Beyond Appearances: Jesus’ Message to Sardis

great to be with you today grab a seat as you guys as you take a seat let me just take a quick moment introduce myself if you haven't if we haven't had the privilege or the honor of meeting my name is luke i pastor journey church in redmond and man i'm slain thank you so much man did it fall off is that what that big bang was i pastored journey church in redmond and man i'm so excited to be here today pastor keith is visiting us in redmond i'm coming back home to bend and i just know that god's gonna do some great things as we just celebrate what god is doing with the journey family of churches maybe you didn't even know that there's a journey church in redmond and we planted actually as journeys celebrating their birthday their 11th birthday this coming week we are celebrating our very first birthday on the same sunday so we're having a great time

of what god is doing i mean i'll tell you of 2020 if there's anything that we've learned is that like any expectation you know i call it the forgotten be attitude it's not forgotten because jesus didn't say it but i just made it up but it's like blessed are the ben for they will they will blessed are the flexible for they will bend and not break that's what 2020 taught us and if anything though i kind of never have imagined what planting or starting a brand new church in the city of redmond would have looked like for the year 2020 but it has gone completely all just the way none of us we could have imagined we launched a year ago we had about 450 people show up to our very first services of the redmond proficiency academy i mean like the energy was electric it was amazing it was just like so rich and powerful and then three weeks later everything got shut down and we never met again for 45 weeks so we had this amazing

launch team and half the people of central oregon have moved to another state somewhere else and people have come back in and we didn't know where we were going to meet there was a time where we were going to meet in the parks and in the city and we had that all settled out and then the city came back and said no you can't have more than 75 people in a gathering even outside so we couldn't do that and all these different things i mean the nature of our first year of church but i'll tell you this i just want to give you some awesome news for one my wife and i we had a baby after seven years of taking a break from parenting or not parenting from from rearing children we had a baby he was our surprise soren ellis cobrae mart are in may and not only did we plant the church we had a brand new baby so our life is completely different than what it was this time last year but you know just to see what god has done in this brand new church for for a while there as we came back and we were doing the journey family of churches television broadcast we didn't

even know if we were going to even continue on meeting in redmond or if we were going to pause and then come back some other day and launch it again when people could gather but you know what god was going before us you know i think back to my very first message of or my very last message in person at journeying ben was last year the beginning of the year was isaiah 43 where god says i'm doing a new thing do you see it i'm gonna bring roads into the wilderness and rivers into the wild when i take a look back at what god has done through 2020 that's exactly what we've seen is god has brought ways where there were no ways and he has brought life where there is no life god is faithful i just want to give you a quick update about what god's doing in redmond about mid-year probably our lowest point of what we were going to do as a church a pastor locally in the city of redmond approached keith and i and just said listen i love what you're doing i see god's breathing on it we want to know

something would you consider bringing us into your church and i want to tell you that on january 15th of 2021 grace gate community church which was a part of the center of redmond voted unanimously as a church to become a part of journey church in redmond we opened on january 21st our very first our own permanent location that we have we have to worry about where we're going to meet week to week we don't have to we don't have to show up four hours early and set up and then wait you know like like wait six hours till church is over to tear down every week we have a place to call home it's amazing to see that god is just breathing on what's happening with journeying church and remember we couldn't do without your support we couldn't do without our family that's why we're better together the journey family of churches so we're just so honored to be a part of

what god has done i'm so grateful you guys need to know how blessed you are here you have such amazing pastors you have such amazing leadership here at journey church i mean with what we've navigated through 2020 pastors all over the all over the nation in the world are trying to figure out what church is like and i tell you your pastors care about you they pray for you they love you they brag about you all the time you ought to call yourselves blessed would you would you give yourselves a big old hand because you should celebrate you well like i said keith is up in bend right now or excuse me up in redmond right now preaching i'm down here and ben preaching and so we did a pulpit swap i'm excited to jump into revelation man if there is a time to study the book of revelation it is 2020 and 2020 one man i'll tell you because everybody everybody come on we were all there everybody thought that 2021 like january 1st 2021 everything was going to be better and then we saw what happened

