The Apocalypse - Revelation 3 — Steve Gallagher

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Let me just open up with a word of prayer this morning. Lord, I just want to express my great love for You and my undying appreciation for the book of Revelation, for leading me into it, for giving me such a hunger for it and such an enjoyment from it.

Lord, I thank You for this powerful, powerful sight into that unseen realm and also into the future. Thank You, Lord. And I pray that You will help us this morning, lift me out of myself, Lord, and help me to share what You wish me to share about these three churches that are expressed in chapter three.

Help me today, Lord. Make these things real to all of us, I pray. In Jesus' name, amen. Before I get started, I want to just say something. A couple weeks ago, Melissa made a comment to me, and it was expressing gratitude for the class.

But she said, man, I feel like so much information's flying at me, you know, and I'm just trusting that it's getting in. And I just want to say that don't worry too much about that. More is getting in than you realize.

Immersing Yourself in Revelation's Atmosphere

We're not concerned about details so much as we're concerned about the atmosphere, the spirit, and the general message of this book getting into our hearts, right? It's good to learn these details and all that stuff.

That's good, and, you know, there's value to it. But my point that I'm trying to make is that it's by sitting in the atmosphere of this book, that is what's going to affect you inside. Now, part two to that is this.

Revelation and the Signs of the Times

I just want to mention that I, Kathy and I, watched a couple of clips on YouTube over the weekend. I think they're called 2012 Weird Events, something like that. Something's Going On is another one, I think.

But all it was was just one thing after another, after another, after another, just these little brief clips from news shows about things that have happened just this year. Actually, the one was 20 minutes of just what went on in March and April of 2012.

It just astounded us. You know, we hear about things happening, tornado here, earthquake here, weird sounds here, birds flying out of the sky here, dolphins washing up on shore and somewhere else. Just these weird things that are happening, weird weather patterns that mankind has never seen before.

Well, you just kind of get used to hearing those little stories. You hear one here and there. But to sit for an hour or 20 minutes or whatever and watch one after another, after another, after another, and it hit me like a sledgehammer yesterday.

My God, we really are in the moments right before the end of time. And it just so happened that I was going through Revelation 11 after I had watched this video. And it's not anything in particular about Revelation 11, but the things that are going on later in the book.

But just to watch what is happening right now in our world and then to look at the book of Revelation. Now listen, the book of Revelation is a special book. You have to immerse yourself in the spirit of it, the atmosphere of it, or it doesn't really hit you.

I know there's going to be people, they're going to be too impatient to go through all the messages in this series. Well, let me just skip ahead to the good stuff. You know, that is a waste of time because all that will happen for people who do that is you'll get stuff in your head, but it won't affect your heart.

It won't do anything to prepare you spiritually for when the kinds of events that we watched on that video clip are happening around us every day. You know, and all helter skelter is breaking loose around us.

You better have something in you. When I shared that message a couple weeks ago, Christians are crazy if they don't get the word of God into them. What was really in my heart was more specific. Christians are crazy if they don't get the book of Revelation into them.

That's what was really in my heart, and I didn't want to confine it to that in that message because it's true on the overall sense as well. But I want to encourage all of you, don't just listen to these messages, but get into this book on your own.

For those of you who would like to do other reading, you can go into amazon .com, just type in Revelation Commentary, and pick out a couple of the people that I quote from. Grant Osborne is one, I think Robert Thomas is the other.

Just type their names in. Either one of those commentaries are excellent, and I encourage you to just take the time and immerse yourself in this book of Revelation. One more thing I'll just mention is that the things that are expressed in these seven letters to these churches, Rex Andrews said they're like obstacles that you have to go through before the rest of the book will open up to you, and I absolutely agree with that because they are dealing with spiritual issues that we have got to be right with the Lord.

The Seven Churches as Spiritual Preparation

The different things that Jesus points out in these churches, we've got to make sure that we're right, and at least we're growing in those areas and getting to where we need to be. And it's as we allow God to do that and get that into us that the rest of the book will open up to us in our hearts, okay?

