It is the book of the Revelation. It's not Revelations or Revelation. It is the book of the Revelation. And we're turning to the chapter three. So Revelation and the chapter three. Begin our reading at the 14th verse of the chapter. Revelation chapter three and the verse 14. And unto the angel of the church of the Latest Saints write, These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God. I know thy works, thou art neither cold nor hot. I would that thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth. Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and of need of nothing. 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 mightest be rich, and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear, and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see. As many as I love, I rebuke and chase him. Be jealous therefore and repent. 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. To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame and am set down with my father in his throne. He that hath an ear, Let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. Amen. Let's keep the word of God open before us and let's seek the Lord together, please. Our loving Father, how thankful we are for thy holy word. We thank thee for its teaching, its voice to us, holy man inspired by God. to write down that which had been communicated to them from God. And we come, Lord, and we see very much the relevance of that which we have read even today. And as we come to Thy Word, we pray that Thou will give to all that honesty of heart We cry, O God, that thou wilt speak to our souls. Leave us not without a voice from heaven, we pray. Take these lips of clay. Lord, touch them with that live coal from off the altar and grant, dear God, that I may speak of thee and speak thy word as thou hast given it to me. Lord, grant now thy blessing and thy presence to be with us in a very particular way this day. Glorify thine only Son, Lord come and revive thy church with life and power. We offer prayer and through our blessed saviors worthy and holy name. Amen and amen. Making an appearance some 1,326 times in the Bible, the word, behold, is one of those words that repeatedly arrests the attention of the Bible reader as they make their way through the sacred scriptures. As a word, the word behold appears many of those 1,326 times as an injunction. Now an injunction is simply an authoritative warning or an authoritative command or order. Over the next number of weeks and months, I want us to look at some of these beholds that we find in the scriptures. Because what comes after this injunction to behold obviously is very important to the divine reader or the divine author of the book or else he would not have placed this arresting word, this word that makes the reader stop to sit up and to take notice and thus I believe that there is much to be profited by as we consider these beholds of the Scripture. Now the first behold that we want to consider today is this behold that we find in the book of the Revelation, the chapter number 3 and the verse number 20. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come into him and will sup with him and he with me. Now, contextually, these words were spoken by the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the sole head and king of his blood-bought church. He speaks them to a backslidden and a lukewarm congregation in the Turkish city of Laodicea. Now the members within that body of believers, that assembly, that congregation, have become proud, self-deceived, and materially wealthy. However, despite their material wealth, they had become spiritual paupers. They were spiritually bankrupt as a congregation of God's believing people. You see, whilst they believed that they had need of nothing, God told them that they were wretched, that they were miserable, that they were poor, that they were blind, and that they were naked. Having shut God out of his church, the picture is painted in the verse 20 of the Savior returning or coming to them as a people, knocking on the door of the church, seeking to enter in again in order that fellowship and communion could be restored between him and his people. Now, although these words were originally spoken to the backslidden members of a little church in Asia Minor, these words, I believe, pass far beyond the limits of the lukewarm Laodiceans whom they were first addressed. I believe that they need to be applied to us, to us as a people, to us as a church, to us as a congregation. either as a warning to us that Christ could withdraw from us, just as he withdrew himself from this church, if we lapse into the same spiritual state as the church of Laodicea had lapsed into, or as a prompt and as a guide that if we have lapsed into that state, of how the conscious presence of God can be secured again in his blood-bought church. Now there are a number of issues that I want to address today as we behold Christ's plea to his church. That's the title, behold Christ's plea to his church. Now the first issue that I want to address is the position that Christ adopts within this plea. The position that Christ adopts within this plea. Where is Christ to be found in relation to his church? in this particular verse and with regard to the church in Laodicea. Well, note the words of the Savior there in the verse 20. