Good morning and welcome to Dishman Baptist Church. What a blessing it is to be here in the house of the Lord with you this morning. Please take your Bibles and turn with me to Jude.

What a dismal picture of the church we have been given. The licentious, permissive lifestyles of the teachers has led to abuses of those in the church who are the most vulnerable - often times this abuse has been overlooked or outright ignored by those who should have taken steps to protect those who are vulnerable and to prevent outrages from taking place.

Worldly ideologies had not only crept their way into the churches but they had kicked down the doors and, despite the leadership’s claims to the contrary, had in many places replaced or at least become equal to the apostle’s teachings, dividing people along lines that the apostle’s sought to remove. Under the influence of these ideologies one’s social or economic status carried as much weight among the believers as an individual’s spiritual status. In some cases more.

There were a few teachers who had been exposed for not only preaching other’s sermons without giving credit but had also contracted out much of their study so that instead of living up to Paul’s admonition to Timothy to study the Word as a workman diligently dividing the Word and teaching it correctly, they were presenting someone else’s conclusions as their own.

One member of the church, a man who was tasked to represent the church’s interests to the world, resigned from his position and as a parting “gift” was given half a year’s salary amounting to more than most members of the church, those who were supporting his efforts, made in a year and possibly two.

And the world was taking notice.

Of course this is not a picture of the church in Jude’s day - it is a picture of the church in our day. Yet, the picture that Jude has drawn us is equally bleak. There were infiltrators who were seeking to mislead the church and to abuse God’s grace. These may have even been well meaning men who felt that what they were doing wasn’t wrong. But in the end they were compromising the Gospel of Christ and leading the flock of God in directions and on paths that they were not to go down.

It is easy to despair when the storm clouds converge above you. When all seems to be going poorly and the battles seem to be lost even as they are being fought. Earlier this week the Public Religion Research Institute released the results of its 2020 American Religious Landscape study. White Evangelical Protestants continue their steady decline, a decline that can certainly be seen in the SBC, from a high of 23% in 2006 (the highest of those surveyed) to 14.5% in 2020. Contrast that to the change among those listed as unaffiliated with religion or the “nones” from 16% in 2006 to 23.3% in 2020. Now to be fair these numbers are only taking in to account white Christians. But the picture is bleak. The storm clouds are converging over the church.

One thing we must recognize is that the teachers that Jude was openly opposing in the first century were not the church. Those seeking to embrace worldly ideologies in our day are not the church. The Southern Baptist Convention is not the church. So as dark as the picture may not seem it is not the end.

I was looking for a different quote that fit a thought but instead I found this quote from the Lord of the Rings that fit the point I am trying to make.

“There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach. His song in the Tower had been defiance rather than hope; for then he was thinking of himself. Now, for a moment, his own fate, and even his master’s, ceased to trouble him. He crawled back into the brambles and laid himself by Frodo’s side, and putting away all fear he cast himself into a deep untroubled sleep.”

Now why do I use that quote here? Because Jude is about to give us a view of the stars. He has just provided us our song of defiance as we vow to watch out for ourselves and our spiritual growth and to watch and attempt to win back those who are wavering or have fallen under the sway of the teachers. But now he will transform that song of defiance to one of hope as he gives us a picture of the One who is so transcendent that the vileness of the current world could never touch or soil Him. And that would be enough but he is also going to show us One who is not only transcendent but immanent enough to keep us from being swept away in the current of evil running rampant through out our world.

Let’s turn our eyes to the stars as we look at Jude 24 and 25.

Jude 24–25 CSB

Now to him who is able to protect you from stumbling and to make you stand in the presence of his glory, without blemish and with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, power, and authority before all time, now and forever. Amen.

I said a moment ago that the teachers that Jude was opposing were not the church. That those seeking to embrace worldly ideologies in our day are not the church. That even the Southern Baptist Convention is not the church. We are the church. The readers of Jude’s letter were the church. We are the one’s who have the heritage that this promise is given too. And what a promise it is.

He Is Able

Now to the One who is able. Stop. I mean we could truly just stop there. Jude could say just those seven words and say all that needs to be said. There’s nothing more that can be added to that statement. He. Is. Able. Our God is able - notice that this is a definitive statement. Jude is not equivocating here. There is no doubt that God is able to do whatever He sets His mind to. Other doxologies in the New Testament strike this same note

Romans 16:25 CSB

Now to him who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the proclamation about Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery kept silent for long ages

Ephesians 3:20 CSB

Now to him who is able to do above and beyond all that we ask or think according to the power that works in us—

The verb here is dynamai. It means to possess capability (whether because of personal or external factors). It is the verbal form of the noun dynamis - translated in other places as power to describe God’s power. In Greek philosophy this power was the unseen mover behind all things. The Old Testament reveals the impersonal force of Greek philosophy to be a personal God who is the creator and governor of all things. One who exercises His power for the His glory and for the good of people. His power is most clearly on display in the Exodus as described in Deuteronomy 3:24

Deuteronomy 3:24 CSB

Lord God, you have begun to show your greatness and your strong hand to your servant, for what god is there in heaven or on earth who can perform deeds and mighty acts like yours?

