Revelation 3: 15-17
Jesus sought the church’s attention, coming before it as the Amen, meaning “in truth;” as the faithful and true witness, meaning He can be relied on; and as the beginning of God’s Creation, meaning He is the source – the One who began this world and has authority over it. Therefore, the church can be confident that what He says is reality. He told the church that because it was lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, it was distasteful to Him; so much so, it was becoming as vomit to be spit out.
In Jesus’ sight, He prefers that one zealously and passionately embraces God (hot) or that one embraces the world, formally or spiritually opposing God (cold). Breaking it down even more, walking in the Spirit is hot; living in the flesh is cold. Those are clear decisions He can respect. A lukewarm condition indicates compromise (one foot in the world; one foot in the kingdom). That often manifests itself as indifference. That’s not acceptable to Jesus, for His wisdom is that no one can serve two masters (Matthew 6: 24).
The Laodicean church was attempting to do just that. As a result, its loyalty and service were divided. That translated into a church that became indifferent to the purity and power of the gospel.
Additionally, like the city, the church prided itself on its wealth. Naturally, like a lot of churches today, the Laodecia church trusted in and praised its wealth as a blessing from God. And though in some cases, God does bless with wealth, this wasn’t the case for the Laodicea church.
It deceived itself into thinking that God smiled upon it. In its indifference, the church didn’t realize that it was through its own efforts that it accumulated earthly wealth. In doing so, the church’s attitude grew to be that it was blessed and that, proudly, it was in need of nothing; that it was special. It was very comfortable; nothing seemed to bother it.
The truth from Jesus, though, was “You don’t know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked.” The church was just the opposite of what it thought it was. Spiritually, it was naked, having shed its commitment to wearing Christ’s righteousness. As such, God could not view it as He views His Son. All that remained to be seen was its naked human condition that’s spiritually poor and awful. Satan had successfully blindfolded the church to that truth.
As for a historical perspective, though the message was geared primarily to the Laodicea church, it also applies to the church age that the Laodicea church symbolically represents. That would be the age from the 20th century to Christ’s second coming. We see the link between John’s time and ours in a parallel message to the church’s last period in Rev. 16: 15 (in reference to Armageddon). The message is a warning that Jesus gives to the end-timers believers. “Behold, I’m coming like a thief. Blessed is the one who stays awake and keeps his clothes, so that he will not walk about naked and men will see his shame.”
The church of today has its attention divided. In some cases, it seems more interested in and concerned about the cares of this world (doing works), rather than going about its ordained mission of spreading the gospel. It is full of itself in attempting to solve the world’s problems, especially political ones, but is half-hearted in its allegiance to God’s purposes. Especially comfortable with its wealth; it has moved away from relying on Christ for everything and has become spiritually self-sufficient. It is in love with and is mimicking the persona of worldly culture. It is a lukewarm church.