What kind of reputation do you have? Does it have to deal with current reality? Past reality? Current fiction? Or past fiction? That is the first question [or series of questions] that we need to ask ourselves when we read the letter to the Church at Sardis (3:1-6), because that is where Jesus starts. Sardis had a name and a reputation and it was a good one, but it was a false one. Jesus knew better. Jesus knows better.
And that is what we all need to realize, Jesus knows not just our external deeds, but our inner most thoughts and feelings. I cannot speak for you, but for me, that is a scary proposition. You see, I'm pretty good at keeping my external deeds in a good light. I keep to the rules, some because I want to, some because I have to, some by habit, and some just because I do not like breaking the rule.
Unlike all of you out there in reader land, I know exactly what the thoughts and feelings and desires and missteps that I have inside my mind. It's not a very nice place sometimes. I speak pacifism yet my thoughts are sometimes violent. I preach love, yet my feelings dwell in rage. Externally I show compassion and compromise, internally I am selfish. To you share wisdom, when in truth I often just feel foolish. I am a mixture of good and bad, and which side is currently winning is depending on the day, the hour, the minute.
There are plenty of people in my life that would say that I am a good husband, father, pastor, friend, son, brother, uncle. There are many times when I am fooling them all. But Jesus knows, knows the real me, no not real, Jesus knows the whole me. And while the Jesus of Revelation is often harsh, the Jesus of the gospels is kind. The Jesus of the gospels convinces me that I am loved in the midst of my hypocrisy, and so are you.
The Jesus of Revelation reminds me, though, that there is coming a day when I will not be able to change anymore. Maybe the world will end in a couple months, like a study soon to be published suggests, or maybe it will keep spinning for millennia. Either way, it doesn't matter, my days are dwindling, just like everyone else. And one day, soon, I will no longer be able to change my ways, I will no longer be able to live wholly or holy.
In the end it doesn't matter what you think of me, or even what I think of me. What will matter is what Jesus thinks of me, I hope it will be a good reputation that I present him with.
Peace and Love,
Pastor K
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