Does that thought humble you? Does it awe you? The teachers in Jude’s day were flouting the power of God as they went about living their licentious lifestyles and taking the truths that were given to them and altering them to excuse their way of life. Our modern tendency is the same but different. We have spent so much time trying to bring God down to our level that we sometimes we have a tendency to forget what a great and amazing God He truly is.

Jonathan Edwards said it this way “Having formed in their minds such a God as suits them, and thinking God to be such a one as favors and agrees with them, people may like Him very well…when they are far from loving the true God.” Some of us have made a God in our own minds that is content with part-time relationships, with occasional visits and with partial devotion. Yet the God of Scripture is a God who is able.

We have forgotten that He possesses no infirmities, no weaknesses, no limitations.

Where we are so want to fail, He is unfailing. When we are silent instead of speaking up - He is able. When we compromise instead of contending - He is able. When we are faithless, He is able - and faithful to remain patient and loving toward us.

He is the all powerful God. He who split the Red Sea so His people could walk through on dry land - He is able. He who smote Goliath to remove the threat of oppression from His people - He is able. He who slaughtered 180,000 Assyrians in one night as a response to the prayers of His king - He is able. He who spoke Creation into existence - He is able.

I took Hayden camping this week with a friend and it was an amazing time. We were at a small lake in Idaho called Lone Lake - it was a beautifully sculpted bowl in the midst of mountains. Some of you may have seen the pictures we posted on Facebook. All I could think of as I looked at the immense beauty of that area was the pleasure that God must have gotten out of speaking that particular place into existence. And yet even that is not the pinnacle or the most beautiful of His natural creations.

What a glorious and majestic God we serve. Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones said it this way “God’s power not only surpasses our power of expression, it surpasses our power of comprehension! Take all the dictionaries of the world, exhaust all the vocabularies, and when you have added them all together you have still not begun to describe the greatness of God’s power.”

He is able. Jude could have stopped right there and he would have said enough for us to meditate on for an eternity but he continues on to tell us, to reassure us that the God who is able, that the God who has already acted on our behalf in the greatest demonstration of His power, the sacrifice of Christ, will continue to act on our behalf to keep us from falling and to present us standing in His presence.

To Keep You From Falling

Oh how fickle we are. And how foolish sometimes. To think that we can keep ourselves from falling or stumbling in our walk. When I was 21 I was only a few weeks away from going to school to follow in my parent’s footsteps as Salvation Army Officers. I would be going to school in three weeks but in a moment of surprising personal reflection, and the Holy Spirit’s prompting, I realized that I was not doing a good job of maintaining my own Christian walk how was I going to be responsible for the walks of the Christians in whatever church I was assigned to. It was a moment of surprising personal reflection and, looking back, I also recognize that it was a mark of immaturity as even now I don’t maintain my own spiritual walk in my own power. If I did I’d stumble every moment.

We are sheep that are prone to go astray. Robert Robinson penned the words of the great hymn “Come Thou Fount” in 1758 including these insightful lyrics “Prone to wander Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love.” And if we’re each honest with ourselves those words resonate through our souls in their familiarity demonstrated in our actions.

Yet we have a good Shepherd who watches over us. The word used here is protect, phylasso, meaning to guard or watch. It is a military term for standing watch on a post. In Navy boot camp we were charged with learning the twelve general orders of a sentry - two of which have relevance here. Order #2 To walk my post in a military manner, keeping always on the alert, and observing everything that takes place within sight or hearing and #5 To quit my post only when properly relieved.

Christ stands guard over His people, standing at the right hand of God interceding for us when we falter as the Spirit works to bring us back in line with His will for our lives. And neither of them will ever quit their posts. They will continue to work to secure and protect those who God has called to salvation until the time comes for Christ to return. The Psalmist promises

Psalm 12:7 CSB

You, Lord, will guard us; you will protect us from this generation forever.

We are in the sure hands of the good shepherd who will guard and protect us from all assaults.

John 10:27–29 CSB

My sheep hear my voice, I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all. No one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.

Scripture is replete with the tension of man’s responsibility and God’s sovereignty in salvation. Christ teaches in John 6 the idea that God will keep all those whom He calls

John 6:37–40 CSB

Everyone the Father gives me will come to me, and the one who comes to me I will never cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. This is the will of him who sent me: that I should lose none of those he has given me but should raise them up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father: that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him will have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”

We need to recognize that, no matter how perilous the journey may seem, no matter how bleak the future may be and no matter how persistent the enemy and our flesh may harry us, we will be secure until the end if we have placed our faith in Christ and trusted in the salvation work that He has accomplished on our behalf. David Clotfelter writes “Is it conceivable that in spite of all this, [Christians] may still fall away and be lost? Is it possible for God to predestine us to holiness, and yet we do not become holy? Can He adopt us as children and then disown us? Can He give us a guarantee of salvation and then renege on His promise? Is the human will so strong as to overcome divine power? Surely not! What more does God need to say to assure us that He will uphold us to the end?”