like the first week of 2020 when we were like wow 2020 was nothing compared to what we see right now like we need to know is this the time god we need to pay attention and i'll tell you what i'm excited as we're looking at the seven letters to these churches as pastor keith has been bringing you in this series of the letters to the churches i want to encourage you we're going to look at our letter today it's going to get deep it's going to get complex i believe this i believe it's going to challenge you i believe it's going to it's going to press you i believe that it might even rub you the wrong way in your faith or in your flesh but you know what don't let that stop you from hearing what god wants to speak into your life because here's the deal here's what happens when we do things like study letters to churches especially churches that have names or or are a part of a city or a region that no longer even exists we have a tendency in our day

in our minds to read these letters and to look at the context of the letter and say you know what that was written to somebody else that that's not to me but i want to just remind you a few things today as we study these scriptures and what i believe god wants to speak into your life i love how hebrews writes it like this hebrews chapter 4 says it like this it says that the word of god is living it's a living breathing thing it's a sharper it's like a sword sharper than a double-edged sword that's able to cut deep into and divide even bone from marrow look at what it says discerning the thoughts and the intentions of the heart these scriptures in which we read these aren't just letters written to another church from another person from another generation this is the word of god speaking to you this is the word of god alive to you and

i i love what paul tells his protege a young pastor in his letter to the letter to timothy he says it like this he says timothy that all scripture is breathed out by god here's the reason why it is profitable for teaching for reprove for correction for training he says look it so that man the man of god could be complete and equipped in every good work you see what we're reading today is not some letter removed to some people who have come and gone what you and i are reading every time we open up our scriptures every time we open up the text or the word of god we're reading a living and breathing document that has been painstakingly preserved for thousands of years from generation to generation and been held reliable

and accurate over each generation so that when we open up the pages of our books we recognize this is not just the words somebody's speaking to somebody else this is the voice of god speaking into our lives and so i want to encourage you as we look at these letters to the churches that god wants to speak to you i believe out of even what we're reading in this book today that god has a message for you maybe it's like paul said for reproof or for correction or encouragement but don't just pass this off as something for somebody else god i believe wants to speak to you i love the fact that the number seven like pastor keith was talking about here in the series the number it represents the number of completions seven days in a week it's a full week in the bible the number is like seven is like the number of god and there's

seven letters to seven churches and there's seven messengers and seven stars and you see seven spirits all of these represent something it's the picture of the fullness of god the the picture of the church and the picture of the correction and the encouragement to the church it's the picture of the spirit of god and the leadership to the church it's a picture that god wants you and i to be complete in our lives through jesus christ so as we dive into this letter today it's to a city called sardis but it's to you and it's to me and god wants to speak life and truth to each and every one of us so if you've got a bible go with me to the book of revelation let's jump right into it revelation chapter 3. revelation chapter 3 if you're watching online grab a bible get your phone out get something out don't just take my word for it listen i

am not a sage on a stage i'm like you just trying to figure out my way through life but i love jesus christ and i believe the holy spirit wants to speak into our lives today so revelations chapter three what i'm gonna do is i'm gonna read this letter like section at a time and we're going to exegete the scripture now that's a christianist word you're like what does that even mean let me just say we're going to pause we're going to look at the truth we're going to dive into it we're going to expound on it and to see what god is speaking as we're reading this letter together out so beginning in romans excuse me romans revelation chapter three revelation chapter three verse number one and the angel of the church of sardis writes or to write he says the words of him who has the seven spirits of god and the seven stars that's the picture of the the wholeness of god the fullness of the

spirit of god look what it says i know your works you have a reputation of being alive but you are dead let's talk a little bit about the picture of this church first and foremost one thing i love about the letters is that god uses the environment around us to show us a picture not only is this written to a church called sardis in a geographical location in this city but there's a picture of something that's actually happening around in the culture that is being reflected to the church sardis was an ancient city at the time of this writing 1300 years before this was even written sardis was a metropolitan area seated high up on on a hill many thought it would be an impregnable impregnable fortress that it couldn't be

conquered but yet alexander the great and the romans had come through and wiped out sardis at one point in history sardis was the epicenter of culture with within the new world things like the dye process of taking colors and impregnating impregnating them into clothes to to create dyes and beautiful colors came from sardis another thing that came out of sardis was the minting of coins sardis was a rich area rich in resources gold and silver floats so the city had a reputation among the history of being a place of great wealth of great resource of sparkle but yet that earthquake had destroyed the city uh kingdoms and empires had come and taken over and left and come and taken over and left and the city was literally a shadow of what it once was and here god is using the picture of