So I just wanted to say that right up front before I went any further in this series. All right, so let's get into Revelation 3. There's a lot of information here, so we're going to fly through it, but don't worry, you know, more is happening for you than you realize.

Sardis: Historical Setting and Gospel Echoes

So let's get started here. Sardis is the first church we're going to look at. Sardis was a city with quite a rich history. It had at one time been the capital of Lydia, which was a country in that region.

And Sardis, the old city, was situated on the top of a plateau 1 ,500 feet above the valley around it. And to get up there, there was just almost like a narrow road. So in other words, the Acropolis there was practically impregnable, and they just did not have to be concerned about invading armies and stuff because it would just, an old lady could defend it practically.

One of the main roads through the region went right by that Acropolis, and it made it a very important place. And I'll get into a little bit more of this later. But anyway, Sardis was located 33 miles south of Thyatira.

One thing I'll mention about this letter to Sardis is that it contains more quotations from the Gospels than any of the other Gospels. For instance, I will confess his name before my father and before his angels.

You can see the same kind of terminology in Matthew 10, 32 and Luke 12, verses 8 and 9. He says here, I will come like a thief. And he says the same thing in Matthew 24, 42 and Luke 12, 39. This word watch, it's different in different translations, but watch, you see that in Matthew 24, 42 and also in Matthew 25, 13, both out of the Olivet Discourse about the end times, but also in 26, 41, he says it, watch and pray for the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak, right?

Blotting out of a name from the book of life, he mentions that in Luke 10, 20. And he who has an ear, which of course is mentioned in all these letters, he used that terminology or something like that in Matthew 11, 15, 13, 9 and 13, 43.

Also in Mark 4, 9 and verse 23, and also in Luke 8, 8 and 14, 35. Okay, so I just want to mention that, that there's some background from things Jesus had said earlier, 60 years earlier, and now he's expressing these things to this church.

All right, let's look at verse 1 here. 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.

Spiritual Life and the Meaning of “Alive”

All right, I'm going to park on this for a few minutes here. This word alive is zeo, Z-A-O, and it's a primary verb in the Greek, and it just means basically to live, you know, at least in secular Greek, that's what it would mean.

But it comes to mean something much more important in scripture, because it's almost always tied in with the life of God, the life that comes forth from God. You know, it's different than other terms.

It's talking about spiritual life, eternal life. Let me give you a couple of examples. John 6, 63, this is Jesus saying, it is the spirit who gives zeo. The flesh profits nothing. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are zeo, life.

And he also said in John 10, 10, the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have zeo and have it abundantly. And then Paul also used it. Paul said in Romans 8, 6, for the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the spirit is zeo and peace.

And in Galatians 6, 8, for the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the spirit will from the spirit reap zeo, eternal life. So you see the contrast in each one of these, the comparison of the flesh life and the spirit life, which brings us into that kind of life in God.

So Sardis is known as a congregation of believers who are full of zeo. That's their reputation. They're known far and wide around the Roman empire, the churches, man, that congregation in Sardis, they're full of the life of God.

But what's Jesus see? He sees something else. He says, but you are dead. See, this was a church that at one time had really walked with God. And out of that life with God came probably many fine outreaches and I won't say programs.

They didn't have programs back then, but things that they were doing to minister to others, to reach out to others, to do deeds of kindness and so on. So that was what they had a name for. Now all that remained was the form.

The activities were continuing on, but the life that had generated those activities at one time was really practically almost non-existent now. Pope and commentaries said they had their reward. People talked about them and gave them credit as having life.

But before God, they were dead. Let us remember that it is as before God, everything is to be estimated. And Johnson said, how does the church die? It may be that they had so made peace with the surrounding society that the offense of the cross had ceased and they were no longer in jeopardy of life or vulnerable to suffering.

Death was a special preoccupation of the Sardinians as witnessed by the impressive necropolis seven miles from the city. What had been a part of the pagan rites had also crept into the church. Okay, now a necropolis basically was an idle temple that, it was all about death.

