Revelation | To the Church of Laodicea | Jon Tyson

Welcome to Garden Church Podcast. We're in a series in the book of Revelation. We're gonna spend the next 26 weeks doing a deep dive into both how to read and how to interpret this amazing book. Enjoy.

Alright. 10 AM. How we feeling? We alright? So good to be with you.

I'm not gonna do the giving liturgy. Instead, I'm gonna put the slide up and just say, let's be generous. As part of the garden kind of story, our values, who we are, we we believe that God has been generous towards us, and we wanna respond in generosity. So would you take your phone out, give? If you don't give, it's time to start giving.

If you give, keep reaching towards risk and sacrifice as you live generously towards God's kingdom. And, there's there's ways to give online. You can text. You can email. You can probably, Snapchat.

We'll figure out a way to get your money. I don't know. There's lots. You can write checks still, until that gets taken away. But, anyways, that was not a political jab.

But, yes, anyways, I'm I'm so glad you're here this this morning. It's it's I already heard it, and so I know it's a powerful morning already. We we saw somebody, get healed of an eye condition. We prayed for healing this morning. We already saw some a miracle take place, and we're just expecting for what God's doing.

But I wanna do 2 things before John comes up here. 1st, the Ernst are here. Will you guys stand? These are missionaries going to Spain. Would you give it up for the Ernst?

Caleb and Kate, stay standing. They're they're gonna be outside at the welcome center so you can connect with them or the connect center, whatever we call it. They'll be out there, you know, answering questions. You guys can grab a seat. They're going to Spain.

Last week, we talked about praying, for God to release vocational ministers to bring the gospel around the world, and we have some. We get to host them. And, you know, part of the joy of being a church that has missionaries around the world is we get the opportunity to host them. And so my expectation to raise you up as the people of God is to pull up some cash and give them what we call a Pentecostal handshake. So just put money in their pockets for date nights and all the un all the the ways that they survive is through your generosity.

So let them come here and be overwhelmed with your generosity towards them. Okay? That's a freebie. There you go. The second thing is serve love our city.

It's happening next Saturday. You heard it from Slav. But please sign up. Please go online and sign up your family. Just serve.

We're we have 45 different projects. We're partnering with lots of churches in the area to bless the community around us. It's one time a year we ask you to show up and serve. So would you consider next Saturday signing up online to do that? Sound good?

Alright. Double announcement. So, I get to introduce my friend, and it's so funny. I'm like, how do I intro I was looking at his bio, and every time I see him, he's written a new book. So, John, let me just say, he is a great friend.

And in this world of ministry, it's rare to find people who have remained faithful to the local church while having a visible, a larger platform beyond the local church. John is also a man of integrity and character and holiness. He's lives a consecrated life. We know each other really well. We talk about the hard things, and there's was something interesting a couple weeks ago.

I was talking to him. I'm like, John, I'm getting an email about you doing a father daughter book that came out, and you're doing this father son thing, and then you got this men's thing coming out. You wrote a book called Fighting Shadows. You have the intentional father book. You have, like, the art of teaching with John Mark.

Like, you got, like, a thousand things, and he's like, yeah. But I'm sold out for the local church

And I wanna be committed for the next 25 years in the city at my local church. And that just blessed my heart so much to see men that are a little bit older than me just going after the things of God. And so we don't bring guest teachers. We bring friends who carry something. So will you welcome pastor John Tyson as he comes?

Thanks for being here. Let me pray for you. Yes. Father, I thank you for my friend. I pray, God, that you would anoint him for the 10 AM.

Thank you for what he's prepared in his heart and his mind. Thank you for the the skill, of the sharpened arrow that you have released into the nations, god. I pray that you increase his influence, to the to pastors and leaders and to the church and beyond. Pray that you bless him as he's in Southern California to feel overwhelmingly welcomed, but also released for ministry. Bless this talk in Jesus name.

Amen. Amen.

Well, what a joy to be with you. Churches, deal with all sorts of problems. There's bad problems you gotta deal with, But then there's good problems. And you've got a good problem, which is, there's no space for anybody. And, you should be grateful for that.

Many churches in this area, their biggest problem is that they can't get anybody to show up. And, it really is a special thing to have, to have capacity problems. Don't can I just say this? Don't take that lightly. You should really be praying about this.

It matters. It's not about you getting a seat. It's not about your convenience. It's about the tens of thousands of people that have not encountered Jesus yet, that that need a place to be able to worship. So just keep praying that there'd be room.

Darren and Alex, wonderful to, be here. Thank you for having me. Love these guys. Love how they lead this church. I I met Darren years ago.

I don't know if you remember what year it was, but seeing what's happened in their lives and in your church is really, really remarkable. This is an important moment, in the kingdom right now. You're probably aware of this, but there is a generational transfer happening in the church. Many of the the spiritual mothers and fathers that sort of got us to where we are are going to be with the Lord, or they're retiring or handing their churches over. And those those can be vulnerable moments, moments the enemy gets in, moments when heresy gets in, moments when bad leadership or the flesh gets in.

