Blameless - Jude 20-25
INTRODUCTION:
As I promised last week this morning we return to the book of Jude to finish it up. The theme of this book is contending for the faith that was once for all time handed down to the saints. In the major portion of this book Jude is describing for us these false teachers that have crept into the church and are seeking to lead the people of our churches astray. He has described them for us giving us examples of how they are like some of those who rebelled against God in the Old Testament. He has given us word pictures from nature to describe their character to us. He has shown us from an ancient prophecy that in the end they will be judged, and described their ungodly behavior to us. Jude instructed us to remember that the apostles had warned us that these mockers, these false teachers, following their own lusts would come in the last days.
This morning we will finish Jude looking at the last 6 verses of this book. These last six verses are written to us who have put our faith in Jesus Christ. They are written that we might be encouraged to keep on in the faith, some final exhortations: first, to building up our faith in the Lord, growing in our faith, then exercising our faith by reaching out to those who are being led astray by the false teachers, and finally, Jude encourages us with a beautiful doxology of how we are kept by our God and will one day be blameless in His presence to His glory and praise. Let’s pray and then read the last six verses of this book.
--PRAY--
SCRIPTURE:
Turn in your Bibles to Jude 20-25 our passage for this morning. Please stand in honor of God’s Word as it is read. Please follow along as I read.
Jude 20-25,
“But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting anxiously for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life. And have mercy on some, who are doubting; save others, snatching them out of the fire; and on some have mercy with fear, hating even the garment polluted by the flesh. Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.” (Jude 20–25, NASB95)[1]
BUILDING YOUR FAITH (Jude 20-21)
Jude begins these final verses by giving those who have put their faith in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sin four imperatives: We are to be building, praying, keeping, and waiting. Let’s look at each of these imperatives.
Jude writes, “But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith.” Our most holy faith is the true faith that was handed down once for all time to the saints. Jude is instructing to grow in the faith. The Christian life must never stand still; if it does, it will go backwards. The false teachers who have come into the church are in the business of tearing down, each Christian must be involved in building up—first his or her own spiritual life, then that of the local assembly where he or she attends. Our spiritual life begins when we agree with God that we are sinners who cannot save ourselves, but believe that Jesus died for our sin and was buried and three days later rose from the dead guaranteeing our forgiveness and eternal life. This is where spiritual life and growth begins, it is based on our faith in Jesus Christ. But for faith to grow there must be nourishment, just as a baby needs nourishment to grow. That nourishment is found in what God has revealed to us in His Word. The Word of God is central to spiritual growth, without it we will not grow, we must be actively building ourselves up on our most holy faith as recorded for us in the Bible. We must spend time in the Word of God daily if we are to grow, if we are to be built up in the faith. Consider the time and the effort that it takes to build a house, if you want to truly grow in your faith it will take more than reading your Bible a few minutes a day. It will require you to study it regularly and in a disciplined way, so that you better understand what it teaches. I am excited about starting the Contenders Discipleship Initiative because the very first class is Bibliology and How to Study the Bible. If you want to understand how to study God’s Word, then you should consider taking this class when it begins in the New Year. In the month of December I will be taking a poll of the church to find out how many are interested in being in Contenders and what evening of the week would be the most convenient for you. I will not kid you though that there will be some homework and these courses will stretch you spiritually. But growing through the study of the Word of God is not the only thing that we need for building ourselves up in the most holy faith, Jude also reminds us that the power for building the Christian life comes from prayer. Jude wrote, “praying in the Holy Spirit,” the Word of God and prayer go together in spiritual growth. You can read and study the Bible and gain a lot of head knowledge, but it is when we talk to the author that the knowledge moves from our head to our hearts. What does it mean to pray in the Holy Spirit? It means to pray according to the leading of the Holy Spirit, as a believer you are indwelt with the Holy Spirit and as you study God’s Word and become more in tune with God’s heart and will, the Spirit of God will prompt you on what to pray. Even when we have our own private prayer time, we are not alone, the Spirit joins with us as we pray, and often we may know that we need to pray, but don’t know how we should pray and the Spirit intercedes for us. Paul wrote in Romans 8:26-28, “In the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” (Romans 8:26–28, NASB95)[2] The Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God, the blessing that we have in the indwelling Holy Spirit who perfectly knows the will of God for each of us and intercedes for us. In prayer when we worship God it is in the Spirit and it is the Spirit who motivates us to pray. Have you ever woken up in the night with a burden to pray for someone or something, that is the Spirit motivating us to pray. When the Christian is yielded to the Spirit in his life, then the Spirit will assist the believer in his prayer life and you will see God answer your prayers.
