I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot.
Laodicea is the reverse of Philadelphia: nothing commended here, nothing reproved there. Yet it remained a candlestick, for a corrupt church is still a church. Christ calls Himself the Amen, steadfast in all His purposes, the faithful and true Witness whose testimony against the lukewarm will be believed, and the Beginning of God's creation, the First Cause and Governor of all things.
AI summary
Commenting on Revelation 3:14-22
Because thou sayest, I am rich,.... In worldly goods, which occasioned her lukewarmness, as riches often do, and her vanity, pride, and arrogance, afterwards expressed. Laodicea was a very rich city, and so will be this church state, through the accession of kings and princes, and great men of the earth unto it, in the former period: riches seldom do any good to the churches...
Verse 15. I know thy works. . That thou art neither cold nor hot. The word cold here would seem to denote the state where there was no pretension to religion; where everything was utterly lifeless and dead. The language is obviously figurative, but it is such as is often employed, when we speak of one as being cold towards another, as having a cold or icy heart, etc.