Hello, and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church Podcast,
where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.
My name is Pastor Josh, and I want to thank you for listening to
this podcast.
I hope that this podcast can be a blessing to you and strengthen
you in the word of God.
Now, come along.
Let's look into the Bible and see what God has for us here today.
All right, let's get into our Bible study tonight.
If you have your Bibles, turn there with me to the Book of Jude.
Who knew that we could spend so much time just on one chapter?
It's one book, but it's also one chapter, 25 verses.
But there's so much here.
And one of the things about the Book of Jude is that there are
some really obscure references that we see that are exclusive to
this book.
Even though he does reference the Old Testament quite frequently,
he does reference even the Jewish tradition and some other Jewish
literature, which we're going to talk about here this evening.
But there's a lot for us to learn.
But to.
To go back and remind ourselves, what is the theme of the
Book of Jude?
It is found all the way back there in verse number three.
Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you the common
salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you and exhort you
that you should earnestly contend for the faith.
And so the whole theme of the Book of Jude is to exhort believers
to contend for the faith.
So let's use it in 2025 language.
He's challenging Christians to fight for the truth.
And the reason being is because the truth is under attack.
And in this case, in this context, in this book, there were
false teachers that had come into the church that were preaching
and teaching and demonstrating ungodly ways.
They were teaching the wrong things.
They were living the wrong way.
And so he says that in verse four, they crept in unawares, so
secretively under the radar.
They came in and they began to lead the people astray from the truth.
And he says, okay, they're ungodly.
And he tells us specifically how they were ungodly and specifically
where they were going astray.
It said that they were using the grace of God.
They were turning or twisting the grace of God into lasciviousness
or sensuality.
And in so doing, they were denying Jesus.
They were denying the deity of Christ by what they were teaching
and by what they were doing.
So I think it's important for us to go back to understand that
so that we can apply what he's been talking about.
So so he says, fight for the faith.
Well, it's not fighting for your preferences, it's not fighting
for your opinion.
It's not fighting for the way that, you know, you think church
should be run.
It's not talking about that.
It's talking about the fighting for the essentials, fighting
for the faith, the gospel.
And, and so he goes on to talk about three groups that were judged
for their rebellion.
He says, so these false teachers are in rebellion.
So this is what's going to happen to these false teachers who
were in rebellion.
And he talked about the Israelites traveling in, out of Egypt
into the wilderness.
They were judged for their rebellion.
The angels that left their own habitation and went into sin.
There were an everlasting judgment in verse 6, verse 7, Sodom
and Gomorrah was punished for their sin of fornication, as it says
there in verse seven.
And, and chasing after the strange flesh, as it says in verse
seven.
And then he goes on to describe more about these false teachers.
He calls them filthy dreamers.
He calls them individuals who defile the flesh.
He calls them individuals who despise dominion or authority.
And they speak evil, evil of dignities or leaders.
They speak evil of leadership.
And he says, hey, the reason why this is wrong is because they're
basically exercising their own flesh as their guide.
And he says, even the angel, verse nine, even Michael the archangel,
when he disputed against the enemy, what did he do?
He didn't use his power, which he had a lot of power, even though
he's not God, he's the most powerful angel.
As it says, they're the archangel.
What did he do at the end of verse nine when he fought against
Satan?
He said, the Lord rebuke thee.
So, so he uses the power of God, the name of God, the truth of
God in his defense.
And so that tells us how we contend for the faith, how we fight
for the truth.
We fight for the truth and the power of God and the word of God
and the strength and the direction of the Spirit.
So he goes on further and, and last week we talked about the, the
three different paths that these false teachers took.
I'm giving you guys a summary, uh, so hopefully you guys can appreciate
a, a five minute Jude summary.
Three ways.
The way of Cain.
What was the way of Cain?
The way of Cain was the faithless path to religion, empty
religion, man centered religion.
Um, the way of Cain was, hey, I'm gonna try to worship God the
way that I wanna worship instead of the way that God told
me to worship.
So there's the way of Cain.
And then we saw that there was the, the heir of Balaam, which was
for fleshly reward, for, for financial gain, for compromising
the truth when it came to selling ourselves for the almighty
dollar, so to speak, in our culture today.
Um, and then he went on to talk about the gain sayings of core,
which was basically this.
They were, they were individuals who were trying to take
authority, inappropriate authority.
Remember what Korah did?
