Deniers of Grace

I think one of the things that we are struck with when we read the Bible is how we all seem t have memories like goldfish. You see it with the Israelites who were saved by God from Egypt then immediately turned to worship idols. Who were punished for that and reminded of the Gospel the didn’t believe that God could bring them into the Promised Land.

In the New Testament the Galatians who received the Gospel from Paul, quickly turned aside to the Judaizers. Not to mention the Corinthians who were rebuked by Paul for profaning the Gospel by their immorality, and then rebuked again mere decades later for the exact same thing! By Clement.

You and I experience the same goldfish-like memory too. We hear of the Grace of God of Sunday through the Gospel, we start the week enthusiastic to live sanctified lives, but as the week goes on, we forget that, Gospel. Life gets in the way, we sin. We stumble. We fall. And by the time Saturday rolls around, it feels like we will just be limping into Church to hear the Word preached again. We need to be constantly reminded.

This is where Jude finds us, “appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints… Now I desire to remind you, though you know all things once for all.” Jude reminds them and us of the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints.

We too often forget the faith handed down to us. We need to be diligent against heresy, sure. But what Jude highlights is a problem common to us all, we need to be reminded of the Gospel so that we do not profane grace and use it as an excuse for sinning. This is the character and nature of the false teaching. It is a temptation to us all.

As Paul says in Romans 6,

“What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? 2 By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? 3 Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.”

My hope for us this evening is that we would take to heart the warnings Jude gives us about these false teachers and be spurred on to attain the apostolic faith that has been handed down to us once and for all, that we might walk in newness of life.

We will look at this text under two headings, Three Examples, and Three Sins.

Three Examples (5-7)

What was so dangerous and destructive about these false teachers? They didn’t deny the divinity of Christ, it wasn’t something more sophisticated and developed that we see in some of Paul’s letters. But their teaching was such that following them would lead to a final and ultimate judgement.

These teachers denied the life-changing grace of God in Christ and instead of being conformed after Christ’s image, they used grace as an excuse for sinning, following their sinful desires. They arrogantly laugh in the face of God.

Jude opens his argument against the false teachers here with significant force, giving us three Old Testament examples: the unbelieving wilderness generation of Israel, the angels who abandoned their heavenly places, and destruction of the sinful cities, Sodom and Gomorrah.

Israel (vs 5)

Read vs 5

The Israelites had just experienced their deliverance by God from Egypt, they had seen God deal swiftly with Pharaoh and his army, his mighty hand of salvation had brought them safely through the waters of judgement.

He led them by a cloud in the day and by a pillar of fire at night. The Lord was with His people. He brought them to the Promised Land. And yet, when they were confronted with a new enemy in the land, what was their response?

“Would that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or would that we had died in this wilderness! 3 Why is the Lord bringing us into this land, to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will become a prey. Would it not be better for us to go back to Egypt?” 4 And they said to one another, “Let us choose a leader and go back to Egypt.”

Despite all these miracles, Israel was still unbelieving. They still desired to go back to Egypt, their captors. They had experienced great deliverance but did not persevere in faith.

One author notes here that Jude is telling us that, “just because people belong to the right community does not mean that they can escape the judgment of God.” Likewise, these false teachers assumed that they could just belong without believing.

Israel was saved from the evils of Egypt, but Jude doesn’t say that they had eternal salvation. They were liberated from the worldly clutches of Egypt, but in unbelief their souls remained hard. There is solace from the world within the community of the saved, yet without faith in Christ’s work alone, we will not be saved truly.

Faith in the powerful hand of God for our salvation is the defining marker of the people of God. But these teachers “deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.” The apostolic faith that has been handed down to us is simply that we would trust the saving work of Christ alone who can deliver us.

Israel saw a type of this salvation yet did not believe. The false teachers saw this salvation yet carried on in unbelief. We too also need reminding that the saving work of Christ alone is our only basis for standing before God.

