This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

I hope you're enjoying going through the book of Revelation as much as I am.
We're in chapter 3 this week. This is day 1.

We're going to look at verse 1 in chapter 3 today and focus on how God can
change our hearts and lives. We're really walking through seven secrets to
growth and change for our churches and our individual lives as we walk through
Revelation chapter 2 and chapter 3, Jesus' messages to these seven churches. And
you remember last week we began by talking about Ephesus and Jesus' message to
keep first things first, and Smyrna, Jesus' message to look up and look ahead,
Pergamum, His message that our doubts often grow out of our relationships, so
take care with your relationships, and Thyatira, Jesus' message that success can
carry way too high a price.

And now we get to a church by the name of Sardis. Revelation chapter 3 verse 1
says, "To the angel of the church in Sardis write, 'These are the words of Him
who holds the seven spirits of God and the seven stars. I know your deeds.

You have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead. '" These are very honest
words from Jesus, and these are words about what to do when it seems like things
are at a dead end. Maybe in your spiritual growth you feel like, "I just can't
get growing.

" Maybe in a relationship things feel like they're at a dead end, you feel like
things are never going to change. Maybe in a ministry, here it's in a specific
church, things were dead. What do you do when you reach a dead end?

Well, Jesus' message is this, "Don't give up, wake up. " These verses we're
going to look at today and tomorrow are a lot like a spiritual alarm clock, and
Jesus wants you to hear it go off right now. You hear the ring and you know,
"I've got to do something.

I was asleep, and I may not know exactly where I am the moment I wake up, but I
know I have to do something. " It's set to go off for a purpose, and Jesus'
message to this church lets them know He wants to make a difference in their
lives. He's coming sooner than you think, and He has a message for you.

We all know that feeling when something that's supposed to be alive, something
that's supposed to be filled with life, is dead. A church that should be filled
with life, and yet you go every weekend, it feels dead. Or you as a believer,
your own life, you know you should feel filled with life in your relationship
with Jesus, but it just feels dead.

Or a marriage, or your relationship with one of your children. It should be
filled with life, and yet it's dead. Based on this passage in Revelation chapter
3, this message to the church in Sardis, there are three prayers that you and I
need to pray.

Three prayers when you feel like something is dead, to see that it come to life
again. The first prayer is this, you pray this simple prayer, "Lord, help me to
see the gaps. Help me to see the gaps between what you see for my life and
what's happening in my life.

" Jesus introduces Himself to the church in Sardis. I hope you're not just going
quickly over these introductions of Jesus in each of these messages to the
churches as we talk about these, because they really are the core of what He can
do to make a difference. In fact, going back to chapter 1, we saw all of these
descriptions of Jesus in Revelation chapter 1, and then He goes through in
chapter 2 and 3, and He applies those very same descriptions to each church, a
different description to each church, showing how who He is meets the basic
needs of our lives.

Here He reminds them that He is the one who holds the sevenfold Spirit of God.
He is the one who holds the seven stars. Now you remember from chapter 1 that
the sevenfold Spirit of God, the seven spirits of God, is not that God has seven
spirits.

It's an idea of perfection. It's a sign of the perfection of God. And Jesus
Christ is saying, "God's Spirit wants to come into your life, and He comes into
your life through a relationship with Me.

" Do you see the gap between who you are and what it would mean to live in a
life, a relationship with God on a daily basis? And then Jesus says, "I also
hold the seven stars in my hand. " Remember, those are God's messengers.

Some people think they refer to angels. Other people think that they refer here
more specifically to pastors. But they refer primarily to the message.

Whether it's an angel or a pastor, they're bringing the message of God. We need
to hear God's message. And the truth is, these things go together.

You need God's Spirit in order to hear God's message. The simple prayer is,
"Holy Spirit, reveal to me what I need to see about myself. Help me to see the
gaps and to be honest about them.

