I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked (Revelation 3:16-17).
It is clear in reading this passage that a lukewarm person is a person who feels no need for God. The lukewarm feel self-sufficient and satisfied in themselves, but we see that this feeling is very far from the truth. The lukewarm are not Christians.
Unfortunately, many of us have approached this verse and applied it to a Christian life. We say things like, “Oh, well he believes that Jesus is his Savior…he is just lukewarm, ya know.” To that, I say this: No, God does not spit his children out of his mouth.
I know this because of Philippians 1:6, and 2 Timothy 2:13. God speaks plainly in his word about the fact that he keeps his children. He tells us that he initiates our salvation, and therefore, he sustains it. He tells us that we have been given his righteousness—through the blood of Christ, his own righteousness—, and that he cannot disown himself. God cannot spit his children out of his mouth because he would almost be spitting out himself.
No, the lukewarm are not just Christians who are feeling less than extreme about God, they are people who have been lulled by Satan, flesh and the pleasures of this world into believing that they do not need God. Anyone who believes this has never believed the Gospel.
It is important for us to know: if God saves us and sustains our faith, then we can never lose that which he has given us. Our God never fails. Is it also important for us to question whether or not we have truly believed in our need for the Cross. If you have not, I pray that you will right now.
So, it should be clear that God’s children are not lukewarm, because God does not spit his children out of his mouth. However, this seems problematic at first; if this is true, I need to know two things:
- How do I become hot?
- Why doesn’t God spit the cold out of his mouth?
I will deal with the latter first. How can God stand a cold soul? Doesn’t he want a heart that is on fire with a passion for his glory? In order to answer this, let’s look at why God says he spits the lukewarm out. He says that those who are lukewarm think they are fine, without even knowing that they are in a wretched and needy state. The great sin of the lukewarm is the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit! “No, God,” they say, “I am doing fine on my own.” The great sin of the lukewarm is twofold: (1) they insult the sufficiency of a wonderful God by supposing themselves to be in no real need, and (2) they are content with being fine when God is offering eternal joy and satisfaction! The lukewarm insult an extravagant God by being content with too little.
Why does God spit out the lukewarm and not the cold? Because the cold man knows his need, and therefore praises God by needing him. This is the prayer of a cold man: “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” (Luke 8:13). No one will get to heaven who supposes himself to be enough for himself. We should not think of the cold as those who openly despise God (though we often do), we should think of them as those who know that—of themselves—they are naked wretches in the snow. This is despair.
And if we understand this, the answer to the question “How do I become hot?” does all but answer itself. We do not and cannot make ourselves hot! Our heat is, rather, the heat of God himself. God does want our hearts to burn with a passion for his glory, but that passion comes from the presence of his Spirit. The more you need God, the more hotly his Spirit will burn within your heart. The hot and the cold are not two—they are one! Within every Christian exists both the feeling of frostbite in the flesh, and the blaze of an eternally burning fire within the Spirit. The one feeds the other so that we hate the flesh, and love the Spirit.
Unfortunately, I have spent much of my life seeing this Biblical metaphor as the attitudes of three different groups of people toward God. I see now, however, that they describe the attitudes of two groups of people toward themselves. The one who knows his need knows God’s satisfaction, while the one who insists on feeding and clothing himself starves and freezes without even knowing it. Do not be diluted to the degree of your need!
My prayer for you, reader, is that you would FEEL your need for God, that the cold chill of sin would reach to your very bones, and that from that place you would come to know Jesus Christ as the only unquenchable, and all-satisfying source of heat and life for your cold, dead soul.
2 Comments on "Spitoons Are No Place For Children"
I like what you have to say regarding the Lukewarm but I want to challenge you to do some background research on Laodicea regarding the hot and cold. Perhaps it is our sports culture but in our 21st century thought we tend to believe “Hot” is good and “Cold” is bad. However, contextually both cold and hot are good things. Just like a “cold” refreshing drink of water is good on a hot day and a nice “hot” cup of tea is good on a frigid day. Love the blog, just want to help you guys purse excellence.
This is really really a blessing. I love it. Praise Jesus.