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December 19, 2004
4th Sunday in Advent
Revelation 3:14-22
Pastor Joel Zank

Behold, Jesus is Coming!

(Revelation 3:14-22) "To the angel of the church in Laodicea write: These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the ruler of God's creation.15 I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other!16 So, because you are lukewarm--neither hot nor cold--I am about to spit you out of my mouth.17 You say, 'I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.' But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked.18 I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see.19 Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest, and repent.20 Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.21 To him who overcomes, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I 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 churches."

In Christ Jesus, the faithful and true witness of God's love and the ruler of God's creation, dear fellow redeemed,

One of our seminary professors would often remind us that if we pastors were going to be true to our Lord and our calling, we would spend all the days of our ministry as Jesus spent his, doing two things, afflicting the comfortable and comforting the afflicted. Today Jesus shows us exactly what this means in the timeless words he speaks to Christians living in Laodicea and in Appleton - words we will consider under the theme: Behold, Jesus is Coming to take from the rich; and to give to the poor.

No, I'm not suggesting that Jesus is like that Robin Hood. The Savior's mission is not to redistribute the world's wealth or fight social injustice. He came once and is coming again as the great "Amen," the Communicator of God's indisputable truth. Jesus is, as he says, the faithful and sincere witness of all that God wants us to know about him. As such, Jesus doesn't change his message from one moment to the next. It is always the same! Why should that matter to us? Why should we care what he says? Because as the living Word of God, through whom we and all things have been made, Jesus is our Lord, our Master, the Ruler of all that we are and all that we have. When he speaks, he does so as the one who knows everything about us. That's why throughout this Advent season we've heard him say to his people past and present, "I know your deeds..."

Today we hear him speak those words to Christians who lived 1900 years ago in the city of Laodicea - a wealthy community famous for minting gold coins, producing expensive black cloth, and discovering a miracle eye-salve used the world over for treating blindness. Laodicea had it all. Its citizens were more than comfortable, including those who belonged to the Christian church.

Now we might be interested to know what good things those Christians were doing with their blessings from God. After all, for the past three weeks we've heard Jesus say to six other churches, "I know your deeds...", and every time he has said that, a compliment has followed as he recounts the good things he's people are doing. But not this time. Instead he must say, "I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other!" (Revelation 3:15). To be hot in this case would mean to be "on fire" for the Savior - to be filled with a love and a zeal for Jesus and his kingdom. We can understand why Jesus would wish that these people were "hot." To be cold, on the other hand, would mean to have a heart frozen by unbelief. Does Jesus really wish the members of this church were unbelievers? Not in the sense that he would want them to perish, but if they were unbelievers, they might at least welcome the life-giving warmth of the gospel and so through its power be saved. But as it was, the people of this church were worse than unbelievers - they were, in Jesus' own words, "lukewarm" Christians whose "take it our leave it" attitude toward the Savior and his gospel made them useless to him. Worse than that, they made Jesus sick. He told them, "...because you are lukewarm--neither hot nor cold--I am about to spit you out of my mouth" (Revelation 3:16) - that's spit as in throw up.

Can you imagine anything more awful than to have Jesus tell you such a thing? He'd never say that to us would he? That depends upon how we think and live. Is our attitude anything like that of the lukewarm Christians in Laodicea? Like them do we ever say, "I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing." I doubt that we run around saying such things, but remember, this has more to do with attitude than words. Perhaps the better question is, do we ever let our comfortable lifestyle dull our spiritual sense of need? Physical comfort can blunt the spiritual discomfort we need in repentance. Let's face it, when we have food on the table, a roof over our head, a car or two or three in the garage, it's hard to imagine that God may not be happy with us, so we just assume that he is. Likewise, when we have a congregation of 1600 members, a large staff of called workers, a beautiful church, money in the bank and no debt, it's hard to imagine that God may not be happy with us. Of course he's happy with us - look at what we have - everything we need and then some.

How quickly we sinners can turn blessings into curses. When we let our possessions have too prominent a place in our lives, when we value the wealth God gives us more than the Word he speaks to us, we quickly become lukewarm, cooling off in our faith and in our life of love to the point where we become useless to Jesus. Is that happening to you? Maybe you should take your spiritual temperature. Do you have a passion for studying God's Word, or do you rarely touch a Bible? Is coming to worship the highlight of your week, or is it something you have to force yourself to do? How about your prayer-life? Are you talking to God often, bringing your sins to him throughout the day, seeking his forgiveness, asking him to grant you deeper insight into his truth, and greater trust in his promises? How about your life of thanks - your devotion to family members, your concern for fellow Christians, your gifts to God's work? Be honest. Would you say these are all a reflection of red hot faith or lukewarm indifference?

