Sardis - The Flat-Lined Church Pt. 1

Introduction

Today, we continue our studies concerning the 7 churches in Asia minor found here in revelation chapters 2 and 3.

So far, we have looked at the church in Ephesus which was a passionless church, the church in Smyrna which was a persecuted church, the church in Pergamos which was a politically correct church, and last Sunday we looked at the church in Thyatira which was a polluted church.

Today, we are going to look at Sardis, which didn't have a pulse, they were dead…They were the flat lined church.

In the emergency room when the monitor is flat-lined it means that there is no reading or signs of life. There is no heartbeat and no pulse, no brain activity and no breathing from the lungs. Life has gone out of the body.

It is easy to detect when a person is dead, but it is not so easy to detect when a church is dead! What is a dead church?

Steven J. Lawson said, concerning a dead church, that “It’s a congregation of corpses with undertakers for ushers, embalmers for elders, and morticians for ministers. Their pastor graduated from a theological cemetery. Their choir director is the local coroner. They sing “Embalmed in Gilead” and “Amazing Grave, How Sweet the Ground.” You might describe their worship as stiff. At the Rapture, they’ll be the first churches taken up because the Bible says, ‘The dead in Christ shall rise first.’ They drive to church in one long line with their headlights on. Whenever someone joins their membership, the church office immediately notifies the next of kin. Each week they put an ad in the obituaries. The church van is a black hearse and the church sign is a tombstone. Their motto is, ‘Many are cold and a few are frozen."

Sardis seemed to be very much alive but it was as dead as a doornail. Its appearance was only artificial. This active church was no more than an animated corpse.

The Great Physician took the pulse of this church and found no heartbeat, no signs of life! Death can come to any congregation that fails to love and serve the Lord Jesus.

May we examine ourselves and ask the Great Physician to do some resurrection work in our midst. The Great Physician does a spiritual autopsy on the church in Sardis.

An autopsy an examination of a corpse to discover the cause of death.

Sardis was a Flat lined church. It was dead and the members didn’t even know it. Because they were ignorant, Jesus wrote them a letter to inform them of their condition.

Let's look first of all at:

The Assembly

Revelation 3:1 (KJV 1900)

1 And unto the angel of the church in Sardis write...

Sardis was a relatively small city, but it was rich and strong, situated on what was thought to be an inaccessible hill, and protected by what was considered to be an impregnable fortress. Its people were proud, arrogant, overconfident. But the city had one unobserved, unguarded weak point, a small crack in the rock wall that surrounded it. One night, in an unsuspecting hour, the enemy came as a thief in the night, and Sardis was conquered. Later the city was partially destroyed by an earthquake. By the time John wrote the book of Revelation, Sardis was in decay, experiencing a slow but sure death.

Sardis was one of the oldest cities in Asia Minor. It was situated at the center of five main roads to important places. Travelers often passed through Sardis to get where they were going. The trade brought by the traffic made Sardis a wealthy town. The church was located in an enormously wealthy town. The people in this city were primarily concerned with pleasure and luxury.

The condition of the city was a vivid picture of the spiritual condition of the church in Sardis—proud, but decaying. The church at Sardis was proud, arrogant, overconfident. The enemy had come, and by degrees had silently destroyed the life of this once magnificent church. The church existed in peace. Neither the Jews nor the Gentiles bothered the church at Sardis, because the church at Sardis did not bother them. There was no persecution in Sardis. The church enjoyed great peace. But it was the peace of a cemetery. The church was dead.

Before Christ says anything about the church, He says something about Himself…Let’s look at:

The Author

The Lord Jesus addresses Himself to this church as:

Revelation 3:1 (KJV 1900)

1 ...he that hath the seven Spirits of God, and the seven stars;...

The number seven is the number of completion or fulness. Jesus is the One who has the perfect fullness of the Holy Spirit…This phrase “seven Spirits of God” assures us of the fullness and different ministries of the Holy Spirit. We find a description of them in Isaiah:

Isaiah 11:1–3 KJV 1900

1 And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, And a Branch shall grow out of his roots: 2 And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, The spirit of wisdom and understanding, The spirit of counsel and might, The spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord; 3 And shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord: And he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, Neither reprove after the hearing of his ears:

Whenever sin and failure mark a local assembly, one can be certain the Holy Spirit has not been in command in the hearts of the people. It is through the Holy Spirit we find victory in our Christian life.

