Revelation 3:15-16 I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot; I wish that you were cold or hot. So because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of My mouth.

I don’t think being lukewarm is bad like murder or lying, but it is a bad place to be in our Christian life according to these verses. Lukewarm people get spit out of the mouth of Jesus. That is certainly not a good thing to have happen. I don’t think that getting spit out means that we lose our salvation, but I do think it means that we lose our relationship with Jesus. I have an intimate, close relationship with my wife but I know of many marriages where there is little closeness, they are married legally but there isn’t much that shows their marriage to be true. Being lukewarm is being content with where you are in your character level, your righteousness, and your level of fruit bearing. The result of being content is a plateaued saint. There is no desire for more growth, a better relationship with Jesus, or more fruit in our lives. It is all good enough. The main problem with being lukewarm is that most who are think they are hot, they are blind to their true condition. Obviously this warning is intended to be a wake up call, a motivator to do something, to change, but it is hard to change what you can’t see to be true in your life. God will take a lukewarm Christian through trials to try and wake them up, sometimes they get it but often they don’t. I believe that a main tool of God’s to wake people up is good preaching. Paul’s admonition to Timothy in 2 Timothy 4:2-3 was “preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires.” Lukewarm Christians don’t want to be reproved, they want to feel good so they go to churches where that is the kind of preaching there is. My goal when I preach is to create a discontent in those who hear with their present level of maturity and a strong desire to do something about it. It doesn’t always happen but I always pray and prepare so that it might.