In this article, we’ll be looking at the fifth church, the church at Sardis – “The Dead Church.”
Introduction
The fifth message of Christ was addressed to the church in Sardis, a small town located about 20 miles southeast of Thyatira.
The city of Sardis was very wealthy, and actually existed at two locations. The first city was built on a mountain. When its population outgrew that spot, a newer section had been built in the valley below.
The newer section of the city hosted a theater, a stadium, and a huge temple to the goddess Artemis that had been started, but never finished.
The older city, on the mountain, had an acropolis and had become an emergency refuge for the city's inhabitants when they were under attack.
Sardis was also known for its impressive cemetery with hundreds of burial mounds.
It had been one of the most powerful cities in the ancient world due to heavy trade among the Aegean islands.
Gold and silver coins were first minted at Sardis. Sardis also claimed to have discovered the art of dyeing wool.
In A.D.17, a devastating earthquake destroyed the city.
The original city had been virtually unconquerable because of the natural rock walls that were nearly vertical on three sides.
Sardis had only been conquered twice in its history, although it had been attacked several times because of its strategic location.
The city was first defeated by the Persian general Cyrus in the sixth century B.C. History tells us that one of the Persian soldiers had observed a soldier from Sardis making his way up the cliffs. The people of Sardis thought they were safe in the upper city on the mountain, but Cyrus's soldiers climbed the cliffs and found their way into the city.
After Cyrus's victory, Sardis became the capital of Persia (modern day Iran).
Later, in the third century B.C., the city was conquered again in the same way by Antiochus the Great. A few of the soldiers climbed the mountain, entered the city, and opened the gates to the invading army.
Sardis had declined in its power and stature by the time of the Roman Empire. They had requested the honor of building a temple to Caesar, but they were refused, and the honor went to Smyrna instead.
The wealth of the city eventually led to moral decay. The city had become lazy; its past splendor was only a fading memory.
Christ had no words of commendation for this church.
It doesn’t appear to have been troubled by heresy from within or persecution from without. Yet, this church had compromised with its pagan surroundings.
Christ's words to the church paralleled the city's history -- "you have a reputation for being alive -- but you are dead."
With that brief introduction, let’s begin our look at Revelation 3: 1-6
v.1, “And to the angel of the church in Sardis write: He who has the seven spirits of God, and the seven stars, says this: ‘I know your deeds, that you have a name that you are alive, but you are dead”:
- “He who has the seven spirits of God and the seven stars."
o We saw this back in chapter 1:16
o The "sevenfold Spirit of God" is another name for the Holy Spirit.
o The “seven stars” are the seven messengers of the churches.
- Jesus says, "I know your deeds."
o As in the case of the other churches, the actions and testimony of the church in Sardis is an open book to the Lord; nothing is hidden from Him.
- That which is invisible to man is perfectly seen by Christ, and He tells what He sees in the closing part of v.1 in a word of sharp condemnation.
o Knowing the church's deeds, Jesus had nothing good to say to them.
o The members may have thought they were a living and active, but according to Christ, they were spiritually dead.
- From the Divine standpoint, it is considered as a church that had only a name of being alive and was dead as far as spiritual life and power were concerned:
o This description of the church at Sardis is one to be considered by the modern church.
o Many are full of activities and programs, but there is little that speaks of Christ or spiritual life and power.
- Just like the city, the church in Sardis was trying to live in its past glory:
o Do churches ever do that, live on past glory?
o You know what I mean:
Ø “Remember when we were the biggest church in the area? Those were the days!”
Ø “We’ve always done it that way! Why should we change?”
Ø “We had so many people coming to receive Jesus. We were great back them.”
Ø Sound familiar to anyone?
o The church at Sardis had compromised with the surrounding society to the point that they had become lazy.
o They were as good as asleep, so Jesus told them to “wake up” and “repent,” which means that they needed to change your minds about living in the past, stop reminiscing and turn back to Him.
v.2, “Wake up, and strengthen the things that remain, which were about to die; for I have not found your deeds completed in the sight of my God”:
- The words "wake up" literally mean, be watchful; pay close attention.
