The Book of Revelation: Revelation 3:14-20

Speaker: Greg Sanders

Passage: Revelation 3:14-20

Jesus is the Amen

I want to take us back into Revelation 3 to the message for the church of Laodicea, which is a really interesting message to discern through the lens of the kindness of the Lord. 

“Write this letter to the angel of the church in Laodicea. This is the message from the one who is the Amen—the faithful and true witness, the beginning of God’s creation.”

Before we step into this message, I want us to think about that phrase: the Amen. The word “amen” here means so be it. It’s very rare in Scripture for “amen” to be given as a title. It’s usually given as an end cap to a statement. Something is spoken, and the word “amen” is given to attest to the law and the prophets. It’s an identification of, oh yeah, that was truth. But here, Jesus is taking on the name Amen for Himself, saying, in Myself, I am the fulfillment, I am the testing, I am stamping everything God says. I’m the completion of everything God will say. I validate it.

Why do I say that? Interestingly, Jesus begins the message this way because He begins with a posture that says everything that comes after this is absolute truth. It’s inarguable; there is no wiggle room in it. That is how it is to be understood. When the Hebrews would read the Scriptures, they would say “amen” at the end, and this was to stamp that as truth. What Jesus is saying for the Church at Laodicea is similar to what He’s saying to us in this. Everything I’m going to speak about after this, you can build your life off of.

Now, I want to just push pause before we dive into that and ask a very simple question: when the Lord speaks, do you hear it like that? Or do we do what I think is a very North American thing, and that is to take it as a suggestion—that’s a cool idea, I’ll think about it—versus the mindset that would hear the Word of the Lord and say, You just gave me directions and truth. I will live from that place.

I think it happens in our minds, maybe without us even knowing it. We begin to discern the Word of the Lord is the suggestion of God, and when we do that, Church, what we are doing is superimposing our own will over His will. It is equivalent to saying, Not Your will, but mine be done. So Jesus is challenging the Church at Laodicea. Please hear what I’m saying in the strength it’s said in.

A WARNING AGAINST LUKEWARM BELIEF

“I know all the things you do, that you are neither hot nor cold. I wish that you were one or the other. But since you are like lukewarm water, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of My mouth!”

How many grew up in a church culture that taught this was about loving God or not loving God? That’s 100% not what it’s about. That’s a very bad execution of Scripture. Jesus is talking about the water source in the region. This region was known for two different types of water: really cold, crystal-clear water that came out of one side of the valley and hot springs that were natural and came on the other side of the valley. Both had high-functioning purposes.

World-renowned for their medicinal abilities, hot waters were known to be bathed in, and they would bring all kinds of healing. The cold waters were some of the coldest waters available in the region. They were phenomenal for refreshment, because we all need that, and for several types of dyeing processes because colder water would set the color differently. Jesus is talking about function and usefulness. He’s saying, I want you to be what I’ve called you to be, not something that is mixed.

So, from this vantage point, both hot and cold are good things. They’re both godly things. What He’s dealing with is the mixture. What He will deal with later is what happens when godly people let go of their tendency in His Kingdom to be hot or cold in a good way and allow sin to settle into their lives and dumb themselves down.

How many of you have ever been in a season of being really disciplined? You’re executing the purpose and plan of God well, and you’re in a good rhythm. Let’s call that cold for a second. Or maybe you’ve been in a really passionate season with the Lord where there’s an overflow of heart and passion, and you’re just in love with the Lord. Let’s call that hot. Both of them are great things, and they are both necessary.

How many have let sin or a habit come into your life that dumb those down to where you’ve lost your traction? That’s what Jesus is talking about. His word for “I will spit you out of my mouth” isn’t “spit,” it’s “vomit.” He basically says, it makes Me sick, so I’m going to expunge you or remove you.

RENEWING OUR HUNGER FOR JESUS

Verse 17: “You say ‘I am rich, I have everything I want. I don’t need a thing.’” 

