THE LETTER TO THE CHURCH AT SARDIS
Revelation 3:1-6
I once heard a story of a little boy who found a snake on his grandfather’s farm. He informed his grandfather, and he took a shovel and cut its head off. Even with its head separated from the rest of its body, the snake hissed and tried to bite the end of the shovel. The little boy remarked “Grandpa, that snake is dead, he just doesn’t know it yet!”
Unfortunately, there are many churches that are like that snake, they are dead; they just don’t know it! There was a church located in Asia Minor many years ago that had this problem. They had a reputation of being alive, but Jesus said that they were dead.
Even though the church was dead, there was a glimmer of hope. There was a faithful remnant of Christians who worshipped there, and Jesus encouraged them to remain faithful to Him. Perhaps it was because of them that Jesus gave the Church at Saris the opportunity to repent instead of completely destroying them. Though Jesus was not pleased with the current condition of this church, He was longsuffering, patient and merciful; He sent them a letter confronting their error and warning them of their future if they failed to repent and return to Him.
Thankfully, I don’t see many parallels between the Church at Sardis and Stockdale but there are some important lessons that we can learn from this letter. Join me as we examine “The Letter To The Church At Sardis”.
- We will begin by considering:
THE RECIPIENTS OF THIS LETTER
v1a "And to the angel of the church in Sardis write,
Sardis was a city that was located 30 miles southeast of Thyatira; it had been the capital of Lydia. Like Ephesus, the people of Sardis were involved in the worship of the Roman Caesar as well as the pagan goddess of fertility, Artemis. The primary industry in Sardis was harvesting and dying wool and making clothing out of it. There was a church located in Sardis, but it was in pitiful shape, there were a handful of genuine believers in that church but most of the congregants were unregenerate. Sardis had a reputation as being a Christian church, but for the most part they were going through the motions with no signs of spiritual life.
Jesus knew all about the sad state of the church at Sardis and He wrote this letter to warn them and to encourage them to remember, repent and return to Him. This leads us to:
THE AUTHOR OF THIS LETTER
v1b 'These things says He who has the seven Spirits of God and the seven stars:
Jesus identifies Himself as the one who “has the seven Spirits of God”. This phrase is likely a reference to the completeness of the Holy Spirit. It is in the power of the Holy Spirit that Jesus controls the churches and their messengers. Jesus also declares that He has “the Seven Stars”, as we have seen in previous letters, this is speaking of the “angels of the seven churches”. This is encouraging; for even in dead churches made up of a majority of unregenerate people, Jesus holds His faithful servants in His hands.
- As we move further we will see:
THE REBUKE IN THIS LETTER
v1c "I know your works, that you have a name that you are alive, but you are dead.
Sardis was a church with lifeless profession. The members professed to know Christ, but they did not possess salvation. Though this church had a reputation for being active and vibrant, Sardis was consumed with sin. They looked really good on the outside, but they were corrupt on the inside. Jesus examined the spiritual condition of this church and he said to them “I have not found your works perfect before God.” He declared that this church was dead; however there were a handful of faithful Christians in that assembly.
This faithful remnant is likely the only reason that Jesus gave this spiritually dead church the opportunity to make things right before He destroyed them. His desire was not to destroy this church, He wanted to redeem it, therefore He sent this letter to instruct them as to how to make things right.
- Notice:
THE COMMAND IN THIS LETTER
v2 Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die, for I have not found your works perfect before God. 3 Remember therefore how you have received and heard; hold fast and repent.
Even though Jesus declared that this church was spiritually dead, He saw some signs of life. He said, “be watchful, and strengthen the things that remain, those that are ready to die”.
Sardis was a church that needed to go back to the beginning; They needed to return to the fundamentals of the faith. They had drifted away from the Apostles teaching, they had ceased growing in their faith, they had abandoned evangelism, and they had lost their focus and turned away from the Lord. Sardis was a church that had gone to sleep; they did not possess the positive attributes that were present in the surrounding churches. There was no love, devotion, good works, sound doctrine, Christian service or evangelism for Jesus to praise them for. They were dead and this was their last chance for a revival. If Sardis would not heed the words of Jesus in this letter, they would face His judgement.
- Notice in verse 3:
THE WARNING IN THIS LETTER
v3b Therefore if you will not watch, I will come upon you as a thief, and you will not know what hour I will come upon you.
Jesus warned this church that if they would not obey Him, they would face His judgment. He said “I will come upon you as a thief”; this is not a reference to His Second Coming, rather it is a description of His sudden and unexpected coming to destroy this hardhearted, unrepentant dead church. There are some churches today that are asleep and dying, some are already dead and this warning applies to them as much as it did to the Church at Sardis.
- As I mentioned earlier, there was a glimmer of hope within this corrupt church. Notice:
THE PRAISE IN THIS LETTER
v4 You have a few names even in Sardis who have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with Me in white, for they are worthy.
The praise in this letter was not for the church as a whole, it was for the faithful few who had “not defiled their garments”. To “defile” means “to smear, to pollute,” or “to stain”. “Garments” refer to their Christian testimony and character. These believers who had not defiled their garments with worldliness would one day walk with Christ in robes of white.
