Relying on Dreams

Notes

v. 8, “Yet in like manner these people also...”

The ungodly perverts and deniers (cf. v. 4) that crept into the church unnoticed are like those ungodly perverts and deniers of old mentioned in vv. 5-7— the unbelieving Israelites, the rebellious angels, and the sexual immoral of Sodom and Gomorrah.

How are they like them?

v. 8, “Yet in like manner these people also, relying on their dreams, defile the flesh, reject authority, and blaspheme the glorious ones.”

Here are four sins, one of which serves as the foundation for the other three.

They rely on their dreams.

They defile the flesh.

They reject authority.

They blaspheme the glorious ones.

What does Jude mean by these things?

Relying on dreams.

Rather than depend on the objective truth of God’s Word, they trusted the subjective impression of their own experiences. A supposed dream from God meant they could ignore God’s Word.

In our day the same thing happens. A man has a dream that he claims is from God, and suddenly whatever sin he loves is no longer a sin. God’s Word may say that its a sin, but he has had a dream that takes authority over God’s Word. This is, of course, complete nonsense. God’s Word is the same yesterday, today, and forever just as God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Just as there is no variation or shadow due to change in him (), so there is no variation or shadow due to change in his Word. If God’s Word says it is morally wrong, it will always be morally wrong.

abortion is OK and homosexuality isn’t a sin.

Q: What would you say to someone who says, “Now, wait a minute. It used to be wrong for God’s people to wear mixed fabrics and marry people other than Israelites. That changed, so why couldn’t something like homosexuality go from once wrong to now right?

Approach #1: Distinguish between the civil, ceremonial, and moral laws in the OT.

Approach #2: Study the NT, which reveals which OT laws continue enforce and which do not because Jesus has fulfilled them through his work on the cross (cf. ).

Q: The subjective experience that turns people from objective truth does not always come from a dream. What other subjective appearances have you heard people point to when they reject God’s Word?

People point to visions, an audible or non-audible word from God, or a personal experience with a family member or close friend.

Another subjective experience that turns people away from God and toward sin is just their own desire. A man desires another man's wife, and on the basis of having this desire he decides that his desire must not be wrong. He convinces himself and tries to convince others with a wicked question, "Why would I have this desire if this desire is wrong?"

VBS Kickoff at Emmanuel: June 5, 2019

Of course this is complete nonsense. We all have desires that we know aren't good for us. The same man who asks, "Why would I have this desire if this desire is wrong," would say to me as I eat a box of expired twinkies, "Hey! You know that's not good for you!" But I could ask him, "Why would I have the desire for these old twinkies if they're not good for me?" He would of course think that ridiculous because he knows that we all sometimes desire things that aren't good.

On Wednesday, June 5, Children's Vacation Bible School begins at Emmanuel Baptist Church! We will meet each Wednesday evening from 5:30-7:30 through July 3. For more information see Dani Dyess. Deacon's Meeting: June 9, 2019 There will be a deacons meeting on June 9 after the evening service in the conference room. Business Meeting: June 12, 2019 Our next business meeting is Wednesday, June 12. Please have any new business needing to be discussed to the office by June 9. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! This Sunday we want to say thank you to those who serve us so well every week here at Emmanuel! While no list like this is ever truly complete and many others serve just as faithfully, we want to say thank you to Stan Winslett who has been leading us in music since 2013, Dani Dyess who has been playing the organ/clavinova at Emmanuel since 1979, Kim Garner who has been our pianist since 2014, Kim Hendrix who has served as secretary since 2013, and Sue Fussell who has been our "sanitation technician" since 2016. We are blessed as a church family to have these brothers and sisters, so please express your appreciation to them today!

a personal experience with a family member or close friend.

Q: If someone points to a subjective experience, how can we verify its authenticity?

We can ask two questions: (1) Does the Bible say the same thing? (2) What does the subjective experience lead to?

For the apostates who had crept into the church in Jude’s day, their subjective experience led to defiling the flesh, rejecting authority, and blaspheming the glorious ones.

We can be sure that whatever leads us to sin is not from God.

Defiling the flesh.

Trusting their subjective experiences as a guide, these people defile the flesh, which means that they engage in sexual immorality.

Sexual immorality is any sexual engagement outside the marriage covenant between a man and a woman.

Rejecting authority.

Trusting their subjective experiences as a guide, these people also reject authority. This is the authority of God as revealed in his Word.

There is no way for these people to have their sin and submit to God, so they must reject his authority in order to have their sin. In effect, this makes their sinful desires the authority in their lives.

Blaspheming the glorious ones.

Trusting their subjective experiences as a guide, these people also blaspheme the glorious ones. Who are these glorious ones and what does it mean to blaspheme them? Well, v. 9 gives us a clue. It says...

Jude 9 ESV

But when the archangel Michael, contending with the devil, was disputing about the body of Moses, he did not presume to pronounce a blasphemous judgment, but said, “The Lord rebuke you.”

