How have you coped with the very hot weather? Many I know just can't bear it and are very glad when the temperature drops by ten or fifteen degrees. There's a limit, after all, to the amount of chilled drinks that can be consumed and some would have it that, although they keep your body hydrated, they do little in the way of providing a lasting cooling effect. Some hold that a hot drink is still more refreshing in hot weather; I'm not sure of the physics behind that idea, though.
I remember, at the age of about six or seven, accompanying my mother to the harvest field to take my father more drink as he worked on into the evening. In my teenage years, when I would get up soon after dad and be eating my breakfast as he packed up his lunch bag. There was room in his bag for his sandwich box and just one bottle of cold tea, which he managed to keep upright while slung on his back for his cycle ride to work. In those days, I thought it strange to drink cold what is, essentially, a hot drink but cold tea it was, poured straight from the teapot with neither milk nor sugar. I think it was all he'd known throughout his working life and he always claimed it was more refreshing than any of the modern drinks that I preferred.
I've lost track of the times I've noticed half a mug of coffee by my desk, neglected as a result of my concentration on the computer screen. Although stone cold, I've drunk it down and found it quite acceptable. And many roadside service stations will offer on their shelves a proprietary brand of chilled coffee ... at a price! One thing I don't like, however, is a hot drink that is getting cold. While having not yet reached the refreshing qualities of a cold drink, it's not the hot drink that I brought a while ago from the kitchen, and is likely to meet the sink in short order. After all, if you go to the tap for a glass of water, you will run the tap for a few moments to 'let it run cold', rather than fill your glass from the water that has been warming in the pipework behind the tap.
In biblical times, the ancient town of Laodicea was a thriving commercial centre renowned for its black woollen cloth and a medical school that produced eye ointment. The local water was so heavy with minerals that it just couldn't be drunk. Nearby Hierapolis had hot springs and an aqueduct was built to provide Laodicea with a more acceptable alternative from there, but by the time it arrived the water was was lukewarm: neither hot nor refreshingly cool.
The last, and arguably the best remembered, of the seven letters to churches that form the second and third chapters of Revelation was written to the Christians at Laodicea and referred to some of these local characteristics (Rev. 3:14-22). Their life and faith had become complacent and no longer incisive as it once had been. Their behaviour didn't demonstrate God's love for the people, and presumably they just couldn't see the needs around them. They were just 'going through the motions' of their religion. There are various translations of verse 16: 'spit (NIV), vomit (NET) or spue (KJV) you out of my mouth'; perhaps one of the modern paraphrases captures the sentiment when it says, 'You make me sick!' It matches the local water, and thus balances the recommended remedies, which refer to 'white clothes to wear' and 'salve to put on your eyes so that you can see' (verse 18).
I can't expect all my readers to share my taste in drinks, so let me simply suggest that, when next you have cause to reject a drink - for whatever reason - you think of lukewarm water and remember the complacency of the Laodiceans. Is there anything you need to tighten up in your spiritual life?
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