- Remember, the city had been conquered twice because the watchman on the walls had not seen the enemy climbing the cliffs:
o Thinking that they were unconquerable on the mountaintop led to a deadly complacency and a deadly spiritual sleepiness.
o What happened in the city was happening to the church, and the church needed to wake up.
o Are there times in our lives when God needs to wake us up?
o Can we get too comfortable? Too sure of ourselves? Too impressed with ourselves? Too sure that we’re the best? There’s some food for thought.
- The situation was not completely hopeless, however, if they caught themselves in time, they could strengthen what remained even though it “was about to die.”
- Christ knew all their deeds and condemned them as "not . . . . complete in the sight of my God":
o The church may have looked impressive from the outside, but the church's deeds were incomplete.
o There was no spiritual motivation or power behind them.
o In the letters to the other churches, Christ commended deeds of love, faithfulness, obedience, and perseverance.
o Sardis, however, had none of these qualities.
o Think about that for a minute: Jesus could find nothing to commend these people for. How tragic.
- When Christ gave the message to the believers in Sardis, He rebuked them because they were not living up to their reputation:
o Their reputation had been established years earlier.
o But a church can’t live in the past. It must keep actively doing the things that the Lord calls them to do.
o Some people live off of the glory of the past, always reminiscing, always looking back, never living for the here and now.
o If you’re living in the past, then you’re dying in the present.
v.3, “Remember, therefore, what you have received and heard; and keep it, and repent. If therefore you will not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come upon you.”
- There are several steps mentioned here in order to bring about restoration:
o Not only are they exhorted to be watchful and strengthen the things which remain in v.2, here, they are warned, first of all, to remember the truth that they had received and heard, and to hold fast to it.
o The word "remember" doesn’t mean to recall something from the past:
Ø It’s a command to keep in the forefront of their attention their rich spiritual heritage of the past as a motivating force in their restoration.
o Secondly, they need to “keep” what they had heard and received:
Ø The idea here is to “keep on keeping.” This is a call to devote serious attention to rebuilding what was left over from their earlier days of fruitfulness.
o They needed to keep on giving earnest attention to their need to strengthen what remained in their spiritual lives.
o The third step on the road to spiritual recovery for this church is to "repent." This step calls for a quick and decisive change of thought and behavior:
Ø That’s what repentance is: first, there is a change of the mind. That change of mind then leads to a change of behavior.
o To summarize, then, the Sardians needed to:
Ø #1- Remember how they had received and heard the gospel.
Ø #2 - Keep giving careful attention to their need to strengthen what remained of their spiritual lives.
Ø #3 - To repent, immediately, confess and turn away from their spiritual laziness.
- If they refused to heed the warning, Christ promises that He will come upon them “as a thief,” meaning:
o That He will come upon them unexpectedly, with devastating suddenness and bring judgment.
o The same symbolism is used at the second coming of the Lord, but that’s not what this is referring to.
o The judgment upon the church in Sardis is going to be just as unexpected, sudden, and permanent as that which is related to the second coming of Christ.
v.4, “But you have a few people in Sardis who have not soiled their garments; and they will walk with Me in white; for they are worthy.”
- “but” is the Greek word, alla. This is a strong note of contrast, an emphatic “BUT.”
- Not every believer in Sardis was being condemned for spiritual laziness and compromise with the world.
- Christ pointed out that some had not “soiled their garments.”
o These believers had not soiled the purity of the Christian life by falling into sinful practices.
o These believers were being faithful to the Lord and His Word.
o It must have been encouraging to those few who had been attempting to live for Christ in this dead church, that Christ was commending them as worthy of His name.
o Here’s a tough question: Are we living a life that is worthy of His name?