Jude gave us a third imperative that goes along with growing through the Word of God and prayer in the Spirit, his third imperative is “keep yourselves in the love of God.” As we grow in our faith we do experience deeper fellowship with God and there are times in our lives when He seems very near. The Bible compares this love of God to the believer and the believer to God as the love of a husband and wife. And I can attest after 23 years of marriage that love deepens over the years. It takes more than wonderful feelings to make a successful marriage; and the same is true to keeping yourself in the love of God. There must be obedience and mutual concern. The apostle John wrote in 1 John 2:5, “…but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him:” (1 John 2:5, NASB95)[3] Jesus said during His earthly ministry in John 15:10, “If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.” (John 15:10, NASB95)[4] We grow in our love for God as we listen to His Word, obey it, and delight in doing what pleases God. This is how we keep ourselves in God’s love. To love God and keep in His love is to love what He loves and hate what He hates. We must love righteousness and hate sin. We must do what He commands, and live a dedicated, separated life to keep in His love. What I mean by separated is we separate ourselves from sin, but not from sinful people or how will they ever know the love of God.
Jude has instructed us to grow in our faith through the Word of God, through prayer in the Holy Spirit, by keeping ourselves in the love of God through obedience to His Word and doing what pleases Him. Jude ends by instructing us to never stop waiting for the blessed hope. Jude writes, “…waiting anxiously for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life.” Jude says never forgetting, never stop waiting with anticipation for the return of Jesus Christ to receive us unto Himself and grant to us the eternal life promised at salvation, eternal life began at the moment we were saved, but here Jude speaks of the eternal life that is ours in our glorified bodies. This is the blessed hope, the sure hope that motivates us to do everything to prepare for this day when we will see Him and experience His mercy in that He will not give us what we deserve, but having paid the full price for our redemption He will take us to be with Him for all eternity. This hope, this earnest waiting for the Lord’s return describes an attitude of life motivated by the promise of our Lord’s return for us to take us out of this evil world. This waiting, this looking for the return of the Lord for us is a great encouragement to Christian living. It motivates us to live a life worthy of the Lord. 1 John 3:3 says, “And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.” (1 John 3:3, NASB95)[5] Paul in his great discourse on the bodily resurrection of believers says that this truth should keep us steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your toil is not in vain in the Lord. Why? Because in the end you receive a glorified body to live eternally in the presence of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. If that does not motivate you in your Christian life nothing will.
EXERCISING YOUR FAITH (Jude 22-23)
Having focused on building ourselves up in the faith by being in God’s Word, praying in the Holy Spirit, obeying God’s Word and keeping in the love of God and by waiting expectantly for our Lord’s return; Jude now turns from building our faith to exercising our faith in regards to those who are being led astray by the false teachers. In verses 22-23 Jude described three different kinds of people who need help because of the influence the false teachers are having in their life.
First, are those who are doubting. They are wavering in their faith because of the teaching and lifestyle of the false teachers. They are believers, but they are not grounded in their faith, they do not have a solid foundation on which to keep themselves from falling. Jude commands us to have mercy on them, to show compassion towards them by seeking to lead them away from the influence of the false teachers. With great mercy and compassion, we draw them away from the false teachers by magnifying all that we have in Christ and by showing Christ’s love to them in practical ways. Make their salvation so wonderful and the Word of God so interesting teaching them how it has all we need for life and godliness that they lose interest in the false teachers. It is not enough just to refute the false doctrines of the false teachers, there must also be a warmth of love that assures the young believer, the doubting believer that we care for them.
Second, Jude tells us to save others, snatching them from the fire. These are those who have left and gone in with the false teachers. These may refer to those who were seeking, but had never really decided to follow Christ. We understand that only God can save them, but we make it abundantly clear to them what they are choosing in following the false teachers, that they themselves are headed to judgment, by following the false teachers the black darkness is reserved for them. Some by only knowing the grime truth of hell and the glorious truth of heaven can be snatched from the fire and be saved.
