DEAD IN THE WATER
Revelation 3.1-6
S: Carnality
C: Relationship with God
Th: God Speaks to the Church
Pr: REPUTATION AND REALITY ARE NOT OFTEN EQUALS.
CV: We will passionately pursue full devotion to Jesus Christ.
I. THE CORRESPONDENT
II. THE CHURCH
III. THE COMMENDATION
IV. THE CONCERN
V. THE COMMAND
VI. THE COUNSEL
PA: How is the change to be observed?
• Refuse to rely on the past for your future.
• Fight for life!
Version: ESV
RMBC 22 February 09 AM
INTRODUCTION:
ILL: Church (H)
I once heard about a church that was so dead, that when a member happened to die during the worship service – the paramedics actually carried out five people before they finally got the right one.
Seriously, though, experts that study the life of the church tell us there are four stages
One way to classify them is like this:
The first stage is…
Movement
This is the beginning stage of most churches.
It usually begins with one or two purpose-driven people, who then gather a small, intimate group of believers.
At this stage, people are very committed.
They throw their whole life into the ministry.
They believe in what they are doing.
They are building God’s kingdom.
Movement then transitions to…
Magnificence
Attendance picks up.
The ministry attains critical mass.
Now, because of their size, they can begin to do things they could only dream about before.
They begin to hire out more positions.
They still have the vision and a dream, and the church family is seeing it fulfilled.
If they are not careful though…
If somewhere along the line they become satisfied in their successes…
Their intensity will begin to diminish.
And magnificence will transition to…
Monument
At this stage, the church talks more about their past than their future.
Instead of moving forward, they work to maintain their past reputation.
They do things because that’s the way they’ve always done them.
At this stage, the church is often cursed by power struggles and many talk about the church as “my church” and “our church” as opposed to the “new” people that have only been there for 20 years or less.
In reality, the church is no longer moving.
Instead, it is stationary.
It is stable.
It is a monument, soon to be a…
Mausoleum
This is the dead church.
People have drifted away or died.
Attendance levels drop, and new people (when they show up) are suspect because the people that are left fear being taken over.
OUR STUDY:
We come to the church in Sardis today as we continue our series, “God Speaks to the Church.”
(1) 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. 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. (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. (4) Yet you have still a few names in Sardis, people who have not soiled their garments, and they will walk with me in white, for they are worthy. (5) The one who conquers will be clothed thus in white garments, and I will never blot his name out of the book of life. 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.”
I. THE CORRESPONDENT
We have two descriptions about Jesus to which we are not accustomed – seven spirits and seven stars.
But through these two descriptions…
Jesus reminds them that He is in control.
The seven spirits communicate the perfection of the Holy Spirit.
He is a Helper.
He is a Comforter.
He provides strength in time of trouble.
But there is more…
He also convicts of sin.
Through the Spirit, Jesus is able to see perceptively and acutely into our lives.
He knows where we need correction.
The seven stars represent the seven churches.
And Jesus is communicating that they are in His hands.
He is the Lord.
He is the head of the church.
He is the One who is in control.
II. THE CHURCH
Sardis is thirty miles to the east of Thyatira.
This city existed at the intersection of five major highways of the ancient world.
It was once the capital of the Lydian kingdom, which had boasted the fabulously rich King Croesus.
It is here that the first gold and silver coins were minted.
And it is also here that wool-dyeing was invented.
In the second half of the first century, Sardis was prosperous, primarily because of its trade and its wool-dyeing industry.
Sardis was situated at the foot of Mt. Tmolus.
Excavations of the city have unearthed a Roman theatre, stadium, and a large but unfinished temple to Artemis, the fertility goddess and the patron deity of the city.
The picture here is of that temple to Artemis.
Sardis had been quite the fortress.
Sardis backed up to Mt. Tmolus which acted as a natural barrier.
Twice though, Sardis was surprised and humiliated by military defeat because they felt that the natural barrier left their city impregnable.
Not so.
Though Sardis was a difficult place to overtake, Cyrus of the Persian Empire and Antiochus of the Grecian Empire were able to take the city via that natural barrier.
The inhabitants of Sardis hadn’t been watching for the enemy.
They left their borders insecure.