Verse 9 references an event not found in our Bible. It is a part of that same body of Jewish intertestamental traditional writing called the Pseudepigrapha.

We already saw Jude refer to one work in this body of literature when he referenced the rebellious angels in v. 6. The account of those rebellious angels is recorded in our Bible at the beginning of , but Jude likely pulls from an expanded retelling of that event, which is found in the Pseudepigrapha in a work called 1 Enoch. Jude will actually quote from 1 Enoch in vv. 14-15.

In v. 9, however, he references a different work from the Pseudepigrapha—The Assumption of Moses. Sometimes this is referred to as The Testament of Moses with The Assumption of Moses being a separate writing, but at some point both works were edited together and simply called The Assumption of Moses.

In an early version of that work that the early church father’s referenced but that is now lost to us, Moses gives prophecies and instructions to Joshua before his death. Once he has died, however, Michael the archangel is tasked with burying Moses’ body, but the devil wants the body for some evil reason. Michael, however, resists the devil not by pronouncing judgment upon him himself but by saying, “The Lord rebuke you.” After the devil is rebuffed by the Lord’s power, Michael is able to go on with the burial of Moses.

Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament

1°. Michael was commissioned to bury Moses.

2°. Satan opposed the burial on the ground (a) that he was the lord of matter (ὕλη) and that accordingly the body should be rightfully handed over to him; (b) that Moses was a murderer, having slain the Egyptian.

3°. Michael having rebutted Satan’s accusations proceeded to charge Satan with having instigated the serpent to tempt Eve.

4°. Finally, all opposition having been overcome, the assumption took place in the presence of Joshua and Caleb, and in a very peculiar way. A two-fold presentation of Moses appeared: one was Moses in company with angels, the other was the dead body of Moses, being buried in the recesses of the mountains.

Q: So based on that understanding of v. 9, what do you think it means that these apostates blasphemed the glorious ones?

It likely means that they attempted to exorcise self-centered authority over fallen angels in order to make themselves look powerful. This is contrasted with Michael’s Lord-centered authority.

As one writer put it...

The NIV Application Commentary: 2 Peter, Jude Application of the Examples to the False Teachers (vv. 8–10)

Presumably, Jude’s point is that the false teachers are so presumptuous as to do what even Michael, the archangel, refused to do: rebuke, without the Lord’s authority and backing, Satan or his associates. For Michael did not himself rebuke Satan; he called on the Lord to do so. The false teachers, however, disparage evil angels on their own authority.

[Illus] Perhaps something similar happened in ...

[Illus] Perhaps something similar happened in ...

Acts 19:13–16 ESV

Then some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists undertook to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, “I adjure you by the Jesus whom Paul proclaims.” Seven sons of a Jewish high priest named Sceva were doing this. But the evil spirit answered them, “Jesus I know, and Paul I recognize, but who are you?” And the man in whom was the evil spirit leaped on them, mastered all of them and overpowered them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded.

Jude doesn’t say that the apostates are tying to cast out demons as did the Jewish exorcists in . But the Jewish exorcist were attempting to overpower the power and influence of evil angels without the Lord-centered authority of Jesus.

Q: Perhaps the dreamers Jude referred to stood before a congregation and said, “Satan, we rebuke you!” What’s wrong with that?

One, you’re praying to Satan.

Two, you’re depending on your own authority in your rebuke of Satan.

Q: What would be wrong with this: “Satan, we rebuke in the Name of Jesus!”?

One, you’re still praying to Satan.

Two, even though the Name of Jesus is invoked, the whole thing still seems self-centered.

Q: Have you seen people do this sort of thing in the church today? What has been your response?

TV shows that depict Satan, demons, witchcraft, etc. as heroic or good.

Q: Have you seen people do this sort of thing in the church today? What has been your response?

There’s a saying that I think was once on a Christian T-shirt: “When the devil reminds me of my past, I remind him of his future.” We get the point: we’ve failed in the past, but the devil is going to hell in the future.

But there is a subtle danger in this statement. It suggests that we are in an audible argument with the devil, and its one in which we are depending on “I”. Remember what it says, “I remind him of his future.”

In reality, we have no inherent authority over the devil or demons, and the only authority we do have comes from the Lord Jesus as we call on him.

Q: How have you seen people not take the spiritual forces of evil as seriously as they should in our day?

TV shows that depict Satan, demons, witchcraft, etc. as heroic or good.

When we belittle the devil or think we can boss the devil around then we “blaspheme all (we) do not understand,” (v. 10a).

As v. 10 says, this blasphemy is one half of what destroys these apostates. The other half is their own animal-like lusts.

Jude 10 ESV

But these people blaspheme all that they do not understand, and they are destroyed by all that they, like unreasoning animals, understand instinctively.

Q: Let’s think about Jude’s use of 1 Enoch and The Assumption of Moses. Does his use of these writings mean that they were divinely inspired? Why?