The Church of Sardis: Revelation 3:1-6
- Tim Cain
- Nov 8, 2009
- Series: Revelations
The Church of Sardis: Revelation 3:1-6
November 7 & 8, 2009
Kaleo El Cajon & Kaleo Linda Vista
Tim Cain
Jesus begins by describing himself much as he did with the church of Ephesus. However, here he adds that he is the one who holds the seven Spirits. The seven spirits in this context is another name for the Holy Spirit. The number seven is understood to stand for completeness and what is understood is that Jesus holds the fullness of the Holy Spirit. With him the Spirit dwells with all his power. Because Jesus has the fullness of the Holy Spirit he is able to give it to whomever he desires. In a moment we will talk about how this description of Jesus was meant to give hope to the church of Sardis.
Now, as we begin to talk about this church I want us listening with eyes on our own hearts. Let’s turn our gaze inward and as we listen to the situation in which this church finds herself. Let’s have ears to hear how it might speak to us, to our situation. Unfortunately and somewhat ironically, I believe those who believe the letter to this church has the least to say about them are actually the ones to whom this letter is written. So, let’s really listen to this letter and honestly try to understand what it might have to say to us.
Jesus goes on to say “I know your works…” In the past four letters Jesus has begun with, “I know,” and then spoken of the good things that he knows about the church. That is how Jesus has begun every letter; I know your works... I know your tribulation, I know you dwell where Satan’s throne is, I know your works… So what are you expecting to see here? You are expecting that Jesus will begin this letter as he has begun every other letter; “I know” and go on to say a few good things about the church. In fact, if you simply look at the first part of the sentence, that is exactly what you get. I know you have the reputation of being alive. The word reputation is the word “name,” so he is saying; you have the name of being alive. That is a great name to bear, isn’t it? The word I know is supposed to be followed by the strengths of the church and certainly it would seem that one of the strengths of the church is that they have an excellent reputation for being alive. They have the name of being alive. However, look at what follows. Jesus says, “I know you have the reputation of being alive, but you are dead.” He goes on as he does with the other churches to call her to repentance.
I want you to take a moment and notice what Jesus is saying to this church merely through the form of the letter and not only by what he has written. Normally the letter begins with, “I know,” followed by the strengths of the churches. Then there is another section that typically begins, “But I have this against you…” Do you remember how three of the other letters had that section? It is a section where Jesus tells the churches what he has against them and calls them to repent. Here we don’t have a section like that. Jesus never says, “I have this against you.”
Instead here is what you see. This church’s strength is her greatest weakness. It is her name of being alive that is listed after the “I know” in order to bring to mind that it is seen to be a strength however, in reality this strength is her greatest weakness. The fact that this church believes she is alive is her greatest weakness.
She has believed what others have said of her. Instead of searching to know what God thinks of her she has listened to what others have said about her and she has found her justification in their approval. She has grown comfortable resting in the name that others have given her. And because of this, she has grown blind to her true state. Because she feels so comfortable in the approval of others, she has grown blind to God’s assessment of her situation. She believes that she is alive, that she is fine. As she has listened to the letters to the other churches, she is looking forward to what God will say to her after he says, “I know”. She feels it will be a long list. Others are full of accolades about her spirituality, certainly God too must appreciate what she has done. And yet Jesus says, “You have the name of being alive but the reality is you are dead.” What a scathing critique! This ought to scare us. Even when everyone else thought this church was fine, Jesus says of her, “You are dead.” Again we see that things are not as they seem. This church had grown comfortable comparing herself to others and feeling better than them and now when she is confronted by the massive Jesus with eyes of blazing fire she finds that she is dead.
Jesus calls her to wake up! He is calling her to wake up and take notice of her situation. He is calling her first and foremost to recognize that she is dead. He is calling her to wake up from her comfortable lying dreams of safety and realize the peril that she is in. She is living in a dream world. She is living as if God did not exist. She is living as if her judgment will be rendered by what others think of her. Her justification is in her name. She has done enough works to get those around her to believe that she is alive, to feel better than others, for the approval of others so now she feels she is approved. However, Jesus says, “I have not found your works complete in the sight of my God.” In other words, Jesus is saying, though you have gained the approval of others through your works, though you feel as if you are good compared to others in my eyes, the eyes that search the mind and the heart, your works are not good enough. And in case you forgot what that means, remember that in the last church I struck down dead the compromisers whose works were not seen as complete in my sight.