But they can also be catalyzing moments where the next round of mothers and fathers are installed, and a whole new thing is birthed in the church. And, that's it's really happening, and it's happening here on Southern Southern California, Happening, here through your church. So, lean in folks. Pray, give, serve, invite people who do not know Jesus. This is a really, really important moment.

So thanks for allowing me to be here and to speak into this this morning. I wanna I wanna open, with a question. We're continuing on on this series about what it means for the church to be faithful in a time of chaotic empire in the book of Revelation. I'm gonna talk about Jesus' message to the church at Laodicea this morning. But I wanna start with a question, and I really want you to ask answer this question in your heart when I ask it.

What makes oh, boy. We got the youth here too. What's up? Let's get it. Hello.

I can feel that energy. I love that. Come Yeah. Okay. What makes a successful church?

How do you tell if a church is successful or not? What dynamics are in place? I when I was a a youth pastor, it was pre pretty new to the US, was working at a church and had the privilege of running a youth group called The Element, 1 e. The Element, Element, Element. The Element was was so good.

We had a skate park. We did a battle of the bands. This is this was Thursday dashboard confessional. This was this is this was these were the days. And, it was really amazing.

We were reaching all these goth kids, all these emo kids. When we did baptisms, this I kid you not, the baptismal water would change color because so many kids had dyed colored hair. We baptized all these kids because no one wanna get in the water. Amazing. And, it really started to grow.

And, then we so a lot of these kids graduated high school. We went on and started a college ministry. College ministry was called Status. Status. Status.

What's your status? Where are you with God, with community, with each other? And, this thing, really, it was just the timing of it was perfect based what what was happening in the city at the time. This was in Orlando. And, it it sort of grew from 200 to 1400 in 2 years.

Our church had about 1500 people in the whole church, and so it doubled the size of the church, put our church into the 100 fastest growing churches in America. They sent us a plaque. Congratulations. You are the 100 fastest growing church in America. And my vision as a youth pastor k.

I'm in my mid mid twenties. My vision was I wanna get to the main auditorium. That was my vision. Like, get me out of this side hall. Get me into the main hall.

And I remember it get we're doing multiple services, and I remember it just got so big. They eventually said, you can have the main hall. And that night, I was like, come on, god. Come on. I went I went to do a sort of a prayer of celebration and consecration.

So no one's there, and I'm walking around the main auditorium. And I'm anticipating God saying, thanks, John, for building this youth group. Thank you. And instead, I walk in, the fear of God is there, and God disciplines me and says, you haven't loved or discipled these people. You haven't made a single disciple.

And I I remember just going, oh, and wanting to crawl out of the main auditorium, go up to the upper room, lock myself in the secret place, and just get right with God. On the outside and there was there was listen. God moved in. There was good things. But it looked so successful.

Momentum, energy, branding, the the place to be, crowds of people. But it just failed to make disciples. And I think it's important to remember this because we do live at a time of history where it's never I think it's never been easier to plant the wrong kind of church. You'd be successful. Southern California is known for all of its large churches, isn't it?

I think you guys invented the megachurch. You know? And, so it's important to ask the question, how can you tell what a proper church is? Well, this passage opens with Jesus, giving some feedback. He says, he is the faithful and the true witness, And he is the one that really can give insight and bear witness to what matters to him.

And so we've always got to ask not not what is our opinion or what do we think, but how does Jesus view our church? And he's called the ruler of God's creation. He's the archetype. He's the prototype. He's the one that all ministry should be modeled on, and all people in church should be formed into.

And so the church can really be measured by what Jesus thinks of the church and whether or not it's producing people that look like him in the church. And this is a challenge because for the Laodiceans, they thought they were a successful church, but they weren't. This is the last of Jesus, 7 letters. 4 of the letters, Jesus commends the church and confronts the church. In 2 of them, he just commends them.

And in one of them, he just rebukes them, and this is the church he just rebukes. And I think it really is sort of the rebuke, in all honesty, that Jesus may give to a church in our time of history, in a culture like ours. John Stott says this, perhaps none of the seven letters is more appropriate to the modern church than this. It describes vividly the respectable, sentimental, nominal skin deep religiosity, which is so widespread amongst us today. Our Christianity is flabby and anemic.

We appear to have taken a lukewarm bath of religion. So this is a heavy word. So let's lean into it. Now listen, just so you know, a faithful preacher will preach the spirit of the text. So there's always a human dilemma.

You've got your personality. You've got all those things. But listen, you wanna hear the spirit of the text. And so I wanna tell you, this is a hard text, and I'm gonna I'm gonna preach it hard to match the spirit of the text there. And it's hard because of how much Jesus loves.

This rebuke is an expression of his fiery and passionate devotion for his people. So see see this as a lover's appeal for the whole heart again, not just a moral rebuke for how we happen to be doing church in a given moment. So let's jump in. The first thing we see in this passage is the warning Jesus gives the Laodiceans. He says this, I know your deeds, that you're neither hot nor cold.