Korah came to Moses and said, hey, Moses, I know that God instituted
you and Aaron as the leaders, but you guys do too much.
We need to come alongside and we need to take control and help
you.
Right.
In the guise of helping, they were coming to hurt.
Uh, so he says these are all tendencies of false teachers.
And so we look out for those things.
We, we keep our eyes open.
And he talked about the danger of that.
He says, these individuals who do this, they're spots in your feast
of charity.
They're.
They're hindrances to your love, they're hindrances to your
growth.
And he goes on to give a bunch of examples.
Clouds without water, um, they're carried about with the wind.
Trees without fruit, um, so he says, they're, they're empty, they're
hip, they're hypocrites, they're fruitless.
They, they come forward with the, you know, sounding of the truth.
But yet at the end of the day, there, there's emptiness.
Verse 13 tells us that.
So all of that to say, we're in verse 14.
He's going to continue now to talk about the certainty of the judgment
upon these certain men.
So in context, if the certain men that are preaching and teaching
false teachings within the church.
And so verse 14, he says, and Enoch, also the seventh from Adam,
prophesied of these, saying, behold, the Lord cometh with ten
thousands of his saints to execute judgment upon all and to
convince all that are ungodly among them.
Of all their ungodly deeds, which they have ungodly committed,
of all their hard speeches, which ungodly sinners have spoken
against him, you might say.
What is he talking about here?
He references Enoch.
Most of you probably know that name, Enoch he's mentioned in Genesis
chapter 5.
He is the individual that was caught up into heaven without dying
in Genesis chapter 5.
And he's also referenced in Hebrews chapter 11 for his faith.
So there was in the Jewish culture an ancient book of Enoch.
It was not received as scripture, but it was highly respected
among the Jews and the early Christians.
So there's a big debate Right.
And some of you, I've already heard.
I mentioned the word Enoch.
I've read the Book of Enoch.
That's great.
But we have to understand that it has not been canonized.
We believe that God preserved his Word.
There's a theological term called preservation.
And so we don't believe that God had hid His Word for a time.
And then now we found these new documents.
We believe that the Book of Enoch is not canonized, therefore
it is not the inspired word of God.
But we do know that here Jude references the Book of Enoch.
So the reference of the Book of Enoch now has become inspired
in the word of God.
You say, wait, wait, wait.
That doesn't make any sense to me.
Well, if that doesn't make sense to you, then the three references
that Paul makes to worldly writers would not make sense either.
Paul mentions in Acts 17 and 1 Corinthians and in Titus chapter
1, References of literature outside of Scripture.
But when it's referenced in Scripture, it now becomes the inspired
word of God.
So what happens here is Jude quotes a prophecy from the Book of
Enoch.
It doesn't mean that the whole Book of Enoch is scripture, but that
this, this portion, this prophecy is.
So Paul quoted pagan poets.
Jude is quoting Enoch.
So what does he say?
He says about this judgment, that.
That God is going to execute judgment upon all, and he's coming
with his saints.
And we.
And we know that this is a reference to the end times.
We know that this is God's ultimate judgment upon the world.
God is judging right and wrong now, obviously.
But if we are honest with ourselves, we can feel maybe that
God is allowing things to happen.
Maybe you've never.
Maybe you've never thought about this, but you're like, hey,
what?
Why?
Why didn't God make it right right now?
Why is God allowing all this evil in the world?
This.
Well, many people call, you know, inequity, whatever you want
to call it.
But the Bible says that God one day is going to make this all
right.
We know that at the end he will.
And so it says that he comes to convince all that are ungodly
among them of all their ungodly deeds.
And so this speaks to this idea of conviction in this quotation.
The Bible says that God is going to judge all of the ungodly.
Now, ungodly here means without God, meaning they don't have
faith.
This isn't talking about Christians who have sinned.
This is talking about the ungodly in rejection.
And so those will be faced with judgment.
Many people take the judgment of God lightly.
You know, you maybe even hear jokes in, in the news or in, in movies
like, oh, you know what?
I've even heard people say, I'm glad to go to hell because that's
where all my friends are.
Folks, that is a misunderstanding of God's judgment
and his righteous indignation against those that are evil.
None of us want God's judgment.
But I will say that all of us deserve God's judgment.
By the way, I think that when we read verse 15, it's easy for us
to say, well, that's what they deserve.
That's what those ungodly people deserve.
Those people that were in rebellion to God, that's what they
deserve.
Let me tell you something folks, here tonight.
