Amen does not belong to the Baptist Church. It's in the Bible. And if you say amen, do you know what it means? It's actually constantly Hebrew on Maine, which means I agree with that. When you say amen, you say I agree with that. And so it's certainly appropriate. John, did you record that by chance? Oh, wow. That was special. That was special. Couple of things. Next Sunday we're beginning another newcomer class. And it's the first classroom in the middle section going down the hall. And if you're new to Westminster Church, or even you've been worshipping here for some several months, it's a good way just to understand what's different about Westminster Church. How are we different from first Methodist, first Presbyterian Lakewood? What's unique about us? There are a number of things that we would love to communicate with you. It's over a seven week period of time. If you're interested in that, if you would see me or Tom, we'd like to put you on the list. I was going to delay what I'm about to say, but I think given what's happened this morning, this is the perfect Sunday to do it. One of the things that I love about Westminster Church is this wonderful Nifex area out here, because it gives us the opportunity to greet one another, to love on each other. How are you? So forth, both before and after the service. One of the drawbacks there, sometimes it's difficult to get people into the service in a timely way. Let me just point out what you just heard this morning was coordinated between Matt Pruitt and myself. I gave him this is my scripture passage. This is my sermon. And my title is The Open Door. And what they sang is in harmony with what I'm going to preach this morning. That goes for the things that we sang at the opening part of the service as well. I just want to remind all of us that worship is not hearing a sermon. It's not. You can hear a sermon and not worship a bit. Sometimes it's easy to think, well, I'm going to get in there by the sermon. And that's the important part. Not so. Yes, the sermon is very important to hear God's word, to hear God speak to us, very important. But sometimes that can be all about us. I want to hear the sermon because it helps me worship is about God himself for trying God worship is about Jesus. And so don't miss the opportunity to come in worship in a timely fashion and participate in all of it because all of it is really thought out of this is this goes with this scripture. This is an appropriate call to worship because because we want God to do something special in this place. I'll be reminding you of this from time to time. I think it's it's good. This morning I was late coming in. And that's why I think it's perfectly approach sometimes things happen and you just can't help it goodness. That it happens. This morning I was late. Let's let's renew our determination to bring our praise on our worship before God who loves us, who enjoys our worship, enjoys it and commands it. Now if you'll take a Bible and turn to Revelation chapter 3, let's hear what God says. Tom, would you give this to Doug in the back?
Revelation three, verse 14 through verse 22, to the angel of the church and lay to see a right. These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the ruler of God's creation. I know your deeds that you're neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other. So because you're lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I'm about to spit you out of my mouth. You say, I'm rich. I've acquired wealth and did not need a thing, but you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire so that you can become rich and white clothes to wear so that you can cover your shameful nakedness and save to put on your eyes so that you can see those whom I love. I review can discipline so be earnest and repent. Here I am. I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him and he with me. To him who overcomes, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I overcame and sat down with my father on his throne. He who has an ear led him here, what the spirit says to the churches. Amen. You remember Rodney King? Go back with me to 1991, 92. After the Rodney King debacle in Los Angeles, they were terrible riots. He was pulled over by the police in 91. There were terrible riots in 92. After he was his trial, there were millions of dollars in losses. It was all documented on TV, videotape, shown to the whole world. There were beatings, building set on fire, looting. It was a brutal time. In the streets of Los Angeles, it was a virtual free for all. As people were shown laughing and celebrating as a stripped store's bear of all their merchandise. You may not have seen it, but there was a TV crew that recorded a newsman who managed to interview some of the looters. He interviewed one smiling man as he exited a store carrying a large box. And the newsman put the microphone under his nose and said, what did you take? This is what the man said. I took gospel cassettes and CDs. I love Jesus. Praise the Lord. When you see something like that, you think, what a disconnect. Oh my goodness. What a disconnect between what he said and what he did. What a disconnect between the way he thinks and the way his life is. When we're talking about the whole issue of addiction and addictive sense, that same thought on a flood of our minds. Oh my goodness. What a disconnect. What a disconnect between what I believe in my head and my heart and and the way I sometimes live. We've been going through the 12 steps of recovery. But actually as we go through this 12 steps, we've actually been looking at the subject of sanctification and the subject of repentance. The presence of sin in all of us doesn't just magically vanish. The minute we're converted, sanctification requires, as the Westminster Confession says, constant cooperation by faith. And what that means is this as we face our sins, we have to keep our eyes focused on Jesus all the way through. As you face your sins, you must keep your eyes focused on Jesus. The emphasis is never I'm terrible. I'm a mess. There's no hope for someone as bad