in the church that said, you're not as righteous as I am because you're not doing it right. Now, we all know that we should go do our jobs on the Sabbath. But just to give you an example, you know, someone will say, well, on the Sabbath, I do this. I mean, I know people that will not let their children go swimming on the Sabbath. And I know people who have a swimming pool and let their children go swimming on the Sabbath. Okay. People come to me, well, which is right and which is wrong? That's not a judgment you and I are to make. Now, if they're doing other things on the Sabbath, I can go say, no, that's you shouldn't do that because I have a biblical reason. But this is your decision and you're held responsible to God for your decision. You're supposed to be mature enough. We're all supposed to be mature enough to say, that's your call. That's not my call. There's some things that aren't none of our calls. There's God's call. That's what we talk about most of the time things are God's call, right? But see, that's the problem with the Laodiceans. This is the problem here of the Pharisee. And so everything is outward because he says, I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I have. Now, should you fast? Yes. Should you tithe? Yes. So aren't these good things? Well, it's okay. Except if you look at somebody else and say, you know what? God's blessed me. I have a better job than you because I'm a better person than you so I can pay better tithes. Now you say, how ridiculous is that? I've heard it. I'm not saying any of you. But you know what I mean? We will judge people on the craziest things. Well, God says, what do you mean? You don't want to say that because you may lose your job the next day. Okay? It's possible. So what we have to realize is we go through here, this man was doing these things. That's why in the parable, Jesus makes him doing those things. He makes him up for a reason because the problem here isn't what he's doing necessarily. It's why he's doing it. It's how he sees himself as a Christian. Remember the problem with the Laodiceans? I am rich and increased with goods in need of nothing. Isn't that what this guy's saying? And the tax collector, standing afar off, raised his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, God, be merciful to me a sinner. I tell you, Jesus says, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other, for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted, justified, allowed to come into a relationship with God. The Pharisee did not understand that he may be in the temple, but God was outside his house knocking on the door.

You see? Hey, hey, this is my house. Why are you shutting it? Because it's God's house. It's the temple. Why are you shutting me out of my house for? That's exactly what is happening in Laodicea. Jesus Christ is pounding on the door, and they don't even know it.

They don't even know it because I'm okay. I get it all right. I get the secret knowledge. I use everything real strict, and I feel good about it.

They just really look warm in their approach to God because their religion was about themselves and not God. So here's what I want you to do. I'm going to wrap this up. Just some things to do.

I want all of you to take some time and fast and pray. Now, if you go to I fast, twice this week, you're probably in trouble. But I want you to fast and pray to God for him to teach you true humility. I'm going to do that. Over the next few months, I'm going to take some time and fast and pray. Now, pray for humility, but pray that God gives it to you with mercy. Or you may wake up the next day naked and poor and blind. Okay? You don't want it. Literally, you may don't ask for that level of humility right off the bat, but ask God to give you humility.

We also must study the scriptures to be grounded in the true mystery. Read the collagions. Read it. Tear it apart. Look at it. What's the true mystery there? And all other mysteries are the biblical mysteries are based on. And then we have to stop despising one another.

Remember the Pharisee trusted himself and despised others. We have to cut each other some slack. Even the weakest of us has value to God. And just because someone's weak, spiritually, doesn't mean we should beat up on them. Now, they need encouragement. Sometimes people need correction. I'm not saying people don't need correction. Unfortunately, I have to do that from time to time. But why do we do it? Is it for their good? Because we love them? Because we want everybody to be moving in the same direction. We want people restored. We want to cover a sin. If somebody repents on something, we want to cover it. We don't want everybody else to know.

We got to cut each other some slack. And we got to stop beating each other up on things that aren't biblical. That aren't biblical. We have to stop doing that. Now, remember the old comedian? I don't remember his name. You know you're a redneck when? How many remember that? I remember the guy's name. Some of you do. Jeff Foxworthy. That's right. Well, you know what? If I just read this and you said, yeah, I hope these people pray and fast for humility. I hope my wife studies the scriptures. I hope my wife, that person over there, starts cutting me more slack. Yeah, well then you're probably a laitist.

Because you don't need these things if you're a laitist. You see the problem? Here's the problem with the laitist and attitude. They don't see it. They just don't see it. That's why you have to turn it on yourself. Don't turn it on anybody else. Turn it on yourself. And here's what God then promises. We'll end up in Revelation 3, verse 21. He says to the people laying to see you, To him who overcomes, I will grant to sit with me on my throne, as I also overcame and sat down with my father on his throne. It's interesting. He doesn't say near as negative things to them here at the end, that he's at some of the other churches. And then he says, He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. There's a lot more on laying to see it. Read Colossians. Do this study. Think of it. Start fasting and praying for humility. So we've now covered the biblical teachings, what we have about those seven churches. We do have one more sermon in the series, where we'll have to look at Revelation 2 and 3 in a greater context, and what does it mean prophetically. And that's what we'll cover next time.