Do you believe this? Christ offers you himself today, you need not bring anything except the empty hands to receive the grace of Christ. He is your cover. He is your righteousness. By His grace alone you can enter into the true promised land, the New Heavens and Earth and so be with your saviour forever.

Angels (vs 6)

Jude then moves to give us another example.

“And the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day—" (Jude 6)

This passage is where Jude gets interesting. It causes and has caused no amount of tension in the Church. Many commentators believe Jude is here referencing the fall of the Angels in Genesis 6, which on its own garners enough attention! But on top of that, the source for the interpretation is from a book called 1 Enoch.

Enoch, we are told, was the seventh from Adam and prophesied. This book, 1 Enoch, taking the name of this man of God, seeks to claim authority for itself based on Enoch’s reputation. And what makes things even more difficult for us today, is that Jude, the brother James who is the Bishop of Jerusalem, and brother of Jesus, quotes from 1 Enoch. So, its presence in the Bible is confusing. His quotation seems to give 1 Enoch legitimacy.

Reading that book, it is clear that it does not fit with the Biblical canon, so did Jude get it wrong? Does that mean that Jude does not fit? The early Church was split on this question, some knew that Jude was Scripture and because He quoted 1 Enoch, that made it Scripture also. But the presence of a portion of a book within Scripture, does not legitimize the whole thing. I think that it is best to follow St. Augustine’s example, who did not hold the authorship of 1 Enoch as legitimate, not because of the supposed author and their godliness, “but because these documents are not believed to belong to him.”

All of these discussion don’t in any way undermine the point that Jude is making in his quote. Whatever we may think of Genesis 6 or 1 Enoch, Jude is wanting to emphasize a similar point he made about Israel. That the rebellion of the Angels led to their abandonment to darkness, which is a spiritual judgment.

The Angels here, following Satan, desired to be like God. They had eternal heavenly glory worshipping and serving their creator, and yet they decided to cast that aside in the pursuit of glory for themselves. An antinomian desires the same, they want to know good and evil for themselves. They want to be like God for themselves. To make their own laws. To cast off the restraints of God, their creator and seek a life of sin instead. In doing so, they reject the authority of God.

These false teachers will come under the same condemnation the angels faced. The angels can never escape from their judgment, their lot has been cast. But we should not fear. Instead, the hope of the Gospel is held out to us. Christ came not to save angels, but to save man. To save us. And as John writes,

And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. 16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned. (John 3:14-18b)

This hope is our only hope.

Sodom and Gomorrah vs 7

Jude moves on to give us a third example. Sometimes, this example is used to say that the Sodomites were destroyed because of homosexuality. Others condemn Sodom and Gomorrah for its pride and hatred of foreigners and inhospitality. But Jude’s point that he makes here is generally about the false teacher’s sexual desire. That they pervert the grace of God into sensuality.

In the same way that the angels usurped their created order and lusted after women, the sodomites lusted after strange flesh. Jude is highlighting to us the shocking character of the false teachers’ rebellion against God.

Jude is urging his readers, to not follow the teachings of these false teachers. As the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah and the angels, no less the sin of Israel who “rebelled against the Lord who had redeemed them,” was shockingly unnatural, so too the rebellion of the false teachers would lead to their condemnation.

Jude goes on to describe the purpose of the judgement of Sodom and Gomorrah. They “serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire.” This site was an ever-present reminder of the reality of divine judgement. The fire and brimstone creating an uninhabitable wasteland became imagery for future judgement.

Even Philo and Josephus who both lived in the first century speak of the “vestiges of the divine fire” still smouldering in Syria. It was the same time these recipients of the letter were living. They could go there and see this city which was destroyed due to arrogant sinful living. This serves as a warning for Jude against those who would follow false teachers, this all waits for people who refuse to obey God.

