Our Condition

Have you ever wondered what Jesus might say if He were to describe your relationship with Him right now? Perhaps He’d say it is strong or that it has been stronger in the past. Have you ever wondered what Jesus might say if He were to describe His people in these last days? In Revelation 3:14–22, Jesus actually does describe them.

He begins by stating that He’s the “ ‘ “Faithful and True Witness, the Beginning of the creation of God” ’ ” (Rev. 3:14, NKJV). A faithful and true witness doesn’t lie but speaks plainly and honestly.

Jesus tells us, Christian individuals who live in the last days, that He knows us. We’re neither hot nor cold, because, from our vantage point, we don’t need anything. The days and weeks pass by, and we spend a little time with God here and there, and we think that’s enough. But it’s not. Instead, we actually need Him far more desperately than we realize. If only we could love and live for Jesus wholeheartedly or not at all. That would be better from God’s perspective than being lukewarm. Jesus says that He’ll vomit us out of His mouth because we taste as bad as we are. But He hasn’t yet done this, and He asks us to make some bold choices right now.

In ancient times, “buying” something meant bartering or exchanging goods. Here, Jesus generously offers an exchange: our apathy for His gold, for His white garments, and for His eye salve. He wants to make us rich in His eyes; He wants to cover us with His perfect robe of righteousness; and He wants to open our eyes to see the truth of how an abiding relationship with Him will change absolutely everything. He offers us all that we need, especially because what we need, we can’t provide for ourselves. He alone can, and will, but only if we are willing.

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Additional Reading: Selected Quotes from Ellen G. White

Like the Jews in the days of Christ, many today hear and believe, but are not willing to step out upon the platform of obedience, and accept the truth as it is in Jesus. They are afraid of losing worldly advantages. Their minds assent to the truth but to obey means to lift the cross of self-denial and sacrifice, and to cease trusting in man and making flesh their arm, and they turn away from the cross. They might sit at the feet of Jesus, learning daily of Him whom to know aright is life eternal, but they are not willing.
Every one who is saved must surrender his own plans, his ambitious schemes, which mean self-glorification, and follow where Christ leads the way. The understanding must be yielded up to Christ, for Him to cleanse, and refine, and purify. This will always be done when a right reception is given to the teachings of the Lord Jesus. It is hard for self to die daily, even when the wondrous story of God’s grace is presented with the wealth of His love, which He unfolds to the soul’s necessity.
O how much we need a more intimate acquaintance with the Lord Jesus. We need to enter into His will and carry out His purposes, saying with the whole heart, “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?” O how I long to see our churches in a condition different from the condition in which they now are—grieving the Holy Spirit day by day with their lukewarm religious life, a life neither cold nor hot. Christ says, “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” (Revelation 3:15, 16).
O how greatly Christ would be honored and glorified before irreligious, worldly men and women if His followers were what they claim to be—true Christians, the love of Christ constraining them to make Him known before an idolatrous world, showing the marked contrast between those who serve God and those who serve Him not. . . . We are to tell others of the love of Christ, and in order to do this, we must know by experience what it means to have this love in the heart. All will find abundant opportunities to work if they will improve the opportunities that come to them.—This Day With God, p. 64.

The condition of many of those who claim to be the children of God is exactly represented by the message to the Laodicean church. There is opened before those who serve God, truths of inestimable value, which, brought into the practical life, show the difference between those who serve God and those who serve Him not. . . .
The Bible is the storehouse of the unsearchable riches of God. But those who have a knowledge of the truth do not understand it as fully as they might. They do not bring the love of Christ into the heart and life. The student of the Word finds himself bending over a fountain of living water. The church needs to drink deeply of the spirituality of the Word. Their service to God needs to be very different from the tame, lifeless, emotionless religious experience that makes many believers but little different from those who believe not.—Our High Calling, p. 348.