I was in a Catholic church in Czechoslovakia a few years ago and it was unbelievable. There must have been, I want to say, 10 ,000 bones, human bones. It was skulls stacked up and arm bones and femurs and everything, just all these parts of skeletons and they had lined the walls with it in this church.

That would be a good modern day example of a necropolis. So, in other words, that spirit of death had somehow seeped into this body of believers and was just slowly but surely taking over and taking over and death was creeping across this body of Christ.

Sardis, Worldly Contamination, and the Faithful Remnant

Now before I get on to these next two verses, I'm going to skip ahead to verse four because they have one more thing I want to mention and I'll go back here in a minute. It says here in verse four, "...but you have a few people in Sardis who have not soiled their garments.".

Okay, so now the reason I'm skipping ahead to this is we're talking about what's wrong in this church and this is by implications. If there's a few people who have not soiled their garments, then that means most of them have.

So, what does that mean, soiled their garments? It primarily is referring to the contamination that comes from commingling with the world. That's what it's talking about. So these people in Sardis, the life of God has been ebbing away little by little over time.

Maybe some of the on-fire Christians had died and moved on and others came along that didn't have a walk with the Lord, I don't know, or maybe they all just kind of backslid away. It's very comparable to the Ephesian church except the Ephesian church has some good things about it.

They were doing some things right. Jesus didn't say that they were near death, you know, so the Sardis church is like the Ephesian church except even worse. It had gone even farther down this path and yet there was a remnant of believers there.

Okay, let's go back to verse 2. This is what Jesus says. He gives five imperatives in these next two verses, things to do to turn things around. Wake up, strengthen, remember, keep, and repent. Those are the five things.

Let me just read these verses first. 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. 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. All right, wake up. The Greek term is Gregorio, you know, it's almost like someone shouting it out, Gregorio!

Wake up! And it means to be vigilant and it's spoken in the present continuous tense. Wake up and stay awake. Wake up and be vigilant. Wake up and be diligent and continue to be diligent in the days ahead.

This is a term also that Jesus used and it's such an important end times term. You see it over and over when the Bible is talking about the end times. This word keeps coming up. For instance, Matthew 24, 42, therefore be on the alert for you do not know which day your Lord is coming.

Be on the alert. Be watchful. Be awake. And as I mentioned, Matthew 25, 13, be on the alert then for you do not know the day nor the hour. Mark 13, 37, what I say to you, I say to all, be on the alert.

There again, that's an end times passage. And Peter also in 1 Peter 5, 8, be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. So when he's saying wake up, he's also saying show yourself to be watchful.

Be constantly alert. Wake up and keep watching. Now let me refer this back to the Sardean situation. And this is one of the things I just have not had time, you know, trying to blow through these in two weeks.

I haven't had time to really develop each of these messages. But this is one of the things. Something Jesus is saying has an application with that particular city. And in this case, I just felt like it was worth mentioning.

Remember I said to you that the city of Sardis was up on the top of this plateau and they were safe. And when invading armies would come in, they just would not be able to overcome that fortress because it was so secure.

But they did have a problem. In 549 B .C., the Persian army came. And also in 195 B .C., Antiochus the Great came and they both conquered this city. And I'll tell you why. Is because they had gotten so lax, they imagined that if they just watched this road that leads up to the Acropolis, you know, as long as they just watched that, they don't have to worry about it.

And so they did. They posted a few guards right there. And what they didn't realize is the Persians sent guys climbing up the cliff on the backside during the night and overtook the city that way. It was the same thing happened in both cases.

So here's the case where Jesus is referring back to that. Look back on the history of your city. Look at what happened the last time you got lax and indifferent and apathetic. That's what's going to happen to you again.

I'm going to come as a thief. Make sure you are wide awake and paying attention to what's going on. And like the city of Sardis, you know, which had fallen into disrepair and was no longer the great city it once had been, you know, it's the same thing with the church.

