#123 The true inner spiritual life

From Meditations on the Past, Present, and Future, by G. M. Mangold.

(Revelation 3:14-22) And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write: These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God; I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth. Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked: I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see. As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.

Laodicea means: Judgment of Peoples; the church of Laodicea is the church of the latter time, from the 19th century onward, namely the church of those who admittedly go out from Babel and form churches of Christ, but lack the true character and power of Christ, and resemble the foolish virgins in that they go out to meet the bridegroom, and also have the lamp, the light of knowledge in His Word which they confess; but the real oil, the unction of the Holy Spirit, is missing, and the true, inner spiritual life is not found in them. Thus saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, who gives to each one the fitting testimony concerning his condition, who testifies to the truth of God through his Spirit which He gives to them that are sealed unto Him as a testimony of God (I John 5:10), and who reveals the divine counsel unto man’s Salvation; who is the origin of God’s creation, for by Him were all things created in heaven and on earth, and in Him all creatures live, move and have their being. He was before all, and all exist through Him. "I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot; thou art indeed no longer in the sleep of death and sin, but dost not arise to a true, godly life." This is a condition of indecision, intermediate between life and death, and the trend of such people is neither forward nor backward; they were awakened from the sleep of sin and have gone out from the participation with the lifeless world church, but therewith they content themselves and remain at this stage, mistaking their awakening for the new birth and therefore consider themselves as newborn, yet they have not attained unto the godly life, and have not been anointed with the Holy Spirit. This condition the Lord deplores in such souls, and says, "O, that ye were either cold or hot!" A partial conversion has taken place, but they have not come so far as to penetrate into a real fellowship with God, and such a condition is so offensive to the Lord that He says: "Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth."

To be cold is the natural state of man in Adam, where he is cold and dead in relation to God; and to be warm or hot is the condition of a new life in Christ, where one is fervent and active in love. Between the two is the state of lukewarmness, the undecided standing, wherein a man may be awakened from the sleep of sin, but is not yet arisen with Christ from the dead, to the end that he might walk in the light of His truth. Such awakened souls commonly fall asleep again, and in their sleep, to dream, so that their imagined spiritual life is but a dreamful fancy. Their eyes are closed and if they do not follow the Lord’s instructions and buy eye-salve, they will remain closed, and unable to see or prove where or how they stand. A dreamer always imagines to be where he is not, and to have what he does not have. However, a dream-vision is only imagination and illusion, and this very dreaming and spiritual intemperance hinders their real awakening in order to realize the condition in which they are situated; through their false dream-phantoms they are deceived and defrauded of their souls' salvation.

There are many persons who, because they have once experienced an awakening, they imagine they are born again, but they have not in the truth and on the way prescribed of God received the new birth, they do not know a newness of life in Christ, and because of their unconfirmed idea that they have received all this, the Word of God, which otherwise would lead them into and within the bounds of the Gospel, therefore cannot accomplish its purpose. Toward such the Lord here directs His word, expressing His regret about their deplorable condition.

Even among the Newlyborn it is possible that such a pitiable condition may occur, if they are not ever watchful and do not continue in prayer in order to grow into a godly life, and such backsliding usually ends in death, so that they die again, unless with new energy they penetrate with force again into the spiritual and godly life.