Last winter, a group of 50 leading Protestant and Roman Catholic scholars met at an interdenominational meeting on the campus of the University of Notre Dame. Their major conclusions were reported in a one-column article in the Grand Rapids Press.
Now, I would expect that few of us ever pay much attention to the reports which come out of these theological councils, since they often only urge the church to work harder in the world for social and political reform.
However, those theologians correctly pinpointed a major problem in the church world today – a problem which even has infected our Protestant Reformed churches.
The problem those 50 scholars referred to was that of spiritual lukewarmness, on in their words, “spiritual numbness.” It is a problem which affects the lives of every single one of us, and in my opinion, might just be the biggest problem facing our churches today.
The problem of spiritual lukewarmness has not sprung up overnight, however. In fact, it has plagued the Church for a long, long time.
Revelation 3 refers to the classic example of spiritual numbness – the church at Laodicea. Verse 15 tells us that the church there was “neither cold nor hot,” but rather, lukewarm.
I think the most striking aspect of the sad story of the Laodicean church is that, in some ways, it could be our story.
The Laodiceans were a rich people. Revelation 3:17 paints for us a picture of how many Laodiceans undoubtedly felt about themselves: “I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing.” In fact, they were so rich that when the city was leveled by an earthquake in 60 AD, they were able to rebuild the town entirely out of their own personal finances.
Like the Laodiceans, we, too, are a rich people. We have beautiful houses, cars, boats, stereos, and hundreds of other possessions which literally 90% of the rest of the people in this world do not have. In comparison to the rest of the world, we are fabulously well off.
Unfortunately, at times we are like the Laodiceans in another respect: spiritual lukewarmness. Like them, we are sometimes neither cold nor hot – we are lukewarm.
With all of our material possessions and all of this world’s pleasures and amusements, we often lose our zeal for the cause of God. We get so caught up in our work, our entertainment, our personal lives, that we have neither the time not desire to seek first the Kingdom of God.
The result is that even though we may appear to be living a proper Christian life, our spiritual activities mean very little to us. We go through the motions of being a Christian, but our hearts just aren’t in what we do.
We sit in the pew on Sunday, but don’t pay very close attention to the sermon. We attend Young People’s Society, but don’t give much thought to the discussion.
For some reason, reading the Bible doesn’t excite us anymore. Our prayers turn into a long recitation of our problems and desires. In short, our Christianity sometimes seems to consist of nothing more than a few ritualistic spiritual exercises.
And so, we drift from week to week in the sea of lukewarmness. Oh, every once in a while we may hear an inspiring sermon and pledge to be better Christians, but we soon forget and life goes on as usual. We are trapped in the web of spiritual apathy and just can’t seem to get out of it.
What’s more, our spiritual lukewarmness is not small sin in the eyes of God, as we are actually rebelling against our Lord and Master. As the scholars who met at Notre Dame put it, we are shaking our fist in the face of God. We are telling our Redeemer that our salvation doesn’t mean very much to us, and that we really don’t care about serving Him.
And what is God’s reaction to people who serve Him only half-heartedly? We read in Revelation 3:16 that God responded to the lukewarmness of the Laodiceans by saying, “Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth.” Clearly, spiritual lukewarmness is an abomination unto the Almighty God.
The question we must ask ourselves is, what can we do about the problem of spiritual lukewarmness? To start, we must recognize that it is a problem which afflicts our churches and our lives. It certainly is not confined only to other churches and other people’s lives.
Second – and this is the hard part – we must learn to put aside our driving pursuit of worldly possessions and happiness and focus in on serving God with zeal and enthusiasm.
To be sure, this is easier said than done, and we certainly cannot accomplish this change on our own. Throwing off the cloak of lukewarmness requires prayer and hard work, but in the end, only God can rekindle in our hearts the strong and infectious desire to serve Him. We are rescued from the sin of spiritual sleepiness only by His grace.
Yes, it is a hard fight, especially in this age of unparalleled wealth, pleasure, and temptation. Yet it is a war which all Christians are called upon to wage. For if we give in to the pervasive mood of spiritual lukewarmness, we will be just as repugnant to God as the Laodiceans were, and He will reject us just as He rejected them.