What Happened to the Laodicean Message?
I am just about to turn 40 years old and thus I am not very young, but neither am I old. However, I am recognizing that certain terms are leaving the vocabulary of the Second Advent movement. One of the terms that has left our common vernacular is the Laodicean message. That message is found in Revelation 3:14-22. While growing up, I can remember hearing the term "Ladodicean" very often. The state of the Laodicean church is "lukewarm" and proud of itself thinking that it is in need of nothing. The early Adventists saw a reference to our church in this description.
Where are the Laodiceans?
Somehow this idea has lost favor. It is not that the idea is often attacked openly, like say the way that the "remnant" church concept is, in contrast it seems to be seen as a relic of a distant past we should quickly forget. But if we lose the Laodicean message, we might not have a counter to the tendency to be proud of the "triumphant" growth of institutions and membership numbers. We need a reminder that we are not about building a larger house or simply about "people in the seats," but are about warning a world of the soon coming of God's kingdom. The Laodicean message reminds us that something is wrong with an institution that looks at its exploits but ignores its great blindness.
Would that Message Strengthen our Enemies?
Certainly today it might be problematic to preach this "Laodicean message." In an era when even preachers and church leaders are leaving us for the "grace" that they found on the outside such a proclamation might "air our dirty laundry." In an era when that which makes us Adventist is attacked with great fierceness, such preaching of teh Laodicean message might be seen as giving more reason to attack. In an era when many of our preachers are preaching about "your breakthrough" and minimizing the message that we have been called to preach, the Laodicean message might excellerate that tendency. Certainly in this era we wouldn't want to attack our church.
Re-Affirm our Laodicean-ness
But maybe just maybe the key to healing our malaise and the key to our ultimate victory is found in following our ancestors in the faith and applying this message to ourselves. Perhaps it is time to reaffirm our "Laodicean-ness." When we do this, we will recognize that we are nothing apart from God. Perhaps we will recognize our inability to overcome our problems and issues when we apply the eye-salve(Revelation 3:18). Perhaps the antagonisms between historic, progressive, evangelical, mainline, and all the other groups in Adventism could be just a little less "antagonistic" if we but remember this message that inspiration has applied to us. Praise God for the message that is needed. I pray the we hear it.
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Sherman Haywood Cox II, MS is a Web Minister and M.Div Student at Vanderbilt Divinity School. 
Laodicean
Sherman, I enjoyed reading your post.
In my church the Laodicean message is brought up now and then.
However, might not the church as a whole be evolving towards an unnamed Post-Laodicean church, in effect, an 8th church? Instead of focusing on its lukewarm condition it looks ahead to a grace-induced condition.
I've thought that if one focuses on being lukewarm year after year, one might just get one's wish and stay that way.
Raul Batista
Raul, Thanks for responding
Raul,
Thanks for responding to the email with your provocative thought. It is difficult in a church as diverse as ours to make many statements without some part of our church being in an exact opposite condition. For certainly there are churches, such as your own, that all you hear is the Laodicean message.
I wish to ask you...is there a dichotomoy between this "grace induced condition" and the laodicean condition? Certainly in an abosluet sense no...but what about our appropriation of it? Could not our "grace induced condition" be another form of the laodicean condition?
Reply
I am exactly the same age as the author and after reading the article I have had exactly the same feeling with regard to Laodicean message. In Poland, we used to proclaim that message widely in 80's and to less extent less in 90's. I cannot say what is the situation nowadays in my home country as I emigrated to the United Kingdom four years ago, but what I can say is that in the UK there is an official conspiracy not to proclaim it at all. Moreover, Ellen White message is viewed in SDA community as the VERY distant relict of the very remote past. But what is the outcome of that attitude? Look at the reverse growth of the native British church and you have the answer. I am not saying about ethnic minory groups which form the core British SDA Church and which cling to biblical and E. White messages. They are growing. If you loose the Laodicean message you might be lost yourself in a twinkle of the eye.