What He’s dealing with is that their life circumstances and their situations are creating so much comfort that they’ve lost connection with Him. They’ve allowed their circumstances to numb them. Life is telling them I’m good. They’ve lost their hunger for Him. They’ve lost their appetite for Him.

Why is this such an important word for us? Because I think in the American church, this is a big deal. It also tells me that what Jesus is teaching the church of Laodicea is also incredibly poignant for us. We are to be managers of our appetite before Him.

What do I mean by appetite? Your hunger for Him, your desire for Him, your passion for Him—that is yours to manage. This means I can do things that grow my passion and appetite for Him, and I can do things that deplete it. In the spiritual realm, the more you eat, the hungrier you get. Do you struggle with an appetite for the Lord? 

I will tell you how I gauge appetite: I watch people worship. Don’t worry, I’m not judging you. How many have ever watched married couples have dinner, and you can tell the ones that don’t like each other? There’s no chemistry, there’s no conversation. They clearly showed up for a food event, not a relational event. Take it one step further; you can watch people, and you can tell which couples are actually having to be together versus the ones that kind of make you sick because they’re so young and in love, they forget to eat. Or they’re eating off each other’s plates the whole time. Or they’re feeding each other, and you’re like, Okay, please stop.

What I’m getting at is there are clear indicators in the external lives of people that reveal the internal relationship. It is no different with the Lord. Our fervency before Him, our passion towards Him, is always revealed. I’m not saying you have to be the most passionate worshiper out there, but you have to be the most engaged one.

I have lots of friends who chill and worship in a relaxed way. I’m not, I pace like a caged animal. I feel like I’m going to spontaneously combust in worship, so I have to move. It’s just the way I’m built and wired. When I lead worship, they used to make fun of me because I’d get my guitar cables wrapped around my ankles. I’d go in circles because it’s just like this whirling dervish of excitement. That’s how I’m built.

I’m not saying there’s a demonstration, I’m saying there’s an indication. I would challenge us, like Jesus challenged the church in Laodicea, to never let the circumstances of our life replace our hunger for Him.

JESUS FREELY GIVES WHAT WE CAN NOT BUY

He says: “You don’t realize that you’re wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked.” What He begins to deal with in them is that they have a perspective problem. They see themselves as one way, and in truth, they’re different. They’re not self-aware of what’s going on.

And then I love His response to them: “So I advise you to buy gold from Me—gold that has been purified by fire. Then you’ll be rich.”

Now, let me figure this out. I walk into a store and say to somebody, You’re poor, and you don’t have any money. You should buy it from me. How are they going to do that if they’re poor and they have no money? I want you to see the tenor of what Jesus is saying. You have nothing. You are wretched, poor, miserable, and blind, so come to My store and buy from Me so I can make you rich.

The only way they could be made rich was if He gave them everything they would buy. This means His perspective is, I have no desire for you to earn it. I want to give it freely to you, so come to Me. To people who have grown cold and lost their passion, He’s not saying, What’s wrong with you? He’s not slapping them on the side of the face, saying, Hey, come on. Buy from me. 

He goes through a few more aspects of who they are. I want you to “…buy white garments from Me so you’ll not be shamed by your nakedness.” He talks about white garments, which is interesting because the region was known for black garments. It was a black wool that was unique to this region. They were known all around the world for it. 

What He’s saying by this is, I want you to let go of the world around you and find yourself in Me. Let me clothe you the way I want to clothe you, don’t embrace what’s going on around you. It’s a good word for us.

“I correct and discipline everyone I love. So be diligent and turn from your indifference.”

That’s the issue with the Laodicean church. They had become indifferent. They’d become numb. How many have ever become numb in a relationship where you’ve become indifferent? We have a tendency, in our human condition, to blame our indifference on someone else. The truth is, you and you alone are in control of your appetite.

If you’re in a marriage and indifferent towards your spouse, that’s your issue, not theirs. You made a covenant to delight in them. The constitution of marriage, as given in the Scriptures, is to care for and protect each other. This means you’re covenantally and contractually obligated before God to 100% do that, regardless of whether your spouse does or not.

