June 22, 2008
“For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.” Romans 8:14-17
Hymn 341 – Jesus bids us shine,
Prayer
Where are we in our study? We have looked at six of the seven churches; today we’ll look at Laodicea. Read Revelation 3:14 – 22. In this period in church history, Christianity has gone bad. These are people who go to church, but some are only pretending to be Christians. They are lukewarm, like a park water fountain on a warm day; you would spit it out! They think they are all right; v. 17 tells us they say they are rich, increased with goods, and in need of nothing. However, the Lord says they are really wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked. Notice that there are five items in that list; five is the number of man’s weakness. This is not what they thought they were, and it is not what God wanted them to be. He offered them the following: gold (divine righteousness), white raiment (purity),and eye salve (for spiritual vision). The Lord said that He will only rebuke those that He loves, and begged them to repent. The Lord knocks to these Christians today; He wants to be let in. He wants to come in, sup, converse, and have fellowship with these people.
So what have we learned from the seven churches? We have seen how the church’s love for God has fluctuated ever since Ephesus; how thankful we can be that there is a little reviving of it in Philadelphia. May we shine in the darkness as Philadelphia did, until the church is raptured. Read Revelation 22:14. just a note about the rapture: when the Lord says “quickly,” He does not mean soon; He means that when it happens, it will happen quickly. The Greek word means “to snatch.”
In v. 8, we looked at what happens to those who do the things mentioned in vv. 5 – 7; If we do them, we will be blessed. But in v. 9, we see a person who does not follow Peter’s counsel. Is this person saved? He is blind! But his sins have been purged; yes, he is a Christian but he has lost his spiritual sight. God gives us the ability to understand His Word, but if we don’t exercise that, we will get rusty. We should pray, “Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law [Word].” (Psalm 119:18). Instead of blind, Darby says shortsighted. The world sees what is right in front of it; we need better than 20/20 vision … that is only possible by faith. But how could one forget that his sins were purged? It seems that he has fallen back into some of them; they have once again become part of his life. He has forgotten that they are judged.
In v. 10 we are given an exhortation: we must make our calling and election sure. This doesn’t mean that we need to find out if we are really called; it means we need to display the fact that we were called to others; can they tell by looking at us? Abraham was called: he was called out of his old home and called to the marvellous position of head of the children of Israel. We have been called out and called to as well: called out of the world and called to live for God. Ours is a heavenly calling, unlike Abraham’s. We are saints by calling (Romans 1:7), elected by God before the foundation of the earth. Yes, our election came before our calling, but it is not until after we are called that we find we were elected. It is all so amazing, we can’t enter into it all!
Little Flock Hymn 212 – Called from above, and heavenly men by birth
Prayer