Pay the Price to Gain Christ and Overcome Lukewarmness and Pride to Reign with Him

We need to be willing to pay the price to buy the white garments – Christ lived out in us – and the eyesalve – the anointing Spirit – to see the preciousness of Christ, not remaining in any lukewarmness but repenting and being zealous and fervent for the Lord, so that we may be the overcomers who sit with the Lord on the throne when He returns!

Amen, Lord, make us Your overcoming ones today. Produce us as Your overcomers. We give ourselves to You, Lord, to just love You. We open to You. We want to pay the price to gain more Christ today. May Christ be infused into us, gained by us, and lived out in us. Amen, Lord, live in us today. Anoint our eyes so that we may see You, appreciate You, and treasure You above all things! Amen, Lord Jesus!

May we be those who enter through the narrow gate and walk on the constricted way that leads to life, the ever-blessed condition of the kingdom. As kingdom people today, we need to choose the narrow path and not the broad way.

The narrow path leads to life but the broad way leads to destruction. The way that leads to life is the way of the cross, not the way of maintaining a career of man or achieving man’s enterprise.

This way restricts us, constrains us, and does not let us do what we want to do but keeps us in the central lane of God’s eternal economy.

May we stay on the way of life in the maintenance of life by enjoying Christ as the tree of life for God’s building in life by our growth in life.

We do this by eating Jesus as the tree of life through pray-reading the word and musing prayerfully over the word of God, and by allowing the Triune God as the law of the Spirit of life to operate in us and regulate us from within.

Also, we stay away from any people who bring in death; we keep ourselves on the line of life. The God-ordained pathway for the church is the way of Philadelphia, which is the constricted way that leads to life. May we take this way today.

May we allow the Lord to recover the genuine brotherly love today, having a recovery in quality and not in quantity, so that we may love all the brothers with God as love.

He is the One who has the key of David to open the door for the spread of the recovery and also to open the door of our heart for our transformation and building up. He wants to build us into Himself and build us into Him.

May we open to Him, using our little power to not deny His name but keep His word in our daily life. May we be warned that, once Philadelphia fails, she becomes Laodicea, and lukewarmness and spiritual pride replace brotherly love.

May we not remain in any lukewarmness or spiritual pride but rather, come to the Lord and take His counsel!

May we pray and pay the price to buy the gold, the divine nature of God, for us to partake of His riches by the living faith in our spirit!

Pay the Price to have Christ Lived out in us and Gain the Anointing Spirit for us to See Christ’s Preciousness

The Lord Jesus counsels the church in Laodicea, the degraded recovered church, to buy from Him gold refined by fire so that she may be rich, white garments to cover her nakedness, and eyesalve to anoint her eyes so that she may see (Rev. 3:18).

We need to pay the price to gain more of the divine nature by means of our living faith, which we receive from the Lord in our organic union with Him.

Furthermore, we need to pay the price to buy white garments so that we may be clothed and that the shame of our nakedness may not be manifested.

Garments signify our conduct; our conduct needs to be proper, clean, pure, and white. White garments signify the conduct that can be approved by the Lord; such conduct is the Lord Himself lived out of the church.

We need to not only exercise our spirit to have the living and acting faith so that we may gain more of the divine nature, but we also need to live by faith so that we may express Christ in our daily living.

As Galatians 2:20 says, we now live no longer in and by the flesh, but in faith, the faith of the Son of God, and Christ lives in us.

On the one hand, we have received Christ as our righteousness subjectively to cover us as our first garment, and He is our righteousness before God. We have been justified by God through faith in Jesus Christ.

On the other hand, we need to live out Christ. We need to have the living faith in the rich, divine nature, which will become the Christ lived out of our being as the second garment to cover our nakedness.

We should no longer live in the vanity of the mind or in the flesh; we should live in the spirit and according to the Spirit (Rom. 8:4; Gal. 6:15, 25) so that we may have a conduct that can be approved by the Lord.

Such a conduct is Christ lived in us, and it is required by us for the covering of our nakedness. Amen!

We also need to pay the price to buy the eyesalve to anoint our eyes so that we may see.

What is the eyesalve? The eyesalve is the anointing Spirit (1 John 2:27). What we need is not more knowledge but more of the Spirit.

It is easy to pay attention to doctrines and teachings, and as we do this, we can be puffed up, proud of what we know, and lukewarm toward the Lord.

