In The Word
Read Jude 1-16
The Warnings of History to the Ungodly
Jude, a bond-servant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James,
To those who are the called, beloved in God the Father, and kept for Jesus Christ: May mercy and peace and love be multiplied to you.
Beloved, while I was making every effort to write you about our common salvation, I felt the necessity to write to you appealing that you contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints. For certain persons have crept in unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into licentiousness and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.
Now I desire to remind you, though you know all things once for all, that the Lord, after saving a people out of the land of Egypt, subsequently destroyed those who did not believe. And angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day, just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, since they in the same way as these indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire.
Yet in the same way these men, also by dreaming, defile the flesh, and reject authority, and revile angelic majesties. But Michael the archangel, when he disputed with the devil and argued about the body of Moses, did not dare pronounce against him a railing judgment, but said, “The Lord rebuke you!” But these men revile the things which they do not understand; and the things which they know by instinct, like unreasoning animals, by these things they are destroyed. Woe to them! For they have gone the way of Cain, and for pay they have rushed headlong into the error of Balaam, and perished in the rebellion of Korah. These are the men who are hidden reefs in your love feasts when they feast with you without fear, caring for themselves; clouds without water, carried along by winds; autumn trees without fruit, doubly dead, uprooted; wild waves of the sea, casting up their own shame like foam; wandering stars, for whom the black darkness has been reserved forever.
It was also about these men that Enoch, in the seventh generation from Adam, prophesied, saying, “Behold, the Lord came with many thousands of His holy ones, to execute judgment upon all, and to convict all the ungodly of all their ungodly deeds which they have done in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.” These are grumblers, finding fault, following after their own lusts; they speak arrogantly, flattering people for the sake of gaining an advantage.
New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation
Walking In The Word
Jude is one of the shortest books in the Bible and almost did not make it into the canon of scripture. I’m glad it did because it is loaded with important truths that compliment other scriptures. God has preserved His Word in a mighty way! There is no doubt in my mind that Jude knew the apostles Paul and Peter. Jude said in verse 1 that he was a brother of James. This James was not the brother of John(sons of Zebedee). This was the James that was one of the sons of Joseph and Mary. This means that Jude was also a son of Joseph and Mary (Matthew 12: 46-50). Jude wrote this epistle after the death of Paul and Peter. Verses 3 and 4 are a fulfillment of what Paul and Peter both prophesied would happen in the church after their departures or deaths. Read Acts 20:27-31, 2 Peter 1:13-2:2, and 2 Timothy 4:6-7. Also compare 2 Peter 2:4, 6, 10, and 12 with Jude 6, 7, 8, and 10, to see the remarkable similarity.
It is important to note that Yahshua would build His church on the rock of revelation of who He (Yahshua) was (Matthew 16:18). After the deaths of Paul and Peter, evil men entered in and brought destructive heresies (Strong’s #139[Greek]). This was necessary so that the real truth of God’s Word would shine that much brighter as the Holy Spirit moved in men’s hearts through the history of the Church (1 Corinthians 11:19). All throughout the building of the church, Paul gave the church of his day and the believers of the present time the spiritual formula to continue in the true faith.