Three Sins (8-10)

Jude begins by noting that these are “dreamers.” The reference is made to dreams as a means of prophetic revelation. Dreams held a high place in Jewish divine revelation, the false teachers knew this and used it to undermine the Gospel. This is set in contrast to Jude’s appeal to stand firm in the faith (vs 3-4).

Not only do these false teachers claim new, divine revelation through dreams, but they use it and its origin from God, as a license for sin! It is this reliance of dreams and “new revelation” that means that these false teachers “defile the flesh, reject authority, and blaspheme the holy ones.” It forms the basis for all they do.

Instead of having lives conformed to that of Christ’s they use the excuse of new revelation as a license for sin and sexual immorality. They defile their flesh in a similar way to that of the angels and Sodom and Gomorrah. In their flagrant disregard of the revelation given in the apostolic tradition, these teachers reject the authority of the Lord, the one who judges sin. These are both in line with antinomian behaviour.

It seems on the surface that the third descriptor throws a curveball of sorts into Jude’s description. The simple interpretation in line with antinomian behaviour is that they blaspheme the angels who are the givers and guardians of the law of Moses (Acts 7:53; Hebrews 2:2). And this makes sense. All these three sins listed are of the same type.

They have given themselves over to the sinful lusts of their flesh, defiling what was good and created by God. They have rejected His authority over their lives, and they blaspheme the angels who were said to have delivered the law of God to Israel. They sought to release themselves from every restraint and requirement of God and seek to drag others with them.

Michael and Satan (9-10)

Jude moves on to give another example from a book called The Assumption of Moses, a piece of apocryphal literature. The discussion of Jude’s use of this literature is the same as to what applies to 1 Enoch. It causes the same problems around canon and authorship. Just as St. Augustine affirmed Jude’s use of that particular part of 1 Enoch, we can affirm the same for The Assumption of Moses.

Jude interprets this example as saying, “these people blaspheme all that they do not understand.” The frivolous rejection of God and his commands has led them to make pronouncements over the angels of which they have no right to do. The words that Michael speaks here, “The Lord rebuke you!,” which are an allusion to Zechariah 3:2, are significant.

The exact reasons for the dispute are not relevant to the point that Jude is making, save that there is a legal dispute between Michael and Satan as to where and how Moses should be buried.

According to tradition, Satan slandered Moses calling him a murderer and unfit for the burial designated by God. The point Jude makes, is that even though Michael was superior to Satan as the archangel, he “did not step beyond his proper place.”

Michael left punishment and the verdict of sin to God while Satan fell to slander. Jude’s point is quite clear; these false teachers have overstepped where they should not. They have followed after Israel, the Angels, Sodom and Gomorrah and here, Satan. They have gone after their own way rather than following the Lord’s. Michael, who seemed to have all authority to judge according to one author, “refrained from doing so, giving way to the Lord as the one who is truly judge.”

The false teachers rejection of the angels as givers of the law reveals that they do not have any actual understanding of these things. Though they may claim to be of great understanding, appealing to their dreams, they are destroyed by this understanding because they reject the true source of truth, God who gives life.

They, “like unreasoning animals, understand instinctively.” “Instinctively” corresponds to “flesh” earlier no doubt alluding to their sexual desires, thus they are no better than animals who follow their sexual instincts.

These false teachers show their utter lack of understanding of the heavenly things and how they are actually subject to their most base, instinctive desires, not even separating themselves from animals. They claim to be spiritual but “prove themselves to be living only on the subhuman level of the beasts.”

There are many who come and seek to grab our attention by “the good life.” They appeal to our fleshly, sinful desires. They put themselves up as their own authority, denying the Gospel of God.

Do not give in to these people, their way is death, and their feet lead to destruction. Contend for the faith you have received and believed. Christ’s way is life, and his feet are peace. He is your only hope in life and in death. Do not be like goldfish, forgetting immediately, but by the grace of God, have the memory of an elephant. Hold fast to Christ, he holds fast to you.