12/20/25 To those the Spirit Speaks

Revelation 3:19-22 19 Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest and repent. 20 Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.21 To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I was victorious and sat down with my Father on his throne. 22 Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”

Whoever has ears,

4 wks ago this verse was covered because it is stated to everyone of the churches in the address to 7 churches by Jesus in Revelation 2-3. The lesson covered the clarifier as to who Jesus is addressing, which is whomever has ears if you listen to western preaching who are literalist, but we discovered that the address is very specific to a particular audience. This audience is those who are faithful to Jesus and is repeated here and well to the other five churches. This is not a general address to any human being born with two ears. To catch the full lesson go back to the last teaching in November to catch the fully understanding, but for our purposes today as led by the Spirit the audience & intent did not change. This is for those who have a robust relationship with the one making the address, Jesus, and he continues the statement,

let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches

Jesus here is saying to those who are His to hear something additional to what He himself is declaring. Let’s be honest, this is a huge issue in today’s church culture & in effective disciplining in the modern age, with the exception of the charismatic denominations who place an emphasis on this which is not entirely called for. This audience, those who place uncustomary faith in Christ throughout the daily works of their life as the only way to have their shame sin & susceptibilities covered are the audience.

To the ones who have the ears to understand & comprehend the voice of Jesus let them hear. This may sound a bit obvious, I mean isn’t that what ears allow us to do? Well, yes but again it is not something that is commonly caught anymore. We have not been taught to listen to anything but what the corporate world, & medical experts, & newscasters & other external voices would have to say to guide, lead & profit our lives. The truth is that is not happening as much as it should be anymore because the objectives of those outside voices & the information, they provide is not always truth. The motives determine what messages are given & how they are given in order to provoke your responses & actions. Notice I said external voices, because that is the difference here. This is outside your being & it is what many of us bow down to at the cost of common sense because we tend to put a trust in it that is not warranted. Jesus directs as a qualifier here that what we are called to listen to is not an external voice, it is an internal voice. This voice comes from within & some of us misappropriate the voice we hear from within. We have either learned to trust it too much or not enough, and we believe that it is our consciousness or our gut indicating direction & selection. Notice that Jesus says it is from the Spirit.

Listen to what the Spirit is saying. This is the same word used for Holy Ghost, Holy Spirit, the 3rd member of the Trinity. Let’s recall who is being addressed to now. Now let’s consider who we are to be listening for. The Holy Spirit is the entity of God himself in you, sharing in his sovereignty & knowledge. His presence within you is the evolution of the temple from Old Testament to new moving from the Tabernacle to the temple to the human temple in which the Spirit of God dwelt.

Your body in its temporary form is the temple of God once you have become a child of God 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 ¹⁹ Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; ²⁰ you were bought at a price. Therefore, honor God with your bodies.

It is what was paid to obtain you, that you walk in faith & hope in every day, clinging to that for victory over the world the flesh & the enemy that makes you a part of this address. The Spirit is the voice that is not your own & never speak contrary to the word of God. It never provokes you to act in a manner that is deemed unrighteous & is the encouragement when those around you will not give any when your world is caving in.

Listen to what the Spirit is saying to the churches. These are the assemblies. When he is present, in which he should be at a gathering of those faithful to Christ there should be a unified message, not necessarily the same but a message that has cohesion.

The 2 passages we have covered for the last 8 weeks have uniformity, commonality & hope emanating from the very text. To those the Spirit speaks listen up, tune out the world & tune into what the Messiah is trying to tell you.

• There is still hope, when you are a child of God,
• there is still a future when you are washed in the Lamb’s blood.
• There is still privilege on the other side of life when you are faithful to Jesus as he is faithful to you.

That is why your heart & your ears should be focused not on social media, or the news, or sports events but on the voice of the Spirit.