It's gone by the wayside, basically. So he's saying wake up and that is like the main thing he says, but he goes on, strengthen the things that remain. In other words, you're on the verge of dying and you need to be resuscitated.

You are right there. These are the things you need to do. Strengthen those things that you know to do. And you guys know if you start sliding away from the Lord, you know what to do. You know to stop your involvement in worldly activities, to repent of sin, to get into the word of God, to get into prayer.

You know the things to do to turn things around. And that's basically what Jesus is saying here. Then he says, I have not found your deeds completed in the sight of my God. And that terminology is very much a judicial term.

It's like a judge talking to a criminal. The church has been investigated by Jesus and now finds himself under indictment. That's really what he's saying is I've investigated you, really searched out everything about you and I can't find anything that God is pleased with.

That's quite an indictment on a body of believers. Verse three, so remember, that's the same thing Jesus told the Ephesians, right? Remember from where you have fallen and do the deeds what you did at first.

He's basically saying the exact same thing. Remember and keep and obey. It's the same message that he told the Ephesian believers. And of course, repent. Thank God for repentance. We can always repent.

Man, the Lord is just so humble and he's just so willing to forgive if people will only humble themselves and repent. That alone will make me love him forever. He's so willing to let us turn to him in our own good timing when we're ready.

Man, it's just amazing what he is willing to put up with from people. All right, here we are back to verse four, 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.

And I use this passage here about Sardis in a message I did at the conference a few years ago, a word to apostates. I used it in the sense that just like the apostate church where the predominant reality of the church is that it was dead.

But there's a few, there's a remnant who are alive and faithful and awake and awaiting my return. Let me read a couple of quotes. Pulpit commentary says, it is evident from the honorable mention of the few who had not defiled their garments that the rest had.

That is to say they had given in to the world's ways. Hence James speaks of pure religion as being part this, keeping your garments unspotted from the world. The church and the world at Sardis seem to have got along together very well.

It is an ill sign when the church and the world are so happy together. There has been compromise somewhere and it is rarely the world which makes it. And you look around the church today, wouldn't you say that's true?

Grant Osborne says this, they are victorious by remaining pure in a church that has increasingly gone apostate. The reason they can walk in white is due to the fact that they have remained pure and their works are complete.

Praise the Lord. You know, and I can say that about you guys here at Pure Life and others listening over the internet. I know many of you listening over the internet are walking in white with the Lord and the Lord is pleased with you and He would say the same thing about you.

Lastly, the biblical illustrator said, the words garment, robe, and raiment are used in the scriptures to typify character. Character is not determined by a single act, but by habitual conduct. It is a fabric made up of thousands of threads and put together by uncounted stitches.

And I thought that is such a great picture of character. You know, our character isn't formed by just one big decision. Our character is formed by a thousand decisions we make every day. We just get into a flow of life and you end up going in a direction, don't you?

Alright, let's finish this out. Verse 5 and 6. 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.

Philadelphia: Faithfulness Despite Little Strength

He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. Alright, let's get into Philadelphia. Philadelphia was 25 miles southeast of Sardis. And it was on top of a hill also overlooking the main road that went through that area.

The town that is there now, the Turks gave it the name Al-Sahir, which means City of God. And I don't know why they called it that, but I can tell you this, that the Christian church there in Philadelphia continued on until 1392.

So hundreds of years of Muslim domination, 600 years of Muslim domination in that area. And they still maintained a viable church for all those years. That's very interesting. You just wonder how much of it was because of the way they started.

Let's look here. Verse 7, And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write, He who is holy, who is true, who has the key of David, who opens and no one will shut, and who shuts and no one opens, says this, I know your deeds.

To hear Jesus say that when your deeds are right, you know what I mean? Verses when you've been messing up or your life is not the way it should be, to hear those words, how ominous that would be. But to hear it when you're right with the Lord, what a blessing.

