, and We'll have to try that for fun sometime, amen? I think I can take all of you, amen. Anyway, open your Bibles to the book of Revelation this morning, to the book of Revelation. Praise the Lord. Good job choir, you stirred my heart this morning, you're singing as well. Revelation, Revelation chapter one. We're gonna pick up our reading this morning in verse four now. It is our homecoming service, our church anniversary of 45 years of being in existence. Compared to other churches, that's long, and to other churches, that's really short. And what's sad is there's so many churches that are non-existent anymore that could have been still in existence. They could have been. And I wanna see what the Bible has to say. We know that sin can destroy anything good. Sin can destroy anything good. Anything great, just let one sinner have his way, can destroy much good is what the Bible says. We know that's what Lucifer did, just one sinner can destroy much good. And look at all the havoc that this world and the universe and heaven was in because of the actions of one sinner. But I want to preach to you this morning from the book of Revelation, and we'll come back, we'll come back to the verse here, and we'll pick up here in just a second. But the Bible talks about the church in Revelation chapter one and two being a candlestick. There's seven golden candlesticks in Revelation chapter one, and the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ, is standing in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks. The candlestick, the Bible tells us at the end of verse one, the mystery of the seven stars, which I sawest in the right hand, to my right hand of the Lord, Those were, we see, were the seven, and the seven golden candlesticks, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches. And the seven candlesticks which thou sawest are the seven churches. And I wanna preach to you this morning on what it's gonna take if our church is gonna remain to the next generations. what it's going to take if we're going to remain to the next generations. Let's pray. Father, I pray that you would help us as we preach this truth, such a simple truth, but profound truth and such a sobering thought according to the scripture. And I pray, Lord, that you'll help us on this great, exciting day for us, Lord, as we celebrate all the years that you have sustained us And Lord, we know that we can say with a psalmist, as he said several times in the book of Psalms, that if it had not been for the Lord, we would not have made it. We totally understand that you have sustained us, that you have carried us, that you have equipped us. And Lord, it's by your grace and your mercy that we have not been consumed as your people. And Father, we wanna rejoice this morning, praise you for your faithfulness. Great is thy faithfulness. And Lord, as we sang about it being worth it, we know that it's worth every mile, it's worth every trial, every trouble that we've gone through for your namesake. And I pray that you'll be honored and glorified in this service and this day. And Lord, as we rejoice in the longevity of our church, Lord, we rejoice in the fact of you, we worship you, we praise you, we thank you this morning for it. because it's not in our own strength and our own power. We know if it was left up to the arm of flesh that we would not be here today. So I pray that you'll bless the preaching. In Jesus Christ's name we ask it, amen. We know the seven golden candlesticks. Let's back up in verse four, representation of the churches. He said in verse four of chapter one, John to the seven churches which are in Asia. grace be unto you and peace from him which is which was which is to come and it says also and from the seven spirits which are before his throne and from jesus christ who is a faithful witness and the first begotten of the dead and the princes of the kings of the earth unto him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood. Man, what great preaching is to be done out of that verse. If you're saved this morning, it's because you've been washed in the blood. If you're lost going to hell because your sins haven't forgiven, you've never been washed in the blood. I love what the hymn writer said, what can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. What can make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. That is a biblical declaration. Forgiveness of sins only comes to the precious blood of Jesus Christ. And the Bible says he's made us kings and priests in our God, and his father to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. God's people said, amen. Behold, he cometh with clouds and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him. All kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him, even so, again God's people said, amen. I'm Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, which was, which is to come, the Almighty. I, John, who also am your brother and companion in tribulation in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ. I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day and heard behind me a great voice as of a trumpet saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last. What thou seest, write in a book, send it unto the seven churches which are in Asia, unto Ephesus, and Smyrna, and unto Pergamos, and Thyatira, and to Sardis, and unto Philadelphia, and Laodicea. And I turned to see the voice that spake with me. Being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks. What he sees, what John sees, these seven candlesticks, the Lord saying, look, when you see these golden candlesticks and the candlestick holds the light of the candle, he said, I want you to understand that these seven candlesticks were already read. These are the seven churches of Asia. Those seven churches that began in Asia that the Lord had planted. And then he