I wish you were either one or the other. So because you're lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I am about to spit you out of my mouth. Is it just me, or is that not what you wanna hear at church? I'm about to spit you out of my mouth. Now there's obviously, as in all of these churches as you've been preaching through them, you realize there's cultural dynamics here.

Laodicea, if we can pull up the map, Laodicea was a part of a tri city area. It's dependent on the cities that are around it. And Laodicea was actually the wealthiest city in the entire region, but it had one fatal flaw. It did not have its own water source. And so as a result, it was reliant on Hierapolis, and it was reliant on Colossae.

11 miles southeast through the Lycus Valley was Colossae. It was at the foot of Mount Cadmus, 84 100 feet high, the highest in Asia Minor. It was snow capped for 9 months of the year, and then the waters would melt. And then that snow the the snow would melt. It would go down, and it will produce this refreshing sort of glacial water, and people loved it.

6 miles away was Hierapolis. It had the most extensive natural hot springs, think Iceland, in the ancient world. And it was the original hot tub. It had calcified minerals in it called travertine. Here's a picture of a tunnel.

You can still go there and experience these hot springs. If you stand in the middle of Laodicea and you look in both directions, you can see Colossian Hierapolis. And so they had to bring this water in, and half of the water was freezing cold, and the other half was boiling hot from these hot springs. But by the time it arrived through the Roman aqueducts, it it formed this, like, murky sedimentary sort of marsh. And when you got a drink of it, there was almost an involuntary response because of the chemicals and because of the heat, where you just be like, what is that?

And Jesus is saying to the people, I know your deeds. You're neither lukewarm nor hot. I wish you were either, but I'm about to spit you out of my mouth. This was a wealthy city that had everything it needed except the most important thing, water as a source. And I was reflecting on modern society.

We think about our world today. The problem with modern life for so many people, we we have such material comfort, such abundance, such autonomy, such high levels of self expression. We we have everything we need, it appears. People are lining up at the borders to come into this country because they perceive this as a place of prosperity and plenty. And so here we are, secularism, we don't need God.

We've got everything we need, but as a result, we're missing that one important thing, which is a spiritual source to sustain our actual lives. And so as a result, here is modern modern humanity relying on drawing from other things instead of having an inner spring for itself. And you see so many people. It's like new age spirituality. The psychics are massive in New York right now.

Psychics, people are manifesting, hoping the universe is, like, benevolent and friend I'm I'm about to manifest. You will manifest disappointment. That's what you will manifest. We're trying to manifest this to and what we're saying is, I don't have inner water for my external thirst. And people try again and again and again.

It's the great weakness of secularism, and as a result, so many people are sort of vomiting out this lukewarm spirituality that doesn't work. Why then would the church be seduced into looking outside of Jesus to what the world has and believing this is gonna satisfy the great thirst of our hearts? But this is what was happening to the people in Laodicea. They're getting sucked into it. It was the affluence and abundance that was sort of numbing them and separating them from God.

Jeremiah 2 says this, has a nation ever changed its gods? Yet, they're not even gods at all, but my people have exchanged their glorious God for worthless idols. Be appalled at this heavens. God is so confused about his people's desire to be like non Christian nations, non believing nations, that he has to literally just talk to the heavens. Like, be heavens, look.

Have you can you comprehend what is literally happening here with my people? Be appalled at this heavens and shudder with great horror, declares the Lord. My people have committed 2 sins. They've forsaken me, the spring of living water, and they've dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns. They cannot hold water.

Jesus wants to satisfy us with living water, yet the church believes it doesn't need him and draws outside sources. So Jesus comes along, and he rebukes the church. And here's here's the key to the critique. Here's the key to the critique. You say now he's talking to them.

He's in he's doing sort of like a, like like going meeting with a therapist. Like, why am I like this? Here's why. You say. Here's your inner talk.

I'm rich. I've acquired wealth, and I don't need a thing. But you don't realize your wretched, pitiful, poor, blind, and naked. That's that's not what you wanna hear from Jesus. Jesus, you're having a little 1 on 1.

How you doing? Yeah. Not good, mate. You got cashed up, but you lost your heart. Poor, wretched, pitiful, blind, and naked.

Later, see, it was a financial center. They were proud of their own minted coins, and they just they believed, hey. We you know, we got so much wealth. We don't need anybody else. They just sort of they were sort of like the Wall Street, where they just everything was there as a life of excess and abundance.

It was a fashion center. They had this rare black wall. This is you know, listen. It's I don't know if it's Rodeo Drive. My Southern California, knowledge is limited.

But whatever that street is, where everything costs more than everything you brought for the last year, That. Did someone say that's everywhere? Okay. That's that's Southern California? Oh, okay.

Great. And, well, you don't want it on discount. You want full price, and you want a relationship with the designer. And here they were. These they they were getting their sense of wealth from cultural status and association with what was happening.

They had a medical center. In the ancient world, many, many eye conditions, and they had no solution for them. Listen. I'm in my late forties. And when I turned 40, my eyesight fell off a cliff.

Like, one day, I woke up and I was like, am I blind? It was so sharp. 2 weeks, can't see a thing. Imagine living in an ancient world where there's no reading glasses. You just like so they have this salve, this rare medical salve that they produce that really changed the quality of life for many people.