Jesus is calling out to the church and saying, stop playing games. You’re not good enough. How ridiculous you look standing naked before God with a self-righteous smirk on your face because you happen to be better than somebody else. How foolish! Here the call is clear. You will stand before one person alone, and on that day it will not be your reputation that is judged, but it will be your works. If you are basking in the comfort of your own self-righteousness because others have approved of your walk with God or because compared to some people you know you are way better, then the call is to wake up. Wake up because you stand before Jesus alone and if you stand before him with your own works, he will not find them complete.
So, this letter is written to a church that is relying on her reputation. She is relying on her approval by others to justify her. She feels confident in her relationship with God because she is better than others. She feels confident in her relationship with God because others see her as a great example of a good Christian. She has the reputation of being alive. However, this reputation has taken her eyes off of Jesus and caused her to look to herself. To look at her own strength, to feel confident and comfortable resting in her own reputation and because she has taken her eyes off of Jesus and been so enamored with herself and her own reputation she has in fact begun to live a lie. Her Christianity is merely external. She has a name of life, she looks like she has it all together but inside she is a rotting corpse. Inside she is full of pride trusting in her own strength for her righteousness and abandoning the humbling righteousness of Jesus. So the call is wake up! Wake up and realize how bankrupt your own virtue is. Wake up and realize that your best works are but soiled rags before the blazing eyes of the one to whom all must give an account. Wake up and realize that your works are not enough! You are not good enough! God is not pleased with you! He is not lucky to have you! No, instead Jesus calls them to remember what they received and heard. They received and heard the Gospel. They received and heard the message that they were dead in their sins until Jesus came and lived a perfect life and shed his precious blood on their behalf on a roman cross so that he might wash away their sins with his precious blood, and so that he might clothe them in clean garments of his righteousness. He came and gave his life so that they might be clothed in his works because his works will be seen as complete in the sight of God and any who are clothed in them will be accepted. That is the gospel they are called to remember. Amidst the shouts of acclamation from their peers they are to remember the truth, Worthy is the Lamb who was slain. All glory and all honor must go to him and him alone. He is the one who is alive and we only live if we live through him. He is the one who is to be acclaimed, he is the one who was approved by his father. All boasting must be in him and in what he has accomplished on the cross. This is what they are called to remember. Remember that you are dead and you need Jesus and you need the Holy Spirit which he alone can give in order to make you alive. That is why it is so beautiful that Jesus pictures himself here as being the one who has the Holy Spirit. He is saying, I have what you need. You are dead and you need the Holy Spirit to come and breathe into your dead souls the breath of life and I have him. Your works are incomplete and what you need is to come to me and to take my righteousness and to stand before God wearing it and it alone. He is calling out to this comfortable church and saying, “Wake up and realize you are dead and come to me and I will give you life. Remember the Gospel, remember my blood and my righteousness. Keep it, and repent, let go of everything else you are carrying.”
One of the hardest things they will have to let go of is their name. They are not alive, they are dead. If they want to cling to their name of being alive, if they want to cling to their reputation, then they will never be able to have his righteousness because their reputation is based on their own merit and they cannot have both their own righteousness and Jesus. As long as their hands are full of their own righteousness, as long as they are living comfortable in their own reputation, as long as they are satisfied with the approval of others, they will never be able to have the approval of God. Here is a trustworthy saying that they have not understood. Jesus came and died for sinner, he came to save dead people. They have the reputation of being alive, they think they are alive so therefore they don’t see themselves as needing a savior. They don’t know how much they need Jesus. They see him as an accessory; they don’t see him as their life. They see his righteousness as a supplement, not as their only hope before God. They see his blood as making up for the little they lack, not as the only remedy for their dead hearts.
