07-08-12 IMAGE IS EVERYTHING - SARDIS

Rev. 3:1 "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.

Rev. 3:2 '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.

Rev. 3:3 'So remember what you have received and heard; and keep it, and repent. Therefore if you do not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come to you.

Rev. 3:4 '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.

Rev. 3:5 ' He who overcomes will 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.

Rev. 3:6 ' He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.'

Our study of the last book in the Bible,

the book of Revelation,

has brought us to the first 6 verses

of Revelation chapter 3.

These 6 verses were written to

the 5^th of the 7 churches that Christ specifically addressed

in Revelation 2 and 3,

the church at Sardis.

Sardis was a wealthy city.

It’s affluence was generated by

its prosperous industries in textiles, dyes, and jewelry.

It was also a deeply pagan city,

with prominent religious cults

that promoted a kind of worship

that involved orgies

and sexual immorality

as a regular part of their religious routine.

It was not an easy place

in which to be a Christian,

and it was certainly not an easy past

from which to find

God’s path to freedom.

And it may have been

those same type of thoughts

that brought this church

to the place it was at

when Christ made these comments to it

at the end of the 1^st century.

This is the first letter or message

in which Christ does not begin

with a word of encouragement

or affirmation

or praise.

He says simply, “I know your deeds, that you have a name that you are alive, but you are dead.”

This church at Sardis

could have been among the Lord’s

greatest trophies of His grace,

a place that proclaimed

the redemptive power of God

as few other churches could have done.

But they had allowed compromise,

rationalization,

and drift to dictate their future.

It is clear from the Lord’s opening comments

that they had chosen to invest

their efforts,

their energy,

and their emotions

into building an external image

rather than establishing

an inner strength and stability in Christ.

I know your deeds, that you have a name that you are alive...

They had kept up the external image.

They made sure they looked good

to the other churches around them.

They looked prosperous,

and successful,

and full of all sorts of programs

and projects...

...but you are dead.

At any given time

every one of us has

what I’m going to call a “focal point” in our Christianity.

That “focal point”

will determine everything else that results from our Christian experience.

This church at Sardis

had selected a focal point

of creating and maintaining

a good external image.

That was the center of their thinking,

the heart of their Christian life.

That focal point

then wrote the script

for everything else they did.

It determined what type of things

they talked about between themselves.

It determined what topics

were acceptable

and unacceptable in the life of the church.

It determined what they prayed about

and what they didn’t.

It determined how they handled their money,

both personally and as a church.

Each of us here this morning

have a focal point to our faith, as well.

Sometimes our focal point is known to us consciously.

I believe I know what mine is

at this point in my Christian life.

Sometimes it’s easy to recognize

if we just ask ourselves the right questions.

Sometimes our focal point

is of such a nature

that we cannot see it ourselves

and we need someone else

to point it out to us.

For some of you

your focal point right now

is a desperate longing to find peace with God.

Most of all

you just want to know what it is

to really experience

a point of peace and rest with your Creator.

For some of you

your current focal point concerns

finding deliverance

from some form of bondage

that dominates your life.

It may be physical pain,

it may be emotional pain,

it may be finding freedom from some

physical or emotional addiction -

alcohol,

drug use,

sexual perversion,

depression,

fear, anxiety...

As you sit here this morning listening to me

two questions keep going through your mind -

“Does this guy understand? And Does he have any answers?”

For some of you

the focal point of your Christian life

may parallel that of the church at Sardis -

your chief concern is not who you are

or how you’re doing,

but rather how you look to others.

What do they think about you?

How is your image in their eyes?

If I were to ask you what your focal point is,

you would ask yourself, “What answer would impress him?

What answer would make me look good in his eyes?”

And then you would probably respond

by saying something like,

“I just want to be faithful to my Lord.”

or “I just want to be of value to others

in any way I can.”

or, “I just want to let God live through me

in any way He chooses to.”

But you would say those things

not because your deepest longing

really is to be faithful,

or to reach out to others,

or to allow God to express Himself through you,

but rather because you think

those answers would make you

look good to me.

For some, your focal point

is figuring out how you can use God

and the people of God

to get something you want.

Maybe its money.

Maybe it’s a respectable image.

Maybe its just the belief that you’re handling this “God thing” OK

so that you can be sure He’s there

in case you get into a tight spot

and need to call on Him.

The potential points of focus

in our relationship with our Creator

are endless.

As I have grown and developed

I have seen my own point of focus

change several times throughout my Christian life.

I believe Peter even prescribes

a number of healthy points of focus

in that passage we have spent so much time with in the past

in II Peter 1:5-7 where he talks about adding to our faith...

moral excellence,

knowledge,

self-control,

perseverance,

godliness,

brotherly kindness,

and love.

My point with all of this

is that the point of focus we have selected

will determine whatever grows out of our Christian experience at any given time,

because that point of focus

will determine where we invest

our efforts and creative and emotional energies.

When Christ spoke to the church at Sardis

He began His comments

by pinpointing the heart of their problem:

for them image was everything.

I know your deeds, that you have a name that you are alive...

This was the same poison

that ran through the veins

of the Pharisees and Sadducees

in the gospels.

It was a poison that had to be removed -

Rev. 3:2 '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.