And they had an educational center, this medical school where people were trained how to use this salve. They're an entertainment center that had these gladiatorial games. People came from the whole region to sort of bread and circus, the heart of the Roman empire. They had a an earthquake in 60 AD, and the entire region was devastated by this earthquake. But they were so financially prosperous.

They said to Nero, we don't need Rome's money to repair the city. I think we'll just rebuild ourselves. And they just had this sense of we are rich and don't need a thing, and some scholars think that may have been the phrase they sent back to Rome. And here is Jesus saying now, again, this is fine for a city. It's nothing wrong with a city being wealthy.

Okay? But what Jesus is saying to the church is that you're getting your identity and security from this the the cultural dynamics of the city that you happen to be in, and this is separating you from me. This is where all the cool kids meet. Everybody, like, left rural Kentucky, and they they left they left Ohio, and they were like, get me to Laodicea, hashtag I wanna live that Laodicea life. This is where people were coming in believing this is where life was to be lived.

So here's all the dynamics of the city, and then Jesus is going to sort of, like, tell them how they've been seduced by this. The first thing he says is this, is you've gotten sucked into the delusion of wealth. And you've got you've just you've gotten sucked into it. If you study sociology and wealth, one of the things you will find consistently is the more wealthy a person becomes, they tend to become less spiritual. It doesn't always happen that way.

There's nothing wrong with having money. If everybody is poor, then someone has to get rich to help the poor. Okay? So I'm not advocating for that, but I'm saying it could be dangerous. Peter Creeps says this.

Mammon, which is really what Jesus raged against, is the inordinate desire to possess wealth, goods, or objects of abstract value with the intention to keep it for oneself far beyond the dictates of basic survival and comfort. It's applied to a markedly high desire and pursuit of world status and power. Mammon is similarly an inordinate desire to acquire or possess more than one needs. Mammon is not desire as such or even desire for temporal possessions as such, but the moderate desire for them. It is natural for man to desire external things as means, but mammon makes them into ends, into gods.

And when a creature is made into a god, it becomes a devil. Money is ubiquitously tempting because of a kind of umbrella principle covering everything money can buy. It also is, or rather falsely promises to be, a security blanket against change. It apes divine self sufficiency. I know of no greater way in American life to take the edge off devotion for Jesus or to remove a passionate and revolutionary spirit than to throw a beach house and a nice meal at it.

Listen. Is this where is this where the is is this where the hippies come from? Southern California. This is where the hate hate Asbury and then down here. And, you talk about Woodstock.

This is like a bunch of kids having sex in the mud and listening to Jimmy Hendrix. Okay? This was like the revolution. And they were what were they like? Anti capitalism.

I'll burn Listen, these were kids. And those those there's a guy in the service from Woodstock, who who was here earlier, came and talked to me. He's talk just talking about the spirit of the age back then. But a a lot of those folks are folks just hoarding wealth in their seventies eighties, refusing to give it to the grandkids. And it's amazing how that revolutionary spirit was sort of softened by materialism and success.

And I say this. It doesn't have to happen, but it can happen. And it's one of the easiest ways that it happens. And so we have to guard. This church got sucked into the wealth of its city, and because enough of them made it to sort of get into the upper echelon of being cultural elite.

Now, listen. Can I just pause for a sec? They would have had a chip on their shoulder as Christians. Because I lived in Rome where Christians were hated. And I lived in Rome where Christians carried cultural shame.

And there was something within them that said, I wanna break this cultural shame of being associated with the poor. And you know what I wanna do? I wanna be a cultural elite. I wanna make it. I wanna be invited to the right club.

I wanna get into the right neighborhood. I want people to see that I am one of them. It was a desire for the affirmation of the world. And so as a result, they put recognition from a wealthy city as more important than recognition from God himself and their faith. It was the delusion of wealth.

They also had the delusion of self sufficiency. They said, we'll take it from here. Now this can happen to any of us. All it takes is time. Do you remember when you were a new believer?

And I I remember so clearly once. I went into my dad's bedroom, and, though, he had some Christian books. And and he had a I'm not trying to critique you. So but this this is what I got out of it. He had Good Morning, Holy Spirit by Benny Hinn on his bookshelf.

Well, I'm about to rebuke it. Sorry. But, anyway, so so so so he have this book. By the way, I said it was a heavy talk, so don't say yes to anything I'm about to say in this talk other than Jesus is Lord. So, yeah, so I said to my to my dad, I need the holy spirit in my life.

Is that a good book? And my dad said, Benny Hinn's a bit dodgy. And I just and I just remember thinking, how do you know that? And I just remember thinking, dear God, let me have a faith deep enough to be able to discern between theologies of preachers. I I didn't know a thing, And I just remember being in awe.

I remember my youth pastor once, in a throwaway sermon, saying, you know, it's that Galatians 5 fruit of the spirit stuff. And I remember thinking, how do you know where anything is in the Bible? I wanna know where stuff is. I wanna know where stuff is. I, for years, thought that John the Baptist was John the beloved and wrote the gospel of John and always wondered how he did it when he was beheaded.

