Jude, servant of the Messiah
Notes
Transcript
You can sometimes tell a lot about a person from a few short words.
It is never the complete picture but often it sets the entire tone of who you understand them to be.
As we look today at Jude’s understanding of Jesus we see who he saw himself to be and who he understood Jesus to be in the first sentence of his epistle.
This letter is from Jude, a slave of Jesus Christ and a brother of James. I am writing to all who have been called by God the Father, who loves you and keeps you safe in the care of Jesus Christ.
He could have claimed authority as one of four named brothers of Jesus.
He is named last, Mark 6:3 and Matthew 13:55 tell us of James, Joseph,* Simon, and Judas.
This proabably indicates he is the youngest of the brothers.
We are also told there were sisters (plural) as well.
He didn’t commence his letter by emphasizing this fact.
He starts with his position as a bond servant of Jesus Christ.
This says something.
Nelson’s New Illustrated Bible Commentary tells us that there were basically two types of slaves in the Roman world.
One became a slave by force and the other by choice.
Those who chose to become a slave, bonded themselves to their master for life.
Jude clearly nails his colours to the wall.
He is saying I have chosen to belong to Christ.
I labour for Christ.
Jude is saying that he is just like every other Christian.
He is also saying that he is called to special service, just as those in the Old Testament were identified as the “slave” (doulos) of the Lord:
We find in passages such as Josh 14:7; 24:29; 2 Kgs 17:23; Ps 89:4, 20 that Abraham, Moses, Joshua, David, and the prophets all used the same term to refer to themselves as slaves or servants of the Lord.
In the New Testament Paul, Peter, and James also called themselves slaves of God and Jesus Christ.
We find this in passages such as Rom 1:1; Gal 1:10; Phil 1:1; Titus 1:1; Jas 1:1; 2 Pet 1:1.
It is a statement of humility and it designates his authority at the same time.
It reflects Jesus’ understanding in Mark 9:35 of how his people should lead.
Yet Jude was from the family of Jesus.
He is the brother of James.
Not James the Apostle, but James who is named by Paul in Galatians 1:19 as the brother of the Lord.
Jude was prepared to accept the position of playing second fiddle to James, his more celebrated brother.
Just think about this for a moment.
You grew up knowing there was something different about your oldest brother.
You saw his passion for the Lord,
You heard the stories you had been told about his birth, how the angel Gabriel appeared to your mother to tell her that was was conceived in her was of the Holy Spirit.
How the shepherds arrived with wild stories of the whole host of heaven singing praises.
How the wise men arrived with gifts that sustained your family when they fled to Egypt to avoid Herod’s attempts to kill Jesus
The prophecies spoken over him by two aged prophets at the temple.
His early years, such as the time he went missing and your parents found him in the temple discussing the word of God with the religious teachers.
Your mum Mary seemed to treasure these things in her heart.
But your siblings didn’t support Jesus when he started his preaching ministry.
You didn’t support him either, in a sense you followed where your older brothers led.
Perhaps your sisters sensed something about Jesus, but it was mum who most believed that Jesus was destined to be someone.
Everything changed after his crucifixtion.
You weren’t surprised when the Romans crucified him.
He was really upsetting the powerful elite of Jerusalem.
You were just glad that you didn’t get caught up in that.
But then everything he had ever said suddenly made sense when he was resurrected from the dead.
Your brother was in fact the Messiah.
Jude, like the rest of his family, experienced a dramatic reassessment of thier understanding.
The Scriptures are clear.
Jude and his family at first didn’t believe Jesus.
When his family heard what was happening, they tried to take him away. “He’s out of his mind,” they said.
In fact the brothers are seen as trying to bait Jesus because they thought he was mad in John 7:2-5
But soon it was time for the Jewish Festival of Shelters, and Jesus’ brothers said to him, “Leave here and go to Judea, where your followers can see your miracles! You can’t become famous if you hide like this! If you can do such wonderful things, show yourself to the world!” For even his brothers didn’t believe in him.
But then everything changes.
The Apostle Paul sets out the sequence in 1 Corinthians 15:1-7.
Jesus personally appeared to James.
James is now in an earthly sense the head of the family unit.
As the oldest brother this responsibility now falls to him.
But then James has a face to face meeting with the risen Lord.
He has a decision to make.
The one he had known as his brother has died, been buried and been raised from the dead.
He has also been transformed and he he is appearing personally to James.