Rev. 3:3 'So remember what you have received and heard; and keep it, and repent. Therefore if you do not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come to you.

As I read the Lord’s comments to Sardis

it also occurred to me

how differently we view local churches

from the way Christ views them.

We as a society,

and I think even within the Christian community,

tend to view just the existence of a church as a good thing.

If we move into a community

and notice several churches in the area

we look at that as a plus.

But our Lord looks at these local churches

from a completely different perspective.

His whole focus

is on what’s happening within those churches.

And repeatedly throughout these letters

He tells them that,

unless they once again return

to the purpose for which He established them,

He will remove them altogether.

In other words, Christian facade,

Christian image

is of no value to the King.

From His perspective

it is better to have nothing in a community

than to have something

that claims to be Christian in name

but that is not operating

under the headship,

authority,

and daily leadership of Christ.

You see, Christ came to present Himself

as the great alternative

to everything this world has to offer.

But when the statement of our lives

either personally

or corporately

ceases to reflect anything different

than what is happening in the world around us,

we become the greatest

and most destructive lie there is.

The Lord’s statement that He would,

...come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come to you...”

was not a threat of judgement,

it was an action designed to preserve hope for the human race.

There is no desperation,

no helplessness and emptiness more real

than that which a person experiences

when they come to what they believe to be the truth

and discover that

what they have come to

is just a Christian-coated version

of the same emptiness

and confusion they came out of.

Our study of the Lord’s comments

to these seven churches

has had a far more profound effect on me personally

than I had ever anticipated.

I think some of you

have probably seen that effect

in my teaching.

I think some of you

have come away from some of our mornings together

saying to yourself,

“I don’t know this Larry.

I’ve never heard him teach like this before.”

If I were to try to put it into words,

I would say that,

as a result of what I have seen in our Lord’s comments to these churches

I have realized as never before

how much we matter to Him,

and how much what we do

and how we live

affects what He is seeking to accomplish

in our world right now.

We cannot change ourselves.

We cannot transform our lives for Him.

But the heart of the true message of the Grace of God

is that our union with Him

and the presence of His Spirit within our lives brings about a healing

and a transformation at the deepest level of our being.

It is a transformation

that begins at the heart level,

but a transformation that,

if it follows the pattern God intends,

will gradually infiltrate every aspect of our lives.

The great dividing line between religion

and the true Christian faith

is the change true faith brings about

in the way we live.

Paul created a special phrase for this change

when he wrote his letter to the church at Rome.

In that letter he talked about,

Rom. 1:4-5

...Jesus Christ our Lord,

through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles for His name's sake...

The obedience of faith.

He is talking about

changes that take place in us

not because we cower in fear at His wrath,

but rather because, for the first time in our lives,

our faith in Christ has allowed us

to know His love in a way

that gives us a longing to please Him.

There are all sorts of things

that have the ability to cloud

and corrupt that vision of Him -

satanic lies that cause us to doubt Him,

powerful sin patterns from our past life

that continue to war against us -

but the heart of these 7 messages

given by Christ to these churches

is the strong affirmation that

this battle for true, healthy life in Christ

matters more than anything else in our lives.

It matters more than everything else in our lives.

And even with this church at Sardis,

that had so blatantly sold out its calling,

our Lord concludes His comments

with words of affirmation

and encouragement

to the few within the church

who had remained faithful.

Rev. 3:4 '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.

Rev. 3:5 ' He who overcomes will 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.

Rev. 3:6 ' He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.'

One of the things about that passage

that screams out at me

is something I mentioned last week

in the context of Christ’s comments

to the church at Thyatira.

Do you remember in that passage

where Christ said,

Rev. 2:26 ' He who overcomes, and he who keeps My deeds until the end, to him I will give authority over the nations;

Rev. 2:27 and he shall rule them with a rod of iron, as the vessels of the potter are broken to pieces, as I also have received authority from My Father;

In that passage

Christ took a prophetic promise

made about HIM

and He applied it to us.

In Psalm 2:4-9 it says:

Ps. 2:4 He who sits in the heavens laughs, The Lord scoffs at them.

Ps. 2:5 Then He will speak to them in His anger And terrify them in His fury, saying,

Ps. 2:6 "But as for Me, I have installed My King Upon Zion, My holy mountain."

Ps. 2:7 "I will surely tell of the decree of the Lord: He said to Me, 'You are My Son, Today I have begotten You.

Ps. 2:8 'Ask of Me, and I will surely give the nations as Your inheritance, And the very ends of the earth as Your possession.

Ps. 2:9 'You shall break them with a rod of iron, You shall shatter them like earthenware.'"

But then, here in Revelation,

Christ allows us to share in that prophecy,

placing the rod of iron in our hands as well.

The same type of thing happens

here in Christ’s comments to the faithful ones at Sardis

when He uses that phrase they are worthy.

This is not man saying to God, “You are worthy”,

it is God saying to His people,

“You, my child, are worthy,

worthy to walk with Me in white...”

Why? Because we lived flawlessly?

No! For there is none righteous in action but God Himself.

But worthy because we have allowed Him

to set the agenda for our lives,

choosing the battles we fight,

and trusting Him to show us

how those battles can be won.

In the terms I’ve used today,

allowing Him to determine our focal point

one day at a time.

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.

Rev. 3:6 ' He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.'