To hear Jesus say, I know your deeds. And to think of the tone of his voice when he's saying it. Behold, I have put before you an open door which no one can shut, because you have a little power and have kept my word and have not denied my name.

Let me read a couple of comments and then I'm going to say a couple of things about that. Osborne said, The church lacked size and statue in the community and was looked down upon and persecuted. They had little authority or influence, but they were faithful.

And that has always been the test of divine blessing rather than success. I remember one time we were interviewing Don Wildman for our magazine and I asked him, I said, you know, Don, you've been doing this for so many years, fighting for the morality in this country, and yet we've seen it just get worse and worse and worse every year.

How do you keep yourself going? Don't you get just really overcome with discouragement at times? And I'll never forget what he said. He said, God did not call me to be successful. He called me to be faithful.

And that has always stuck with me, and that was the exact right answer. That was such a blessing to hear that. The Pope of Commentary says,. The expression is to be regarded as referring probably to her membership as but few in number, to her wealth as but very small, to her knowledge and gifts as being but slender, to great and distinguished men amongst her as being very rare, to her social position as being quite humble.

Hence she was small in human esteem, one of those weak things which, however, God often chooses wherewith to accomplish His own purposes. What a thing. This is what came to me. Look at these three things in this verse.

These are the three reasons why the Lord is so pleased with them. And what is the first one? Because you have little power? It's not like, well, even though you're not doing too well in numbers, still I'm pleased with you because your heart is right.

That's kind of what you would expect Him to say. But that isn't what He says. He actually lists one of the reasons He's so happy with them is because they're so outwardly insignificant. That's amazing.

That is really amazing when you think about it. I've used the story in my book, The Time of Your Lives. I used the story of Victor Plymire who was sent by the Lord to Tibet. I think it was back in the 1930s or something.

And he went over there and lived and brought his wife there. She got pregnant. They had a son. Years and years they labored amongst those people. No converts for years. His wife died. Then his son died.

He had to dig both their graves himself. That man labored there for years and hardly made a dent because of the hardness of heart of the people there. And yet how pleased God was with his life. And I used his life and compared him to some of these mega evangelists who have thousands flocked to altars and stuff, most of whom are probably having very pathetic conversions.

So what is great in God's esteem? You know what I mean? It's not always the way things seem, especially with a worldly church that constantly promotes outward success as being the sign of God's favor.

And it's just not true. And also that you have kept my word and have not denied my name. There it is, just faithfulness. In the face of difficult situations and so on, they have remained faithful. Verse 9, we get a little clearer sense about the problems they faced.

Behold, I will cause those of the synagogue of Satan who say that they are Jews and are not, but lie, I will make them come and bow down at your feet and make them know that I have loved you. So this is the second time we've heard about the synagogue of Satan, isn't it?

By the wording here, kept my word, you didn't deny my name. The way that Jesus said this, it seems to point back to some historical event. Something happened, some particular incident occurred that they had stayed faithful to Jesus in the midst of it.

Laodicea: Lukewarm, Self-Satisfied Christianity

All right, we've got to get moving on here. Let's get to Laodicea. Laodicea was in the Lycus Valley. And Laodicea was right next to Colossae and Heriopolis. I can still see it in my mind's eye. I was standing in the ruins of Laodicea, which were also up on a high ridge or plateau area.

And then there was a big valley that dropped down. And then there was a mountain over on the other side of that valley. And that's where Heriopolis was. And from where I was standing in the ruins of Laodicea, you could look over at that mountain and see where the hot springs that were located there were going down the sides of the hill.

And you could see all the white mineral deposits from Laodicea. And then when I went over there, it was spectacular. And that was a Roman spa area. So it was kind of like a resort city, Heriopolis was.

Laodicea was a very prosperous city. They made money mainly through wool. They had a special kind of wool that they were known for there that sold for a lot of money. So it was a very prosperous city.

I mean, the ruins were extensive. They had a huge amphitheater and a coliseum and all kinds of stuff that usually only occurs when a city was prosperous. And it was. Coliseum, by comparison, was down in the valley.

