“To Him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before His glorious presence without fault and with great joy – to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen!” (Jude 24-25)
Lesson #11
Vs 20-23 (Revised Standard Version)
But you, beloved, build yourselves up on your most holy faith; pray in the Holy Spirit; 21 keep yourselves in the love of God; wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. 22 And convince some, who doubt; 23 save some, by snatching them out of the fire; on some have mercy with fear, hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.
Vs 20 -23 (The Message)
But you, dear friends, carefully build yourselves up in this most holy faith by praying in the Holy Spirit, staying right at the center of God’s love, keeping your arms open and outstretched, ready for the mercy of our Master, Jesus Christ. This is the unending life, the real life!
Go easy on those who hesitate in the faith. Go after those who take the wrong way. Be tender with sinners, but not soft on sin. The sin itself stinks to high heaven.
Jude contrasts the behavior of the faithful with that of the opponents. Here he describes the characteristics of the faithful.
The faithful build up life on the foundation of the most holy faith. The life of the Christian is found, not on something which we manufacture but on something we have received. The faith first came from Jesus to the apostles, the apostles to the church and now the church to us. We are community, as Christians we are sooooooo much bigger than self, our opinions, our belief systems, etc. Where have I received what I believe?
The faithful are people of prayer. The essence of Christianity is our total dependence on God, and prayer is acknowledging that dependence. We must pray, we must take everything to God because without Him we are nothing. How often do I go through the day without seeking God’s help? And when we pray we pray in the Holy Spirit, in other words our human prayers will be selfish and blind. It is only when the Holy Spirit takes full possession of us that our desires are purified and our prayers are right. Have I surrendered every part of my life to the Holy Spirit?
The faithful keep themselves in the love of God. Jude uses wording here to remind his readers of the covenant relationship between God and his people as described in Exodus 24: 1-8. That covenant was two sided, God would be God to his people and they would love and obey Him. Love and obedience cannot be separated! Do I ever express love for the Lord and then willfully act in disobedience?
The faithful wait with expectation. We know that Christ’s purpose for us is to reconcile us in this life and bring us into eternal life with God himself. Do I realize the abundant life Christ promises now and the eternal life to come?
As Christians we have a binding duty to reach out to anyone that is lost, regardless of who they are, where they are, what they have done, etc. Jude gives us three examples.
“Those who doubt” These folks flirt with falsehood. They are attracted by wrong teachings and they believe error. They hesitate when given truth. We must urge them into truth with patience and love. We must be ready to defend the faith and give a reason for the hope that is in us. Can I describe out loud the hope that is in me? We must ban all arrogance and intolerance from our approach to others. I really do attempt not to get on a soapbox but I hate people who argue the faith as “my way or the highway.” As Christians we really do believe “no one can come to the Father except through the Son” but do we express that in love through invitation or are we in fighting stance?
We must be ready to speak in time. We must be ready to “snatch them from the flames.” This phrase particularly interests me because I’m a volunteer firefighter. As firefighters we train for, but pray that the day never comes, where we pull up on a fire and have someone trapped inside a building. But on that day there is no doubt that we will walk into those flames. But we don’t do it blind or unprepared! We will go because we have prepared: hours of training; bunker gear; fire trucks; breathing apparatus; hoses; axes; water; on and on the list goes. We will take all of that knowledge and all of the equipment possible and only then plunge into the burning house to search, find and then literally drag that person to safety. I had to stop typing for awhile, for I am so overcome with conviction. Do I really go after the lost this way?? Do you?? What if I saw my family members or friends or children or whomever in a burning house would I stand by and let them burn? Lord, help us to see those who don’t know you as victims trapped in a burning building. And by that I don’t just mean hell, if people don’t know Christ, they don’t know true peace, contentment, wholeness in life, much less eternal things. Have I spent hours in training (the Word and prayer) do I possess equipment (the church) so that when I go in to rescue I am not burned? Do I realize even with everything done right when fighting a fire it can still be risky, therefore, we must have great courage? Lord, help me and those who read this study to really evaluate our attitude toward the lost, our time spent in preparation, and our courage to “snatch them from the flames.” Amen.
When we think in these terms that last phrase in verse 23 makes perfect sense, “hate the sin but love the sinner.” We are never to hate the sinner, no matter what the sin, that can be very difficult. As a matter of fact without God, it is impossible. We must also remember that it is sin that causes all the pain, sadness, hate, war, bad in our world, not God? Have you ever heard someone say God caused (something cruel)? We must remember that all evil and bad is in and part of our world because of sin, period. Even when God may take us to the woodshed, it’s because of sin. Do I really hate sin? Don’t answer that too quick…
Nancy Cantrell,
Associate Pastor