The gospel says that all of us deserve what verse 15 says, all of
us deserve it.
From the very beginning, the Bible says, there is none good, no,
not one.
And the Bible says, for all have sinned and come short of the
glory of God.
So we say, so what makes the difference between someone who is
not going to face God's judgment and someone who is going
to face God's judgment?
The Bible says very clearly that it's faith, it's our identity
in Christ.
So when we trust in Jesus Christ, we're not trusting in him
to help us.
We're trusting in him to save us from destruction.
I want you to see a cool passage of scripture that I think
will help us kind of frame in our minds the difference between
someone who is on the side of judgment and who is on the side of
grace.
It's in First John, chapter two, not far away if you turn back
left in your Bibles, probably just a few pages.
First John, chapter two speaks of who we are in Christ and how we
can escape the judgment of God going back, theologically speaking,
all of us deserve God's judgment.
All of us deserve separation.
All of us deserve eternal punishment from him.
But First John, chapter two, verse one says this, my little children.
So.
So John is referencing Christians, those that are in the
faith.
These things write I unto you that ye sin not so.
So John says, guys, I'm writing you these things so that
you don't sin.
And all of us would say, that sounds good.
But then he says something interesting.
And if any man sin, meaning this, you shouldn't want to sin,
you should strive not to sin.
But the reality is, is that you will sin.
So what happens?
Well, now we're facing God's judgment again.
No, what does it say?
It says, and if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father.
Who's the advocate?
Jesus Christ, the righteous.
It's Jesus's righteousness that allows us to not face the judgment
of God.
And so it's not a matter of good people versus bad people.
I want to be very clear about that.
I think a lot of times we think, well, my goods outweigh my
bad, so therefore God's not going to judge me.
That's not what it's about.
The Bible says if you've offended one sin, you've offended
them all.
And so I think so many times we wrap up our Christian life with
pride because we're like, hey, we aren't those bad people over there
that, that God's going to judge.
And we, and we put a label on whoever we think is really bad.
And it depends on who you are.
Right?
You know, some of us have our pet sins that we hate, and we should
hate sin.
But the truth is, is that scripture says very clearly here
that the distinction between those that are judged and those that
are not judged, it's those who have faith in Jesus Christ and have
his righteousness on their account.
And Jesus is their advocate, their, their lawyer, so to speak.
And so think of like a throne room or not a throne room, let's
say a courtroom.
God the Father is sitting up there in the judgment seat and, and
we're standing before him, Guilty, guilty as charged.
But then you have the advocate, Jesus, he comes in the
scene, he says, hey, look, I paid the price.
I took the payment, I took the cross.
I'm the one who knew no sin, and he was the one that took that
sin for us.
So therefore we can celebrate that we are not part of verse 15.
We are not the ones that are going to receive the judgments upon
us, but we are gonna be the ones that can celebrate the truth
of Jesus's righteousness, not celebrating our goodness.
Because sometimes what can happen is Christians can get together
and we can start talking about how good we are and how bad they
are, but the truth is, is that we need to talk more often about
how bad we are and how good God is and how much he has changed
us.
So anything that you do in your life that reflects anything
that I do, that I reflect Christ in it's glory to him, it's
glory to his power, and it's his transformation in my life, not
my own.
I didn't clean myself up.
My flesh still wants what my flesh wanted before I got saved.
I, I, some of you might look at me like what your flesh wants,
what your flesh wants and the Bible speaks of this idea that we
die to the flesh.
And now we allow the Spirit to guide us.
And the Spirit guiding us allows us to respond in righteousness.
But again, it's not our righteousness.
It's the Spirit working through us.
And so I.
I think that that's so important for us to understand.
So.
So think of somebody arrested for a crime.
It is Jesus who breaks the shackles of our guilt.
And so we're back to Jude, verse 15.
He says they've committed these ungodly works.
And he gets specific here, and he says of all their hard speeches.
What's he talking about here?
They're.
They're hard speeches.
I think that that's important to.
To see because we.
We think of a hard speech as like, man, I got a.
I got a big speech I have to give here.
That's.
That's not what he's talking about here.
He's talking about their.
Their.
Their harsh speech.
It's harsh.
It's.
It's grading.
So he's characterizing these individuals that.
In rebellion to God.
And so he says harsh speech.
And that harsh speech allows them.
I like Spurgeon.
Some of you know, Spurgeon.
Charles Spurgeon, great prince of preachers there in England.