Friends, you can set the thermometers aside. Our soul doctor, Jesus, has been taking our temperature for some time and what he sees just makes him sick, so much so that he says to each of us, "I am about to spit you out of my mouth." Now if you find that image nothing more than disgusting, you're missing point. For to be spit out of the Lord's mouth can only mean to be completely forsaken by him, in other words damned. That's how sin-sick we are and we didn't even know it. Jesus says, "...you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked" (Revelation 3:17).

Behold, in these words Jesus is coming to afflict all of us who have grown comfortable in our lukewarm relationship with him. He is coming to take from the rich, to take from us the false sense of security we have found in the things we own and the money we've saved. We thought we were really something. But Jesus says we're disgusting sinners who are not to be envied, but pitied because we're nothing more than blind beggars who can't see the shamefulness of our own sins.

These have got to be some of the most painful things Jesus has ever said to us. But even in the pain there is hope. Did you hear it? Jesus said, "I am about to spit you out of my mouth." He hasn't done that - not yet - which means these are words of warning, spoken not out of hatred, but out of love. Jesus himself says so in Revelation 3:19, "Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest, and repent." Jesus loves us so much that he's willing to show us how poor we really are so that we might repent of our sinful lukewarmness, declare ourselves spiritually bankrupt and, then, depend only on the wealth of his grace to save us. Friends, if you do this, you will not be disappointed, for behold, Jesus is coming to give to us poor sinners the riches of his salvation.

Instead of disowning us for the shabby way we've treated him, Jesus says, "I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see" (Revelation 3:18). Not all the gold, and all the black cloth, and all the eye-salve for which Laodicea was so famous could help sinners one bit. But Jesus has all that we sinners need. He offers it to us in terms that we certainly appreciate. When we find something truly valuable to us, we're willing to buy it at all costs. Here Jesus offers us salvation. How much are we willing to pay for it? What we wouldn't give to be saved from hell, but as we just confessed, we are poor sinners. We can't buy God's forgiveness. We can't earn eternal life. What does Jesus mean when he counsels us to buy these things? Listen to what our Lord says in Isaiah 55:1-3: "Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost.2 ...Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and your soul will delight in the richest of fare.3 Give ear and come to me; hear me, that your soul may live. I will make an everlasting covenant with you, my faithful love promised to David." The promises that Jesus makes to us here and throughout Scripture cannot be purchased with money; they becomes ours, free of charge, through very faith those promises create in us.

Here in Revelation 3, Jesus offers us the pure gold of heaven, gold that came out of the fires of affliction he suffered for our sins. Has there ever been love like his? We are the ones who have been lukewarm, and yet on Good Friday it was Jesus whom God spit from his mouth into the depths of hell where he bore the shame and the curse of our sins in our place. And it was on that very same Friday that we were washed clean in Savior's blood, so that now all our sins are hidden from God's sight, perfectly covered by the beautiful white garments of Christ's holiness. And best of all, Jesus has cured our blindness. He has given us eyes of faith with which to see and believe all that he's done to make us his people. Having loved us so, Jesus never wants to lose us again. For this reason he keeps coming to us poor sinners day after day, calling to us through his gospel, "Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me" (Revelation 3:20).

What a portrait of grace, the Ruler of all creation, seeking out and standing at the beggar's door - the door of our hearts. He has come to us all the way from heaven, and still he must come a bit farther for by nature we have neither the strength nor the desire to open faith's door for ourselves. So Jesus does for us what he did for his dead friend Lazarus. He calls into the tomb of our hearts and with his powerful Word he gives us new life and makes our hearts his home away from home in heaven. Friends, as long as we keep listening to his voice, as long as we keep clinging to his promised love and forgiveness, he will stay with us and commune with us for the rest of our lives.

And then, before you know it, we will suddenly see him, no longer through eyes of faith, but face to face. We'll be standing at his right hand, rejoicing because the faith he gave us will have gotten us the victory over all our enemies. We'll be safe and sound and more than that because the same Jesus who was pleased to make our poor hearts his throne here on earth, will give us the right to sit with him on his throne in heaven where we will rule with him for all eternity. Hold on to that vision dear friends so that it may bring you comfort in every affliction; for Jesus' sake. Amen.