said, in the midst of the seven candlesticks, one likened to the son of man, clothed with the garment down to the foot, girded about the paps with a golden girdle. Now we see the Lord is in the midst. He's in the midst of the churches. He's there. Our church, Gethsemane Baptist Church, is supposed to be a golden candlestick. or a candlestick. We can see these seven churches, Jesus was in the midst of these seven churches. He desires to be in the midst of the church. You know what we see when we get to the seventh church, the church of Laodicea? Jesus is outside the church knocking on the door, wanting to get in. We're gonna look at Laodicea here in a second. He's knocking on the door, wanting to get in. As we read about the church of Ephesus, we talk about Laodicea this morning. The Lord spoke to the church at Ephesus in the day of John, sent a letter to them, and he warned them, he warned them that if they did not repent and begin to do what they're supposed to do, that he would remove their candlestick. If God removes a candlestick in heaven, it will be removed from earth. Now, I believe it's God's will for every Bible-believing church to continue till Jesus comes. It was a perfect will of God for all seven of these churches to still be in remaining, still steadfast today that we should be able to go over to Asia and said, right there, there's a church at Ephesus, still around after these 2,000-something years. There's a church of Smyrna, there's Philadelphia. We ought to be able to go visit those churches, and they should have been continuing from preacher to preacher to preacher, from generation to generation to generation, from families to families to families, the church should be in existence. You know what's sad in America? You can hardly find many churches that are over 50 years in existence. Some of them are there. Some are 100 years, some 200 years, 250 years. But let me say to you, most of those churches that have been around 250 years are not what they were when they started. You know what most of them are? If you're in the same building, they're known for the building being old. Come look at our old building. Come look at history. Let's look, look, look at this church. I mean, it may be tattered, it may look old, may have been repainted, may have been done, and you walk inside and you realize from looking at the church building itself, it's been there for a long time. And most of the time, that's the glory of old churches, the oldness of their facility. But I'm telling you this morning, church, as we have continued for 45 years, 45 years, And as God seems to be blessing Gethsemane Baptist Church and all, don't always think material things are always a representation of God's blessings, that we're doing what we're always supposed to do. God is just kind so many times to his people. And may I remind you, if it wasn't of God's mercies, we'd have already been consumed. This crowd's committed enough sin today for Jesus to just go ahead and wipe us out and start over. As God was preaching on this morning, using faithfulness as an acrostic, and he said, we're gonna have to fight, right? We're gonna have to fight. The reason of the church, we're gonna have to remain faithful, and you're gonna have to fight. You're gonna have to adore him and worship him. You're gonna have to be involved, right? As he went through it, you have to be involved. You have to give him your time. You're gonna have to humble yourself, humble yourself. And what's the other F? Anybody remember? Forgiving. You're gonna have to forgive. Do you realize that I have not only had to forgive, man, I have had to been forgiven. I'm not talking about from the Lord. Yes, but I'm talking about from God's people. Since I've been the pastor of this church, people have had to forgive me. People have had to forgive me. And if there's not forgiveness, I'm gonna tell you what'll happen. We'll bite and devour one another and we'll be consumed one of another. It won't be the Lord that has to remove the candlestick. It'll be us that removed ourself. And then he talked about unity. And as he ended with unity, the El and faithfully talked about love. We've got to love God. We've got to stay in love with the Lord. And that's where the church of Ephesus fell. And the Lord told them, you have left your first love. And if you don't repent, get back and do the first works. If you don't turn back and love me like you're supposed to, we're fixing to read it to you in the scripture. He said, I will come and I will remove your candlestick. Pastor Randall pastored the church for 25 years, started the church and pastored it around 25 years. I just completed 19 years as the pastor of the church. Next year as we celebrate homecoming will be 20 years, 45 years. And I'm looking at that and I'm thinking, that could happen when the church, as we continue to go on and the next man becomes the pastor. God ought to be blessing and people in love with God, living holy and living right. And when that pastor's run his course, the next man ought to be faithful to step in, ordained of God and fall in love with the Lord and the people ought to be serving God together. And I'm going to tell you something, hundreds of years from now, the church should be alive and well better than it is today. Not getting worse. better than it is today. I don't think we've reached our climax and it's just downhill after this. Kind of like when you turn 50, you know, it's like, woo, all right, it's over, we're going down. You know, we're 45 years, we hit 50, man, we ought to just be on the clock spiritually. Our church, our church, if we're gonna remain to the next generations, if the Lord, it seems like the Lord's prophecy and the scriptures lining up, we think, man, how much more can this world take? Lord, how much more before you come back? Even come, Lord Jesus, come quickly. But if it's