“So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.” Revelation 3:16 NIV
As with any new relationship, the beginning always seems to be full of emotion. When we first enter a relationship we tend to be curious about the other person, we want to get to know them. We are deciding in those first several times of seeing each other whether we want to become more involved or not. If we decide to move further into the relationship, then we typically want to spend more time with them, learn new things about them, and we usually think about them more.
This level of emotional involvement can last for a long time depending on the type of relationship we are talking about. Friendships tend to develop a little slower than romantic relationships because there is not as high of a level of emotional involvement in the beginning. Another factor that can influence a relationship is the popularity of it. When we are beginning a friendship with someone who everyone else wants to be friends with as well, there is an attraction to that relationship, you want to know what everyone else sees that is drawing them to that person.
Most people do not rush to become friends with a person everyone else is ignoring. The same can be said about romantic relationships, our level of willingness to invest our time to get to know another person can depend on how our friends view this individual. This is also how we usually function when we are discussing our relationship with the Creator of the Universe.
When we first hear about Jesus, the emotional level of those around us can influence us in how we proceed in developing this relationship. Should it work this way, no, but it does. Once we decide to be a one of Jesus’s followers, we are thankfully filled with the Holy Spirit, Who is able to direct us in the growth of this relationship. As with any other relationship, new things excite us, our emotions are higher, we are all in and we focus a lot of our attention to that relationship.
However, that ‘fire’ we feel at the beginning of relationships can fade and the relationship with Jesus is no different. We can go from being hyper focused on the relationship to becoming comfortable in the relationship. When we become comfortable, we usually don’t give that relationship a lot of thought and sometimes our emotional investment decreases.
In our verse for today, Jesus is talking to the church at Laodicea because they have moved from being ‘on fire’ for Jesus and the advancement of the Church to being lukewarm. So they haven’t abandoned their relationship with Jesus, but they are not working to grow it either. They became comfortable in what they had and unfortunately when we become comfortable we usually stop putting effort into the relationship.
This upsets Jesus because He is ‘on fire’ for us and suffered a horrible death on the cross so that we could have that personal relationship with Him now and for all of eternity. In this verse, it feels to me like Jesus would rather they had decided they didn’t want to be in a relationship with Him and simply walked away than being in the relationship but not interested in growing it. The verse tells us that Jesus wanted to spit them out of His mouth because of their complacency.
My question for everyone today is…..Are you on fire for Jesus or are you lukewarm?