The call for them is to wake up, to be vigilant. They have fallen asleep and what has caused them to fall asleep is their confidence in themselves. Annie Dillard says this, and I find it absolutely applicable to this church and to our lives. She says, “We are never more asleep at the switches then when we fathom we control any switches at all.” Do you hear what she is saying? She is saying whenever we think that we are in control, whenever we think that we have things figured out, whenever we cease feeling overwhelmed and instead feel adequate for the tasks ahead, we are absolutely asleep. This is the slumber from which Jesus is calling the church to wake. Wake up out of your self-reliance. Wake up out of your self-sufficiency. Wake up out of your comfortable, controlled lives because they are a lie. You are not in control. If you think you are or feel like you are, then you are asleep. You are not righteous. You are a hopeless, dead, individual with nothing at all to offer, with whom Jesus has lovingly offered to come and trade places. He has offered to come, be your righteousness, die your death, and give you his life so that you might for all eternity walk with him, clothed in his perfect righteousness, glorifying and praising him and enjoying him forever. There is nothing to boast of here except our amazing savior.
So the call is to wake up from our delusional self-reliance. It’s not true. We are not in control and the comfort we feel when we think we are in control is a lie. It is a lie that will one day be toppled. So much of the Bible is this call that begs us to not be found believing this lie when it is too late. Wake up now while there is still time.
In God’s amazing providence, the history of Sardis plays a very important role in this letter. Sardis was an impregnable city. It began as a military base and throughout ancient history it had served as one of the capital cities. It was surrounded on three sides by steep cliffs and could only be approached from the front. Therefore it was a very easy city to defend. In the ancient days, taking Sardis was a proverbial way of speaking about the impossible, like saying, “When pigs fly.” That is how unbeatable this city was seen. So, in a day when cities were constantly rising and falling, Sardis became very wealthy because it could not be sacked. Its people where very arrogant and felt absolutely secure and comfortable in their fortress. Until one night, a single mountain climber scaled the steep cliffs and climbed over the wall in an area that was not guarded and opened up the gates and let King Cyrus of Persia in, and Sardis fell after only 14 days. In the city, just as in the church, her strength became her greatest weakness. One person scaled a wall and the city fell. The city fell because they didn’t even feel like they needed to have guards on the wall. They felt so secure, so safe, that they fell asleep in their delusion of safety. That is why this call for the city to wake up before Jesus comes like a thief in the night is so fitting. Their history revealed the foolishness of resting in self-reliance. Instead their history shouted, “Be vigilant. Be always on the lookout. Don’t grow comfortable in your reputation.”
There is a temptation for Christians in America to get into the church, conquer for the most part the visible sins that the church frowns upon, and then feel like we have it together. We surround ourselves with others who likewise tell us that we have it all together, and soon, we feel like we have the Christian life figured out. We feel like for the most part we have arrived. There may be times of real suffering or trial, but for the most part we feel secure, we have a plan, we have a backup plan if that plan fails, and our days and weeks just float by. We seldom find ourselves overwhelmed by anything let alone our own sin or the magnificence of our savior. We would never say it, but we feel like we have arrived, we have figured out the Christian life. Of course we know there are always areas of improvement and that is one of the things we love about Christianity, it has lots of wisdom to help us improve. We learn how to be better parents, better spouses, better at work; there are always areas we are working on but the idea of being overwhelmed doesn’t occur to us often. We certainly have not felt anything like desperation for a long time.
The call is to remember. Remember your desperation. Remember when your sin was overwhelming. Remember when Jesus was your only hope, when you knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that without him you would be undone. Remember that, hold fast to it, keep it, don’t let it go. The call is for us to wake up and remember our desperation. Since when does the fact that the Creator of the universe, the one whose eyes are shining like a fire, who has a massive sword coming out of his mouth, who speaks and his voice is like the roar of many waters, since when does such a one taking on flesh and dying on a roman cross for total failures like you and me stop being overwhelming? When does something else from this world actually become newsworthy in a world where that has just happened? Remember when 9/11 happened? The only things on the news were about 9/11, that was it. Nothing else made the news. You didn’t have to hear about which grocery store was trying to sell things past their expiration point, you didn’t have to see what celebrity was reading books to kids at the library or what someone was saying about health care. Those things paled in comparison to the magnitude of 9/11. Well, this world may be full of information, but nothing it can offer us can compare to the amazing truths that we have received and heard in the Gospel. Keep those things. Believe those things. Meditate on those things. Let those things overwhelm you. Let’s not grow complacent. Let’s not think that we have arrived. The moment we believe we have Christianity figured out is the moment we demonstrate that we don’t really understand it. It is too lofty for us, too much for us to ever take in. These overwhelming truths are enough to give our lives to searching out. Repent and let go of everything else that you are holding onto. Let go being in control. Let go of the lie that you are good. Let go of feeling like you need to always justify yourself before others. Let go of these lies and accept the fact that we are dead sinners whose only hope is found in Christ and whose lives are to be spent gazing at his beauty, marveling at his forgiveness, clinging to his righteousness in a world bent on pulling us away from Jesus.