James is convinced and Acts 1:14 tells us that he becomes one of the earliest believers along with his brothers and family.
They all met together and were constantly united in prayer, along with Mary the mother of Jesus, several other women, and the brothers of Jesus.
James becomes an elder of the Jerusalem church.
It appears that the entire family become pillars of the church.
Historians can trace the family of Jude for a 100 years after these events.
Eusebius Hist. eccl. 3.19.1–3.20.6 tells us that Jude’’s grandsons are in the land of Judea during the reign of the emporer Domitian (AD 81-96) and the liniage of the family in positions of leadership in the early church appears to still be current until at least the reign of the emporer Trajan. (Hegesippus)
For Jude
Jude Theological Emphases of the Book
Jesus is the Messiah through whom deliverance and eternal life come (
Simply defined, the Hebrew term messiah or the Greek equivalent term Christ (χριστός, christos) means anointed one.
Jude has come to understand and experience that his brother Jesus, is the annointed one who has delivered people from their sin and granted them eternal life.
This is a monumental realisation for a little brother to make.
Pause
Have you ever approached a massive structure from a great distance?
Something like a mountain.
At first it doesn’t look that big.
Slowly as you close the distance the object grows.
Eventually you get closer and realise that you can no longer see the whole thing.
Then you get to the base and the object towers over you.
And then you try to climb it and realise that the view might be worth it but trying to climb it wasn’t maybe a great idea.
Jude’s realisation was bigger than that.
He has gone from the youngest son of a carpenter, in a small inconsequential village to the brother of the Messiah, the Christ the one who has overcome sin and death and now offers eternal life to all who will believe.
Talk about a mind blowing realisation.
Yet Jude writes these words in verse 21a
await the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will bring you eternal life.
Jude’s understanding of who Jesus really is has grown.
From brother
To mad
To a threat to his life, if he get’s dragged into the power plays of the elite.
To dead.
To resurrected and ascended, the giver of eternal life.
In Jude verse 4 we see another insight into how Jude’s understanding has been transformed.
He describes Jesus as, “Our only Master and Lord.”
The context is in reference to those who deny the Lord’s authority so they can do their own thing.
Jude Commentary
Master (δεσπότην, despotēn) identifies Jesus as one who has legal control and authority over people, and Lord (κύριον, kyrion) identifies Jesus as one who is in a position of authority
Jude understands the unique position of Jesus as not only the saviour but also the master.
This isn’t a simple, Jesus is the boss man, sort of thing.
Throughout the New Testament the term that is translated master in Jude 4 is almost always applied to God the Father, except for 2 Peter 2:1 where Peter applies it to Jesus.
Yet here Jude appears to apply this term to Jesus and the Father.
We see here a hint of the Trinity, co-equal, co-eternal, three but one, one but three.
Jude is ascribing the same attributes to Jesus as he as a Jew in Judea would only nomrally ascribe to God.
The early church were absolutely convinced that Jesus was who he said he was.
Here Jude upholds Jesus’claim in John 10:30 “The Father and I are one.””
This is an enormous claim, as it rests all authority in heaven and on earth in Jesus.
The understanding of Jude his brothers and the entire early church was that Jesus was more than just the Jewish Messiah they had been hoping for.
He is more than just what the Jewish people had understood.
He is Christ, the Lord,
The second person of the Trinity, fully God and fully man, ascended and sitting at God the Father’s right hand to judge the living and dead.
When Jude in verse 4 speaks against the ungodly people who are a threat within the church he condemns them because their actions deny who Jesus really is.
They have placed their beliefs, their action in opposition to Jesus.
They have in Judes words denied God.
And finally we see in Jude’s understanding of Jesus the representation of God’s Glory.
Michael Green in the Tyndale Commentary puts it like this.
2 Peter and Jude: An Introduction and Commentary i. Doxology (24–25)
God’s eternal radiance was crystallized in Jesus Christ (
Jude closing doxology in verses 24 to 25 is clear.
In Jesus we see all the fullness of God.
The challenge to us today is very simple.
Do you see Jesus as Jude did?
Messiah, Lord, God himself, incarnate in the flesh.
Saviour, Master.
The one who can bring you to eternal life.
Or do you make the same eternally fatal error of the ungodly men who deny all that Jesus is and substitute your own version of God in his place?
Please don’t make that mistake, it only leads to destruction.