what was actually happening within the city to show this is what's happening within the church a reputation of being alive but are dead in that now found within the city of uh of sardis was this great temple to a pagan god named artemis and artemis the worship involved in the artemis temple what would would dwarf anything that our world today would even recognize as something crazy like the debauchery involved in the worship of artemis when it comes to the sexual culture of the world in which we live in the revolution that began in the 60s and has carried on to where we look at our culture today and wonder what is going on pastor keith talked about that last week with the jezebel spirit that this culture this worship would dwarf anything that you and i could see today in our culture this is how bad

how crazy it was in this season and so here in this region now the word of god through jesus christ through his friend john writes these letters to the churches and he says something and i want to just point this out he says to the church of sardis write this i know your works do you see how it says that in the scripture that jesus christ is speaking to the church i know your works as a matter of fact five out of the seven letters written to the church jesus says i know your works church we need to pay attention to what's being said in this moment that god is watching what we are doing with life and there is always this tension that we live within our faith of what we do and what we believe our works and our faith and so often what happens with our

religion is that we begin to believe that the more good i do the better i am with god i remember i was having a conversation with a with a young girl i was actually vacationing in hawaii and we were talking to her about faith and i said like you know what is it we know where do you stand with god and she says oh man i live my life by this motto as long as i do good and be good it's all good that's great that should be a bumper sticker but we begin to believe that as long as we can do good and be good it's all good but god says i know your works but here's the truth of what scripture tells us time and time again you and i are not saved by our works there is nothing nothing not one thing that you could do not a formula or a group of things or a cluster of things that you could do that would ever make you or i good enough in the eyes of god

to earn salvation paul tells it like this and i'll talk about this again at the end of the message he says we have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of god nobody had to teach you how to lie nobody had to teach you how to cheat nobody had to try to teach you how to get your way in life you figured that out all on your own but he says the free gift of god is eternal salvation so we are saved by faith and through grace in jesus christ so we're not saved by our works but we better pay attention to what the words of jesus christ are speaking to the church because jesus says i know your works and he goes on he says these words he says you have a reputation a rapport that just simply means how the people view you people see you people think of you and they think that everything's good everything's put together everything's right everything's pleasant everything's wonderful in that he says everybody

looks at you from the outside and you've got it all together man if there is anything that our culture speaks today this is the trajectory of the world in which we live in is to present your very best picture first filter it i add some things to it you know try to do it take a picture six times over add some doctor it up i mean we've learned this have you ever noticed that even with zoom and working from home there's even filters now on your web meeting things that you can doctor up your appearance to make you look better than you actually look at home we are the kings of presenting one thing but living something completely different in our culture and here's the reputation what the church is saying is he's saying i know your works i know that everybody's looking at you from the outside and saying they've got it all together but here's the problem with that on the

inside you are dead and this is a reminder to you and i that while jesus is looking at our works it is not our works that save us it is our works by which we will be judged it is the way in which we live our life it is the way in which we enact it's the way in which we walk out our life that jesus reminds us that we are to live for him because here's the way religion works religion creeps into the faith and religion begins to say that as long as you can look the part as long as you can play the part as long as you can speak the part as long as you can act the part as long as you can convince everybody else around you that you must be right or good with god then you actually must be right or good with god this isn't a new problem this isn't

something that is new to the western culture this isn't something to just to america or to sardis this was a problem even in jesus day jesus rebuked the leaders of the church and he would say are the leaders of the of the jewish faith the pharisees and the religious rulers he says man if there's anybody that was a hypocrite or a person who said one thing and did another it's the religious leaders he would say they wore the right clothes they're phylacteries it's simply just a storage box that they would roll up scriptures and they would put it on their forehead and on their arm because the bible says to bind it on your heads and on your hearts their phylacteries would be bigger than everybody else's they loved the positions of honor they loved the title they loved the power but they did not do what they told everybody else to do and he goes so far as to even say it like this in matthew chapter 23 jesus says to the script to the to the pharisees he says woe to you scribes the the the educated

