Week 52 Case 7 Laodicea
One of the things I’ve noticed about the six previous churches is that John either a) says some Good Things & some Bad Things about each church or else b) he just says some Good Things. But he’s got nothing Good to say about Laodicea.
As far as that goes he doesn’t have a list of Bad Things about Laodicea either. It’s like he has nothing much to say about them one way or the other. They aren’t hot. They aren’t cold. They’re the lukewarm church in the list – The Indifferent & Neutral & Nonpartisan Church of Laodicea.
It’s pretty clear the people in the Laodicean church didn’t view themselves that way. They’d done some kind of a self-assessment and discovered three very self-affirming things (a kind of Laodicean Creed):
I am rich
I have everything I want
I don’t need a thing.
This didn’t square with the church-assessment that the Lord had done. According to his findings the Laodicean congregation was: wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked.
At least Ephesus Pergamum Thyatira & Sardis each had a couple of strengths – virtues to (arguably) balance out the shortfalls. But Laodicea had nothing. It was a nonchalant & unconcerned & easy-going Devil-may-care congregation.
The Lord ended by telling them to be diligent and turn from your indifference. But it’s hard to know how they’d manage a back-to-front 180-degree swing that would take them from I’m-Definitely-Okay to I’m-Not-Okay-At-All.
Note: Revelation 3:14-22. Quotes from 3:17 19 (NLT)