Chew on that one for a second. You could never stand before the Lord and say, I could have if they would have. His answer is, No. You could have if you would have. Because you were in control of what I gave you to do.

The enemy loves to teach us that other people can take away our right to follow the Lord. They can’t. We follow the Lord because He told us to. We live the way He told us to. We carry His image, His divine nature. We carry His love, His compassion, His mercy, and His kindness because He gave us the ability to—not because somebody gave us the opportunity to.

RESPOND TO THE INVITATION OF JESUS

Here’s what I really want to get to. He tells them to let go of their indifference, and then He tells them, Here’s the secret. Verse 20: “Look! Here, I stand at the door and knock. If you hear me calling and open the door, I will come in and share a meal as friends. Those who are victorious will sit with Me on My throne, just as I was victorious and sat with My Father on His throne. Anyone who’s willing to hear should listen to the Spirit and understand what He is saying to the churches.”

Holy Spirit, just for the next couple of moments, would You open the eyes of our hearts to see what You want us to see? Would You open the ears of our minds to hear what You want us to hear? Would You grant us the ability to understand and know what You want out of this?

I want you to look at this phrase in verse 20. How many of you have ever seen this in a picture or heard it taught that this is Jesus’s call to humanity? It’s almost been grabbed onto as some evangelistic idea of, Look, Jesus is standing at the door, and He’s knocking on humanity. That’s unfortunately not what’s going on in the text. He’s standing at a church. It would be no different than if He was standing outside of the doors of Vintage saying, Look, I’m standing at the door and I’m knocking. He’s talking to believers. It’s not to an individual person; He’s talking to a corporate assembly.

He uses the phrase look which is to grab their attention. It’s intended to startle them and cause them to pay attention. What is He asking them to do? What He’s saying is, You’re at a critical juncture. Your indifference can only be remedied by what I’m going to give you.

Please hear this: our indifference, any places we become indifferent, can only be remedied by what He’s going to give us. 

“If you hear me calling and open the door, I will come in, and we will share a meal as friends.” So here’s what He’s asking them to do. He’s asking them to respond to His invitation. How many of you are terrible at RSVPs? How many get RSVP reminders from people all the time, saying, Will you please RSVP? I invited you. You’re like, Yeah, yeah, I’m going. I just didn’t tell you.

What Jesus is saying to the Laodicean church is that He initiates relationship, but they’re going to have to choose to meet Him in it. Jesus initiates relationship, but we have to meet Him in that invitation. I love the symbol of knocking on the door because it reveals something. It reveals His desire for relationship.

I want us to see this as His posture. He’s saying, Look, I want an intimate relationship with you. I am standing at the door of this house. Come on, guys. This is what I want. And He’s not saying it to individuals, He’s saying it to the church. I want to be with you. I want to be in your gatherings. I want to be in your culture, but your indifference is keeping Me out. 

HEARING REQUIRES OUR OBEDIENCE 

This idea has bothered me a lot lately, and not just at Vintage. It’s bothered me a lot in a lot of churches I go to with my business. I mean, a lot of churches. It bothers me when I’m with the people of God, and they don’t worship. It feels like a personal offense. Like, I thought we were in love with him. I thought we were all on the same team. That we were going to lay our lives down for our King. That we were going to pour ourselves out for our King.

I think indifference is a really dangerous thing, and Jesus seems to agree here. He asks them to hear His voice. I want you to pay attention to the narrative. The idea of “hearing” is critical to this narrative. And I want you to see how Jesus connects something. Hearing His voice, based on this text, is connected to obedience to His ways. It’s almost as if He’s saying, You can’t walk in disobedience to Me in any area of your life and say you hear Me. You can’t walk in disobedience to Him in any area of your life and say that you hear God.

You can say you’re disobedient to what you’ve heard. Can you imagine if we were that refreshingly honest? How am I doing in life? I’m walking in a lot of disobedience to the Lord. Seriously, I’m being super disobedient to Jesus. 