We are in a war to treasure Christ above everything else, to depend and cling to him in a world that calls us to rely on ourselves. It is a war to submit to his word in a world that calls us toward independence. It is a war to stay awake and be vigilant in a world calling us to relax and enjoy the many comforts it offers us. I know it seems hard to always be vigilant. I know at first it seems like this call is such a difficult call. It is a difficult call but only because everything in this world fights against it. In and of itself it is a simple call, a call to let go. It is a call to give up being in control and instead to give all control to the one who loved us and gave up his only son for us. It is a call to stop relying on ourselves but to entrust ourselves to our God, knowing that he is better even than us. He is better than us. The way he will run our lives is better than the way we would. He is wiser, he is in total control and knows the outcomes of every decision he makes, and he is for our good. Do you know how you feel when you feel like you have everything in control, like you have all the contingency plans figured out, like you are ready for something? Maybe you are ready for an interview, or a test, or ready for whatever challenge you are facing. You know how it feels to have it all figured out. Feels pretty good right? You sleep easy, no worries, you are in control. I want you to know that if we will only let go and truly trust in Jesus, we can feel like this about everything. All those feelings about us being ready for anything, they are a lie. Jesus holds our next breath in his hands. What fools are we who don’t even control our next breath to fathom that we are in control of anything else. We are fools. We have the reputation of being in control but we are not! Let’s wake up and be vigilant to fight all feelings of self-reliance and instead to live joyfully dependent upon our God.
One of the things that is so hard about living like this is that our lives become a constant battle with the flesh that wants us to trust it and our culture that calls us to find security, comfort, and joy in stuff instead of in Jesus who is our savior. We live in a world that wants us to believe what they say about us and not what our savior says. They want us to live for their approval and not for his, so we find that to live a life of desperate dependence upon Jesus is to live a life constantly fighting, failing, and having to cling to Jesus and his righteousness as our only hope. This is a life of tremendous joy and yet it is also a constant fight. When we are fighting like this, constantly fighting our sin, realizing our own arrogance and confessing it, despairing of our own failures, we often find that looking at the rest of the church is really discouraging. When we are living desperately dependent upon Jesus, we can sure feel alone can’t we? It seems like everyone else at church has it all together. Most of the time in our missional communities, everyone looks like they are doing pretty well, like they have things figured out. When we confess a sin we get lots of good advice as if everyone else had already fought that sin and figured out an answer to it. This can be really discouraging. Often we feel that we are alone because we know how often and how badly we fail while everyone else seems to make it through their weeks with relatively few real failures, certainly nothing they couldn’t take care of themselves. This is why so many of us don’t understand what is so important about community. Why is it such a big deal to be in a missional community? I am doing pretty good, I don’t think I really need to be in one of these groups. They are more for people who are really struggling with a sin and need accountability. Well, if you feel isolated sometimes because you feel like such a failure and know that Jesus is your only hope, Jesus has a word for you. I still have a few names in Sardis, “people who have not soiled their garments, and they will walk with me in white, for they are worthy.” Jesus comes to encourage those who feel alone in a church that has it all together. He comes to encourage the repentant sinners in a church of self-proclaimed good people. In a church full of people wearing their own good works as their garments, Jesus comes and says, “There are a few people who know how ugly their own good deeds are. There are a few who have not soiled their garments by trying to patch their own good deeds on them but instead have clung to me, to my righteousness as their only hope. Don’t be discouraged if you feel alone because you feel so desperate for me. Don’t feel bad, I am here for you.” For all those who willingly despair of their own righteousness, for all of those who live at the foot of the cross, daily dying to their own goodness and clinging to Jesus as their only hope, to all those who know that a day without Jesus would be their utter end, to all those who consider everything rubbish in order that they might have their hands free to cling to Jesus and his righteousness, to all those who find that walking with Jesus through life is their only hope—they will not only walk with Jesus now, but forever more they will walk with him clothed in his righteousness.