I like this quote that he said.
He said, you know, the sort of people alluded to here.
Nothing ever satisfies him.
Satisfies them.
They're discontented even with the gospel.
The bread of heaven must be cut into three pieces and served
on dainty napkins, or else they cannot eat it.
And very soon their soul hates even this light bread.
There is no way by which a Christian man can serve God so as
to please them.
They will pick holes in every preacher's coat.
And if the great high priest himself were here, they would find
fault with the color of the stones of his breastplate.
Spurgeon said that in a sermon.
And, man, that's pretty strong word.
So.
By the way, that wasn't Pastor Josh.
That was Charles Spurgeon.
If you have any problem with him, uh, you can take it up with
him in heaven when you meet him one day.
But.
But the truth is, is that sometimes that's what happens in
our life.
We.
We have all these great things, but yet we can't see the
blessing in the midst of the.
The problem.
And, and so they.
They.
They managed themselves to get to a place where they were trying
to flatter people.
These certain men, in this case, knew how to talk smooth ways
and, And.
And flattering Words, they would say anything good or bad, to
get an advantage, to get up.
You know, you've ever met someone like that, they'll tell you
anything as long as it's them on top.
So you would say, so how do we be different?
How, how, how do we distinguish ourselves in a different
manner than this?
And then how do we watch out for this?
Well, he gives us what we should do.
How do we keep ourselves in this way?
Because that's the way culture goes.
That's the norm.
That's the world.
Verse 17, he says, but beloved, again, referencing Christians,
referencing believers.
Remember ye the words which were spoken before of the apostles
of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Remember what you've been taught about the truth.
We are to be different.
We are to remember what Jesus taught.
The word of God is always the answer to danger and division within
the church.
It's always the word of God.
That's what he's saying here.
Jude is saying, hey, you know what?
You know how you be different?
You know how you're different than these false teachers?
You know how you're different than the world?
You know how you're different than the ungodly?
You center everything and remember the word.
You remember scripture.
So we can allow divisions to happen.
We can allow conflict to happen.
We can even allow attacks to the truth happen.
But at the end of the day, what we have to do is we have to
recenter ourselves in scripture.
More and more, I am learning that if scripture doesn't mention
it, I'm going to tell you, if someone comes up and says, hey, what
do you think about this?
Sometimes I'm even cautious to say what I think about it because
if scripture doesn't mention it, I don't know.
Whoa, whoa.
You can't say you don't know.
I don't know.
Scripture doesn't mention it.
So we're not sure.
You can believe what you want to believe about that.
But.
And it's fun sometimes to have a gospel imagination.
I like that, by the way.
I do like that.
But we have to be very careful when we take anything outside of
scripture and make that the importance.
The gospel is the gospel for a reason.
And you know, I was listening to another Spurgeon.
I wasn't listening to it.
Spurgeon.
I was reading Spurgeon's sermon.
Dictated to me.
So it wasn't his voice.
But he was saying that when a church gets tired of hearing the
gospel is an indication that they are not where they need to be.
He said sometimes churches will get like, hey, why are you preaching
the gospel, we're all saved.
We all know the truth of Jesus.
Teach us something else.
Everything is based in the gospel.
Therefore, if we want to talk about morality, if we want to talk
about conflict resolution, if we want to talk about husband and
wife relationships, if we want to talk about defending the faith,
it all goes back to the gospel, Jesus.
If.
If we don't have Jesus and Jesus resurrected, what's the point?
We're just like every other false religion out there.
And so it's Jesus at the heart of these things.
And Jesus marks it with grace and truth and compassion.
And so the apostles had warned the early church that this would
happen.
Verse 18, how that they told you there should be mockers in the
last time.
So what is he saying here?
He says, don't be shocked that people are mocking Christ.
I think so much we're.
We're so shocked at the evil of this world that it takes us back
too far to the point where we're off guard.
Expect.
I know this isn't revolutionary, but expect unsaved
people to act like unsafe people.
Expect complainers to complain.
Expect people that are filled with hate to act in hate.
That's what the Bible says.
And so we don't get shocked when the world is that way.
I mean, we can turn away from sin and we can recoil from sin, which
we should.
But there is a point in our minds where we know the Bible says
that in the last time, which, by the way, we are in the last time.
And someone says, wait, you believe we're at the very last days?
Maybe.
But the Bible actually teaches theologically that from the moment
of Jesus resurrection, we have been in the last days, and we're
just getting closer and closer.