and the pharisees the religious rulers your hypocrites he says for you're like white washed tombs which outwardly appear beautiful but within are full of dead people's bones and uncleanness he goes on he says so outwardly you appear righteousness righteous to others but in within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness see what does this teach us today in our day and age that when we can come and we can judge a book by its cover we can we can judge the success of a church by its size or by production values or by all these different things and we say surely something good must be going on there but and listen i'm not telling you it's wrong to look good

i'm not telling you it's wrong to be put together i'm not telling you it's wrong to be successful but when we do that at the expense of propping up something that is not genuine on the inside god sees right through it and while we might be able to put on the image for the world around us the truth of the matter is we're not fooling anyone but ourselves so this warning to the church is that i know your works everybody thinks that you're alive but on the inside you are dead and now in revelation chapter three verse two he says it like this i love this part of the scripture because he says it in verse two wake up strengthen what remains and what is about to die for you i have not found your works

complete in the sight of my god remember verse 3 remember then what you have received and what you have heard and keep it and repent and you and if you will not wake up i will come like a thief in the night and you will not know at what hour that i will come against you see we look at this as a scripture of like intimidation but really what the scripture is showing us is the character the nature of the attributes of a god who wants more for you than he's asking from you because look what jesus says in this letter in the very beginning it says wake up wake up here's what i'm leveraging against you here's the accusation against you is that you're fake you're pretending you've lost what you actually were and there's something on the inside of you that is slowly

dying while the world thinks everything is successful and he says wake up you see this is the attribute of god of god of mercy a god of love a god of saying i want more for you i love what lamentation says lamentation says it like this it says that the steadfast love of the lord never ceases his mercies never come to an end they are new every morning great is the faithfulness of god so there's not a day that we can outrun or outstretch the mercies of god you are never too far gone while you have breath in your lungs to find mercy and grace with god almighty but the mistake that so many of us make is that we misjudge or we mistake or we

don't see that the mercy of god is seasonal or is for a time and we mistake the mercy of god for the acceptance of our sin so what happens is we look at our lives and we say well nothing is happening in this moment i'm not feeling the judgment or the wrath that i read about in the bible so surely god must just accept me the way i am and we say this all the time in church come as you are but friends please do not stay that way because hebrews says it like this it says that it isn't appointed at once for a man to die and to face judgment the mercies of god are ever are ever going and never ending but you and i from the moment we were born a clock started to tick and we don't

know what tomorrow holds and the warning here is don't misjudge this season i'm giving you of mercy to correct the the approach to correct the life to correct this as the acceptance for what is going on because he says it i will come to you you won't know it and so he says wake up it says strengthen yourself i love this jesus tells us followers in the garden of gethsemane right before he's about to go to the cross he says wake up unless don't fall asleep unless you would enter into temptation but pray paul writes in romans paul writes in first corinthians paul writes in ephesians paul writes in thessalonians peter writes in his letter the same words church wake up and what they're saying is pay attention don't just drone through life have you ever noticed

that we can just go through the motions and days and weeks and months can pass by and we haven't even felt any different if there's one thing i've learned in 2020 is that we've got our ups and we've got our downs 20 20 was hard on all of us and there were days for me where i just couldn't handle it any longer and i would sit back on the couch and i would turn on a show and i would watch it until my brain tuned out until i felt the judgment come from the television that would ask me one of the most embarrassing questions of my day are you still watching if you've ever binged on a tv show you know that and you're like yeah i mean there's only three more episodes to go i've only been at it for nine hours listen i'm not telling you that binge watching on a day off on netflix is bad or you shouldn't do those things i'm

just telling you life has a way of just going through the cycles and going through the motions and droning through it and all of a sudden days turn into weeks and weeks turn into months and months turn into years and then we look back and we wonder where has life gone and the warning to the church is wake up don't just let this moment pass you by don't just let this season pass you by god is at work do we see it is the question wake up and strengthen him love it he says it strengthen that which you have seen strengthened he says because your words or your works have been found to be not complete revelation jesus is saying what your works are doing what you're doing with your life it's not full