as me beating yourself up must not take the place of looking at Jesus. Here's where we've been. Step one. We admitted we were powerless over this particular sin and our lives had become unmanageable. Step of honesty. We came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity, the step of hope. We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood him, the step of faith. Step four, we made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves, the step of integrity. Step five, we admitted to God to ourselves and another human being, the exact nature of our wrongs, the step of courage. And step six, we were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character, the step of willingness. I've chosen Revelation three because I think it perfectly illustrates the step of willingness. I want to give you some background about the church of Laedicea that I just read you about. The church of Laedicea is the last of seven churches that are mentioned there in Revelation three, the seven churches of Asia Minor, that Jesus Christ gave John a special message that he wanted to convey to the churches. Now, the church of Laedicea was originally known, or Laedicea was originally known as deospalus. It was known as the city of Zeus. Zeus was the greatest Olympian God. He was considered the ruler God, the protector of all. The church of Laedicea, more than likely was started by the Apostle Paul with the aid of the Papyrus. And here's a little interesting Bible fact that you probably don't know. The Apostle Paul wrote a letter to the church of Laedicea that has since been lost. We know about the letter to the church at Ephesus and the church of Philippi, the letter to the church at Galatia. And so what, there was a letter to the church of Laedicea in the Colossians four, verse 16. Let me just read you how we know this. After this letter has been read to you, the letter of Colossians, see that it's also read in the church of the Laedicea and that you in turn read the letter from Laedicea. How about that? So the church of Laedicea was considered an important church. Important enough that Paul wrote a letter to them, just like he did to the Christians at Ephesus and so forth. The church was probably started by Paul. Laedicea was an important trade center. It was an important trade center because it was in the middle of the north-south route of trade. It was also in the middle of the east-west route of trade. The north-south trade was between Sardis and Perga, and the east-west traffic was from the Euphrates to Ephesus. Laedicea was a rich commercial center. It was a very, very affluent place. This is where the rich people went. Laedicea had many spas that wealthy people, the affluent would go to. Or rather Laedicea was known for its wool that came from black goats. They were famous because of the manufacture of clothing from that wool. They were famous for their banking for their spas. There was also a very famous medical school in Laedicea that was especially known. In fact, it was worldwide known or known throughout the Mediterranean world at least because of its eye sap that was made from frigian powder. This frigian powder was also exported in tablet form. It was not only in the form of eye sap. It was used that way, but it was in tablet form as well. It was sent throughout the Mediterranean. Farming was probably the initial first industry and then others followed. Farmers were there and then clothing manufacturers were there because that's where they could get wool for clothing. Then bankers came in and said, well, there's money here and then because there was money there, people opened up spas and then people opened up the famous medical school in order to care for all of these folks. When I talk about, when you talk about prosperity, Laedicea was so prosperous that when it was destroyed by an earthquake in 60 AD, completely leveled, they refused help from the Roman Empire and rebuilt the city entirely from their own wealth. Now think about Hurricane Katrina and the devastation of Mississippi and New Orleans. What if they said, I don't want anybody itself? Laedicea did that. Terrible earthquake wiped it clear from the mat. They rebuilt it from their own wealth. They refused aid from the Roman Empire. Laedicea was unique also because they were dependent on external water that was piped there by way of aqueducts. There was cold water that came from the mountains near Colosse about four miles away, came through this aqueduct. Also hot water came from the famous hot springs at here Apalice, also known as Pamukule. And the water came to Laedicea through these clay pipes. For thousands of years, a hot spring at higher Apalice or Pamukule has poured out thousands of gallons of hot saturated mineral water. And their system was frankly ingenious. Stacey and I got to see the ruins of this about seven years ago in its spectacular. I'm going to show you just a couple of pictures. Let's see the first picture. Here's a picture of goats. You see the black goats. You can see the lush green grass. It was great for pasture. This is what Laedicea initially made their money from. They're producing the the the the wool from the goats that was made into clothing. And it was they were especially known for this fine black clothing. It was a very, very soft and was very, very expensive. Then the next slide. This is some of the the piping, some of the the clay pipes that you can still see the round things. These are some of the pipes and these pipes over time because of the heavy calcium content in the water, the pipes became clogged kind of like person's arteries become clogged sometimes with things. These clay pipes got clogged and so the the the water which initially flowed through began to just kind of trickle because the pipe was getting smaller the next slide. This is a this is one of the hot springs at higherapolis or Pumukule. You see the white there. That's the calcium from the water that's made these I guess was called the lag tights outwardly. That water is hot. It's about 105 degrees. They have a hot tub. You know that's really hot. They pipe