So just as it was true 2000 years ago here with Jude, it's true
today.
So there will be mockers in the last times who should walk after
their own ungodly lust.
You see a theme with these guys that he's talking about.
It always goes back to they're walking their way.
They're walking the fleshly path, the ungodly path.
So he says, don't be shocked with this.
A passage of scripture that maybe some of you are familiar with
is in second Timothy, chapter four.
You could turn there with me if you'd like.
It's again, another prophecy of what it'll be like in the last
times.
And I think that when you read this, or when you listen to me read
this, you will see where we are.
Second Timothy, chapter four, verses three and four.
For the time will come when they people will not endure sound
doctrine.
So, so what is he saying here?
He says there will be a day which in this case Paul was talking
to Timothy and he says in your day, so it's even maybe worse now
that people will not want to endure or listen to or accept sound
teaching.
Says, but after their own lust.
There's a theme there.
Right back to their lust shall they heap to themselves, meaning
they'll, they'll bring in, they'll attract, they will basically
hunger after heap to themselves teachers having itching
ears.
And they shall turn away their ears from the truth and shall be
turned unto fables, meaning this people will bring in and be
attracted to what they want to hear.
And there will be people, there always will be people that
will tell them what they want to hear.
Right?
So like if I got up and I, I, what I could do is this, I could
say, hey everybody, we're going to take a survey.
Surveys aren't a bad thing.
We're actually going to be doing a survey this Sunday about
opportunities for you to get involved here at the church.
But if I, if I said, okay, let's, I'm going to take a survey
and I want to hear what you guys want to hear preached to you.
And okay, I get all these opinions and they come in and okay,
now I want to ask you what you don't want to have preached to you.
And I get all those opinions, in I go, okay, I know that this area
right here is something that I can't preach because everyone's going
to get upset.
So what do I do?
I take that off the table.
I don't necessarily out and out deny it, but what I do is I'll
just preach the stuff that's palatable for the church.
And that sounds good and it might even be, it might even be truthful
to a, to a degree.
But when we don't tell the whole story, we, we are, we are essentially
lying.
Have you ever taught your children that?
If our kids come into our house and hey, so what happened here?
And they tell you something, is that the whole truth?
If it's not the whole truth, it's a lie.
And, and, and so there's that idea of sometimes we always think
that false teachers and people that are trying to divide the church
are going to come in with like, you know, a pitchfork and horns
and come in and ah, we're gonna get you and we're terrible
people.
No, it's coming in, in a way, the way of Cain, the, the, the, the
heir of Balaam, it could be any of those paths.
But what we can see there in second Timothy chapter four is that
there is going to be a day.
And he says, but Watch thou, verse 5.
But watch thou in all things.
Endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full
proof of the ministry.
For I am now ready to be offered in the time of my departure
is at hand.
And so we have Paul saying, be ready, just do what you need to do.
And as Christians, that's what we have to do in our society.
We have to recognize the difference between a truth and a
lie, deception.
And scripture verse 19, they.
These be they who separate themselves.
That's an interesting way to put it.
They separate themselves.
Essentially it means this.
They themselves cause the separation.
It's not that they're saying like, oh, we're separating from these
good people.
It's that they come in and they're characterized by division.
So wherever they go, division happens.
And, and if you read Jesus's high priestly prayer in John 17,
it's, it's Jesus's prayer for the church.
What?
Jesus could have prayed a lot of things, and he did.
But one of the things that were at the top of his prayer was
this, that they be unified, that they be together.
Um, we see what was the mark of a healthy church in Acts chapter
two.
They were in one accord.
And so what does Satan do?
Satan wants the opposite of what God wants.
So therefore he wants to cause division.
So he says these individuals that cause division are sensual,
having not the spirit.
So there, there we get to the deepest, darkest problem.
There's no spirit.
There's no spirit involved.
There's no indwelling of the spirit.
There's no guidance of the spirit.
So what we can see is this, and I think this is important for
us to see here this evening.
If we are unsaved, there's a person in our midst that's unsaved.
We should expect them to act unsaved and therefore living without
the Spirit.
Right?
I mean, that's, that's the distinction of a believer.
A believer is someone who has the spirit living within them.
But the Bible also speaks of individuals who have the spirit living
within them.
So that, so that's called the indwelling of the spirit.
But there's also individuals that are not living filled with the
spirit.
Meaning I have the spirit living within me, but I've suppressed
the conviction of the spirit so much.