They hadn’t been doing the things that it takes to stay vibrant and alive.
Funny thing about that…
Those last few sentences describe the church in Sardis as well.
The church hadn’t been watching for the enemy.
The church had left their borders insecure.
The church hadn’t been doing the things that it takes to stay vibrant and alive.
II. THE CONCERN
ILL Organization (H)
A German soldier was wounded. He was told to go to the military hospital for treatment. When he arrived at a large and imposing building, he saw two doors, one marked, "For the slightly wounded" and the other, "For the seriously wounded."
He entered through the first door and found himself going down a long hall. At the end of it were two more doors, one marked "For officers" and the other "For non-officers." He entered through the latter and found himself going down another long hall.
At the end of it were two more doors, one marked, "For party members" the other, "For non-party members." He took the second door, and when he opened it, he found himself out on the street.
When the soldier returned home, his mother asked him, "How did things go at the hospital?"
"Well, Mother" he replied, "to tell the truth, the people there didn’t do anything for me, but you ought to see the tremendous organization they have!"
Many churches have a superb organization.
Their people are busy.
But unless the Spirit of God is free to work through them, the church’s ministry is earthy, not heavenly.
The church at Sardis was organized, but dead.
For, in their case…
Reputation and reality were far apart.
The church in Sardis had a reputation of being alive, but it was a reputation it no longer deserved.
For Jesus says, “When I look at you, I see dead people.”
This church had already had its “hey day.”
It was a time that the ministry was cooking.
Now it appears that even though that booming period had probably long since passed, Sardis’ reputation of being a live church still lingered on in some hearts and minds.
Jesus however says to those holding on to that past reputation, “You have a reputation for being alive but the reality is that for the most part the light’s gone out of your church and your church is dead.”
What causes a church to go dead like that?
Sin.
Strife.
Immorality.
False doctrine.
Selfishness.
Complacency.
A lack of love.
IV. THE COMMENDATION
But…
There were a few vital signs.
There were some that were worthy of wearing white.
White is the symbol of purity.
Any purity one has comes from the salvation that is provided in and through Jesus.
Jesus uses the opposite to get their attention.
He talks about soiled clothes to a city whose industry is centered around clothing.
The idea of soiled here is one of being stained, smeared or polluted.
And when we try to do things on our own efforts, God tells us it is nothing better than filthy rags.
But for those that were wholly dependent on Jesus, there was hope.
They could make a difference.
So here is…
V. THE COMMAND
It was back to basics.
They were to keep working.
There was still hope for Sardis.
The church was on life support, but it was not over until it was over.
They were to keep in the Word, and repent as needed.
Together, they just might wake up those who still had a trace of spiritual life in them.
ILL Personal
During the first decade of my life, the church my parents attended belonged to what we call a mainline denomination. It was during these years they asked my dad to be a Sunday School teacher. When he accepted this responsibility, he dived into studying the Bible with great fervor. He was really enjoying it. And he was finding something else out in the process. He actually believed what he was studying. It was during this time that his relationship with God began.
What my dad soon discovered, however, was that most of those who were in leadership of this church had very little interest in spiritual things. This was a church with a reputation for good, but very little life existed in it. They had no mission. They had no purpose. All they had was a reputation.
So what will keep a church going?
Only one thing keeps you going.
It’s seeing people come to know Jesus!
This is what was so great about the Super Bowl party.
We saw new birth.
We saw new faith.
We saw people commit their lives into deeper relationship with Him.
This is what keeps any church from being dead.
It’s what we are designed for.
It’s what we are destined for.
Christianity isn’t designed for a sedentary, settled context.
VI. THE COUNSEL
Our assignment is to…
Be an overcomer.
You will note that the church in Sardis does not face any persecution.
Why is that?
Well, why would Satan bother to persecute a dead church?
If it is not making a difference in the world, why interfere?
This is a church that needs to wake up.
This is no time to lounge around in spiritual pajamas.
This is war.
This is time to make sure your name was written in the book of life.
God won’t take it away when we are not ashamed of Him.
CHALLENGE:
So how does this apply to Randall?
Remember, it is no help to us if we don’t examine our own spiritual condition, both as individuals and as a church.
For if Jesus was addressing Randall, what do you think He would say?