it's not the full picture of it it's incomplete in your life see god's not asking you to abide by some horrifically horrible laws to live by they talk about that in the book of acts when people were coming to jesus christ they said why would we lay a burden on other people that are coming to jesus that we have a hard time holding to ourselves god doesn't want to lay this this noose or this weight around your neck but rather god wants to free you in life to live for purpose and for fulfillment in life and so he says your works are incomplete why because your works are all about you i love what james the half brother of jesus says actually to be honest with you i don't love what james the half-brother of jesus says it's one of those scriptures in the bible that i kind of wish i wouldn't have read but now that i've read it i i have to do something with it

james the half-brother of jesus writes in james chapter one he says brethren count it all joy when you fall into various kinds of trials i don't like that verse but he goes on and he says it like this because you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness and then he goes on and he says it like this and let steadfastness have its full effect that you would be perfect complete lacking nothing god wants you to live a life that is full and that fullness comes even in the hardships of life we want comfort we want fun we want we want to do everything for us and god is saying that even in the hardest times of life that i've got purpose and fulfillment for you

when it's done in faith i love what paul writes paul writes to his friends at the church in corinth in the book of first corinthians paul writes that he gives this analogy he says listen everything you and i do everything is a scary thought everything you and i do we'll be judged by god every action every moment everything we do will be laid out before judgment that that scares me and he says it like this he paints a picture he says what you do with your life is like building when you build your life you could build with good stuff or you could build with cheap stuff so here's what he says he says anyone who builds on a foundation with gold silver or precious stone that's the good stuff he says or they could build with wood hay or straw he says each one's work each one's work will become manifest that simply just means will be

made known it will be revealed for the day we'll disclose it that's the day of judgment that's why it's a capital d because it will be revealed by fire and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done so gold we know will refine silver we know it will refine precious stones are made with the greatest amount of pressure within the earth that we know that heat actually makes them better so they will be revealed in fire so that if the work anyone has built on the foundation survives he'll receive a reward now look at verse 15. if anyone's work is burned up he will suffer loss though he himself will be saved as the only through fire that's actually good news here's what paul is saying he's confirming once again your works do not

determine your salvation to jesus christ accepting the gift of salvation through jesus christ by accepting him for who he was through his holy spirit is what gets you salvation but paul is saying everything you do in life will be judged at the end of your life and you can either have a reward or at the end of the day you could come into heaven with the hem of your garment still on fire because that's all you got left god does not want you friends to come into the pearly gates of heaven smelling like smoke with nothing left to say except for i watched everything there was on netflix there is more to life than just living for ourselves than just doing what is comfortable or what is natural or what

feels good to us this is a life of purpose this is a life of meaning this is what god through jesus christ wants for you and wants for me in this letter to this church it's to push us into something greater to something deeper what are you and i doing with our lives is it precious or is it ash that's what this question or this letter is asking to each and every one of us i love hear the call of action in this verse now john as he writes through jesus christ he says remember what you have been taught to hold on to it receive it which you have heard he says keep it hold on to it and repent repentance is not something that we do out of shame repentance is a gift from god that we can go before god and say i

was wrong but here's the invitation he's saying lean into the gift that was given to you you see jesus before he died on a cross he told his followers i cannot stay with you because if i stay with you you guys can get me but the world doesn't he says i've got to go so that my father would send the holy spirit the holy spirit is not a sideline on a theo theological page the holy spirit is the spirit of the living god like in the book of genesis it says hovered over the face of the deep now god is inviting you into life and relationship with his holy spirit that would dwell and live on your soul and in with you that you could have direct access to god the father this is the invitation and the call to action that john is saying lean into the gift that you have been given in the spirit of god jesus says that he would come and he

would teach you he would remind you that he would lead you into all truth that he would lead you to his plan that jesus is inviting you into life and he's giving you the spirit of god the creator of the universe to live and to dwell and to tabernacle or to dwell with you every day how friends then can we not with joy serve if we are full of god's own spirit the spirit that hovered over the face of the deep the spirit that brought signs wonders and miracles the spirit of god that jesus breathed onto and that showed to uh showed up in a room of 120 crazy followers in a room above another room called the upper room that's why they call it the upper room and to birth the church how could we then not