- Jesus goes on to give a promise to those who had remained faithful and to all of those who are “overcomers”. Let’s examine:
THE PROMISE IN THIS LETTER
v5 He who overcomes shall be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot out his name from the Book of Life; but I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels. 6 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches." '
The “overcomers” are those whose righteous acts marked them as true believers. These people had assurance that one day they will be “clothed in white garments”. To be clothed in white means to be set apart for God and made pure. There is also a promise of eternal life for those who remain steadfast in their faith. Jesus goes on to promise that He will confess the names of the overcomers before His Father and the angels of heaven. Furthermore, their names will not be blotted out from the Book of Life. The names of all believers are registered in the book of life. This book symbolizes God’s knowledge of who belongs to him. All who belong to God are listed the book of life, and Jesus will introduce them to the Father and the Heavenly Angels as belonging to Him.
In ancient times, city officials would erase the names of undesirable people off of their roles; the true believer has no reason to fear that Jesus will ever erase their name from the Book of Life.
Like Sardis, there are some dead churches in our day. There are others that are not dead yet, but they are essentially on life support! They may appear to be successful; they may have a reputation as being a church that is alive, but things are not always what they seem.
- Dr. Alan Carr shares several symptoms of a dying church. He says:
“A dying church rests on its past accomplishments and is satisfied with its presence state. A dying church is more concerned about their rituals and their formalities than they are about spirituality. A dying church is more concerned about social change than they are about seeing people changed by the power of God. A dying church is more concerned with material growth than it is with spiritual growth. A dying church is more concerned with pleasing men that it is with pleasing God. A dying church clings more tightly to its creeds and confessions than it does to the Word of God. A dying church is one that loses its conviction that the Bible is the Word of God.
Thankfully, I don’t see any of those symptoms within our assembly, but we must never be so arrogant as to think that Stockdale Baptist Church is immortal. If we are not vigilant, some of the same issues that plagued the Church at Sardis could affect our spiritual health.
It would help us to listen to the exhortation that Jesus gave to the Church at Sardis. He told them four things that they should continue to do as they live for Him in the midst of such devastating circumstances. He instructed them to “strengthen the things which remain”. Not everything about this church was dead; there was a spark of life in the present and a glimmer of hope for the future. However, they must strengthen those things before they died out. The people in this church needed to reclaim their zeal for the things of God. I have no doubt that the Church in Sardis continued to sing, pray, preach and give, but Jesus said, “their works were not perfect before Him”. There was no eternal value in what they were doing; they were merely going through the motions.
It is possible to be busy in the things of God without doing anything for God. Unless the Lord is the focus and the purpose of everything we do, we are wasting our time. If God is not receiving the glory, our works are not complete! Jesus also instructed them to “Remember therefore how you have received and heard”. Jesus told Sardis to remember where He had brought them from and all that He had done for them. They needed to remember the excitement and joy that they once possessed and return to walking in His will.
We must never cease to remember where Jesus has brought us from and all that He has done for us. This is true for the individual Christian and the church as a whole. If you fail to remember God’s goodness, it won’t be long before you begin to drift away from Him.
Jesus also instructed them to “Hold fast”. Sardis had lost some things that needed to be regained; however there were some things that they still possessed that they needed to hold on to. If they refused to obey this command, what did remain would be lost; those things would die as well!
Like Sardis, we must identify what is good and we must hold on to those things that honor the Lord, if not there will be serious consequences. The fourth thing that Jesus instructed Sardis to do was to “repent”. Repentance is to experience a change of mind about our sins that results in a change of direction. When we repent, we turn from our sins and we turn toward God. When there is sin in the life of an individual, there must be repentance before there can be restoration and revival.
The same is true for the church; when a church has allowed itself to be lulled into a state of slumber, their only hope is to repent! Just as He called on Sardis to repent, Jesus is calling on His people and His churches to repent today! If God’s people refuse to strengthen what remains, hold on to what is good and repent of their sins, then judgment is inevitable. Jesus said in verse 3 - “Therefore if you will not watch, I will come upon you as a thief, and you will not know what hour I will come upon you.” If God’s people did not respond to His message then He would come among them and take away what little they had left. When this happens, the church would be totally dead.
Many churches have already experienced this tragic death. They ignored Jesus’ message and faced His severe judgment. They continue to operate; things still look the same as they did before. They still sing, preach, teach, pray and give but the church is dead, the ministry is ineffective, and Jesus is nowhere to be found. May it never be said of our church that we have a reputation for being alive but we are actually dead. It is important for us to assess our ministry, strengthen what remains, hold fast to what is good and repent of our sinfulness.
Just as Jesus knew all about Sardis, He knows all about Stockdale. I pray that He does not see a dead church, a dying church, or even a declining church. We should do whatever is necessary to be a church that brings Him honor and glory. God’s Word is beneficial for many reasons; one is that we get to learn from the errors of others. I pray that we learn much from the errors that Jesus confronted in “The Letter To The Church At Sardis”.
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