Nobody is perfect, but walking in established disobedience without repentance is sin. Screwing up and repenting is Kingdom. We’re not perfect, we’re not going to walk perfectly, but the heart thing should be that the moment we step wrong, we stop and say, That is not who You made me to be. Please forgive me, and we move back in the right direction.

I think we can discern from this passage and the other messages that He gives to the other churches that walking in alignment with His ways and living according to the Scriptures works as a tuning mechanism and increases our ability to hear. You can increase your ability to hear His voice by walking in obedience to what you read. That’s how you tune your ears.

You’re like, I don’t know how to hear God. Start walking in obedience to what you can know. Way too many people are like, I don’t know anything this says, but I’m trying to hear God. Read it out loud. Put it on tape, I don’t care.

JESUS WANTS TO CONNECT WITH US

He asks them to sit with Him, and I want you to think about the things He’s requesting. He’s like, Hey, invite me in. Listen to what I’m saying. Sit with Me. What He’s asking is for access to their entire life. Sharing a meal is an opportunity for open dialogue. That’s why we see husbands and wives who don’t talk at a meal, and we think that’s kind of weird. It’s a place you’re supposed to talk. Something’s not right with a family who sits at the dinner table in dead silence. It’s called dysfunction. 

We understand that the food table is intended to be a place of relational connection. That’s what Jesus is looking for. He’s saying, Sit with me, connect with me. We’re seeing this through the lens of what He says to Laodicea. He wasn’t looking to dictate a conversation. He was looking to have one. We so often just assume all He really wants us to tell us stuff. He’s inviting them. I want to sit with you and share a meal. Open the door.

Church, I think there’s a lie that the enemy loves to whisper, that Jesus is looking to control our lives. It’s not the case. He’s deeply committed to our journey. He knows what is best. He’s the Amen of Heaven. He’s the yes of Heaven. Everything He says is perfect and true.

What happens if we trust that? What happens if we change our mindset and our posture? If we begin to sit with Him and we begin to pour out our life before Him and we begin to get His advice on everything because we know He is fully truth? Imagine if we begin to approach the Scriptures with a neutrality of, Everything this says, I’m going to live. I’m not going to argue. I’m not going to question it because it’s Him. He’s the Amen of Heaven. He gave His word so I can submit my life to what it says. And if it says something I don’t like, I’m going to change what I like.

INTIMACY IS THE KEY TO VICTORY

The last thing He says is that He wants them to join with Him. What He’s telling them is intimacy with Him requires that they grant Him full access. Then he makes the next statement, “To all who are victorious.” Why? Because intimacy with Jesus is the path to victory. Inviting Him into your everyday life is the key to winning your everyday life.

He’s not looking to control you. He’s looking to do life with you. I would offer to you that the dreams the Lord has for your life are bigger than the ones you have. I would argue with you that anything you’ve put in front of what He has for you is only diminishing your capacity, not increasing it.

We have an enemy that would love for us to bite onto the hook that says, Choose Your Own Adventure; you know what’s best. And sometimes we do that. We deal with addiction. We deal with stubbornness. We deal with pride. We deal with sin patterns. Yet all we are doing in those moments is undermining our own success.

Jesus’s statement is, I want a relationship with you. Basically what He says to Laodicea is, You do realize this Kingdom life only works if you’re connected to Me? I would ask you this question: are you trying to live a Kingdom life disconnected from Him? Are you making space for conversation and intimacy with Him? Are you creating systems and places where you just sit with Him and go, Hey, I just want to talk? I want your perspective. Religion is the knowledge of Him; intimacy is knowing Him. They’re incredibly different.

PURSUING GOD IN ALL AREAS OF LIFE

There are several things the Laodicean church was doing that were numbing them. Part of it was they were, fiscally, incredibly affluent. It’s ironic that He says to them, You’re poor. They were one of the wealthiest regions in the world. It was the center of banking. They had money. Think about Abu Dhabi or some of the places in the Middle East where the median level is just really wealthy. If you’re poor there, you’re still rich by most people’s standards. This is that kind of region. 

