I will spit you out of My mouth

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Pastor John, I see very plain statements in the Bible that show that Christ does not lose any of His true sheep. However, I am struggling to understand a passage in Revelation 3 where Christ says “because you are lukewarm… I will spit you out of My mouth.” Are you able to help me understand what these words mean?

Thanks for your question. The phrase you quoted, lifted out of its context, has caused many to doubt the biblical doctrine of the perseverance of the saints. To correctly understand the verse in question, one has to see the broader context and know something of the historical background.

Please allow me to illustrate. Suppose someone 300 years from now, comes across a letter written this year (2013) in which a mother writes, “After the Church service today, we all went to McDonalds and each of the kids had a happy meal.”

Then let us imagine (hard as it may be to do so) that sometime between now and 300 years from now, all the McDonalds restaurants go out of business. I realize that might be a far fetched notion, but lets go along with it for a moment for the sake of illustration.

Then, 300 years from now, someone who has never heard of the McDonalds restaurant chain looks at the words “we all went to McDonalds” and assumes that this meant a Scottish family (rather than a restaurant). They then assume that the phrase “each of the kids had a happy meal” meant that the kids were happy when they ate the food. We can almost laugh at such an interpretation knowing that it misses the mark completely. That is because here in the 21st Century, the words “McDonalds” and “happy meal” are almost universally understood to refer to a restaurant and a special sized meal for children (that includes a small toy for them to play with).

The idea of McDonalds being a Scottish family and that the kids enjoyed their meal, is a possible interpretation, but that is not how these words would normally be understood in our early 21st Century context. It is far more likely that the intended meaning of the words are that the family went to a well known restaurant called McDonalds, and each of the kids had child sized meals which included toys for each child.

I say all this because the words in Revelation chapter 3 had a context, that when known, make the passage easy to understand. However, when historical context is either unknown or ignored, we are likely to misinterpret the intended meaning of the text.

The words you quote are taken from a passage in Revelation chapter 3 (v. 14-22) where the Lord Jesus, through His apostle John, is writing to the Church at Laodicea. The city of Laodicea was located in the Lycus River Valley and was an important commercial center in the first century. The local water supply was not adequate for the many residents of the city and so an underground aqueduct was built.

Two cities were in close proximity to Laodicea and both of them had contrasting types of water. Hierapolis was well known for its hot springs, and Colosse was famous for its cold refreshing water that flowed from a mountain stream. There are great uses for hot water and cold water, however, Laodicea, with only its underground aqueduct, had only tepid (or lukewarm) water. Visitors unaccustomed to Laodicea tasting the water would immediately detest it and spit it out.

In Christ’s 33 years on earth, there is no record of Him traveling to the region in and around Laodicea. Touching His humanity, all we can say about His knowledge of the area can only be mere speculation. However, as the Ascended Christ and in His full deity, Christ knows all things and therefore can address the Laodicean Church with full knowledge of the geographical data. Christ used the historical situation known by all Laodiceans to describe the spiritual condition of the local Church there. The Church in Laodicea was neither cold (outwardly hostile to Christ) nor hot (zealous for Christ and His gospel), but were instead lukewarm – professing faith in Christ but were really hypocrites of the highest order, and certainly, not true disciples of Christ.

Theologians have long made the distinction between the visible and invisible Church. The visible Church is the Church man sees. We see with our eyes all who make a profession of faith in Christ. The invisible Church is the Church that is seen only by God – His true sheep. The Lord knows the identity of His elect, even when we (because we do not see things as He does) are fooled. God, of course, is never fooled. “The Lord knows those who are His” (2 Tim. 2:19).

We all know that not everyone who professes Christ, truly possess Christ. Many say they know Him, but Christ will say to many professors “depart from Me, I never knew you.” (Matt 7:21ff). Notice that! He does not say, “I knew you at one time but you blew it.” No, He says that He never knew them. There never was a time when Christ was united to them, savingly.

When Christ says to such people, “I will spit you out of My mouth” He was speaking to a Church full of hypocrites. To use another Biblical expression, they honored Christ with their lips but their hearts were far from Him. Just as the Lord Jesus (in the Gospels) saved His harshest words for the religious hypocrites of His day (the Scribes and Pharisees), so the Lord will vomit such lukewarm members of the Church in Laodicea out of His mouth.

He addresses this same exact group (the Church of Laodicea) just a few verses later when He says, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.” (Rev 3:20) Christ stood outside the Church and through the means of this letter, was knocking on the door. There was not a single true believer in the Laodicean Church, and yet, as Dr. John MacArthur stated, “If one member would recognize his spiritual bankrupcy and respond in saving faith, He would enter the church.” A full explanation of Revelation 3:20 can be found here.

The verse you quote has nothing to do with a true believer losing salvation. It is in fact a word to a Church that seemed to have everything, naturally speaking, but spiritually was completely destitute – poor, blind and naked. That is why Christ exhorts them, “I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, so that you may be rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself and the shame of your nakedness may not be seen, and salve to anoint your eyes, so that you may see. Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent.” (v. 18, 19)

Now you know something of the background, read through the passage again and see if the meaning now becomes clear:

14 “And to the angel of the church in Laodicea write: ‘The words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of God’s creation.