" And as you're being honest, you have to recognize something about Jesus Christ
in a way that He helps me to see the gap in my life between what I am, what's
dead in my life or dying, and what should come to life. Jesus Christ knows the
difference between reputation and reality. He says to this church, "You have a
reputation of being alive, but you're dead.

" One of the reasons things die sometimes, relationships, churches, is we try to
hold up the reputation instead of being honest about it. Reputation is what
everybody thinks you are, character is what you really are. The people in Sardis
saw this church as a respectable group of people who were neither dangerous nor
desirable.

They were just decent people. They were mild-mannered people meeting in
mild-mannered ways, striving to be more mild-mannered. They were, to take the
term of an old movie, they were the church of the living dead.

And they had a great reputation, but there was nothing happening in the church.
What do you pray? Lord, help me to see the gaps.

Specifically, I'm talking about these kind of gaps. Lord, help me to see the
gaps between what I say and what I do. If I say I love the Lord, but I look at
my life and how I express my love for the Lord, and I see that there's a
difference between those two things, then instead of living for reputation, why
not just accept reality and say, "God, I see the gap.

Can you do anything about it, Jesus? " If you say you want to be a disciple of
Jesus Christ, but there's no real discipline in your life, you're just after fun
and pleasure like the rest of the world, then there's a gap. I remember reading
a long time ago, Calvin Miller said, "Many Christians are really Christ-aholics
and not disciples at all.

Disciples are cross-bearers. They seek Christ. Christ-aholics seek happiness.

Disciples dare to discipline themselves, and the demands they place on
themselves leave them enjoying the happiness of their growth. Christ-aholics are
escapists looking for a shortcut to happiness. " Calvin Miller said that.

That's the gap sometimes in my life. I say I want to be a disciple, but really
all I want is to be happy, to have a better day, to have pleasure in my life.
Sometimes it's tough to be a disciple.

Sometimes it means suffering. Sometimes it means persecution, but there's always
joy in serving him. "Lord, help me to see the gaps between what I say and what I
do.

" Another major area is, "Lord, help me to see the gaps between my values and my
actions. " If I say I value my family more than anything, but I never have any
time to spend with them, of course something's going to be dying in me and
probably in my relationships with them. If I say that I value God's Word, but I
can never seem to make time to read it or study it.

Now, you're making time to study it right now. You're showing your value of
God's Word by being a part of drive-time devotions. But if I never make time to
study it, there's going to be a gap in my life, a huge frustration.

I'm going to feel inside like something is dying because something is. If I say
I value integrity, but I find myself cutting corners whenever needed, then
there's that frustration gap in my life, the gap between reputation and reality,
what Jesus wants to do in my life and what's happening in my life. If I say I
value purity, but I spend hours and every day filling my mind with the world's
junk instead of the purity of God's Word and the purity of conversations with
God's people and considering who God really is, that's the gap.

Consider the gap. You also might want to consider the gap, not just between what
you say and what you do, your values and actions, but also between where you
were and where you are. I think Jesus is talking about that to this church in
Sardis.

He knew where they were, that they had grown and great things were happening,
but all they had left was reputation. So how about you? If you look at your life
a year ago, two years ago, your faith, your love for others, your passion for
God's Word, and you look at where you are right now, are you growing or are you
going backwards?

If you've done really well in your life, you might be able to slide for a lot of
years on your reputation of past growth, but Jesus sees, he sees clear through
to our hearts and he says, "I want you to pray a prayer. Lord, help me to see
the gaps, to be honest about them, and instead of living for reputation, help me
to live for the reality of what you want to do in my life. " Let's pray that
prayer right now.

Jesus, that's a difficult prayer to pray, but we pray. Help me to see the gaps
between what I say and what I do, between my values and my actions, between
where I was and where I am, and help me to realize that I don't have to live up
to a reputation. The truth of the matter is, all I need to do is live out the
reality of your love in my life.

Thank you for the reality of that love. Thank you that there's never a gap
there, and thank you that I can trust in you in this moment today. In Jesus'
name I pray, amen.

Join us tomorrow. We're going to continue our look together at what Jesus says
to a dying church.