And yet He says, You’re poor. Why? It doesn’t matter what you have. If you don’t have intimate intimacy with Him, you have nothing. They weren’t willing to be faithful in finance. Pastor Dustin and I went on a deep dive into the historical side of this church, and most scholars believe that while they were super wealthy, they were also stingy. They had a poverty mentality towards finance, so they wouldn’t release it. 

I want to challenge you and me with this question: Are you making space for Him in your daily life? Because here’s the thing: If you make space for Him and have a conversation with Him, He’ll control every aspect of your life. Or are you just doing religion where you’re like, Yeah, I go to church, but I kind of make my own decisions everywhere else?

You say I don’t know how to hear God’s voice. Well, the Bible is a great place to start. I’ve built the last 40 years of my life, starting when I was nine, by reading a proverb of the day every day. For the first 10 years I don’t think I understood them. It was just a great place to start. If you don’t have a place to start, start there. Read Proverbs. I don’t care where, just don’t start in Leviticus because you’ll stop.

Can I challenge you to ask yourself: Is Jesus knocking at the door of my life wanting intimacy?

Here’s what’s really been bugging me. You’re going to love this happy-go-lucky ending. There’s a story in Israel’s history, and that is that one guy named Achan of Ai refused to obey God, and the Lord held all of Israel guilty until he would fix it. I think the Lord wants to do stuff in our culture, but He’s waiting for all of us to get on board.

What happens if we consider that our unwillingness to surrender to the Lord actually hurts the community we’re in?

It’s not just about us. It has a deep impact on the people around us, and so maybe a simple thing we can do is own our space. If you say, You know what? I’m going to take care of my space. I’m going to get alone with Jesus and make sure He has control of my life. I’m going to make sure I’m hearing His voice. I want to make sure I’m studying the Scriptures. I can do that as part of being in this community.

It will not hurt your world. It will help your world. We’ve treated this message to Laodicea as the harshest of the seven, and I actually think it’s one of the kindest messages Jesus gives. Because He says to them, You’re an absolute wreck. Come hang out with Me, and we will fix you. It’s no different than Isaiah 1: “Come now, let us reason together…Though your sins be like scarlet, they could be white as wool.”

The Lord’s answer is always the same: Your life is an absolute wreck. Come hang out with Me, let’s get it better. The whisper of the enemy is always the same: Your life’s a mess. Get it right, and then go talk to God. Do you see the difference? We have a King who’s so confident in His own purity that His answer is, Come hang out with Me. I’ll fix you. Come in your brokenness, bad as you are, and I’ll fix you.

The number one thing you can do in your life to improve your relationship with Jesus is just hang out with Him. What if I hear Him wrong? He’ll fix it. What if I become a headcase? We’ll fix it. You have friends and family, and they’ll say, Hey, that’s actually not what the Scriptures say. Let’s talk about this.

This was always intended to be something where a community of people were on a pursuit. That we’re all uniquely pursuing the King so the King could dwell corporately with us. He is the Amen of Heaven, which means everything He says is true. Everything He says can be banked on and lived on. Are you approaching His voice that way?

Lord, we love You, and we honor You. Lord, I know there are places for lots of us where we’re probably not giving You access. We hear that statement, Hey, I’m standing outside the door. I want in. I want to spend my life with you. Lord, for all the places of fear that would keep us from embracing that, would You forgive us? We’re not afraid of You because of You. We’re afraid of You because we know us. We’re stubborn. We don’t want to give up the areas that we’re in control of. And yet, it’s crazy because You’re the Amen of Heaven. Everything You say is perfect. It’s truth. We can build our lives off of it. Holy Spirit, this week would You point things out? Would You knock louder if You have to? We want to be a people fully surrendered to You. We love You. We honor You. In Jesus, amen.