The Bible says quench not the spirit.
Okay, quenching the spirit means the spirit convicts, I reject.
And there's a time when I have rejected the Spirit so much in my
life.
I've quenched the Spirit so much in my life that Paul speaks
of what's called a seared conscience.
And when we have that seared conscience, we can get to a place
in our life that we are living still in the family of God, in our
position, but living away from the Spirit because the Spirit has
no longer has any meaning to us.
And we can be living just like this.
And so what we can see is this.
There are Christians who are living outside of what a Christian
should be living like.
And so I think that that's something that we need to be aware
of when it comes to our own life.
We, we, we have to take a look at ourselves, take a look at our
own life.
So I, I, I read the New Testament and you know what I naturally
do?
I naturally put myself in the shoes of the apostles.
That's what we, of course, we're, we're the star of the show.
We're the best.
But often I, I have tried now, I should say, to read the New Testament
through the eyes of a Pharisee.
Am I that guy?
Am I the Pharisee?
Am I the one that's living outside of these truths of scripture?
And so I think the first step, and we're gonna look just at the
first step.
There's actually three steps in how to contend for the faith.
We're gonna just look at the first step tonight.
I'm gonna summarize it and then we're gonna close out verse
number 20.
Look inward.
The, the first thing that we do when it comes to being ready to
contend for the faith is not to start looking at all the people
on the outside and going, okay, how many people can I go after?
You know, we're gonna storm em.
The truth is, is that what did Jesus teach when, when we're.
The Bible never says don't judge completely.
It, it does speak against condemnation.
I have no right to condemn anybody.
But the Bible does say, when you're going to make a judgment call
about a believer and come and exhort them, pick the beam out of
your eye before you try to go after their spec.
That's not saying never try to help another Christian.
That's a lot of people take that out of context.
They say, well, you know what?
You shouldn't go around and try to help people in their sin because
you've got a beam in your eye.
No, Jesus is teaching, hey, get yourself ready to go where you're
walking in the Spirit.
So that you can help other people.
We should help other people.
And so what we do first when we're going to contend for the faith
is we look inward.
So, so that's what verse 20 is.
But ye beloved, referencing now the Christians again, building
up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost.
And so what he says is this.
He says, keep yourselves, verse 21.
Keep yourselves, allow yourselves to live in the love of
God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal
life.
That is probably not the first thing we would think about when we
think about contending for the faith.
He doesn't say hey, go and go to Bible college and make sure you
have all the arguments.
He doesn't say hey you know what, go out and start attacking
people.
He says first and foremost, inwardly, where are you at spiritually?
Build up yourselves on your most holy faith.
Build your Christian faith.
Grow in your faith.
Pray in the Holy Ghost.
Meaning pray asking God in the Spirit to allow you to live in the
Spirit.
Keep yourselves in the love of God.
Be reminded.
Remember the love of God.
Look for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.
Meaning you look to him, you try to be more like Christ.
We know that God loves even the ungodly.
Romans chapter five tells us that.
It says, for when we were yet without strength, in due time, Christ
died for the ungodly.
And you'd say, I don't think God sent Jesus to die for the ungodly.
Romans 5, verse 8.
But God commended his love towards us and that while we were
yet sinners, Christ died for us.
It says it right there.
God loved us enough to die for us even when we were ungodly.
Not so that we would stay ungodly, but that we would live in
that transformative life.
And so what does he say?
Go back to the love of God.
It means to keep yourself in constant reminders of God's ever
present love in our life.
The Bible does say to love the ungodly.
The Bible does not say to accept the ungodly.
The Bible says to demonstrate our love for the ungodly.
It doesn't mean that we should build up the ungodly in their ungodly
ways.
So therefore what we have to do is we have to be prepared to profess
and to live out the love of Christ to those around us.
And so the one way that we can build up our faith is to be reminded
about what Christ has done for us.
The Gospel.
We see their prayer.
We say that we see there the reminder of God's Mercy.
And so this is the faith that Jude was talking about all the way
back in verse three.
Remember, in verse three, he says, contend for the faith.
You're contending for this very thing that you're trying to
grow in the truth of God.
Another way to keep yourself in the love of God is to confess
your sins before God.
Right?
First John, chapter one, verse nine.
If we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us our
sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
So part of our prayer lives is to confess before God where we have
fallen short.
God already knows where we are.
God already knows that you've fallen short.
