Previously on SEVEN TYPES OF CHURCHES 2 – BIBLE STUDY SERMON, SEVEN TYPES OF CHURCHES – BIBLE STUDY SERMON
Jesus was telling the angel of the church in Sardis that He had not found their works perfect before God. This is what sin does to a person. Wherever sin resides, it pollutes every other area. The perfection of God means the absence of sin in every area of life.
If you wash a plate clean but there is a little dirt on one side, will you still use that plate to serve food to a king? That small stain condemns the whole plate.
You cannot say you are committed to God while harboring hatred and envy within you. You cannot claim to belong to God while part of your life is being used by the prince of darkness. The part of you that has been dedicated to the devil disqualifies you before God.
A little leaven corrupts the whole lump and makes it unacceptable before God. The area that the spirit of death has touched invites the power of the grave into that place. Wherever sin reigns, death is inevitable.
Jesus Christ said that if your eye causes you to sin, remove it and enter life with one eye rather than enter hell with your whole body. This is the implication of sin: it contaminates whatever it touches and causes the whole life to be rejected by God. It is like cancer; if it is not cut off from the affected area, it spreads and infects others.
Among these five remaining churches are found the doctrines of Balaam and Jezebel. Among them are those who pretend to live but are dead, and those who pretend to be rich but are miserable. All of these have yet to attain the perfection demanded by God and will have their names removed from the Book of Life if they fail to amend their ways.
To the angel of the church in Philadelphia write: “These things says He who is holy, He who is true, He who has the key of David, He who opens and no one shuts, and shuts and no one opens.”
He knows their works and has set before them an open door that no one can shut, for they have little strength, yet they have kept His word and have not denied His name. See the Lord’s commendation concerning this church. God promised to make those of the synagogue of Satan, who pretend to be Christians, come and bow before their feet to demonstrate His love toward them.
Because they have kept the word of His patience, they will be kept from the hour of temptation that will come upon the whole world to test those who dwell on the earth.
That hour is at hand. We are already feeling its effects, but the ones who will escape are those who have washed their garments in the blood of the Lamb. This is their mark of protection during that dreadful hour, when many will ask, “Where is God?”
To the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write: He knows their works, and they are neither cold nor hot. Lukewarmness has no place in the kingdom of God. You must either be cold or hot, otherwise you will be spewed out of His mouth.
This is the kind of church that relies on riches and equates them with spirituality before men. They believe that God measures holiness by material wealth. If you are poor, you do not belong among them, as though poverty is evidence of the devil’s presence in your life.
These are churches that have replaced God with mammon. They worship money in their services while pretending to worship God. The richest and most famous individuals assume positions of leadership rather than truly spiritual people.
The more they grow in riches, the more miserable and wretched they become, for they glory in wealth rather than in the knowledge of God.
Their riches have made them wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked—poor in the knowledge of God, blind to the truth that should set them free from the bondage of corruption, miserable in believing that wealth is the mark of divine favor, and naked to the extent that they cover themselves with the fig leaves of religion and church rituals.
God is telling them to come to Him for the gold and silver of His Word, which are true riches; for white garments of holiness and righteousness to cover their nakedness; and for anointed eyes to see spiritually, giving them discernment to recognize the lies of the devil.
He loves them, which is why He rebukes and disciplines them, so that they may repent and come out of the bondage and deception of the devil.
Many believe that wealth determines one’s relationship with God. This is a lie from the pit of hell, designed to exalt riches above the glory of God. These are churches that depend on worldly glory to thrive. Their names cannot be found in the Book of Life, for they have bowed to Satan in exchange for the glory of this world.
This passage has taught me that kingdom riches are not measured by material possessions but by the amount of God’s Word that you obey. These are the true riches that can never be taken away.
A church organization—or a person—who gives themselves over to pleasure is dead while still living. What then can be said of churches that center their prayers on material gain and financial prosperity? They too are dead while living.
Their Bible study is nothing to write home about. When leaders lack knowledge of the Word, how can they impart it to others? You can only give what you have. They travel great distances to make converts, yet turn them into twice the children of hell.
Some churches have no time to teach their members the ways of the Lord, yet they always find time to organize parties and celebrate their leaders’ birthdays, requiring every member to contribute if they wish to remain in the good graces of those leaders.
They sponsor their leaders’ trips abroad for vacations, while their members’ children are being sent home from school because of unpaid fees.
Where do we go from here when the enemy is busy harvesting souls, and we behave as though nothing matters more than our own pleasure?
Those who are neither hot nor cold will be spewed out of His mouth. This kind of lukewarmness is an abomination before God, one that cannot be tolerated either in heaven or on earth.
Prayer: Father lord do not cast me away from your presence, in Jesus name amen.
HAPPY NEW MONTH!!!