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. I want you to notice that the knocking that is taking place here is not from the inside of the door to those outside. No, rather, it's rather one from the outside knocking to those who are inside. And I say that is the case because of what the text goes on to say. Notice what it says, if any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in. I will come in to him. The Savior does not say, I will go out to him. No, the text says that I will come in to him. And so when Christ is knocking here, we find that he has taken up a position outside the door of this church and seeks to be readmitted. Now, this is not the natural place for the head and king of his church to adopt. You would know that to be true. No, the natural place, the most logical place, the most proper place for Christ to take within His church is in the midst of His people, among His people. We thought about that text, I think it was before I went off on holidays, where two or three are gathered together in my knee, and there am I in the midst of them. Turn back just a few chapters to Revelation chapter 1, because in this chapter we find the most proper, the most logical, the most natural place for Christ to adopt with regard to his position within the Church of Jesus Christ. Note there Revelation 1 in the verse number 13. And in the midst of the seven candlesticks, one like unto the Son of Man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and gird about the paps with the golden girdle. Now this is John's vision on the Isle of Patmos concerning none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. Now we're not left to speculate what these seven golden candlesticks are, because the Lord communicates what they are to John at the latter part of the chapter. Look down there at the verse 20 now of Revelation chapter one. The mystery of the seven stars, which thou sawest in my right hand, and the seven golden candlesticks. The seven stars are the angels or the pastors of the seven churches, and the seven candlesticks which thou sawest are the seven churches." And so the candlesticks is a representation of the churches that John was about to communicate, or Christ was about to communicate through the apostle John, a message to each of those churches. And so where do we find Christ in Revelation chapter 1. We find him in the midst of the golden candlesticks. But where do we find him in Revelation chapter 3? We don't find him in the midst of his church. No, we find him outside the church. He's outside her door. He's no longer in the midst. No longer there in his proper, in his preeminent, in his natural place. Now the question then should come to your mind, how has this sad state of affairs come to pass? How has it been since Revelation chapter 1 and then Revelation chapter 3 that Christ has taken a position that is different in both chapters? Whereas he is in the midst in chapter 1, he's now outside the door in chapter number 3. How has such a sad state of affairs occurred, at least with respect to the church in Laodicea? Well, there are only two natural answers to that particular question. Only two possible answers. Either he has been ejected from the church. Can you imagine that? Christ being ejected from his church, or he has taken the personal decision to withdraw his conscious presence from the church in Laodicea. Now the ejection of Christ from any church happens and occurs when a church apostatizes, whenever they apostatize. This happens whenever the leadership of a church teach that which is contrary to the revelation of God's Word. Christ cannot dwell. cannot dwell where the cardinal truths of the faith are attacked and denied by those within its leadership and those within its ranks. Now you should be asking yourself the question, what are the cardinal truths of the faith? If you are to decipher whether or not a church has apostatized, and if the mark be that they deny the fundamentals of the faith, the cardinal truths of the faith, you should be asking yourself the question, what are they? Because there may come a time that I may have to bring such a test to the church to which I attend. Are they denying the faith? Are they preaching that which is contrary to the revealed Word of God? What are they? Let me give you, I would say, the five key ones. Number one, the deity of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and God the Son. Such a truth is set forth in places like John 1 verse 1, John 20 verse 28, Hebrews 1 verse 8 and 9. Number 2, the virgin birth of Jesus Christ, that He was born of the Virgin Mary without sin. Isaiah 7, 14, Matthew 1, 23, Luke 1 verse 27. Number 3, the blood atonement. What a truth, what a doctrine that is, that man is saved only by and through the blood of Christ. The blood of Christ is the ransom price paid for our redemption, that only through the sharing of blood has redemption been purchased and, thank God, then applied to our souls by the Spirit of God. Acts 20 20 at Romans 5 verse 9 Ephesians 1 verse 7 the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ that he was raised from the dead on the third day bodily in his body in which he died he was raised gloriously Luke 24 36 to 46 and then the inerrancy of Scripture As it's set forth in 2 Timothy 3, 16 and 17, 2 Peter 1, verse 20, all scripture is given by inspiration of God. And it is in every church a body denies these fundamentals of the faith that Christ withdraws himself. He leaves the church because the church is to be the pillar and ground off the truth How then we as a church must be on our guard from any defection from these fundamentals. It is our duty to keep the faith, and not only to keep it, but to earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered on to the saints. Now the church in Laodicea may have been guilty of such a departure. They may have been guilty from these, a departure from these key tenets of the faith that caused Christ to adopt such a position. Now, although there is no direct reference that Laodicea had become, as it were, a breeding ground for doctrinal heresy, the titles that are given to the Lord Jesus Christ in the verse 14 seems to indicate that there may have been a