I’m tired of people looking at Jesus’ letter to the Church
in Laodicea and
misinterpreting it.
“So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor
hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth.”
So many preachers preaching from this passage, saying it’s
better to be hot or cold. That’s fine, but then they drive right into the
ditch. “Hot,” they say, is a person who’s “on fire” for God. And “Cold,” they
say, is the opposite, someone who’s turned off on God. But people that are just
“meh,” people who aren’t really passionate one way or the other are said to be “lukewarm,”
and, they proclaim boldly, “God hates lukewarm!”
The encouragement to be passionate for God is wonderful. The
thought that God likes atheists or passionately anti-Christian activity more
than half-hearted Christianity? Yeah, that’s balderdash. You can argue that a
half-hearted lover of God is better than a hater of God, or you can argue that
God loves ‘em all the same, but you CAN’T argue that God loves haters better
than folks that are tired of trying.
The root of this whole metaphor comes from Laodicea’s city water supply. This isn’t
about half-hearted people. This is about water.
Laodicea,
you see, had no reliable springs, no reliable city water of their own, so they
imported their water.
They imported water from two other cities: Hierapolis
(about 6 miles south) and Colossae,
about 10 miles east.
Hierapolis was famous for
hot springs, and the water
they got from there was still hot if it was fresh. They were (and
still are)
famous for
hot springs,
for healing waters, where people can sit and soak their wounded or aging
bodies.
Colossae
was in the mountains and the water they got from there was cold if it was
fresh. Since Laodicea
spent summers consistently above 100ºF (38ºC), cold, refreshing mountain water
was wonderful and refreshing and invigorating!
Both sources of water had a fair bit of minerals in them:
they actually invented something like manhole covers to get into the pipes and
clean them out regularly, because the minerals would build up and keep the
water from running freely. When the pipes were clogged, the water sat in the
pipes, rather than flowed through the pipes.
If the water had been sitting, stagnating, in pipes or in a
pond or cistern somewhere, it was neither hot nor cold: it was lukewarm. It was
also probably unsafe, so spitting it out is a really good thing to do.
But the statement here isn’t that God vomits out people who aren't passionate enough, though the call to passionate following is appropriate.
The statement here is “Be who you’re called to be.”
If you’re going to be a healing person, where broken people
can come and soak away their pains, great. Be that!
If you’re going to be a bracing drink of cold, mountain
water, that’ll wake folks up and get them motivated, great. Be that!
Don’t sit in the pipes so long that you just gum up the
works and nobody gets good ministry. And don’t sit and stagnate. That’s not
good for anybody.
Whatever you’re called to do: do it. Be passionate about it!
Don’t just sit and stagnate.