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You know the verse. 'Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.' You've read it and felt the low-grade shame of someone going through the motions. What almost no one tells you is what lukewarm meant to the church in Laodicea — and why the image is more specific, and more hopeful, than you've been told.
Get These Verses Daily — Free“I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.”
Laodicea's water was physically nauseating — neither the healing hot of Hierapolis nor the refreshing cold of Colossae. The image is about uselessness, not emotional temperature. A church so comfortable with its own wealth that it delivered nothing to anyone.
“Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked: I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich.”
The self-assessment was completely wrong. They thought they had everything. Jesus lists what they actually were: wretched, miserable, poor, blind, naked. The first step out of lukewarmness is accurate self-knowledge — seeing yourself as you actually are.
“Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.”
This was written to a church, not to the unsaved. Jesus is outside his own people's door, knocking. He has not abandoned them. He is waiting to be let back to the center of what they had made about themselves.
“As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God.”
The Psalm of Korah — written from spiritual dryness, from someone who remembers what it felt like to be close to God and is not there now. The panting itself is the beginning of return. If you still want the water, you are not as far gone as you fear.
“As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent.”
The rebuke is an act of love, not rejection. The command is be zealous — present imperative, start now — and repent. Repentance here is not self-punishment. It is a turn, a decision to open the door that has been closed.
“Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your labour for that which satisfieth not?”
Spending yourself on what doesn't satisfy is the diagnostic. Lukewarm faith is often the result of seeking fullness in the wrong places until thirst itself goes numb. The invitation remains: come to the waters.
Laodicea was a wealthy city in Asia Minor. It had a problem with its water supply: the hot springs came from Hierapolis, several miles north, and the cold water came from Colossae, to the east. By the time either reached Laodicea through the aqueducts, it had arrived at the same temperature — lukewarm. Hierapolis's hot water was famous for its healing properties. Colossae's cold water was refreshing and clean. Laodicea's water was neither. It was tepid, mineral-laden, and made people physically ill.
When Jesus says "I will spue thee out of my mouth," the image to the church in Laodicea was immediate and visceral — they would have thought of their own water, the water that came in promising refreshment or healing and delivered neither. The rebuke is not against people who feel spiritually average. It is against a church that had the resources to heal and refresh others but had become so absorbed in its own wealth that it delivered nothing useful to anyone.
The context matters because it reframes the question. The problem Jesus identifies is not low emotional temperature — it is uselessness. The church in Laodicea thought it was rich and in need of nothing. Jesus says it is wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked. The self-assessment was entirely wrong. Lukewarm faith in this passage is not the faith of a person who is dry and struggling. It is the faith of a person who has stopped noticing they need anything.
Commentary is from a charismatic Protestant perspective, drawing on KJV text and public-domain sources including Spurgeon, Andrew Murray, and Matthew Henry.
What follows the rebuke in Revelation 3 is often cut off before the important part. After "I will spue thee out," Jesus says: "As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent." The rebuke is itself an act of love. He is not announcing rejection — he is calling them back. And the next verse: "Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me."
This is the verse used in evangelistic settings as an appeal to the unsaved. But it was written to a church — to people who already identified as Christians. Jesus is outside the door of his own church, knocking, waiting to be let in. The church had become so self-sufficient that it had effectively closed the door to the one it was named for. Zeal and repentance here mean letting him back to the center — not manufacturing spiritual feelings, but opening the door.
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