still 200 years before Jesus comes, I'd sure like to know that after I'm dead and gone, I'd love on the day of judgment for the church of the living God of Gethsemane Baptist Church, stand before the Lord, and they were still in existence, fighting the good fight of faith. If that's gonna happen, you young people are gonna have to fall in love with Jesus. You old people are gonna have to set the example. You're gonna have to blaze the trail. Those that come behind us, will they find us faithful? Will they find us faithful? I hope Gethsemane, if she continues 200 years, I hope we haven't gone the way that all we have here is a Sunday morning service. You know, most churches have gone that way. And I was talking about it to men last night at Zesto's and we were sitting around and we were talking about it. And you know what's amazing? That if we stopped having Wednesday night service, some people would be happy. Others would hopefully be upset. But you know what amazes me? There'll be people that don't ever come on Wednesday night that are members that are upset. I can't believe our church don't have church on Wednesday night anymore. Really? I didn't know you'd feel that way about it. And then we don't have Sunday night service. And some of the people that get upset, I can't believe our church is compromising. No church on Sunday night. And they don't even come on Sunday night. You wanna know why? Because people just like people to be faithful, that they'll be there when they decide to come. God helped us to remain faithful. to remain faithful. Look what the Bible says here in the book of Revelation chapter two, the church at Ephesus. Unto the angel of the church of Ephesus write, these things saith he that holdeth the seven stars in his right hand, who walketh in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks. And those candlesticks being the churches. He said, I know thy works. So he's writing to the church of Ephesus. I know thy works. and thy labor. So we can see this as a working church. I mean, they're doing right. They're working for the Lord. He said, I know your works. And he said, I know your labor. So I'm at all the effort they're putting in for the Lord. I know thy effort, thy patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are evil. I mean, this church has some standards. I mean, the church, what he's talking about, they've got some standards. They're working. They are laboring. They've got patience. They cannot bear evil, the sins of their day. They're standing against it. They're not compromising. They're not going liberal. They're not going the way of contemporary churches of their day. I mean, they're holding their ground. I would say, man, praise God for this church, right? As we're reading it, we're thinking, man, this church, boy, they really must be pleasing to God. And he says, and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars. So they've exposed false brethren, they've exposed false teachers, they've exposed false prophets. I mean, they're maintaining is what it looks like, right, being faithful. But then he says, and hast borne. I mean, think about the burdens that they have carried. And again, he said, and hast patience. And for my namesake has labored, has not fainted. They didn't quit. They didn't give up. They didn't faint when they got weary. They didn't let their strength get so weak that they just gave up and quit and stopped. But look what the Bible says. After the Lord declared all that about the church, he said, nevertheless, I have somewhat against thee. I mean, Lord, what could you have against a faithful church like that? What could you have against them? You see what he said? Have someone against you because thou hast left thy first love. Look what he said in verse five. Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen. Let me ask you a question. Verse two and three, does it sound like a fallen church? Be honest. If all we had was two and three about, and did not read where the Lord said he had something against them and declared it, if the chapter stopped there, we'd have said, wow, we wanna be like that church. That's what we would say. That's what I would say. And you see what happened? He said, you've left your first love. Remember therefore from whence you've fallen and repent and do the first works or else I will come unto thee quickly and remove thy candlestick out of his place except thou repent. I don't know about you, I say, wow. I look at that church and the Lord warned the church of Ephesus. if you don't begin to do the first works. You know what the first thing happens when you get saved? Man, you fall in love with the Lord. And because you love him, you serve him. Because you love him, you keep his commandments. Isn't that what the Bible says? The proof of our love, if you love me, you'll keep my word. If you love me, you will keep my commandments. The Bible gave us a commandment to love the Lord our God with all of our heart, all of our soul, all of our mind, and all of our strength. That's the way we're supposed to love Him. With all of our being, everything about us, love Him that way. God help us not to fall in love with the blessings more than we do the blesser. Isn't that what happens? We fall in love with the blessings, the one who gives to us, and all of a sudden we forget about the one who gave it, and we forget about the grace and the mercy and how unworthy we are, and somehow we start looking at the monetary things we have in the blessed hand of God, and we get all caught up in that somehow being our identity, and we fail to stay in love with the one that blessed us. Let's don't let our love shift to the blessings more than the blesser. God said, I will remove the church. You know, I'm afraid that the devil gets a lot of credit for churches being removed over the years, and it just might have been God who moved