live according to the ways of god except for to reject god's ways for our ways to reject god's plans for our plans like that song said your ways are better to recognize what god wants for us is life his purpose is meaning and jesus says if you won't if you won't listen to what i'm saying if you won't heed the words the warning the season of mercy to which i am extending to you in this moment i will come like a thief and you won't know it you won't be prepared for it you won't know that time or that season and for me this season this word it scares me and it shocks me and it's

sobering because it's so real to me in this moment in november i had some friends that were visiting from from out of out of town and i took them out to smith rock and i've got a bunch of climbing gear and ropes and harnesses and shoes and and so we took a bunch of friends and their family out to smith rock and we went climbing for the day and i loaded all my stuff into the back of my truck and i had it there and i've got one of those camper shells that you can lock and it all stays in the back of my truck i remember right after we went climbing with them we we showed up in journey red and we were doing these bible studies that were online and so we would come in and we'd set up a studio and we'd go through this bible study was a sermon on the mountain we'd set up all this camera gear that we had procured over the year and just and broadcast it online it was probably one of those first cold days of the month and i got home was probably about 10 o'clock at night

after tearing down the studio and doing the bible study and i was tired it'd been a long day been a long process and i remember i walked inside and i put my keys down on the little table we put my keys down in the holy spirit in that moment right then checked me and said go get that stuff out of your car so i went back to my car and there was a bin full of all the camera gear thousands of dollars worth of camera gear and i grabbed that said i don't want it to sit out in the cold so i grabbed it i brought it inside the holy spirit as i walked back inside the holy spirit in my soul just deep in my chest all of a sudden i felt this go get your stuff out of your car and i thought to myself you know what it's really cold it's really late it's dark i'm really tired i'll just do it in the morning i know i got to get up

early in the morning i got to be here at bend at 7 am which means i gotta get up at five to get here by that time so i'll just do it in the morning i got up in the morning i got into my truck to warm it up like we do on those cold days and as i was driving away from my driveway i looked out of my rearview mirror and i thought man something's really interesting my my camper shell is open right outside of my street i stopped on the side of the road everything that was in the back of my truck that i did not get was stolen when i made my insurance claim was about 15 years worth of climbing gear that i had acquired it was about 4 500 worth of equipment that was stolen from me the worst part wasn't the theft the worst part wasn't the fact that like what i had was gone the worst part for

me was that i knew it the holy spirit had told me check your stuff don't leave it in your car and i said i'll do it tomorrow friends how many of us treat our faith that way that in this very moment of our lives the holy spirit is saying stop stop i've got so much more for you stop and we say i'll do it tomorrow i'll do it tomorrow i'll do it tomorrow and if 2020's taught us anything with this pandemic whether you believe it's real or not one thing we know is that we're all one incident and accident or epidemic away from our eternal creed or our eternal destiny and i'm not trying to preach fear to you

i'm not trying to scare you but i'm telling you we don't know what tomorrow holds and this is what jesus is warning the church i will come and you will not be ready there is no time like the moment right now the present to give it over to god and i love as he finishes this up in revelation chapter three verse number four he finishes with an encouragement revelation 3 4 he says yet you still have a few names in sardis people who haven't soiled their garments and they walk with me in white for they are worthy the one who conquers will be clothed thus in their white garments i will never blot out his name out of

the book of life i will confess his name before my father and before his angels verse number six he who has an ear to hear let him hear what the spirit says to the churches once again god paints a picture of what people are seeing on the outside by what is happening within the church you see the worship of this temple in artemis the only way in which you could approach the temple to worship with with orgies and sexual culture and human sacrifice and this is a horrible debauchery of humanity and paganism was to approach the temple with a white linen and in this white robe they would check you at the temple and if you were pure if your if your garment was unsoiled or not dirty they would allow you to participate in the worship of this pagan god but if you were soiled you were rejected

and yet here's an external image that god is using for the church saying there are those among you who have not given into the vortex of human debauchery who have not given into the vortex of gravity of sucking us into our sin nature allowing us to fall to the bottom of who we are there are those of you who have conquered your your clothes are not dirtied or soiled with the sin of the culture but you have been overcomers and he says to you i will clothe them in white white represents purity white represents uh like like snow after a winter's day like there's a blanket of freshness this is what jesus wants for you a life of freshness a life of purity a life in which you exist and god sees you in all that you