Charles Spurgeon used this illustration to make this point

300 Sermon Illustrations from Charles Spurgeon Clinging to the Precipice (Psalm 73:2; Jude 24–25)

There are some spots, I believe, on some of the more difficult Swiss mountains where no man ought to go at all, I think, and where, if any must go, they should be only such as have become most accomplished mountaineers through years of practice. For one has to cling to the rock side, to hold on, perhaps, by bushes or stones that may be there, with nothing for the feet to rest on except, perhaps, an inch of projecting crag. And so we go creeping on with our backs to the danger, for to look down upon it would be to make the brain reel and cause us to fall. And the result of falling, of course, would be the end of life—the body would be dashed into a thousand pieces.

Such is truly the way to heaven. You must all have passed some such difficult places, and, in looking back, I can only myself say, “Unto him that has kept me from falling, when my feet had nearly gone, and my steps had almost slipped, unto him be glory forever and ever.”

But the beauty of what Jude writes here is that it is not just about this temporal life because there is a promise here for our future as well.

To Make You Stand

“I can only imagine what it will be like when I walk by Your side.” We love that song and many of us sing along with the lyrics and try to imagine what it will be like. There’s really only one line in the song that probably provides the best picture of what will happen - “or to my knees will I fall”. That is the proper level of awe to have when we come face to face with God.

I’m amazed at the audacity of some of the Word of Faith teachers who promote their journey to heaven stories. They’re so irreverent and so ridiculous. And so wrong. John the Apostle is transported into Heaven and has an encounter with Christ and he falls over like a dead man. Our proper response to God when we see Him is to fall down on our knees as we recognize our own unworthiness to be in His presence.

And yet here Jude writes “Now to Him who is able to make you stand in the presence of His glory.” That is amazing. Isaiah comes face to face with His glory and is ashamed and pronounces woe upon himself. We come and He makes us stand. It’s as if we come into His presence and bow our knee and He comes to us, gently reaching out and taking us by the chin to raise our face to Him first and then to make us stand up as His sons and daughters. We fall to our knees because we recognize our own unworthiness. He raises us to our feet because in Him we are worthy. We are blameless. We are without blemish.

This is our prayer and our benediction for each of you every week

1 Thessalonians 5:23 CSB

Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely. And may your whole spirit, soul, and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

That you will be kept sound and blameless. That you will be presented mature in Christ. That He will make you stand - the verb is histemi and it means to present, to confirm or establish - in His presence without blemish. We are not there yet. We are not blameless in our sinful bodies, we are blameless if we are found in Christ.

2 Corinthians 5:21 CSB

He made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

This is the great exchange by which our sin is imputed to Christ and His righteousness is imputed to us. What a source of joy that is both now and for the prospect that when we do stand before God our shame, our guilt will have been removed. We have nothing to fear on that day. Unlike Isaiah when he was given a vision of God’s throne room, when we stand there in person we can have joy knowing that the stain of sin has been removed from us and that we are free to worship God forever.

What a beautiful prospect that the God who is able not only secures us throughout this life but will also cause us to stand in His most holy presence in eternity to come.

The Only One

Jude finishes this grand doxological statement returning our eyes to the star, the Morning Star, the beautiful One, the One and only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord. In a first century society that was not monotheistic and had many different options for god, Jude turns his readers eyes to the unified, triune God. It is only through the shed blood of Christ that we can rightly gain access and forgiveness from God - that He can be our Savior. Jude closes out his epistle reminding the believers and us of the glorious nature of God. Gene Green writing in Baker’s Exegetical Commentary on this passage says “Jude’s doxology is not a random collection of stereotypical language but rather a carefully selected locus of divine attributes that highlight his grandeur and ruling power.”

He doesn’t write that we are to give glory, majesty, power and authority to God because each of these attributes are already inherently His. God is not glorious because we ascribe glory to Him - He is glorious because of the culmination of all of His attributes. He isn’t majestic because we see Him that way. He is majestic because He is the absolute sovereign ruler of all things. He doesn’t have power because we have condescended to give it to Him - He has power because He created all things and therefore all things are subject to Him but He is a benevolent sovereign. He doesn’t have authority because we have given it to Him - He has authority because He has the right to do anything He pleases.

Psalm 115:3 CSB

Our God is in heaven and does whatever he pleases.

Jude closes by reminding his readers that the God who created the world and existed before time began possessed all of these qualities then. The God who was immanent enough to keep them from stumbling possesses all of these qualities now. The God who will rule forever and will make them stand in His presence blameless and with great joy will possess all of these qualities then. Because He is the immutable, unchanging God. Green writes “In a world of change and decay, this declaration of the immutable nature of God is more than the human mind can comprehend.”

Oh what a great and glorious God we serve. He. Is. Able. Jude ends his epistle turning his readers, and our, eyes to the One who is able to keep us despite all of the misleading, confusing and distressing teachings and practices that are happening in the world today. He has never forsaken His church and He wont now. We can have faith that He will continue to work and sustain His people and that His sheep will hear His voice.

As Paul tells us in 1 Thessalonians 5

1 Thessalonians 5:24 CSB

He who calls you is faithful; he will do it.

He. Is. Able.