the church. You wanna know why? Because we bear his name. And he cannot continue to bless a place and put his approval on a place that's not honoring, glorifying his name, and that's not in love with him. The Lord is not content for us to go on without being in love with him. You wanna know why this church had all those things right? I believe they were produced out of a genuine love for Jesus. And they began to let their love wane away. You know, as Scott said this morning, you're faithful to what you love. you're faithful to what you love. And so I encourage you this morning to stay in love. If you're in love with Jesus, stay in love with Jesus. If you're love, if you have left your first love, the love of your faith, and you began to, and you say, preacher, how do you leave your first love? I'm afraid that sometime in the book of John chapter two, where he said, love not the world, not the things that are in the world. You're gonna love something. Man's gonna love something. He's gonna love himself, he's gonna love the world, he's gonna love pleasure, or he's gonna love God. You're gonna love something. I'm gonna tell you this, what you love, you spend time with. What you love, you think about. What you love, you talk about. Have I told you about my grandbaby? Right? And so the Lord rebuked this church. If all I get is this settling here, they left their first love. I wonder, as I read this morning about all seven of these churches, I wonder if Gethsemane was number eight, and there's been many over the years, but if the Lord wrote a declaration in the scripture for everybody to read for time and eternity, about Gethsemane Baptist Church in its present condition, I wonder what the Lord would say. And the only way that I can come to a conclusion if I search my own heart personally, search my own life personally, what would the Lord say? He said, I'll remove your candlestick. I don't know about you, but it'd grieve me to no end to think Gethsemane wouldn't be around 30 years from now. Grieve me to no end to think A hundred years from now. Why can't Gethsemane be thriving a hundred years from now? You know what would hinder that? Worldly-minded people. You know what would hinder that? Carnally-minded Christians. You know what would hinder that? Not loving the Lord, content to be saved on your way to heaven. God doesn't bless a church because you have money. I didn't know where the blessings come from. I mean, God doesn't bless the church because we live in nice homes and we dress nice, you know. I mean, that's not because we're business owners and you have good, because you got a good business, God's going to bless this church. The blessings of God does not come because of those things. It's not what brings the blessings of God in our life. And so I want you to look what he said. He said, I'll remove your candlestick. Repent, repent. If something else has your love, church, repent. What happens when you first, remember after you first got saved how excited you were? Remember you just wanted to do something for the Lord? You just thought so tender, just what can I do? And you begin to pass out tracts and you begin to, you know, want to go to church and you begin to memorize scripture and you begin to read your Bible and study your Bible and learn your Bible. You begin to witness to people at the workplace the newness of being in love with the Lord and having faith. And then over the years, all of a sudden that begins to wane away. The Lord said, repent, get back to the first works as produced by love. That's what causes a church to be alive, a church that's in love with the Lord. And so he said, repent, verse six. He said, this thou hast, that thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. And that's a doctrine of, really, what that doctrine is, a doctrine of we're no longer under the law, we're under grace. You know, we don't have to live by the law, we're just under great loose living, saved but living loose, making exceptions, justifying sin and newfound liberties. is what it is. And so then he said, I want you to look with me if you would, look at, look at, and I'll give you some verses on this in a second. Let's look in, let's look at Pergamos. Look at chapter two in verse 12, the church at Pergamos. Look what he said. To the angel of the church in Pergasus write, these things saith he which hath a sharp sword and two edges. He said, I know thy works, where thou dwellest, even where Satan's seat is, and holdest fast my name, and hast not denied my faith, even in the days where an artipest was my fateful martyr, who was slain among you where Satan dwelleth. I mean, you want to come out of church being in the fire? And martyrs in the church, and the church is, I mean, they have held fast. Look what he says in verse 14, but I have a few things against thee. "'cause I'll hast there them," to my people in the church, "'that hold the doctrine of Balaam, "'who taught Balak to cast a stumbling block "'before the children of Israel, "'to eat things sacrificed unto idols, "'and to commit fornication.'" Now, the Lord said, here's my problem with you. You're faithful, a lot of you are faithful, but inside your church are people that hold that doctrine of Balaam. And you remember when Balaam, Balak tried to get Balaam to curse Israel? Remember that, remember the whole story? And he goes down there and he smites his donkey, hits that donkey three times and she talks to him and says, why have you smitten me? I've saved your life. And opened up his eyes and he saw the angel stand in the way ready to kill him. And he goes down there and instead of cursing Israel, every time the Lord comes on him and he blesses Israel three times. But if you study your Bible and find out, Balaam hung around. And he said, I can't curse Israel, God won't let me. And I'm not, because see, he loved the wages of unrighteousness. He