Sirius is like, how did he do that? Was that like prophecy? So dependent. Years later, I got a lot of opinions on theology, Walking with the Lord a long time. My early dependence is very, very hard for me to maintain right now.

I walk with the Lord a lot. I've been in New York for 20 years pastoring a church, got a lot of experience. And if we're not careful, time gets us away from being dependent on the Lord like we were in the early years. I've been meditating in the life of king Asa in the old testament. You're probably familiar there's this verse, 2nd chronicles 16:9.

The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to show himself strong on the behalf of those whose hearts is full years. And we're like, frame that. What a promise. It's not a promise. It's a rebuke.

Because king Asa, when he was a younger king, realized, lord, I I I need your wisdom here. I live in a land full of idols, and he started tearing down the high places and calling the people back to worship Yahweh. And the Kushites came, which were the Ethiopians. They came. A huge army came against him, and he realized in the flesh, I cannot win.

So in desperation, he called everybody to seek the Lord and humble themselves. And the key phrase of his leadership was relying on the Lord. And so he relies on the Lord and the Lord delivers him, and it's an amazing victory. And this leads him into a position of peace for 25 years. 25 years, everything's going great.

He starts storing up money, the the treasury of the temple is full. He has a lot of personal wealth, and then a regional threat emerges. And instead of even seeking the lord, he just goes to another political guidance and say, look, I've got a bunch of money here in the temple and got a bunch of personal wealth. How about I just give you some of this and you take care of the problem for me? And he makes an alliance, and then Hanani the prophet comes to him and says, you failed to rely on the Lord, like you did when you were younger, and you just relied on your own resources, and now you'll always be at war.

You could have had a definitive victory. You relied on the arm of the flesh. The arm of the flesh will have to fight for you in the future. And then Ace's heart, instead of humbling himself, puts the prophet in prison and then begins to oppress the people. And it's the prophet who says to him, God is just looking to support humble and hungry people, but in your arrogance, you fail to rely on him.

And at the end of his life, it gets worse. He gets some kind of foot condition, which they think is gout, which I only remember Benjamin Franklin struggled with. No other reference point for gout. But he had gout in his feet, And then at the end of his life, in spite of everything God had done, in spite of a prophetic warning, he said he relied only on human doctors and did not turn to the Lord. And I I simply say this.

We've got to get rid of the delusion of self sufficiency, and we have to choose biblical dependency in spite of all that we have. And then there's the delusion of their condition. Here's the here's the danger. They can't see it. It's got a giant spiritual blind spot.

They just can't discern that anything's wrong. And he says, you're you're poor. You're wretched. You're blind. You're pitiful.

You're naked. Warren Risby says this. All of the church's man made programs can never bring life any more than a circus can resurrect a corpse. And the issue is you needed to be dependent upon God again. Listen, jumping out of a helicopter with an Easter bunny and dropping eggs to get people to come to church is not the solution to your church not growing.

Adding a bunch of programs and just doing stuff cannot necessarily bring people back to life. Participation alone does not equal transformation. Tozer says this, if the Holy Spirit was withdrawn from the church today, 95% of what we do would go on and no one would know the difference. If the Holy Spirit had been withdrawn from the New Testament church, 95% of what they did would stop, and everybody would know the difference. And that can be the danger of things going well for a church.

Things are going well for our church in New York. Got 2 great new buildings. Got 1,000,000 of dollars in the bank. Biggest budget we've ever had. Healthiest leadership team we've ever had.

And everyone's like, how do you feel about it? I'm like, grateful and terrified. Because momentum makes you look better than you actually are, and it loses your ability to discern your true condition. And I'm I'm like, lord god, please. We choose dependence.

People say, why does your church pray so much? We have 4 prayer meetings a day. Why does your church pray so much? Because I'm terrified of trying to do this in the flesh. I'm choosing dependence.

Even though in the natural, I don't need dependence, because I never want to think I can do this on my the second you say, thanks, Jesus. We'll take it from here. He's like, okay. So number 3, here's what he does. He exhorts them.

He says, I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire so you can become rich. Listen. Jesus is committed to your spiritual prosperity, and he wants you to be spiritually wealthy. The in in Colossians 2, when he says, I'm earnestly contending for you and also those in Laodicea, that you may understand your true riches in Christ Jesus. This was his heart.

He says, I want you to get gold refined by the fire, so you can become rich, white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness, and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see. True wealth, gold refined by fire. Jesus wanted spiritual wealth for the rich young ruler. He says, sell what you have, and great will your treasure be in heaven. He's like, look.

This account this economy is about to collapse, and I wanna put your money in an account where it will never be touched and be secure forever. We just make a quick exchange. So just like, I'm gonna like, so that's gonna be held by the poor real quick, and then I'm gonna give it and he just, no. I can't make that exchange. True wealth.

It's not just about what we have here. It's about having spiritual riches. This is about character, soul, depth, that which is refined, that which matters most. It's about having true covering, white clothes, so you can cover your shameful nakedness. Now shame and nakedness are edonic terms.