drift. There may have been a drift in the church's thinking and teaching on the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Notice how he is referred to there in the verse 14. He is called the Amen. He is called the faithful and true witness. He is called the beginning of the creation of God. And so as I've said, it may indicate the Spirit of God, Christ himself speaking. He may be hinting that there is a drift with regard to the doctrine of the Lord Jesus Christ. And can I say, brethren and sisters, that is critical territory, critical. When a church errs on the doctrine of Jesus Christ, she is on very dangerous ground. You need to remember that Laodicea was some 10 miles from the city of Colossae. Now in the city of Colossae, they had problems as a church. And the problem with regard to this church in Colossae was that individuals had come in and taught a different doctrine. They denied the deity of Jesus Christ. That is why the book of Colossians was written, to affirm the New Testament church's belief in the doctrine of the deity of Jesus Christ. That's the context in which the book of Colossians is to be read. He is the preeminent one. that in all things he might have the preeminence, that in him dwelleth all the fullness of God bodily. These are passages, phrases that we find in the book of Colossians. Paul is defending the doctrine of the deity of Jesus Christ, and it may just have been that that which had infected the church 10 miles up the road had found itself to infiltrate the church in Laodicea. And so it may have been that this church had started to drift with regard to the doctrine of Jesus Christ. However, it seems to be that the sin of the Laodicean membership was less obvious than outright heresy. It seems that her attendees had simply, they had simply become lukewarm. They become lukewarm in their love for Jesus Christ. Note the charge brought against her there in the verse 15 and 16, and note who it's brought by. Look again, verse 14, who's it brought by? By the faithful and true witness. And so there's no lies being told here. There's no cover up. This faithful and true witness, this omniscient God, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, possessing all of the attributes and perfections of God, this omniscient Christ, he looks into the assembly and he sees their sin, and he pinpoints their sin, and he brings his charge against them there in the verse 15 and 16, I know thy works. that thou art neither cold nor hot, thou art lukewarm. Now we all know what lukewarm is. It's halfway between hot and cold. Tepid water, we would maybe call it. Christ here charges them with simple lukewarmness. A lethargy, an apathy, A carelessness had set in among them as a people, and as a result they had declined within their spiritual eyes so much so that God said that He was sick of them. He said, I will spew you, or I will spew thee out of my mouth. The word is vomit. Such was the lukewarmness, such was the state into which this church had declined that it made the God of heaven sick. As it were, it turned him to think that this is what my church has declined to, to simply to be people of orthodoxy. And yet, no longer any fire, no longer any passion, no longer any zeal, no longer any enthusiasm for the things of God or for the things of Christ. We need to be honest with ourselves today. Do not these words express the state of our own hearts at times? The state into which they can deteriorate into? We become lax, apathetic, indifferent. It seems to be that the fire of love for Christ begins to burn low. We find ourselves lapsing into a state of lukewarmness. This is a state that is marked by carelessness, complacency, worldliness, indifference. a lack of concern, even a spirit of independence, that we can do it, we can say the right things and go right through the right motions, and yet never, ever be in contact with God. You know this state, it eventually impacts our vision, it impacts our vitality, It impacts our vigor in the things of God so that we become so sickening to Him that He would spew us out of His mouth. But the saddest thing in this account in Revelation chapter 3 is that the church of Laodicea was not even aware of her state. Notice what it says there in the verse 17, and knowest not They said, we're increased with goods. We have need of nothing. And no, it's not. They were so deluded. They were so proud that they hadn't got to the stage that they realized that our condition is not what it once was. Having undergone a self-assessment process, Those within the church membership, they comforted themselves with the thought that they were rich and increased with goods and in need of nothing. That was their assessment, and yet God, who assessed the exact same assembly, he saw things differently. No, he said that they were rich and increased, or sorry, they were wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. Now, we have to ask ourselves the question, who was right? Who was right? Was it the membership of the church or was it the head of the church? Was it mere human beings who love to cover their sins and their backslidings or was it the Lord Jesus Christ who knows the hearts of all men? Well, well, you would know that God's assessment, His diagnosis was the right one. I put it to you that we as a church But I put it to you in maybe a more personal way, that we as individuals can become so blinkered by our own self-righteousness that we cannot properly assess where we are spiritually with God. This is why the Psalmist David said, search me, O God. He didn't do the searching, God did the searching. We compare ourselves with others, with the church next door. We pat ourselves on the back and say, well, I'm not as bad as they are. Or we say that we haven't become as liberal