The third people that Jude described are to be shown mercy with fear. Jude warns us that trying to help some who have erred must be done with great caution so that we do not become trapped ourselves. When we try to help someone, who has been captured by false doctrine, we must be careful for Satan can use him to defile us. In trying to save him we may be stained or burned ourselves. Many a preacher has put himself in a compromising position and ended up sinning instead of helping the person. We certainly must love people and seek to lead them into a proper understanding of God and what He teaches in His Word, but we must never under-estimate the power of Satan when He has a foothold in someone’s life. Defilement spreads rapidly and secretly and must be dealt with drastically. As leaders in the church we must not put ourselves in situations that might compromise or even seemingly compromise our faith. What that means is we must stand together as we contend for the faith.
THE PERFECTOR OF OUR FAITH (Jude 24-25)
After instructing us to build our faith, then to exercise our faith by seeking to help those who are weaker in the faith, or who have not made a decision for Christ and are being influenced by false teachers, Jude ends his book with a beautiful doxology that is surely familiar to all of you because I use it often as our benediction. In this doxology, Jude makes it perfectly clear that it is the work of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit that brings about our sanctification as we walk through this life. Jude acknowledges that only the one God in three persons is able to bring us through this life and bring us into His presence. All three persons of the Godhead were involved in our salvation and sanctification and glorification. Without God, we would have stumbled and fallen. Jude says to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, who walks with you through this life and supports you and indwells you and strengthens you, it is to Him that we give all praise and glory because He and only He could keep us from stumbling, He and only He could make us stand in His glorious presence and when we enter and stand in His presence we are blameless, our sanctification is complete as we are clothed in the righteousness of our Lord Jesus Christ. This presentation of us in His glory will be with great joy. I do not know who will be more joyful, we who stand blameless before the glory of the Lord, or the Lord who has made us stand in His presence blameless, forgiven, glorified. Jude continues “to the only God our Savior, I often think that we think that Jesus is the Savior and He is in that it was His work on the cross that saved us, but God the Father is the Savior in that the plan of redemption was determined by Him before the foundations of the world were laid. God is the author of salvation, Jesus is the means of salvation through His death and resurrection, and the Holy Spirit is the agent of salvation, raising us to new life as He baptizes us into Christ Jesus. So correctly Jude calls God our Savior, and Jesus Christ our Lord, the Lord who reigns over our lives because of what He did for us by taking the penalty we deserved and paying it for us with His life, we owe Him everything and He is the Lord of lords and King of kings. To God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord were we made to stand in the presence of His glory blameless and to the Godhead we ascribe all glory because there is no one else who is so glorious, all majesty because God is the majestic One, all dominion because as the Creator and Lord it all belongs to Him, all authority or power, He is the ultimate authority, no one has authority over Him, He rules as God and Lord from before time began, before the Creation began because that is when time began, before that in eternity past He was God and Lord. He is God and Lord now in this present time, sovereign involved in the history of the world, and He will be God and Lord forever, into all eternity future without end. Amen.
CONCLUSION:
How can I add to that? Jude ends his letter writing about our salvation which was his desire at the beginning. He encourages us to continue to grow in the faith, to ground our faith in the Word of God so that we recognize a false gospel, and false doctrine. To be growing in our faith through prayer in the Holy Spirit. Learning God’s Word and praying are key to keeping in God’s love because we are allowing God to speak to us from His Word and we are speaking to God about His Word and what we are to do to please Him. Finally, we do not stop waiting for His return for us, this motivates us to obey Him and serve Him. As we anxiously wait for His return we reach out to the world around us and seek to share the gospel with those who we encounter in our day to day lives. This is done in showing mercy to the doubters, saving some by laying out before them the consequences of living a life of sin, the grime truth of judgment and hell. Showing mercy, with fear, with caution that we do not become defiled while trying to help those who are walking in sin.
The glorious truth is that God is with us keeping us from stumbling and will one day cause us to stand in the presence of His glory blameless. What a day of rejoicing that will be when we ascribe all glory, all majesty, all dominion and all authority to the only God our Savior through Jesus Christ our Lord and it will be face-to-face in our glorified bodies. I read these words of Job this week that reminded me of that coming day. Job said, “As for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, And at the last He will take His stand on the earth. Even after my skin is destroyed, Yet from my flesh I shall see God; Whom I myself shall behold, And whom my eyes will see and not another. My heart faints within me!” (Job 19:25–27, NASB95)[6] Does your heart faint within you at the thought of seeing our God and our Lord in your flesh with your eyes. It does me, the Lord will have to stand me in His presence because I will be face down in worship in being brought into the presence of His glory!
--LET’S PRAY--
[1]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[2]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[3]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[4]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[5]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[6]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995