They were created in the image of God. And as soon as sin came in, shame came in. They had covered themselves. And and God says, who told you you were naked? And they're like, we just sort of figured it out.

And, and that's the great problem we have in the world today because when you try and clothe yourself, you will always just be using cultural means to cover up internal shame. You need a different identity. Listen. I I I don't say this with any judgment. I say this as a sociological observation.

Okay? But at which point in our society did self definition become the highest good? At which point did choosing your pronouns become the highest point of self understanding? At which at which point did we say, I have to construct an identity from nothing, and I need everybody to validate this for me. Otherwise, I feel like I don't exist or have any sense of worth in the world.

And and all of the self creation, this could be social media profiles, the personas we put on. This can be putting our careers on, success, influence, all of these things. What we're doing is fending off our inner shame. But how is your shame really covered? Well, it's covered by the blood of Jesus.

It's this white clothing, not all the the stuff of the world. And when you've been justified by faith, Jesus says later on that it's white equals righteousness in the book of Revelation. When Jesus clothes you with a true identity, where you are known and wanted and chosen and holy and dearly loved, you don't need anybody else's external validation. In fact, it's possible to be clothed with such righteousness, the righteousness of Christ, that nothing the world says about you can shake you. In fact, you become antifragile, which means the world the more the world persecutes you and resists you, it says the spirit of grace and glory rests on you, and it's actually building your spiritual capacity.

So he says to them, don't get your sense of covering from the world and to the church. Don't try and make peace with our culture, and identify yourself the way the world does. Let Christ cover you and love you and wash you and make you secure, and give you the identity you want. And then let him give you true vision. He says you need self to put on your eyes, so you can see.

We've lost our vision of what matters. This church thought we don't we're doing so great here. Just dominating in Laodicea. Dominating. But you know this, the kingdom of heaven doesn't work like the world works.

We can often think, man, it's so good, and we're killing it. And the truth is, it's really elsewhere. That's not us. I I had the chance, to speak at a men's conference, and it was a great conference, but it was very different than who I am. Okay?

I'm kind of, what they call bookish. K? So my high like, I like to read and sit in rooms that are dark and read more. That's, like, that's it. Okay?

And, I I the last time I was here, I think I was here for 5 or 6 days, and everyone was like, oh, man. Must have been nice there, down in SoCal. Did you hit the beach? I was like, my feet did not touch the sand. What were you doing?

Reading and working? I mean, I just I loved it. So anyway, that's me. I'm a bit of a dork, but I'm at, I'm at a men's conference that's like a monster truck men's conference. Like, the guys are shirtless with grilling stuff in trucks with painted torsos.

I was just like, oh gosh. This is thank you, Lord, for the chance for a cross cultural mission. And, so listen. I I give this sermon, and, honestly, the sermon goes great. Okay?

Goes well, hits a nerve, and, and, you know, a lot of affirmation. Man, thank you. That was so great. I mean, I mean, having lunch, with a group of people. One of my mentors is sitting next to me, and I'm sitting next to this just this small little guy from Indonesia.

Quiet. It's like you wouldn't even notice him at the table, barely spoke. And then my mentor said, do you know who that dude is? I was like, no. He says he says, well, that that guy does men's ministry.

I was like, great. He said, yeah, he's discipled a 1000000 men in Indonesia. And 200,000 of them were Muslims who led to Christ. And people in their church had been martyred for their faith. And, so just just remember your talk wasn't that good.

And it was act it was actually just a reminder. Like, we we think we're the center of kingdom activity on earth. We're gonna get to heaven with all of our wealth in the American church. And Jesus is gonna say, I hope you enjoyed that, folks. It's gonna be a while.

And then after all the, you know, the the lady leaders of the Iranian church, they'll be there for and get out of the way and let them forth. We we've gotta see clearly of what matters. Doesn't mean we hate ourselves. God's put us here because he wants us here. We just have a right understanding of who we are and where things are.

We have to see properly. Now why is Jesus what's the reason he is going so hard at the later decision later decisions? Here's what he says. Those whom I love, I rebuke and I discipline. Those I love, I rebuke and discipline.

So here's his exhortation. Be earnest and repent. And so so this is a love based rebuke, and it's an always with Jesus, an invitation to more. And he says, here I am. I stand at the door and I knock.

If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I'll come in and eat with that person, and they with me. This is amazing, because you think Jesus would say, you know, boom, kick the door, and give me back my church. He's gonna come in, and he's gonna slap you around. He's gonna say, do more for me. You know?

And this is nothing like what Jesus actually is interested in. He's he's like, please let me in. It's a loving discipline and rebuke, and he what he's after is intimacy. What he's after is true intimacy with you. This is this is so surprising to me.

This it's it's love. It's loving him, and he loves you with such whole hearted love. And he just wants to be equally yoked with a bride that loves him back like he loves. And that's really the heart of it. Revelation 2 starts, with Jesus saying, like, please return to your first love.