15 “‘I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! 16 So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. 17 For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked. 18 I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, so that you may be rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself and the shame of your nakedness may not be seen, and salve to anoint your eyes, so that you may see. 19 Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent. 20 Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me. 21 The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne. 22 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.’”

– Revelation 3:14-22

I hope that helps. God bless, John

Miscellaneous Quotes (72)

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“I simply argue that the cross should be raised again at the center of the marketplace as well as on the steeple of the church. I am recovering the claim that Jesus was not crucified in a cathedral between two candles but on a cross between two thieves; on the town’s garbage heap; at a crossroad so cosmopolitan they had to write his title in Hebrew and Latin and Greek, at the kind of place where cynics talk smut, and thieves curse, and soldiers gamble. Because that is where he died. And that is what he died for. And that is what he died about. That is where churchmen ought to be and what churchmen ought to be about.” – George MacLeod, quoted by Richard C. Halverson, Perspective, 6 January 1988.

“For every one hundred men who can stand adversity there is only one who can withstand prosperity.” – Thomas Carlyle

“God would never permit any evil if he could not bring good out of evil.” – Thomas Watson

What will it cost to be a true Christian? “it will cost him his self-righteousness. He must cast away all pride and high thoughts, and conceit of his own goodness. He must be content to go to heaven as a poor sinner, saved only by free grace, and owing all to the merit and righteousness of another.” – J. C. Ryle

“Courage is about doing what you’re afraid to do. There can be no courage unless you’re scared.” – Eddie Rickenbacker

“The religion of some people is constrained, like the cold bath when used, not for pleasure, but from necessity for health, into which one goes with reluctance, and is glad when able to get out. But religion to the true believer is like water to a fish; it is his element; he lives in it and could not live out of it.” – John Newton

“We know how God would act if he were in our place — he has been in our place.” – A.W. Tozer

“God’s sovereignty does not negate our responsibility to pray, but rather makes it possible for us to pray with confidence.” – Jerry Bridges

“Missions is not the ultimate goal of the church. Worship is. Missions exists because worship doesn’t.” – John Piper

“You cannot slander human nature; it is worse than words can paint it.” – Charles H. Spurgeon

“Now faith cometh not of our free-will; but is the gift of God, given us by grace, ere there be any will in our hearts to do the law of God. And why God giveth …it not every man, I can give no reckoning of his judgments. But well I know, I never deserved it, nor prepared myself unto it; but ran another way clean contrary in my blindness, and sought not that way; but he sought me, and found me out, and showed it me, and therewith drew me to him. And I bow the knees of my heart unto God night and day, that he will show it all other men; and I suffer all that I can, to be a servant to open their eyes. For well I know they cannot see of themselves, before God hath prevented them with his grace.” – William Tyndale

“When we become too glib in prayer we are most surely talking to ourselves.” – A.W. Tozer

“When we see that the whole sum of our salvation, and every single part of it, are comprehended in Christ, we must beware of deriving even the minutest portion of it from any other quarter.” – John Calvin

“Unbelief is actually perverted faith, for it puts its trust, not in the living God but in dying men. The unbeliever denies the self-sufficiency of God and usurps attributes that are not his. This dual sin dishonors God and ultimately destroys the soul of man.” – A. W. Tozer

“There is no greater discovery than seeing God as the author of your destiny.” – Ravi Zacharias

“When the devil accuses us and says, ‘You are a sinner and therefore damned,’ we should answer, ‘Because you say I am a sinner, I will be righteous and saved.’ ‘No,’ says the devil, ‘you will be damned.’ And I reply, ‘No, for I fly to Christ, who gave himself for my sins. Satan, you will not prevail against me when you try to terrify me by setting forth the greatness of my sins and try to bring me into heaviness, distrust, despair, hatred, contempt and blasphemy against God. On the contrary, when you say I am a sinner, you give me armor and weapons against yourself, so that with your own sword I may cut your throat and tread you under my feet, for Christ died for sinners. . . . As often as you object that I am a sinner, so often you remind me of the benefit of Christ my Redeemer, on whose shoulders, and not on mine, lie all my sins. So when you say I am a sinner, you do not terrify me but comfort me immeasurably.’” – Martin Luther, commenting on Galatians 1:4, “. . . the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins.”

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us — for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree.” Galatians 3:13

“To the Jews, this was absolute blasphemy: a cursed Messiah on a cursed cross. No wonder the cross was such a stumbling block to them! To put it in the most shocking and yet perhaps the most accurate way, the apostolic message was about a God-damned Messiah.” – Philip Graham Ryken, Galatians (Phillipsburg, 2005), page 115.

“The main condition of spiritual life, according to 1 John 1, is fellowship with God; and the prerequisite for communion with God is ‘walking in the light,’ which may be defined as an honest heart awareness of the truth about the condition of one’s life and the truth of God’s grace, which both covers sin and provides a dynamic of sanctifying transformation. Live orthodoxy is found not among those who wave the flag of commitment to biblicism but among those who live in this focused spotlight of applied biblical truth.” – Richard F. Lovelace, Dynamics of Spiritual Life (Downers Grove, 1979), page 284.

“God frees us from our bankruptcy only by paying our debts on Christ’s cross. More than that. He has not only cancelled the debt, but also destroyed the document on which it was recorded.” – John R. W. Stott, The Cross of Christ (Downers Grove, 1986), page 234.