Zechariah 4:6 KJV 1900

6 Then he answered and spake unto me, saying, This is the word of the Lord unto Zerubbabel, saying, Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, Saith the Lord of hosts.

This is a reminder to the churches that we are to operate under the awesome power of the Holy Spirit. When the church walks in the power of the flesh, we will surely fail, but when we walk in the power of the Spirit, there will be success. There will be glory and there will be power and life instead of deadness and ineffectiveness!

When the human spirit is in control of the human body, amazing things can be accomplished. For instance, a pianist can sit down at a keyboard; perform thousands of delicate, precise movements that will produce beautiful music. However, let that same pianist suffer some injury that leaves the arms paralyzed, and the mind is no longer in control of those arms, hands and fingers. Then, try as it might, the human spirit cannot will the hands to make music. So too, when the Spirit of God is in control of the members of the church, great things can be accomplished. However, when He is not, paralysis is the result and nothing can be accomplished for God.

The “seven stars” are the Pastors of the churches, we learned that a few weeks back in chapter 1...

Just like the other letters, this one is addressed to the angel or pastor of the church. See, it was his business to tell the church what the Lord had told him.

It is never easy to tell a comfortable congregation what they don’t want to hear. However difficult it may be, the message must be delivered, Jesus is able to revive the dead church. He has the spirit of life and he can cause the angel of the church to preach the gospel with renewed power and fervency.

Jesus the One Who has everything the church needs to succeed. His Spirit has all the power the churches need. His Word has all the direction His churches need.

Jesus seems to be saying, “If you will submit to me, you will find in me all you need to accomplish my mission in this world.”

So, here it is that we see that the author of this letter, and the author of each letter is Jesus Christ…Notice thirdly:

The Admonition

Look at what the Lord says when He begins speaking about the church:

Revelation 3:1 (KJV 1900)

1 ...I know thy works, that thou hast a name that thou livest, and art dead.

Jesus tells them, “I know thy works”. He came to each church we’ve studied as One Who sees all and knows all. Notice He does not commend their works and He does not condemn their works. He merely tells them that He knows everything they are doing.

He knows everything we are doing too! He sees it all, along with the motives that drive us to do what we do.

Hebrews 4:12–13 KJV 1900

12 For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. 13 Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.

He sees us as a whole, and He sees the individual as well. He knows your heart. He knows everything you do and He knows why you do it. That is a sobering thought.

Revelation 3:1 “...I know thy works, that thou hast a name that thou livest, and art dead.”

Jesus didn’t scold them for a lack of effort. They were not lazy but lifeless. They had power to produce but failed to do it. They had no excuse for their lifelessness because they had a limitless Lord. His power was available but they did not appropriate it. Why was their labor without life? Let me give you two possible reasons...

First, their labor may have been without life because it was without faith. James tells us that faith without works is dead. And if faith without works is dead, then works without faith is also dead.

A second explanation for their lifelessness is their emphasis on pleasure. They lived in a place that emphasized pleasurable living and the church may have been caught up in that spirit. Paul told Timothy, “But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth” (1 Timothy 5:6). There are those who are “lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God” (2 Timothy 3:4b).

Some of the severest criticism of Christ came to the church at Sardis. He did not rebuke them so much for what they had done but for what they had failed to do. Their lifelessness was a symptom of their trouble and not the source.

Conclusion

Wow, we’ve just got through the first verse, but we will finish this up tonight at 6…Don’t miss it, when we come back this evening, we will look in depth at the problem, and the prescription that Christ give them.

Vance Havner once commented that ministries often begin with a man who has a vision. That vision is captured by others and becomes a movement. As the movement gains followers and momentum, it becomes a machine. After a while, people forget all about the vision and what was once a movement becomes nothing more than a monument to a man and a glorious past.

Proverbs 29:18 (KJV 1900)

18 Where there is no vision, the people perish...