- Jesus says, "they will walk with me in white":
o Because of their refusal to defile themselves while under great cultural pressure, Christ will replace their humanly preserved, clean garments with those that are white by Divine standards.
o Because of the earlier contrast between soiled garments of sinful church members and unsoiled garments a faithful Christians, it’s pretty clear that the whiteness of these new garments stands for holiness and purity.
o Such garments are reserved for Christ, unfallen angels, the two men at Christ's ascension, and the glorified Church.
o White symbolizes purity.
- Anticipation of wearing such garments and enjoying the personal companionship of Christ provides great incentive for continued faithfulness for the few in Sardis that were standing against the tide of apathy that had gripped the majority in this church.
v.5, “He who overcomes shall thus be clothed in white garments; and I will not erase his name from the book of life, and I will confess his name before my Father, and before His angels.”
- "he who overcomes" – these are the ones who have not soiled their garments with cultural compromising and self-righteousness.
- To those individuals, in the Sardis church who overcome, the promise is given that they “shall be clothed in white garments.”
- White apparel in the Scriptures often denotes: celebration, victory, purity or the heavenly state.
- The thought seems to be that the righteousness of the saints, bestowed in the form of a garment, is a symbol of their acceptability to God and the Divine recognition of their office and ministry as priests of God.
- They have not defiled their garments as others have done in Sardis, and now they are promised, that in the future, they will have the heavenly white garment and will walk with Christ, because they are judged as "worthy" to do so.
- Jesus goes on to say, "I will not erase their names from the book of life."
- This verse has troubled Bible scholars in view of other promises of Scripture, which seem to indicate that a person who has once received Jesus Christ as Savior is forever secure and his salvation.
- Some believe that this verse opens the door for a true believer to be able to lose his salvation:
o But to make the continuance of our salvation depend upon works is a huge failure to understand that salvation is by God's grace alone, through our faith alone, in Jesus Christ alone.
o If salvation depended upon the believer's perseverance or works, then no name would've been written in there in the first place.
- Perhaps the best explanation of this is to consider the Book of Life not as the role of those who are saved, but rather a list of those for whom Christ died, that is, all humanity, who have possessed physical life:
o As they come to maturity and are faced with the responsibility of accepting or rejecting Christ, their names are blotted out if they failed to believe and receive Jesus Christ as Savior:
Ø Whereas, those who do accept Christ as Savior, are confirmed in their position in the Book of Life, and their names are confessed before the Father and the heavenly angels.
o Without getting too bogged down in the details and the debates, we can say that the implication of the passage is that those who put their trust in Christ and thus overcome by faith, have the privilege of being recognized as saints of God throughout eternity, even though they come from such a church in Sardis, where the spiritual testimony was at a very low point and much was offensive to the Lord.
o Its best to view these words of Jesus not as a threat, as some do. This is a promise to those ever remain true to Him, regardless of what’s happening all around the in society.
o So, Christ promises a threefold reward for the faithful:
Ø He affirms that they will “be clothed in white.”
Ø He affirms that He "will never erase their names from the Book Life."
Ø He affirms that He "will announce before my Father and His angels that they’re mine.”
v.6, “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”
- Again, for those who are hearing Jesus’ words, pay attention!
- Listen and heed what the Spirit is saying to the church.
- Don’t compromise with the world’s values or systems. Stay true to Christ and His Word.
- We’re called to be different, unique, set apart for Jesus and His Father, our Father.
- Don’t live in the past, as some churches and individuals do:
o Keep striving to live for Christ.
o Stay faithful to the Lord even if many around you are joining hands with the world’s system or false teaching/teachers.
- Lastly, there will be a reward for the faithful:
o We will be clothed in white.
o We are secure in Christ.
o Jesus will openly announce us before His Father and the angels of heaven.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, stay faithful to Him and His Word!
By His Grace,
Gary T. Dromi, Ph.D., D. Min.