or as modern as they have become, while all the time the result is the same. Death in the church. How we need to see ourselves as God sees us, as Cromwell, I think it was, who said, warts and all, when his portrait was being painted by a painter. Warts and all, paint them all. Theodosian's problem is our problem. It was a church that was plagued with materialism, worldliness, and lukewarmness. Is that not our church? Is that not our own lives? We run after gold instead of souls. We're more concerned about how much money we have in the church accounts rather than how many souls were brought to Christ last year. We compromise with the world in so many spheres of our lives, so many. We are no longer on fire for God. When's the last time you ever met a person on fire for God? We are to be those people. I tell you, we are lukewarm at best, cold at worst. Well, may God use this message today to shake us out of our ease, our complacency. her own self-deception, and may it lead to a return to the Lord, the position that he adopts. Notice secondly, the petition that Christ proffers in this plea. Now you would think that such a company of saints was beyond recovery, wouldn't you? God had said that they were wretched and miserable, poor, blind, and naked. Surely there was no future for such a people. Surely God had every right to abandon them completely and to raise up another in its place to do its will. Surely this church in Laodicea was beyond recovery. But that is not the case. Thank God that was not the case. You see, Christ did not abandon her. Rather, he stands at her door and he knocks. But not only does he knock, but then he speaks, he communicates with the church. And he utters the following petition, if any man hear my voice and open the door. Now there's mercy in this. There is abundant mercy in this. He is the God of the second chance. Here's the God who comes to this assembly of lukewarm believers and he says to them, I'm willing to return. He says, I'm wanting to return. He says, I'm waiting to return. But all that I need is for someone to open the door. That's what I need. Just someone to open the door. I'm convinced that this petition If any man hear my voice and open the door, I believe that this petition by Christ was intended to provoke a threefold reaction from his church. The Savior was willing and ready to take his rightful place within the church and within the personal lives of those within the church, but first there had to be a realization, a realization. a realization of where they were with God individually. Notice that the Savior does not address his remarks to the church as a collective whole. No, rather he addresses it to the individual. Note what he says in verse 20, if any man, singular, not if the man, But if a man, any man, any woman, that's the term, I believe the Greek term used, it can be used for man or woman. You see, he speaks to them as individuals. Because the church is simply a gathering together of individuals who have been redeemed by God and reconciled to God. And thus the onus is on each and every individual member to realize that they have lapsed from a former state and they have become lukewarm. And so I asked you, as an individual, As an individual, has God been bringing you to that place where you've realized that I am not what I once was for God? Has zeal abated? Has a worldly mindset taken over your life? Are you, as a professing Christian, trifling with sin? Has there been a waning in your spiritual life? Is the passion of God and the passion for God still marking you as a dead when you first and believed the gospel? Is your enthusiasm for the things of God, is your love for the means of grace as it once was? Has there been, as it were, a dawning? Has there been a realization that there is an ongoing drift in your life that is adding to the collective drift within the Church of Jesus Christ? If so, God would have you to know that he's standing knocking the door of your life, and he's seeking to enter in. Oh, do not think that, as it were, you're placed on the spiritual scrap heap, and your failures, and the wicked one would suggest that to your mind. I could never return, I could never enjoy the fellowship, the communion that I once enjoyed with the Lord. Ah, that is not so because here we find a church who had lapsed into a deplorable state and yet Christ still comes to them. He still comes in mercy and He says, if you open the door, I'll come in and I'll sup with And thou wilt sup with me. A realization. Secondly, there needs to be a repentance. Mark the words at the end of verse 19. Be zealous therefore and repent. Read the whole verse. As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Be zealous therefore, repent. Do you notice he still loves them? He still loves them. As many as I love, he still loves them. as a company, as an assembly, as individuals, though the drift is on and though the state has deteriorated and though there has been a decline within the spirituality of the individual members and with the body of Christ as a whole within the city of Laodicea, He still loved them. He still loved them. Because He loves His church. He loves His church. And he does this out of love. He does what he does, he rebukes and he chastens, but what motivates him? To make himself a name within the church? The thing that motivates him is love. Love. Whom the Father loveth, he chasteneth. scourgeth every son whom he receiveth." Repentance. What is repentance? We can't better. The Westminster divines on the very issue, repentance onto life as a saving grace whereby a sinner out of a true sense of sin and apprehension of the mercy of God doth with grief and hatred of his sin, turn from it on to God with full purpose and endeavor after new obedience." Yes, what a definition