What we need is to come to the Lord and pay the price to buy the eyesalve. We need to pay the price to gain more of the anointing Spirit, who is the Lord Himself as the life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45).

May we exercise our spirit to touch the Lord, be filled with Him, and gain more of the anointing Spirit! When we heed the inner anointing, we will see the supreme preciousness of Christ.

When our eyes are anointed with the anointing Spirit, we may have both foresight and deep insight to see things thoroughly.

We will see the preciousness of Christ, and we will treasure what He is to us and in us. We will realise that He is the treasure in our earthen vessel.

When we see Christ, when we realise His supreme preciousness, we will be willing to pay the price to gain Him.

The reason we are not fervently loving the Lord and do not pay the price to gain Him is that we do not see His preciousness, and the reason we don’t see His preciousness is that we are blind.

The god of this age blinds our eyes, our eyes are turned from the Lord, and we cannot see the Lord; therefore, we need to come to Him and allow Him to anoint us.

When we see how precious Christ is, we will realise that nothing else compares to Him.

Once our eyes are anointed by the divine, spiritual eyesalve, we will realise that it is worthwhile for us to pay any price for Christ.

The price we pay is too low, for even if we pay the price of our self, our future, and our life, nothing compares with what we get: we get Christ, who is everything.

To see this, we need the eyesalve. We need the Lord to anoint us.

When we see Christ and realise His supreme preciousness by being anointed with the anointing Spirit, the spiritual eyesalve, we will count all things loss for Christ and we will be willing to suffer the loss of all things on behalf of Christ (Phil. 3:8).

May we be turned from doctrines to Christ. May we come to Him and enjoy Him.

May we realise that we’re not here for doctrines or even for the so-called truths; we are here for the rich Christ!

We pay attention to Christ. We come to Him to gain Him as the gold, the white garments, and the eyesalve, so that we may be fervently loving the Lord!

Laodicea, the degraded recovered church, needs this kind of eyesalve for the healing of her blindness (see Job 42:5-6).

Dead, vain knowledge and doctrinal forms make the degraded recovered church lukewarm; what she needs is to repent of her lukewarmness and be zealous, boiling, burning, that thereby she may regain the enjoyment of the reality of Christ.

Whenever we sense that we are lukewarm, when we sense spiritual pride and realise that we’re not burning for the Lord, we need to repent and come back to Christ.

Lord Jesus, we repent for our lukewarmness and for our spiritual pride. We want to be zealous, boiling, burning for You so that we may regain our enjoyment of the reality of Christ. Oh Lord, we come to You by exercising our spirit to gain more of the divine nature as the gold. We exercise our spirit to live one spirit with You today. May our conduct be Christ living in us. Be lived out of us today. May our conduct be approved by the Lord as we exercise to no longer live in and by ourselves but allow Christ to live in us. Amen, Lord, we want to pay the price to buy the eyesalve to anoint our eyes with the anointing Spirit! Hallelujah, Christ is the life-giving Spirit to be the anointing teaching us all things. Heal us of our blindness. Heal us of anything that blinds us. Oh Lord, may we see Your preciousness. May we realise how precious Christ is to us. We give ourselves to You today to just gain You, enjoy You, be filled with You, and be constituted with Your riches! Oh Lord, what we need is not more doctrine – we need more of Christ!

Overcome the Lukewarmness and Pride and Pay the Price to gain Christ to Reign with Him

To the church in Laodicea, the Lord introduces Himself as being the One who is the Amen, the faithful and true Witness, the beginning of the creation of God (Rev. 3:14).

He knows the works of the degraded recovered church; He knows that she is neither hot nor cold.

He wishes that she were either cold or hot, but because she’s lukewarm, He is about to spew her out of His mouth.

The Lord is intimately related and one with the church, but because the church is not hot for the Lord nor cold toward the world, the Lord will spew her out of His mouth. Oh Lord!

The degraded recovered church says that she is wealthy and has become rich and has need of nothing, but she does not know that she is wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked (v. 17).

What a pitiful situation she is in! She thinks she is one thing, but in God’s eyes, she is miserable and poor!

So the Lord counsels her to buy from Him gold refined by fire so that she may be rich, white garments so that she may be clothed and that the shame of her nakedness may not be manifested, and eyesalve to anoint her eyes so that she may see.

