Because You are Lukewarm
Because You are Lukewarm Excerpt 15. neither cold— The antithesis to “hot,” literally, “boiling” ( “fervent,” Ac 18:25 ; Rom 12:11 ; compare So 8:6 ; Lu 24:32 ), requires that “cold” should here mean more than negatively cold ; it is rather, positively icy cold : having never yet been warmed. The Laodiceans were in spiritual things cold comparatively, but not cold as the world outside, and as those who had never belonged to the Church. The lukewarm state, if it be the transitional stage to a warmer, is a desirable state (for a little religion, if real, is better than none); but most fatal when, as here, an abiding condition, for it is mistaken for a safe state ( Rev 3:17 ). This accounts for Christ’s desiring that they were cold rather than lukewarm. For then there would not be the same “danger of mixed motive and disregarded principle” [Alford]. Also, there is more hope of the “cold,” that is, those who are of the world, and not yet warmed by the Gospel call; ...