wanted money to be compensated. He went down there hoping to gain monetarily. You better be real careful before you compromise your faith in what you believe because of money. That's not the real blessing. And do you understand what he did? He said, I can't curse them. I've tried three times and God's made me bless them. But here's what I can do. I can tell you how you can have an influence and you can make them fall. And you know what he told them? How to get them to get the women of the land, their women, Balak's nation to entice the men of Israel and call them to the suppers of their gods and come and eat, and to eat things sacrificed on the idols. You know what ended up happening? Israel started committing fornication with those women. Begin to fall into sensual sin. And what he said, from the days of Israel to your New Testament, Here they are after Christ, that that doctrine is still alive and well from the day of Israel has entered into the church of the living God. And here's what happened. We have verses, we have verses. We know the earth is the Lord's and the fullness there. Paul dealt with it. He said, we know an idol's nothing. There's no gods outside of our God. And if somebody invites you to a feast and you're disposed to go, go. And if there's meat sat before you, eat the meat. But if you hear that meat a sacrifice to an idol, don't eat it. Don't eat it for conscience sake. He said, not your own conscience, but for the conscience of the other man who knows it and gave you the information. Because what you're telling him, now listen, you have liberty to eat the meat. What's wrong with the meat? Nothing. Except it's going to hurt somebody's conscience and affect them from coming to the truth. You know what happened in the church here, at this church? They have the doctrine of, they have violated Christian liberty. You wanna know why so many churches are moving today off of where they stood? They are violating true biblical liberty and they call it Christian liberty. We are in a faith, I never even, there was never even, up to even 10 years ago, this movement of embracing my liberties as a Christian. You know what that stems from? This me, me, me society. It's all about me. Cater to me, it's me, it's me. The self-centered society. Tolerating everybody and everything. Can't offend anybody. And if somebody does something, you just have to go along with it and talk. Don't say nothing about it. You're the bad guy if you say anything. You know what happened in this church? You wanna know why they were in trouble with God? They began to take liberties upon them in the name of Jesus. They really didn't have. And they begin to make exceptions for eating meat unto these idols. They abuse their liberty in Christ. And they begin to fornicate. I mean, who would imagine such fornication would be going on in the Church of the Living God as going on in 2023? If Gethsemane Baptist Church, there are churches that I can, I'm not gonna name them, there are churches I can start naming right now Some you'll know and some you won't know that when I got saved, they were strong Bible-believing church. When I started pastoring, they were a strong Bible-believing church. They're not that today. Some of the same people, some of them are the same pastor, the pastor changed. And I know dress it and everything, but could you imagine next Sunday morning, you coming in and I'm in skinny jeans, God help. I've got some little tucked in shirt. I better lose a little weight before that. And I got flip-flops on and just casual and we, you know, we're playing spa music and glass pulpit and just kind of chatting with you from the pulpit. That transition's happened all across our nation. And the people sitting in the pews And God help our church if it's this way. Some people saying, amen, I agree, but don't live a bit of it when you leave here. If our church is gonna remain, it's gonna be because God sees a holy people. He'll see a holy people. See people love of the Lord, people going after sinners, trying to win them to God. You're living right in your home, you're keeping your marriages right. You're raising your children for the glory of God. You're coming to church, keeping unity in the church, not letting yourself get offended to where you cause problems in the church and end up getting divided. You're going to learn to forgive and to walk with charity. We're going to have to obey. What I'm trying to tell you, we got to obey the scripture. We can't take for granted there's going to be longevity in the church just because we've got a good building. If God allows us, looks like we're going that way, next month I'll be able to present you the plans. I met with the architect on Friday for the final saying of what our building's gonna look like, and he's gone to full sketching trying to get it right, and I'm gonna be able to present that to you. We don't have the funds for all of it, but I'm praying God let us get to the end of it and build it. I was gonna tell you what I've always told you, and I know you've been shocked. I was like, praise God, we got all the money we need to build it. You'd have been shouting glory to God, and I said, we gotta get it out of your wallet. We just gotta get it, and we can build it. I believe if everybody just died like they're supposed to, give to the Lord like they're supposed to, that we'd be able to meet that need. But if we're gonna make it, it's not gonna be because we have a sanctuary three times as big. If we're gonna be around 50 years from now, if we're gonna be around 10 years from now. I tell you churches tonight, this morning I'll tell you about churches that was just as strong as we may think we are now, don't misunderstand me. understand that everything seems to be well and the Lord's blessing and people are getting saved and I know everybody's not perfect, but I'm telling you those