Jude Part 1

Intro

If you have your Bibles please turn to the Book of Jude. We will begin with the introduction

Jude 1–2 NIV

Jude, a servant of Jesus Christ and a brother of James, To those who have been called, who are loved in God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ: Mercy, peace and love be yours in abundance.

For the next two weeks we are going to do something a little bit different than our normal set of sermons. We are going to go through the entire book of Jude. I picked the shortest book in the Bible because I think I can do this in two weeks. This is called expository preaching. Basically you just pick a book in the Bible and work your way through it. And the book of Jude is one that many of us skip over , however it is a timeless set of instructions and has a lot of relatable topics that we are dealing with in the here in now. So the author in question is named Jude, he is the half brother of Jesus. I wonder all the time when I read Jude or the Epistle from James what it must have been like to grow up with Jesus. He must likely wrote his letter between 67 and 80 A.D.

The purpose which we are going to dive into was to warn the church about the apostasy that was quickly over taking the early church. He was writing to warn them about the false teachings that were becoming more and more popular in the church.

This is not going to be an easy sermon, however I believe that we can see exactly what Jude was talking about in work in today’s church. I am going to do my very best to keep this from getting taken off youtube. It is a warning that we need to be aware of and take action which will be next week’s sermon.

So let us dive into the scriptures :

Jude 3–4 NIV

Dear friends, although I was very eager to write to you about the salvation we share, I felt compelled to write and urge you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to God’s holy people. For certain individuals whose condemnation was written about long ago have secretly slipped in among you. They are ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into a license for immorality and deny Jesus Christ our only Sovereign and Lord.

Jude was originally going to write about salvation. Yet he couldn’t do that. he was compelled to instead to write the epistle that we have. This is the mark of a good shepherd and a good leader. This is a man of conviction that could not just ignore what was going on around him and in the church. Conviction is what is lacking in the western church. We need people to stand up and be compelled to urge people to contend for the faith. Conviction by the way is the Holy Spirit talking you to. The Holy Spirit getting your attention so that you wake. He is telling you , hey this pretty important.

All that is required for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.

Warren W. Wiersbe

This is what has happened in our culture and in our churches, sometimes even our families. We have ignored the Holy Spirit compelling us to speak the full truth of the Gospel. People have slipped into the church and have moved Christianity to allow for immorality. Now in this letter Jude is speaking specifically about gnosticism.

The Bible Knowledge Commentary Purpose

Gnosticism declared that the spirit was good and the material was evil. Therefore the spiritual was to be cultivated and fed, with freedom to pursue its good inclinations. In addition Gnostics felt free to give vent to the desires of the flesh. Thus the heart of this apostasy was that it turned the grace of God into license and lasciviousness. Jude wrote to warn of this dual apostasy of wrong conduct and false doctrine

Does this sound familiar? gnosticism , a belief system was proven to be heretical during the first century by leaders of the church is alive and well today. The difference between when Jude wrote this letter and today, is that number of people contending for the true faith of Jesus is much smaller. It has been allowed to permeate throughout the church. With the small change from calling it gnosticism to calling it differences in interpretation, theological diversity, etc.

So people have been trying to figure out the decline in Christianity in our society. I want to share an insight that I got from reading Jude. Throughout history empire after empire have attempting to quell the spread of the Gospel, all have failed. However the methods were usually by force. In Nazi Germany, Nazi officials would come to the churches and tell them what they believed now. The Soviets did the same thing. They imprisoned and martyred believers. The mistake they made though was that doesn’t stop believers. We believe in a savior that went to the cross for us.

Blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.

c. 50.

Tertullian

The devil has realized that violence and force do not work out so well. So he changed tactics and he has gone back to the playbook and used a tactic that failed in the first century but would work now. Instead of attempting to force a change on the entire church it is better to change it from within. Divide and conquer if you will. It becomes a whole lot easier when people are simply just agreeing take the Gospel of Jesus and alter it. Once this begins it moves people further and further away from God until there really isn’t need to attend church at all because there is no need to.

Now the real genius behind all of it, is that we are doing it in the name of Jesus. We call it hospitality or being a good neighbor. It doesn’t become about what scripture actually says, it becomes a name-calling game that we see everywhere in our world. The word love has been so altered that it now means that if you love you must accept anything and everything I do or want to do regardless of how it effects you.

Once the church has been weakened then you can see what happens in society. There are currently pro-life people facing prison sentences for protesting. Yet there is not any outrage about their freedom of speech or the loss of their freedom.

The entire Hamas and Israeli conflict has left me very grief stricken over the state of American Christianity. Here is the truth. If you believe in God and Jesus and the Bible, then you believe in Israel. It is a simple as that. Gentiles, that would be you and I are grafted into the tree with Israel. We both share the same exact spiritual heritage. Their history is our history. Here is the scary part is that people are actually supporting terrorists and the violent tactics that were used. The church has only stood by and asked for a cease-fire. This is what I mean by the weakening of the church.