One of our core values here at Randall is to…
Passionately pursue full devotion to Christ.
You see, it is our goal to be a church that is pursuing full devotion to Jesus.
We want to be what Jesus wants us to be.
We want to be followers of Jesus.
We want to be like Jesus.
We want to men of God – women of God – and nothing else matters.
So, note this…
Whenever we are not about Jesus, we risk becoming like the church in Sardis.
What we must learn from the church in Sardis church is this…
Refuse to rely on the past for your future.
We have spoken about our relationship to the past before.
It is good that we recognize and celebrate our past.
Randall has had many fruitful years.
But we have run into the problem that many successful churches have had.
We get stuck.
We get in a rut.
And we start misinterpreting what made us successful in the first place.
We think it is an organizational structure.
We think it is a certain ministry.
We think it is a certain kind of pastor.
We think it is a certain kind of music.
Does any of this sound familiar?
But it is not any of these things that make a church successful.
What makes a church successful is not so much what you do, but who you are.
Ultimately, it is about passionately pursuing full devotion to Jesus.
You see…
We can ill afford to be alive organizationally and dead spiritually.
We must not be caught dead in the water.
You will see dead fish floating with the flow of the water, but you have never seen a dead fish swimming against it.
Fish are designed to swim against the current, not go with it.
And so are we.
Where our hope lies as a church is to have an honest awareness that something is wrong.
Last July, the leaders had a spiritual health retreat and from that we developed a Prayer Action Plan.
The Prayer Action Plan describes areas where we determined that there are some longtime sins in our midst that we must confront.
We must confront.
We must confess.
We must repent.
The leaders of the church have been praying through it because we know that these things must change.
We know we must…
…renounce our pride
…renounce stubbornness
…renounce our oppositional spirit
…renounce sins of the tongue
…renounce political behavior
…renounce passive leadership behavior
…renounce our inward focus.
ILL Warning (S)
On February 26, 1993, a powerful bomb exploded in the underground parking garage of the World Trade Center in New York City, killing six people and injuring more than a thousand. It sparked an aggressive investigation with many arrests. But few law enforcement authorities recognized it as part of an international terrorist plot. When the Trade Center towers were destroyed by terrorists in 2001, police commissioner Raymond Kelly looked back on the first attack and said, "It should have been a wake-up call for America."
I believe God is gracing us with a “wake-up call.”
And we need to…
Fight for life !
We need to fight for the life of Randall.
He is speaking to us, and He wants us to fight for the life of Randall.
It starts with you and me.
It starts with what we will do with the time God has given us.
We have been given a tremendously high calling that takes courage, integrity, and commitment.
We can passionately pursue Jesus.
The question is…
Is this will be what I will do with the time God has given me?
For Further Study: Judges 16.19-20; Isaiah 64.6; Matthew 10.32, 24.43-44; Luke 10.20; John 6.63, 10.3, 16.7-11; Romans 13.11-14; Ephesians 1.22-23, 2.10, 5.13-14; I Thessalonians 5.2; II Peter 3.10
BENEDICTION:
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.
RESOURCES:
SermonCentral:
Blankenship, Terry Sardis: The Living Corpse
Davidson, Dennis The Content Church
Drake, James Emergency Triage
Fuller, Tom Waking the Dead
Huffman, Ewen The Message to the Church at Sardis
McCormick, Darren I See Dead People…
Scudder, David Standing Alone for Christ
Strite, Jeff The Comatose Congregation
Zimmerman, David Active, but not Alive
Other:
Jeremiah, David, and Carole C. Carlson. Escape the Coming Night. Dallas: Word Publishing, 1990.
Keener, Craig S. The Ivp Bible Background Commentary: New Testament. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1993.
MacArthur, John, Jr. Revelation 1-11. The Macarthur New Testament Commentary. Chicago: Moody Press, 1999.
Mounce, Robert H. The Book of Revelation. The New International Commentary on the New Testament, ed. F. F. Bruce. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1977.
Stern, David H. The Jewish New Testament Commentary. Clarksville, MD: Jewish New Testament Publications, Inc., 1992.
Wiersbe, Warren W. The Bible Exposition Commentary: New Testament. Colorado Springs: ChariotVictor Publishing, 1989.