It was situated by a river down there. And it seemed to be just a real small little town. You could hardly see any ruins at all. I mean, there were fragments on this mound, but that was about it. So those three towns, cities, whatever, were very close to each other within a couple of miles from each other.

And actually, let me just read something out of Colossians 4, the last couple of verses there. Now remember, when Paul wrote Colossians, he was sitting in prison in Rome, right? And Epaphras had evangelized in that area and had apparently got a church started in Colossae, probably also got the one started in Laodicea.

Look here at verse 16 if you want to keep up, Colossians 4, 16. When this letter is read among you, have it also read in the church of the Laodiceans. And you, for your part, read my letter that is coming from Laodicea.

Okay, so they were reading two different letters, and Paul wanted what he was expressing to one to be heard at the other and vice versa. The one that came from Laodicea could have been one that he wrote to the Laodiceans, or it could have been the epistle to the Ephesians, which was more of a circular letter.

I don't know if you knew that. It really wasn't written just to the Ephesian church. It really was more of a circular letter that made the rounds. So it could have been that letter that Paul is referring to.

Going on, say to Archippus, take heed to the ministry which you have received in the Lord that you may fulfill it. Okay, who's Archippus? It seems as though he was Philemon's son. Remember Philemon was a wealthy guy who lived in Colossae.

One of his slaves named Onesimus had escaped and ended up in Rome and got saved by Paul, and so Paul was sending him back with this letter to Philemon. You remember that? Well, Archippus, it seems, was the son of Philemon, either his son or part of his household or some real connection there.

So it seems that he was from Colossae, but he became the first bishop of the Laodicean church. So back when Paul wrote, which was like 30 years before, he was telling Archippus, you know, make sure you do this right.

Make sure you lead that church right. And if he came out of a wealthy home, you could see where he may have been affected by that. And so we find a church here in Laodicea which is what? Lukewarm, backslidden, just not really walking with the Lord at all.

George Ladd said, The church in Laodicea is obviously quite prosperous and outwardly in excellent condition. The letter makes no mention of persecution from Roman officials, of trouble from the Jews or of any false teachers within the church.

Laodicea was much like Sardis, an example of nominal, self-satisfied Christianity. All right, let's read the first couple of verses here. To the angel of the church in Laodicea write, The Amen, the faithful and true witness.

The beginning of the creation of God says this, I know your deeds that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were cold or hot. All right, I want to read what Robert Thomas said. The works are more than the deeds done.

They are reflection of life and conduct in general, including the outward and inward spiritual activities. They are evidence of the inward spiritual condition the Lord alone sees and knows directly. It is by means of these that men prove what they actually are.

In all these letters when he's talking about deeds, he's looking not only at the things they are actually doing, but also the condition of their inward life with God. All right, hot, cold, what is this all about?

Now some commentators, remember how I said that each of these letters had something to do with the physical attributes of that city or whatever. So it is possible that when he was referring to hot, he was talking about the hot springs in Heriopolis.

And when he was talking about cold, he may have been referring to that cold river that ran alongside Colossae down there in the valley. And this is kind of like some kind of a putrid in between or something.

Is that possible? Yeah. Hot is the word zestos, and it literally means to boil. So what he's looking for, of course, is boiling hot Christians on fire for the Lord. That's what he wants. But it's interesting to me that he would prefer that they were cold over lukewarm.

Listen to what Thomas said. And man, is that the truth. I can tell you for myself, if I was called to be an evangelist, a soul winner, I would much prefer to be in New York or California than to be in Kentucky because everyone here thinks they're saved.

They have been so gospelized in the Bible Belt area that you just put forth just enough, just show up at church and everyone's good. And that that mentality is so cemented into the culture. And I think that's really what he's talking about here.

There was a mentality of lukewarmness, of tepidness about the things of God that had just become entrenched in the culture of the Laodicean church. And look at Jesus. When he was ministering there in Palestine, he preferred to be around the tax collectors and harlots to being around the religious people, right?