are it says if you overcome if you resist the gravity of the culture if you fight the vortex of the paganism i will clothe you in white and i love this some people have a problem with the scripture he says i will never blot your name out of the book of life i love what jesus is saying because he's not saying i will cut it out he's reassuring them you will never lose your place with me in faith through jesus christ what this is to you what this is to me this is the affirmation of our faith this is jesus christ telling you this is jesus christ telling me that you don't have to live your life wondering if you are

okay that you don't have to grope around in the darkness hoping that at some point god would turn on the light switch for you and that you would know that you and god are squared away and that your righteousness your right standing with god is what it should be god wants you to know right now that you are in a place of acceptance through jesus christ but so many of us because of works so many of us because of our image so many of us because of our action we wonder am i good enough for god the truth is friends none of us are but jesus christ in the middle of our sin on our worst day like paul says in romans chapter 5 gave himself up for us so that we could accept

life in jesus so that we could accept wholeness in christ so that we could accept purpose for the rest of our days and here's what jesus is saying to the church listen to what i'm saying and you don't have to wonder each and every day as you wake up am i okay because you have the holy spirit on the inside of you through jesus christ that when you wake up that you've got god the creator of the universe conversing and relating with you telling you about your value telling you about his love telling you about how proud he is of you telling about how you you make god dance [Music] because of his great love for you in jesus christ [Music] this is the nature of god he loves you so much that he's going to warn you he's going to rub you the wrong way he's going to correct you

he's going to stop you and i from the path of which we're headed on a path of self-destruction simply so that we could find life in jesus christ and the warning at the end of the letter is this he who has an ear to hear let him hear [Music] don't let this warning of the church friends fall on deaf ears don't let religion drone you through another day this is the time i believe that we are coming into a season of our faith where we're now more than ever we will be required to receive the gift of faith through jesus christ but to act on it in our lives [Music] and let this warning as a part of a parable or a message that jesus gave in his great message the sermon on the mount

as he's preaching to crowds and probably through the course of his ministry on earth preached this message several times over but here as matthew records at the sermon on the mount jesus says these words not everyone who says to me lord lord will enter the kingdom of heaven but the one who does the will of my father who is in heaven he goes on and he says on that day many of you will say to me the lord didn't we prophesy in your name but lord didn't we cast out demons in your name but lord didn't we do many good works in your name and jesus comes back and says

i will declare to them i never knew you depart from me you workers of lawlessness you see the whole basis of this scripture the whole basis of these letters is not to do what looks good on the outside so that everybody can think that you're good because you might fool the world around you but you'll never fool god who created you and when jesus says depart from me you workers of lawlessness what he's saying is it's not about what you do it's about who you know [Music] and when you know god when you discover who god wants you to be the prophecy the demon casting out

that's called exorcism the good works that flows as a byproduct from what god is doing on the inside out versus the church of sardis and truth be told many of us today who are trying to figure things out from the outside in i believe that god is extending an invitation to us these letters are not letters to somebody else in some other point in history their letters to us [Music] say wake up pay attention it's not about projecting the image [Music] it's about receiving the gift walking in that gift and today wherever you are if you've walked into this place

or you're watching online or you're watching by television that i believe god is extending that invitation to you extending that invitation to me of life life eternally in heaven but life with purpose here on earth [Music] friends it doesn't happen as we saw today it doesn't happen because you go to church it doesn't happen because you have a cross around your neck or because when the census knocked on your door that you told them that you were a christian it doesn't happen because you've got a tattoo somewhere on your body of a scriptural reference or because you're a spiritual person it happens because you give your life to jesus christ jesus says he is the way the truth and the life no one goes to the father except through him you can say well pastor i believe in all spiritualities and god is everywhere and all roads lead to heaven that's wonderful thought but the scripture is implicitly clear the only way is through jesus christ

but the recognition that god loved you so much that he gave for you on your worst day his very best jesus and that god wants so much more for you than he's even asking from you in life that the invitation of jesus christ is not a burdensome weight to carry but rather it's shedding the weight of the life and of our past and taking freedom in jesus christ to the future and that invitation stands to you today in this moment in this time wherever you are whether you're watching on a computer screen or a television screen you're here in this room god wants you to live life will you receive the invitation would you do me a favor right now if you're in this room would you just close your eyes for a moment bow your heads listen we're not ashamed this isn't a

