In the book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ, the LORD issues a severe warning to a particular Church, and to churches of every age in general. The Church of the Laodiceans had become a victim of religion without the power of God, guilty of what Paul termed in his second letter to Timothy (3:5) as ‘Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof...’ The following quotation is from the third chapter of Revelation verses fifteen through eighteen. “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 spue 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 eyesalve, that thou mayest see.” How weary the Holy God must be with this society of churchgoers. As man’s religion with its superstitious ritualism is ever increasing, true religion and experimental union with Christ is decreasing. While the Lord God demands a pure heart and unfeigned lips to appear before Him, poor deceived wretches robed in their hypocritical rags go about their ceremonial labors from Sabbath to Sabbath convinced in their blind minds that by means of their works they are accepted with God. Oh my dear reader, be not deceived! A man is not accepted for who he is or what he has done; he is accepted by sincerely believing who Christ is and what He has done. He is accepted only as he repents of what he is and what he has done; and only as he embraces, relies on, rests and trusts fully in the finished work of Jesus Christ. It is Christ alone who came and fully did the will of God as a substitute for fallen sinners. It is in Christ alone that the Holy God finds complacency (satisfaction). As we make Christ our refuge it is in Him and for Jesus’ sake that we find the words of the father applied to sinners, “…This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17). We must trust Jesus alone for the Father’s well pleasing of us. Religion without Christ is active, but empty, never satisfying, never producing contentment. Only that person who has found Christ to be ALL IN ALL, and believes that in Christ’s fullness and completeness alone he has found acceptance with God shall enjoy satisfaction and contentment in his religion. That person has truly found the “Pearl of great price,” and would gladly trade all the lesser gems of man-made religion for the joy and satisfaction of having the One Great Pearl, which is Christ.
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