I do not support war or the use of violence. However the church has got to start to showing people the truth of what happens in the world. The church cannot keep making these middle of the road proclamations.

One thing I like to do, is look at church websites, and specifically I like to look at the statement of beliefs. I like to look at those because you can see what kind of church it is before you even go. There are some with a great set of beliefs posted and I read and wished I had wrote it. There are others that are so general that it could be anything they believe in. Some do not have any beliefs posted.

Jude 8–10 NIV

In the very same way, on the strength of their dreams these ungodly people pollute their own bodies, reject authority and heap abuse on celestial beings. But even the archangel Michael, when he was disputing with the devil about the body of Moses, did not himself dare to condemn him for slander but said, “The Lord rebuke you!” Yet these people slander whatever they do not understand, and the very things they do understand by instinct—as irrational animals do—will destroy them.

It always amazes me that something written in the first century is very relevant today. This could have been written this morning. This is exactly what we are doing right now. We pollute our own bodies with chemicals so that we can deal with this broken world. It doesn’t even have to be narcotics. When you watch TV how many alcohol commercials are on. The amount of things that we can use to pollute our own bodies is mind blowing when you sit down and think about it.

We reject authority. People have been doing this forever. We were all teenagers or are teenagers now. At some point in our lives we thought we had all the answers. However in our current culture I see this happening from all sorts of people. We reject the authority of scripture , of God and once that happens well why not reject all authority. If I don’t have to listen to the creator of all things. Then why do I need to listen to anyone else? If I can create my “own truth” then I can reject everything inlcuding any and all reasonable arugments.

I stand by this assessment, you will find it difficult to find a true atheist in this world. A true atheist rejects the very notion of God. So there would be no need to hate God, and yet that is the very argument that most atheist use for their beliefs. The world is so quick to blame God at every turn for something bad that happens and but at the same time we reject anything that interferes with our free will. When God does give us the miracles we pray for people are quick to chalk it up to something else.

Now here is the part that again is the mark of the true leader that Jude is. Believers are not exempt from correction in this letter. The archangel Michael did not even condemn the devil. Think about this for minute, he did not condemn the devil to hell for the rebellion that he lead. Instead He said the Lord rebuke you

We do not condemn people nor do we send people to heaven. This is another way that we reject the authority of God. We take His authority into our own hands. It is isn’t our authority. It isn’t our authority to judge anyone’s life before they come to Jesus.

We are to stand up on Biblical scripture vs heretical ideology just as Jude is doing here. But there is a big difference between ideas and people.

Jude 12–13 NIV

These people are blemishes at your love feasts, eating with you without the slightest qualm—shepherds who feed only themselves. They are clouds without rain, blown along by the wind; autumn trees, without fruit and uprooted—twice dead. They are wild waves of the sea, foaming up their shame; wandering stars, for whom blackest darkness has been reserved forever.

This is the danger facing the church and why it is working so well because it is a two fold plan. Gnosticism is the game plan but it is having success for two reasons. One is the people that are bringing it in. The second , in my opinion is much sadder. Shepherds who only feed themselves. When I say that the church quit. I specifically mean that pastors did. It is easier talk about other stuff. Pastors have become concerned with social media clout, setting up franchises instead of planting new churches. There are Christians with huge platforms that can reach a lot of people. Yet they do not say anything of substance. The shepherds who are supposed to lay down their lives for the flock are few and far in today’s church. There are people I know that believe the word of scripture but will not make a stand when these false teachings pop up.

James 3:1 NIV

Not many of you should become teachers, my fellow believers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly.

I pray for church leaders so much. For the sake of the people they are leading and for the sake of themselves. I am always praying for God to raise up the next wave of leaders that will step into the fray. We know that God will raise up the next generation of leaders. When the people rejected going into the promise land in the book of Exodus. God let them wander and a new generation was brought up to take the promise land. That is what we are talking about here , people that will step into the fray for what is right in this world. That is what is missing. About a month ago, I talked about the decline in people that say they are Christian. The biggest reason for this decline is self-inflicted. It isn’t because of science , or psychology , or the ideologies that we contend with.

It is self-inflicted wounds that leaders made to the church because they wanted to be relevant. Because they water down the Gospel to the point that anything goes. That is not the type of thing that I want to be involved with. I can sin all by myself, I don’t need anyone to encourage me to do so or tell me that it is ok.

What I do need is people in my life that love me enough to tell me the truth even the hard truths. Everyone needs that.

Hebrews 4:12–13 NIV

For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

I need the Word of God in my life. The full entire Word of God in my life. Because without it, I am lost. Because without the Word of God society is lost. If you don’t believe me on that notion please visit where ever you get your news.

In closing, where does this leave us? We can see the playbook from the enemy but also be reassured that God always leaves a remnant of believers. I can tell you that this church is one of the churches that are still stepping into the fray. This church is one that has and always will be built on the Word of God.

If you want to give your life over to Jesus today, or you want to learn more, or you need pray we will be up the front.

Let us close in prayer.