Wake Up!
In Ephesians 5:14, Paul says, “Awake, O sleeper, and rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.” How do you obey a command to wake up from sleep? Let me tell you when you will obey the command to wake up. You will wake up when you are on the sixth floor of a hotel at 3 AM and fire alarms are blasting. You particularly will wake up when small children are with you in that hotel room and the wife who you love. That happened to my family once on a trip to New York, and let me tell you, you respond to the call to wake up! I’ve never been so cold standing in a parking lot in my briefs as that night in New York.
The church of Sardis is told to WAKE up! Christ is calling His bride toward a wakefulness of urgent importance. To be told to wake up is to be told to be alert and arise from your unconscious state to a conscious and attentive one. This church is not at all aware of her real spiritual state. They think they are “fine.” They are far from “fine.”
The thought that most of my congregants think they are “fine” is a scary thought. They think they are “fine” when they are just going about their busy days. They are working, shopping, driving, playing their video games, binging Netflix at night, scrolling on their phones and running their children wildly from one activity to another. In the meantime, they have forgotten the priority of the pursuit of intimacy with God each day, touching base with fellow members of the Body, getting time in the Scriptures, practicing prayer or solitude. Week after week, in the busyness of the social activities, there is little zeal for worship or deep commitment to our local church, and on and on. My concern is this: One is either always growing and maturing spiritually or one is slowly drifting off. There is no neutrality in the Christian life. You are either connected to the Vine, or you are not. “Fine” can often appear alive, but it is in fact a “deadness”, with no zeal for God and the things of God.
The church today—and every individual in the church (including Hebron)—needs to wake up. A wakeup call is a sudden clear warning that something is bad or “off.” I got a wakeup call at 3 AM that one chilly New York morning, not the one I was expecting from the main desk at 7:30 AM. We thought we were “fine” in our beds that particular night, but we needed to heed the call to awake. A wakeup call from the Lord is a spiritual call; we respond with renewal of the mind, love in our hearts, hope in all we do.
A prayer from a 16th century Puritan pastor:
O My Savior, help me. I am slow to learn, so prone to forget, so weak to climb; I am in the foothills when I should be on the heights; I am pained by my graceless heart, my prayerless days, my poverty of love, my sloth in the heavenly race, my sullied conscience, my wasted hours, my unspent opportunities.
I am blind while light shines around me; take the scales from my eyes, grind to dust the evil heart of unbelief. Make it my chiefest joy to study thee, meditate on thee, gaze on thee, sit like Mary at thy feet, lean like John on thy breast, appeal like Peter to thy love, count like Paul all things dung.
Give me increase and progress in grace so that there may be more decision in my character, more vigour in my purposes, more elevation in my life, more fervor in my devotion, more constancy in my zeal.
For worship this week, read Revelation 3:1-6.
1. Why do you think God cares about our spiritual state of health and alertness? How is this different than just God wanting converts and people to be saved?
2. See Matthew 7:21-23. Why does God say “I never knew you” to people who thought they were doing good and were “fine”?
3. Can you think of a time in your life when God has prodded you to wake up, given you a wakeup call? How is this Philippians 2:12-13 in action in your sanctification?
4. What do you think zeal is in the Christian life? Can you think of someone who is zealous for the Lord? What would Hebron Church look like in a zealous state spiritually?
5. Spend some time praying for your walk with the Lord and Hebron – the need for renewal and being called to wakefulness!