When he says, “Because they are worthy.” He is not saying that they themselves are worthy of anything. In the next chapter we find that there is only one who is worthy. Chapters 4 and 5 call out, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain.” Chapter 7 goes on to tell us where the saints get their white robes. It describes those dressed in white saying, “These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white n the blood of the lamb. Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence. They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike the, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”
In a culture that calls its people to live lives of self reliance and where many who call themselves Christians believe that they have got the Christian life figured out, it will be a difficult road daily dying to our own desire to be in control and to rest in our own abilities and instead to cling to Jesus’ righteousness as our only hope. To despair of our own abilities and boast only in the cross. That is why we need each other. We need each other lest we forget and begin to believe that we have things figured out. We need each other to remind us of our precious savior, of what he has done for us at the cross and how worthy he is to be worshiped. We need each other to remind us that if we will cling to his righteousness we will walk with him in white. We need to be reminded both of his amazing promises and of our own sin which causes us to need his promises so much.
The call to the church of Sardis is a call to us today. It is a call to all of us who live for the approval of others rather then the approval which comes from Jesus. It is a call for all of us who feel comfortable with our own good works. It comes to all of us who feel like we are better than others. It comes to all of us who sometimes feel like we have the Christian life figured out. It comes to all of us who fathom that we are in control of anything and says “Wake up!” Wake up and run to Jesus. Remember what he has done for you. Let it overwhelm you, desperately cling to his righteousness as your only hope. Despair of being in control, wake up, and know that all you need you have in Jesus. Know that if you will cling to him, he will never leave you or forsake you and that you will walk with him for all eternity, clothed in his righteousness which alone will stand before God at the final judgment. This letter is a call for the church which bears the name Christian to need and love and treasure Christ. Certainly our country is full of those who bear the name Christian and yet do not consider everything rubbish in order that they might gain Christ. In the end it will be those who are walking with him, clothed in his righteousness who will keep his name. The rest will be revealed for what they always were, dead. Let us be awake when he comes. Let us be found to be clinging to him as our only hope when he comes. We are all failures. Instead of letting our strength be our greatest weakness lets let our weakness be our greatest strength.
Let’s hear the words of Jesus to Paul when he says, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Instead of boasting in our strength and feeling secure in how we are living the Christian life, let’s boast in our weakness so that the power of Christ might rest on us. Let us know that when we are weak and clinging to the grace of Jesus as our only hope then are we strong. In a culture that hates weakness let us embrace it so that Jesus’ power might be made perfect in us. Might we stop justifying ourselves and let our savior justify us. He will do it so much better. Oh Kaleo that we might be a broken, humble, weak people, who cling to our savior as our only hope so that Jesus might be seen to be majestic and powerful in our lives! Wake up and cling to him.
I want to end with a quote from a man named Douglas Coupland. At the end of his memoirs he writes, “Now, here is my secret: I tell you with an openness of heart that I doubt I shall ever achieve again, so I pray that you are in a quiet room as you hear these words. My secret is that I need God, that I am sick and can no longer make it alone. I need God to help me give, because I no longer seem capable of giving; to help me be kind, as I no longer seem capable of kindness; to help me love as I seem beyond being able to love.”
Let’s just admit our secret. Let’s wake up and admit we need God. We need him because our own righteousness is not complete before our God. It’s ok to need our God. It’s ok because he has offered us everything we need in his precious son who came and gave his life on the cross for us, for our desperate need. Our need is so big that it took God dying on the cross to fill it. Don’t excuse it, don’t try and pretend it isn’t there. It was our need, our sin that required the cross; surely it is too great to minimize. Yet our savior paid the price. He paid for our sin with his life so let’s just cling to him. Let’s lose ourselves in his righteousness. Let’s set our minds upon his beauty, let’s give ourselves to clinging to him always because we need him. And let’s live lives of radical gratitude to the God who gave himself for us.
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