And what happens if you don't return? A slow descent, where in this particular passage, they have forgotten to love Jesus so much, Jesus isn't even inside the church anymore, that he's like, can you please let me back in, bride? You build a whole house. I'm not even in it. Hey.

Can I can I can I come back in? This is extraordinary what happens when you lose your love. I I read this, wonderful book in a dark room without sand. I read this wonderful book, called surprised by oxford by doctor Carolyn Weber. It's a beautiful book.

It's a memoir about a woman who as a young, like, young radical feminist, angry at any concept of a male god and goes off to Oxford, wicked smart, goes off to Oxford. And I almost against her will has the person of Jesus chase her down and win her heart. And it's such a beautiful book. Like, I would just read it and be weeping because I could feel Jesus coming after her heart. And they turn into a movie.

It's a beautiful book. But in it right at the end where she's considering giving a life to Jesus, the the person walking her towards faith takes her to visit to see this painting at a church in Oxford. And she goes in, and it's this famous passage, Revelation 3:20, behold, I stand at the door and knock. And he says, really, this is your moment of choice. She says, I sense Jesus is knocking at the door of your heart.

Revelation 3:20

And so they stand there meditating, doing a little Visio Divina looking at this picture. And then she says, hey. There's a the the artist has made a mistake. And she says, oh, what do you notice? She said, well, there's no handle on the outside.

How's Jesus gonna come in? And she says, Now you understand. You can only open it from the inside. Jesus can't force his way in. You have to let him in.

Do you wanna let him in? And it's this beautiful moment because it really is an invitation to intimacy. It's Jesus saying, do you remember what that was like? Come on back in. 1, the greatest lie the enemy ever sold the church is that the world has it better than the church.

Kit, listen. I don't know if there's a real housewife of, Orange County here. Okay? God moves in mysterious ways. But here but here's my ex I'm never getting out loud to speak here again, so this is fun.

But I'll just say this. My experience has been working with a lot of people who are successful in the eyes of the world in New York. That they're actually aching for what we have, not for us to have what they have. And the level of stress, broken relationships, the level of distrust because everybody wants something from them, level of family dynamics that are strained, the level of unhealthy ambition and drive and work pressure, and it's crushing them. And what we've got is unconditional love, true riches, a secure inheritance, and a permanent family in the church.

And Jesus just wants us to experience the beauty of that. Now he he, as always, is doing this because he has something better for us. And, honestly, the promise he gives you know, all these churches have promises. The promise he gives is so incredible. It's almost heretical, except it's I'm about to read it, and it's in the bible.

John 17 is almost heretical, where Jesus says, father, that you have loved them just like you've loved me. And I was like, hang on. Let me get that out in the Greek. It can't mean that. And you get it out, and it means exactly that.

It's Jesus' invisible prayer. Father, if only they knew that you feel about them like you feel about me. You just say, what is that? Have you ever wanted to be truly loved? Your love like Christ is by the father.

That's extraordinary. Well, look at what Jesus promises the church in later stages. Hey. You guys think you got it pretty good? Got your little black wall, got your minted coins, got your eyes off.

He says, look at this to the one who is victorious. I will give the right to sit with me on my throne just as I was victorious and sat down with my father on his throne. Whoever has his, let him hear what the spirit says. Now when you get to heaven, here's what I was planning on doing, throwing my crowns at the feet of Jesus. Get up.

You're gonna get up next week into heaven and see what's happening. Here's here's these living creatures. You know you know this. This in the old testament, they covered their eyes out of fear. In the new testament, they're covered with eyes so they can behold his glory.

It's extraordinary what's happening. The the the multitudes are hosanna, hallelujah, worthy glory. And Jesus is gonna be like, yo, Laodicea, you overcame that independent spirit. You overcame the delusion of mammon. You overcame that delusion of just doing things on your own.

So here's your reward. Come on. He'd be like, no. He's like, come on. If you imagine ascending the throne of the universe with Christ and getting a view from the center of all power, authority with the son of God raised in glory and power, alive forevermore as a reward.

You tell me what's good. 5 minutes of fame, and you'll be gone soon, and no one will even remember you were here in 20 years. Or Christ said, come on. Come to the throne. Come and sit on this throne and enjoy my victory as a gift for you.

This is this is impossible. So I wanna say this. Jesus says you have to overcome the temptations of an affluent independent society. You gotta overcome it. You gotta choose dependence.

You have to choose dependence. You you may actually may not be dependent. You have to choose dependence. You have to structure your life as a disciple where god is required and not optional in how you live. I was talking with a guy that came from, look at what they used to call a closed country to the gospel, and this is a person who had experienced persecution for his faith.

And he moved over to the US. And I'd asked him, gosh, you know, must have been so hard back where you were from. And I said, yeah. It was hard. He said, but America's harder to follow Jesus.

I was like, come again? He's like, no. No. America's harder. He said, you see, there was no lukewarm Christians under persecution.

You deny your faith and you go back into the world, or you're all in for Jesus. And he says, we had something you rarely know about called the fellowship of his sufferings. And we had a kind of intimacy that is very, very rare in a culture like yours. And he said, also, whenever you were locked up, you were locked up with other, like, psychos who loved Jesus. So these people were like, zeal for God.