for the sinner and what it is with regard to saving faith, but could we not take the same definition and apply it to the saint of God as well? What is repentance with regard to the child of God? What is it? Well, it is with grief and hatred of our sin, We, as believers, turn from it to God with full purpose of and endeavor after new obedience. It's just the same for us. Repent, repent, and our repentance will be evidenced by new obedience. To what? To the dictates of a preacher, To the standards of other Christians, to the regulations of a denomination, no. New obedience after the standards and the commandments that are set forth for the believer, and the believer's only rule of faith and practice, the word of God. That's how we'll know we've repented, when we just start to live out the word. And then there had to be not only a realization and a repentance, then there had to be a returning. Look at verse 18, I counsel thee, The buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich and white. Raymond, that thou mayest be clothed, and the shame of thy nakedness do not appear. And anoint thy eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see. Instead of them being self-sufficient and self-reliant, these people were encouraged to return to the one who could, the one who could provide for their deficiencies. Who were they to buy from? He said, I counsel thee to buy of me. a returning to God. And did you notice that he provides for every deficiency that they had? Did you notice that? He called them poor. What does he provide for them? Gold tried in the fire, that thou mightest be rich. He said that they were naked. What does he provide for them? White raiment, so that they could be clothed, and the shame of their nakedness would not appear. They were blind. What did he provide for them? Eyesalve. so that they could anoint their eyes and that they would see clearly. In other words, a return to God would see that all their needs were met by him. Thank God for that. My return, your return, our return to God would see all our needs being met by him. How well we could heed the words there then of Hosea chapter six, verse one and two, come and let us return on to the Lord for he hath torn and he will heal. He has smitten and he will bind us up. After two days he will revive us. In the third day he will raise us up and we shall live in his sight. If God was willing to do this for these people, I believe he's willing to do it for us. if we would only but realize, repent, and return. There is a final concluding thought. The promise that Christ makes in this plea, the one who hears his voice and who responds and opens the door to him, the promise is made that I will come into him. and will sup with him, and he with me. Though he had distanced himself from them, he had not fully withdrawn from them. He's not gone so far away that he cannot return. He loves his church too much to leave her altogether. And so he waits and he longs that a people would hear his voice and open the door. That opening will lead then to the reestablishment of fellowship because it says, I will come into him and sup with him and then he with me. What an incentive for us to return One incentive to seek the Lord again, to return from our wanderings, to cease from our strain, to repent of our lukewarmness, so that we would enjoy the fellowship and communion that we once enjoyed. I wonder, is there a cry going up from your heart just now? Return. Return, oh God. Come again into my life in all your fullness. Come again to us as a people. Come to us as a church. Come to us as a nation. Return. Mr. Spurgeon preached on this text on Lord's Day, the 26th of July, 1874 at the Metropolitan Tabernacle in the city of London. Mr. Spurgeon closed with these words. With regard to that which he had preached upon, he said, there is something for us to do in this matter. He said we must examine ourselves and we must confess the fault if we have declined in grace. And then we must not talk about setting the church right. We must pray for grace, each one for himself, for the text does not say if the church will open the door. It says, but if any man hear my voice and open the door. It must, he said, be done by individuals. The church will only get right by each man getting right. So the challenge is, will you, will I, get right with God? If I do, if you do, if we do, that will begin the process of the church getting right with God. May God minister to our hearts. May God speak to us. And if you have heard his voice, listen, respond, and Christ will return in all of his fullness. May God bless the beginning of these series of messages on some of the beholds of the scriptures. Let's bow together in prayer. Let's take a few moments of silence. Has God been searching your heart as he has mine? May there be a turning on to him. And as we turn from him, we turn from our sin. Our loving Father, we long for thy presence and we seek thy favor. We acknowledge our personal declension We cry to thee that thou wilt return, return to Zion. We bless thee that the God of heaven delights in mercy. How quickly he could have left that church, and yet he gave them space to repent. We pray that we may do as our moderator encouraged us to do, to rend our hearts and not our garments. We cry to Thee, pity us, Lord, and give us a day when Christ is in His preeminent place. in all of our lives. May we seek Thee as individuals, and may that result in the reviving of every heart. We leave ourselves now before Thee, take Thy word. May we leave this place carefully and prayerfully, and may nothing be lost of that which God has brought to our attention. Through his word today, we offer prayer, and through our Savior's precious name. Amen, amen. May the Lord bless as you make your way home.