The Lord advises those who are in the degraded recovered church to pay the price to gain more of Christ as the golden divine nature, the white garments of having Christ lived out of them, and the eyesalve to see the preciousness of Christ.

When we pay the price, we will see Christ, we will love Him, we will treasure Him, and we will give ourselves to Him; we will be willing to pay any price to gain Christ!

The Lord reproves those whom He loves, and He disciplines them; therefore, may we be zealous and repent (v. 19).

He loves us. He cares for us. He disciplines us. He reproves us. And He wants us to be zealous and repent.

Behold, the Lord stands at the door and knocks, and if anyone hears His voice and opens the door, He will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Him (v. 20).

May we open the door of our heart to the Lord again and again. May we allow Him to come into our heart, and may we feast with Him.

May we not let Him be outside the door of our heart; may we let the Lord come in and make His home deep down in our heart (Eph. 3:17).

To those who overcome the lukewarmness and spiritual pride in the church in Laodicea, the Lord will give them to sit with Him on His throne, even as He also overcame and was given to sit with His Father on His throne (Rev. 3:21-22).

May we have an ear to hear what the Spirit is speaking to the churches. The prize to the overcomer in the degraded recovered church is to participate in the Lord’s authority in the coming millennial kingdom.

Those who overcome lukewarmness and pride will share in the Lord’s authority in the coming kingdom to be co-kings with Christ ruling over the whole earth. Hallelujah!

This will happen in the coming age, and we can also have a foretaste of this today. On the one hand, the strict fulfilment and meaning of the promises and discipline or loss spoken of in these seven epistles refer to what will happen in the next age.

However, today we can have a foretaste of this, in principle. The promises and rewards the Lord gives to the overcomers can be applied to us today.

We don’t have to wait until we enter into the kingdom age to enjoy all these special portions.

We can be the Lord’s overcoming saints and be privileged to enjoy the kingdom with its blessings today in the church life.

Thank the Lord for all the promises He gave us for us to enjoy as a foretaste in the church life today!

May we overcome the lukewarmness and pride of the degraded recovered church.

May we pay the price to buy the gold, the white garment, and the eyesalve, and may we open the door so that the Lord may come in!

Lord Jesus, we exercise our spirit today and we come to You. Make us Your overcoming saints today. May we overcome any lukewarmness in our being and in the church life. May we overcome any spiritual pride. May we be willing to pay the price to gain more of Christ as the divine nature, the lived-out righteousness, and the anointing Spirit in our Christian life. Amen, Lord, we open the door of our heart to You. Come in, Lord, and dine with us and us with You. Make us Your overcomers today. Grant us an ear to hear what the Spirit is speaking to the churches today. We aspire to be Your overcomers, those who will be rewarded by You to sit with You on the throne in the kingdom! May we be those who participate in the Lord’s authority and be a co-king with Him in ruling over the whole earth in the coming millennial kingdom! Amen, Lord, make us Your overcomers today. Overcome in us. You are the unique Overcomer; make us the same as You are today, those who overcome in Christ and by Christ!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by the brothers on this topic, and portions from, Life-study of Revelation, pp. 199-204 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crucial Aspects of Matthew 5 through 7 (2025 September ITERO), week 7, Entering through the Narrow Gate and Walking on the Constricted Way That Leads to Life, the Ever-blessed Condition of the Kingdom – day 6.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – Laodicea warns us all: / From Philadelphia some will fall. / By saying, “I am rich,” it’s then / The Lord is outside wanting in. / Lukewarmness we must ever spurn / And in the spirit always burn, / The inward life experience gain, / And pay the price with Him to reign. (Hymns #1274 stanzas 15-16)
  – Will you be an overcomer? / Never lukewarm be, / Ne’er content with what you’ve gotten, / More you need to see. / Will you be an overcomer? / Christ is calling still! / Will you now be loyal to Him, / His demand fulfill. (Hymns #294 stanzas 7-8)
  – Like “Philadelphia” she must be / To keep Christ’s word, confess His Name; / All “lukewarm” pride she must o’ercome / To feast with Him who overcame. / Thus will the Church be purified / To be the lampstand of pure gold, / To match the testimony pure, / The life of Jesus fit to hold. (Hymns #822 stanzas 7-8)