churches have been ripped to shreds. There are churches with huge facilities with less than 20 people sitting in them. And had hundreds of people at one time. I don't want Gethsemane to ever be that. And the only way it will never be that It's left up to you striving in your personal life and me striving in my personal life to love God. Live for the Lord and love each other. That's a proof of God working in you. How we know we're saved is we have love one toward another. Look with me if you would. Real quick, chapter three, the church at Laodicea, I want you to see this. church of Laodicea. He said in verse 14, 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 work cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, neither cold nor hot, I'll spew thee out of my mouth. I remember how convicting those verses were to me as a young Christian. They're still convicting. And I remember when I got saved and read those verses that, wait a minute, the Lord God, God would rather me be out of church, not reading my Bible, never witnessing. He'd rather me be all the way cold than be half in and half out. Rather me be all the way cold than putting on a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof. See, you know what happens when you're cold and hot? It's a defining line. We know where you're at. We know you're cold, we know you're hot. There's no confusion where you're standing. But I'm gonna tell you the problem is when we become lukewarm. You know how you become lukewarm? You mix hot water and cold water together. And you get lukewarm. And the Lord said, I'll spew you out of my mouth. I wish you were cold or hot. Now, what we want you to be is hot. What we want you to be is, as we use a statement, being on fire for the Lord. Right? Being on fire. Being hot for the Lord. I'm afraid that the Laodicean church describes most of America's Christians just lukewarm. Lukewarm Christianity is just content to come to church every now and then, or even just come to church Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night. Just because you come Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, don't mean you're in love with the Lord. Doesn't mean you're on fire. I mean, thank God we can say you're faithful to church, but are you faithful to the Bible? Are you faithful to your Lord? What I'm trying to preach to you this morning is to remind you, we're not gonna be around, we'll be like all the other churches who ran well and we hindered ourselves. Jesus told church, I mean, Paul said church at Galatia, you ran well, who doth hinder you? That you don't obey the truth. This persuasion cometh not of him that called you. What hindered you? What hindered you? And so he said, I want you to know, he said, I don't want you to be, I'd rather you be cold or hot, not lukewarm. He said, because I'll sayest, verse 17, look at this. Because I'll sayest, I am rich. Laodicean church had wealth. I am rich. I'm increased with goods. They had things. They have need of nothing. They really couldn't point their finger and look at any need. You don't come out being wealthy. And knowest not that thou art wretched. See, God doesn't see like man sees. The Lord said, I know that you're wealthy. You have need of nothing. You're rich. You've got the finest of things. And the Lord said, I'm looking at you, and you're a wretched group of people. You're miserable. You're miserable. You're poor. See, true riches are spiritual. True riches are eternal riches. You're poor. You're blind, can't even see your condition. Naked, which means you're not clothed in His righteousness like you're supposed to. He said, 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 the eye salve that thou mayest see. As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. The Lord wants us to be right. Be zealous therefore and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If any man hear my voice and open the door, I'll come into him and will sup with him and he with me. Do you realize the Lord standing at the door and he's knocking? And he's standing at your heart's door. I know this is used, this passage for salvation. In context, it's not dealing with salvation. He's standing at the door knocking, save people, save people, knocking on the door saying, I've been shoved out here. I'm on the outside, I wanna be on the inside. And you know what it is? Even in the church, he's on the outside of the door knocking. You know how many churches are having church this morning and Jesus is on the outside? He's not in the midst. I'm telling you, he's on the outside. Some of those churches you walked up into, you walked up to the door and you looked and you saw what was going on in there, you turn around and leave. I know people that have sat in churches that had to get up and leave. I was not gonna sit there with all that mess going on. I wasn't gonna sit there, that wasn't even church and I wasn't gonna submit myself to it. Jesus is knocking, here's what he said, if any man. for the Lord to be in the midst and for the Lord, you know what the Lord wants? Here's how he blesses the church, by each individual opening the door and receiving him in for fellowship. If any man, any man, question, is the Lord knocking on your heart this morning as a believer and saying, look, I want to fellowship with you. I want to fellowship with you. I want to come in. I want to sup with you. That supping means to sit down and take time to fellowship one with another, like sipping on a cup of coffee, just fellowshipping. The Lord said, look, I'm knocking. If any man will hear my voice and open the door, I will come into him and will sup with him and he with me. Him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame and sat down with my father in his throne. He that hath an ear to hear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches. I want to take a moment to pray.