secret like ooh look around pastor's doing something no paul the apostle writes in first and second corinthians he says these words examine yourselves what this is right now is a moment of intimacy shut out what's going on around you stop thinking about tomorrow or the week right now this is between you and god is god inviting you into something there's god beckoning you into something jesus says that no one comes to the father unless he is drawn is god inviting you is he extending an invitation to life and the question is if god is extending the invitation of life in jesus christ will you respond to that invitation today paul says in the book of romans that if you believe with your heart confess with your mouth that jesus christ is lord was raised from the dead that you would be saved if you believe unto or you confess unto salvation you believe unto it

simply put here's what i want to do i want to pray with you a prayer to receive jesus christ listen it's not an aberrant cadabra magical prayer as long as you see it just the way the pastor said it everything is good between you and god that's religion but simply put i just wanna i wanna give you the gift of faith in this moment to extend and to receive god's calling for you and will you respond to the invitation of life in jesus christ and simply put i just want to know who it is i'm praying with so if that's you in this place if you've never given your heart to jesus this is your moment if god is inviting you into life maybe you've been living for yourself you say you know what it's time for me to hear what the letter to sardis is all about and to repent and to go for jesus this is the day i'll put a stake in the ground and say i go for jesus and if that's you in just a moment here's what i want to do i'm going to count with you i'll go like this i'll go one two and i'll go three if that's you

just pop a hand up i'll sit i'll acknowledge it you can put it right back down hands are already going up we'll do it all together i just want to know who i'm praying with i'm not going to make you walk an altar i'm not going to make you stand up front right in your chair you can receive jesus christ the question is will you do that all ready hands are up if that's you in this moment forget what's going on around you this is between you and god will you respond to the invitation of jesus christ here we go one two three let me see your hands this place say it put them up so i can see hold them for second one seven people right here in this room friends you need to know something you know hold on hold on you need to know something that the devil's tactics for you are gonna insulate you and isolate you and tell you that you are alone the very fact that there are people in this room that are making the very decision

that you are making is an evidence that you are not by yourself god is inviting you into something greater and something deeper and something more meaningful than you can even imagine and you start it by a journey of faith and today i want you to know heaven is celebrating the decision that you are making in this moment so whether you raise your hand or you should raise your hand whether you're watching online or on television i want you to pray and pray with me listen like i said this isn't a magical statement this is faith i want you to take these words make them yours believe them with your heart hear yourself speak these and i believe that god is going to initiate a relationship with you through jesus christ that will change everything in your life from the inside out [Music] so if you raise your hand or you should have raised your hand would you repeat these words after me if you're in this room and you're a follower of jesus would you just also say these words audibly so that the people who were

around you through comfort could also pray this together simply say these words father god thank you for jesus in this moment i receive the invitation to life fill me with your love with your grace and with your holy spirit forgive me of my past my sin and my regrets and from this day forward i will follow you with all of my life in jesus name amen friends can we celebrate that today come on that's awesome let's cheer it on listen i want you to know something that you did not arrive at your destination you started your journey pun intended

i want you to know listen you don't need to go on this journey alone we want to come alongside if we want to support you we want to build you up if you made the decision to follow jesus christ would you simply do this would you text the word life l-i-f-e life to the number that's on the screen [Music] [Music] to close it out with a 541-527-7277 and a worship to god would you stand your feet i just want to pray over you before we wrap it up i want to believe that god is going to speak to you in ways that you've never been spoken to before i want to believe that the holy spirit is going to move in your heart in ways that you've never experienced today we are going somewhere together so would you do me a favor in faith would you just raise a hand or answer the lord this is a sign of surrender father i pray for the saints of god that are here today lord i lift up this this this crowd in

this room lord i lift up those who are watching at home lord i pray god right now that you would speak to us your word i pray that you would speak to us your faith god i pray that we would know your love in a way that we have never experienced before and lord i pray that you would shower us with your holy spirit that we would walk in a way that would be pleasing to you like your word says complete in every thing we do holy spirit i pray that you would bless every person that is here today in jesus mighty name amen friends remember as we leave that god loves you god cares about you and god sees you