When Christ visited the church body at Sardis, He said to them, “I know your works, that you have a name that you are alive, but you are dead” (Revelation 3:1). He reached out to check their vital signs and, as the great Bible teacher Dr. Lehman Strauss once put it, “The Great Physician felt their pulse [and] pronounced them dead.” They had degenerated from holiness to phoniness.
Oh, the dreadful condition of being artificial! Many people know only the appearance and not the reality of Jesus Christ. Do you know the difference between appearance and reality? God does! In every generation He has had to pronounce this woe against certain ones: “… These people draw near Me with their mouths, and honor Me with their lips, but have removed their hearts far from Me …” (Isaiah 29:13).
Think of the excruciating eternal impact of being busy and active in the church—but ending up unknown by Jesus Christ! Is your heart in the same place that your mouth is saying you are? You talk and sing about the Lord, and perhaps even teach a class, but does your heart belong to Him?
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Pastor John Barnett has been devouring the Word of God for over 30 years. John, now the teaching pastor of Calvary Bible Church in Kalamazoo, Michigan has served congregations in Oklahoma, New England, Georgia and California. He also served on the Faculty of the Master's College...