the water to lay to see they open spas there in the next slide. This is the ruins of some of those spas. There were archways they had large pools and so forth and then the last one very similar. I'll just do another one. Massive ruins of spas and commerce and banking. Let me tell you, lay it asia had it going and lay to see as a place where the apostle Paul started to church but the hot springs of lay to see it became lukewarm as the pipes constricted and contracted from all the calcium the hot water became lukewarm and the cold water from the mountains at higherapolis became very tepid. People complained because it both the hot water and the cold water had become just kind of nauseous. Nobody was happy people complained it wasn't an attractive place there and Jesus is saying he's using imagery that the layer to see is a very familiar with. Jesus says there were Christians in the layer to see it just like that. They had a Christian profession but something was clogging up their spiritual arteries to such an extent that he was ready to spew them out of his mouth. They loved their fashionable black clothes but they needed to be clothed in what he could give them. White garments of righteousness. They were wealthy but it adored their spirituality they'd become fat and sassy and self-reliant. They needed to buy gold refined in the fire. They had the best eye medicine of the day but Jesus says to them but you're blind. You need eye-sav that only Jesus could provide. That's the background for what Jesus says here in Revelation 3. Obviously second there's a very strong warning here. This is a very strong passage. John is being very bold as he recounts the vision that Jesus Christ has revealed to him some 30 plus years ago. Stacey's dead. Talked to her. She'd become a Christian. Talked to her about a new sound faith in Christ. He told her. He said, honey I'm glad you're interested in church but your mama and I feel that you're becoming a religious fanatic and that is wrong. And Stacey said, daddy in Revelation 3, Jesus said he'd rather someone be hotter cold than look warm about their faith. He said, Jesus never said that. Yes sir he did. No he did not. It's in Revelation 3 and that night he got out of Apple and turned to Revelation 3. He was shocked. It was the beginning of a spiritual turnaround in his own life. It really was. Who is it that knocks at your door? It's the king of kings. The Lord of Lords. If Jesus were to knock at your door what would he say to you about your strengths? What would he say to you about the things that you highly value and prize? The things you take pride in. What would Jesus say to you about your accomplishments? What would Jesus say to you about you're holding on to bad righteousness? That is some addictive behavior. What would Jesus say to you about your spiritual apathy while professing to believe? You want to know the truth? We have a lot more in common with that looter who was interviewed in 1992 in the streets of Los Angeles than we really want to admit. There's a disconnect. Where in your spiritual life could Jesus say to you, you know you're not really hot and you're not really cold. You're just going through the motions. You look good. You still go to church but you're going through the motions. You're putting your passion, your energy and something that won't bring the return. Let me just state the obvious. I've been delayed to see it. As wealthy as layered to see it was, can I simply point out that it pales in comparison to Gainesville, Georgia. Pales. Addictions take place when something other than Jesus becomes your passion. Addictions take place when something other than Jesus becomes your spiritual emotional glue. And a key step in this passage and in the sixth step of recovery is a whole concept of willingness because here in Revelation 3 it's obvious. Jesus is calling upon his church. He's calling upon you and he's calling upon me to repent. Revelation 319. You know what the steps of recovery are? The steps of recovery are helpful to people because they're consistent with what the Bible says about what it means to repair it. It's obvious in this passage here opening the door to your heart means a willingness to see your stuff, a willingness to take a look at your sins, a willingness for Jesus to come back in and establish new intimacy with you. Now you and I have heard this passage used dozens of times, hundreds of times, with non-Christians, challenging non-Christians to open the door to Jesus. I don't have a problem with that but that isn't the context. Jesus is speaking to his own to you, and you, and you, and you, and you, and you, and you, and you, and me. And he says you've lost your passion. I want to do so much more in you. Are you willing? Will you open the door? There's a strikingly similar passage in Matthew 23. Let me read it to you. You snakes. You brood of vipers. How will you escape being condemned to hell? Therefore I'm sending you prophets and wise men and teachers and some of them you will kill them, crucify, and others you will flag in your synagogues and pursue from town to town. And so upon you will come all the righteous blood that has been shed on earth and the blood of the righteous able to the blood of Zacharias who you murdered between the temple and the altar. I tell you the truth. All this will come upon this generation. And then, Jesus says these remarkable words, oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sick you how often have I longed to gather your children to gather as a hymn gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing. I'll slip desolate. You were not willing to hear Jesus pain. It's the anguish of unrequited love. Do you know what that feels like?
If you're a guy, it feels like this. She's dating him. She's going out with him and not with me. She's going out with that jerk, that scumbag. If you're a girl, it feels like this. He proposed to her. After the way she too timed in with every other boy she met when I could have been so much better for him. It's the pain of unrequited love. Remember this. Jesus Christ is a jealous lover.
