Big Idea: Jesus rebukes his church for its compromise that is leading to spiritual death and reassures the faithful few with promises of heavenly citizenship.

Understanding the Text

The message to the church in Sardis is the fifth (and most negative) in the series of messages to the seven churches in Revelation 2–3. Jesus confronts a church relying on its past reputation to make up for its present spiritual slumber. Only a few people are commended by the Lord as he attempts to rescue this church from certain death. No mention is made of persecution from without or false teaching from within because the primary problem is a wholesale assimilation to the surrounding culture. In Sardis, the Christians looked a whole lot like everyone else. Of special interest are the parallels between the m…