Revelation 3:1-6 Series

Revelation 3:1-6

To the Church in Sardis

“And to the angel of the church in Sardis write: ‘The words of him who has the seven spirits of God and the seven stars.

As mentioned previously the seven spirits many think is the Holy Spirit but being seven tends to complicate this idea. The seven stars are the seven angels of the seven churches.

“‘I know your works. You have the reputation of being alive, but you are dead. 2 Wake up, and strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have not found your works complete in the sight of my God.

All knowing Christ sees even the heart of the believer and He knows who are truly His and who are not. The reputation of this church of being alive but are not and are dead is an indication that this church isn't who it says it is and has many of the local people deceived that they are alive. Alive would mean alive in Christ or lead by the Spirit but most likely they are alive in themselves meaning the are doing things for the wrong reasons, probably selfish reasons.

Churches and individual Christians can appear to be thriving in Christ but this just goes to show that secondary motivations can easily overwhelm a church or individual. We need to take caution in this because it is easy to fall into this trap of thinking you are doing things for the right reasons when you are not. Is this the entire church? Most likely not but surely it is the majority.

This church as like many churches today which need a spiritual awakening. The question then comes to mind which is how does a church become spiritually awake? Things such as the deep teaching of scripture taught with passion for sure is the best way to start, also a fervent church prayer life and understanding intensely who you were as a lost sinner and what the cost was for your salvation. These are a few great ways to start to turn the ship and correct its course.

But Jesus here still feels there can be hope in that He says to “wake up and strengthen what remains”. Many churches and Christians alike are in this place of just being out of what it is to be a Christian. Pastors are not exempt either being most likely they are the ones who have led the church in this poor direction to begin with.

I can say that I see church after church dragging Christianity down farther and farther even in the small town I moved to as a missionary. Poor teaching and poor understanding of scripture is where I would say the problem lies. Also, I see little desire from the congregation that they want to learn either for the most part. There are always the few who do.

3 Remember, then, what you received and heard. Keep it, and repent. If you will not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come against you.

We see in many places in scripture this understanding of remembering what you received so the question is what does this mean. I would conclude it is multi faceted and at the top it being Christ but as well all the biblical teachings in scripture.

One of the greatest short falls in the modern church today is the reduction and really the intentional withholding of much of scripture. This would be hard for many to believe but it is very true. If the church is a denominational church it has to conform to what the denominations beliefs are which means many things in scripture cannot be taught. If the independent church has a strict set of doctrinal positions again they are confined to those things and need to maneuver carefully around opposing teachings.

It is my opinion the best way to teach through scripture is verses by verse carefully explaining everything that God has laid out for us and not picking and choosing what you want to teach on and what you don't. Of course this does take a greater understanding insuring that every piece of scripture is taught in context.

Doing this though provides a deeper understanding of what God has written and then allows us to know what we need to repent from. If a church doesn't teach certain things chances are the congregation will think it is either not important or will just never know that it is important.

The last part of this verse is interested in that Christ says if the Church or individual Christian does not wake up from their laziness and lack of Christian ambition that Christ will come against them. What that means is things will begin to come into your life that creates great distress in order to refine you and motivate you back into His grace.