And the time will come when he will be no longer lover by judge. Look, your house is left you desolate. 0.3, promise. The passage I read to you from Matthew chapter 23 was it was Jesus addressing people who were addicted to the law, Pharisees and scribes. Let me give you a little bit of history of that. About 150 years BC there was an attempt to focus Greek education on the Jews. Now you know what it's like when somebody tries to make you do something you don't want to do. When somebody tries to force something on you or make you go in a certain direction, what does it make you want to do? It makes you want to go to the opposite. Go in an opposite direction. And so as Greek education was forced upon the Jews during this period, the Pharisees rose up and became staunch defenders of their Jewish religion and their traditions. And so the Pharisees developed a national system of education so that all little Jewish boys would be taught the Torah because they were sure that if they just taught the Torah to these Jewish boys, the Israelites would be able to achieve true holiness through the study of the Torah. They committed themselves to teaching and education. Pharisees made their main function teaching and preaching. Now at this point in Matthew 23, when Jesus says these words, the Pharisees had been doing this program of discipleship for over 150 years
and Jesus calls them snakes because here were people in the dark who thought that they were living in the light. It's a very dangerous place to be. People in the dark who really thought they were living in the light. In the same way, as we look at Revelation 3, it's obvious that it's dangerous to believe that your door with Jesus is open when in reality it's closed. We can end up like the Pharisees and the lady to see it. Believing that we're okay, but not seeing that the door isn't really swung open. It's so easy and in contemporary Christianity to think, we're good. We're in church. We honor God. We know that America has forsaken him. We need to get this country back to the right path of obedience. Isn't it terrible in our country about the gays and the liberals and the drug dealers and the immoral? These are the people responsible for the terrible climate in this country for it's slide and they're running it down and that's why our country is going to hell on the hand basket. You've heard those kind of things said. We feel better when we say something like that. It seems to ring true. Feels good. Feels kind of righteous. But we don't see that we get something out of the condemnation out of pointing out that other people are bad. We get something out of the gossip. It's our pride. And you know how you can tell when you see a gay pride march or something out or the liberal demonstration or something outlandish. This is how you can tell. Your own pride is kicked in. Your first response is anger to judge, to use your tongue but not pray. Guess what? We have a problem as bad as theirs. It's just not as noticeable. So we stay in the dark while professing to live in the light. I'm going to make a statement that's going to surprise you. In fact, it may shock you. But I want you to take it to heart and I want you to think about it and pray about it. You're eating. You're dieting compulsively. You're anorexia. You're bulinia. You're exercising. You're drinking too much. You're prescription drugs. You're pot. You're gambling. You're anger. You're rage. You're spending. You're lusting. You're internet surfing. You're gossiping. You're scourge chasing. You're cussing. You're compulsive lying. Your sports addiction isn't your worst sin. There's a sin underneath the sin. Do you know what it is? Your worst sin is that you don't think it has anything to do with Jesus. That he can't do anything about it. And that he can't satisfy that spirit will need that vacuum inside of you that you've been trying to fill. Your worst sin is not the outward one. Your worst sin is that you don't think that it has anything to do with Jesus. You don't think that he can do anything about it. You don't think that he can satisfy the spirit will need the vacuum inside of you that you've been trying to fill. It's your pride, your flesh, your self-god that reigns supreme. Are you willing to look at that? Addiction happens when we become passionate about something else other than Jesus Christ. You said, preacher, I thought your third point here was about promise. I thought in the third point you're going to say something encouraging to me. And you're talking about the sin underneath the sin, how depressing can you get? The sixth step of recovery, willingness, yeah, right, whatever. Please understand, there's another facet to willingness. When you're really ready to look at your passions, when you're ready to look at what you have substituted in the place of Jesus, when you're willing to consider what has corroded your pipeline of fellowship with Him. Jesus Christ is willing to renew your passion for Him. He's a persistent lover. No matter how far you've wandered, no matter how deep you're sin, no matter how far in another country you live on. Do you understand? He will take you back. He will take you back, feeling today, right now, right here, just like you are. Willingness, do you hear that sound? I think I heard a trumpet. Somebody has just gotten off of a horse outside. He'll look through your people. Oh, no, I'm so unprepared. There's a knock. Listen to his voice. Here I am. I stand at the door knock. Anyone hears my voice and opens the door. I will come in and eat with him. And he with me. Amen. Let's pray. With every head bowed, if this strikes home with you, if Jesus is speaking to you about something in your life that you have substituted for Him, we just put up your hand a little bit so I can pray for you. Yes, thank you. Thank you. God bless you. Yes, God bless you. God bless you. Hear the words of Jesus. Anyone who opens the door, I will come in and eat with him. And he with me, Lord Jesus. You know our hearts, our idle factories. And we thank you for this step of recovery which points us to the Scriptures and points us to a Savior who's willing to receive us back. We bless you. We praise you. We worship you. Oh, Jesus. Amen.