He goes, it was very, very hard, but there was a strange intimacy with the Lord and a and a camaraderie and fellowship of suffering. He said, but I actually think it's harder here because the delusion of ease is so great. You have more to overcome here than we had to overcome there. I think that's true. John Piper said this, the greatest enemy for God is not poison, but apple pie.

It's not the banquet of the wicked that dulls our appetite for the banquet of heaven, but endless nibbling at the table of the world. It's not the x rated video, but the prime time dribble of triviality we drink it every night. The greatest adversary of love to God is not his enemy, but his gifts. The most deadly appetites are not for the poison of evil, but for the simple pleasures of earth. For when these replace an appetite for God himself, the idolatry is scarcely recognizable.

These are not evil in themselves. K? They're not vices. They are gifts of god. They're your basic meat, potatoes, coffee gardening, reading, decorating, traveling, investing, TV watching, and Internet surfing, shopping and exercising, collecting, and talking.

And all of them can become deadly substitutes for God. And this is what had happened to the later seasons. They had taken the gifts of God and turned them into gods. And Jesus said, I want your whole heart back. I want your whole heart back.

I want all of you. Here's the truth, and you all know this. You can't be fully happy in the world, can you? You just can't. Because you are you've got a jealous lover.

He wants all of you. He says, the spirit he put within us is jealous and envious for us. That's why the most miserable people in the world are half hearted Christians. People who love Jesus filled with zeal, awesome. People who don't know Jesus, like, eat, drink, be married tomorrow, like, smoke it, whatever.

Get after it. Do it. And in the middle of those Christians who were trying to enjoy pleasure, but the whole time, they're like, oh, gosh. At some point, this is not gonna be this good. And so Jesus, in his love, wants to deliver you from the delusion of a half hearted faith.

And out of passion, he wants to bring you back to himself. So just a couple of thoughts of response here. Number 1 and and listen. This I honestly, I don't wanna let you off the hook. I don't think this is Jesus' message to this church as a whole.

Okay? But, there could be people in this church, a part of this congregation, where you've gotten so busy that you have literally pushed Jesus out of your life. And your success and your prosperity has got to the point where Jesus you don't even have a spot at your table for Jesus in your life anymore. And he loves you, and he wants more for you. And do you hear him this morning saying, let me in.

I want those early days again. I got more for you. I got better things for you. Let me lift the delusion. Let me reorder your loves.

Let me fully satisfy you with spiritual prosperity. Will you open the door this morning? Secondly, will you ask God to search us? And this is important because they they thought they were good, and it took Jesus to tell them they weren't good. And you may be like, dude, man, what a great message.

Certainly doesn't apply to me. Bless god. Well, why don't you just ask god if it applies to you and then see if you wanna bless him? Okay? Let's just lord, will you just search me?

Is there anything in me? You need an MRI, not just like your friend touching your shirt. Like, no. I feel like nothing's broken, man. I think you're good.

You need someone who can see clearly to see clearly the motivational structure of your heart. Lord, search us. And then this is really important, restoring dependence. Is God asking you to do something radical this morning, even as a one off act of repentance that makes you dependent on him? You gotta choose dependence.

Listen. I'm not a moralist. I have no way. It's probably so different for each one of you. 1 of you could do something radical, and it wouldn't move another person's heart.

Another person does something small. It would would shake you. The Lord knows what dependence looks like for you and your circumstance and your situation, but he wants you to be dependent. So is there any place you've just gotten independent relying on your own gifts, your own resources where you are living a God optional life? The root of secularism is not getting rid of God.

It's having God as an option. The Christian does not have an option of life without Christ. And then just asking God to give you zeal, lukewarm, burning, or refreshing. That's his heart for you. You are destined for a heart full of zeal.

And so what if you've got a half hearted or a distracted heart, or you've become the 3rd soil and god's making it real to you, Why don't you just put your heart before the Lord this morning and ask him to warm it up? He loves to do that. He's so merciful. He's so kind. Now the last thing I wanna say is there's a warning here.

The word that Jesus uses when he says, I wanna open the door and dine with you. I think the King James version says, sup. I wanna sup with you. It's an interesting word because it talks about the last meal of the day. Jesus isn't saying, I wanna have brunch with you.

He's like, hey. Listen. Time is almost over in the day for this repentance to result in restoration of our fellowship. And so it's it's an urgent knock on it. There's not, hello.

Yoo hoo. The this is a time is urgent here, and I want your heart back. Let me in your life. Otherwise, things will not go well. It's an urgent call of love for your life.

And so heed his call for supper. But for some of you, this could be the last supper. So let's open our hearts to him. So would you bow your heads, and can we just bring our hearts before the Lord? Let's stand together.

If you just bring your heart before the Lord, and just wait on him and just ask him, holy spirit, is there anything you wanna say to me from this word from my heart this morning? Why has God got you in the room with me, this guest speaker, on this passage for your life today? God has a word for you. Let's open our hearts to respond.

Thank you so much for listening. For more information, please visit us at garden.church.