Revelation 3:1 The great fault found with Sardis is that is has a name to live, but is dead. What a high position, in a worldly point of view, has the nominal church occupied during this period! Look at her high-sounding titles, and her favor with the world. But how pride and popularity have grown apace, until spirituality is destroyed, the line of distinction between the church and the world is obliterated, and the different popular bodies are churches of Christ only in name!  This church was to hear the proclamation of the doctrine of the second advent. "If therefore thou shall not watch, I will come on thee as a thief." Verse 3. This implies that the doctrine of the advent would be proclaimed, and the duty of watching would be enjoined upon the church.