The word confession means to just say the same thing.
To agree.
To agree on my sin before God.
God to agree.
I know my sin is wrong.
I know that I've walked away from you.
I know that I've allowed myself to turn my ways to the flesh.
And so therefore, Lord, I want you to restore me back into your
fellowship, not restore salvation.
But the Bible does say to restore the joy of our salvation.
And so the Holy Spirit may help us pray by giving us the right
words to say we should pray to the.
By the way, biblically speaking, I think this is a controversial
topic, but I think I can show you scripture to talk about this.
I believe the model prayer is to pray to the Father in the power
of the Spirit in the name of Jesus.
Right.
I believe that's the path that we should take.
Now, some people say, can I pray to Jesus?
That's a kind of an interesting topic.
I believe you can.
I don't think there's anything wrong with that.
But I believe when Jesus was asked, how should you pray?
He says, to thou, our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be
thy name.
So we say we address the Father through the power of the Spirit,
verse 20, praying in the Holy Ghost, and then obviously in the
name of Jesus Christ.
And the way it.
It doesn't mean that your prayer is actually more magical when
you say in Jesus's name at the end.
It just means that you're praying in the fact that you could
only approach God in his throne room because of the blood
of Jesus Christ.
So someone says, well, I didn't say Jesus at the end of my
prayer.
Is that prayer not valid?
No, you're praying on the fact that you're in.
You're in the standing in the family of God because of Jesus.
And so I think that's important for us to understand there
in that essence of prayer.
And so the third way I think that we can keep ourselves in the
love of God is that we just keep our eyes fixed on the Gospel.
We keep our eyes fixed, as it says in verse 21, the mercy of our
Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.
That's what he's saying there.
That would be a fancy way to say your salvation.
The mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.
Eternal life is salvation.
John 3:16.
For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son,
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting
life.
So it's meditating upon living in celebrating, proclaiming the gospel.
And then he's going to say, yeah, there, there are other steps.
You look inward first, but then you gotta look outward.
And that's what the next step, step is to look outward.
And, and ultimately at the end of all of this, it is to look upward.
And so for, for the, this week and next week, we're gonna look at
those three steps.
To look inward, to look outward, and then to look upward.
And that is really how we contend for the faith.
It's not about having a bunch of conflicts.
You know, there are Christians who enjoy confrontation and to, to
the point where it's like, okay, I'm gonna cause confrontation.
And the Bible says, no, be led in the Spirit.
God will get.
If you're walking in the Spirit, God will give you the discernment
to know when to share your faith and when not to share the faith.
There is a time and a place not to say something.
We know that because Jesus didn't say the same thing every single
time he dealt with people.
There were times where Jesus did walk away.
If you remember where he was preaching there in Nazareth, his
own town.
They weren't receiving him because they, they, they were not
respecting him because that's where he was from.
So Jesus didn't say, well, I'm going to stay in Nazareth till everyone
hears me.
Jesus moved and, and so there is a time and a place, Paul did that.
Paul left certain places and said, you know what?
God's work isn't here anymore.
The Holy Spirit sometimes closes the door.
And so if we're, if, if we're going to look at this from the perspective
of as a church, we're going go into all the world.
It's the Holy Spirit guiding us to say, okay, this is a gospel
opportunity.
Maybe this isn't a gospel opportunity.
I can still live out the gospel, but maybe this isn't a confrontational
opportunity.
So the point I'm trying To make is don't just go out looking
for a fight.
If you live the gospel, the fights will find you.
Let me tell you, if you live long enough and you live for the
truth of Christ, and you proclaim the love of Christ and you
proclaim the word of God, there will be enough conflict for
you, enough to contend for the faith.
And.
And it will come in different routes.
It will come in different ways.
And so the book of Jude is all about how can we contend for the
faith?
And how can we be the ones prepared to go out?
You, you can't contend for the faith.
If you go back and look at verse 15, 16 and say, you know what?
Ooh, I am someone who has grading speech.
I am someone that's a murmur, a complainer walking after my own
lust, someone speaking swelling words.
Okay, There are some times in our life where we need to reinspect
what we're doing, but that's the grace of God, because all of
us, all of us deserve what we were talking about in verse 15, the
judgment of God.
But yet we still have that grace.
And so it's never too late.
It's never too late to come back to him.
You know how I know it's not too late?
Because you're right here taking it in breath.
It's not too late.
Okay, we can continue on.
God's gonna give us another day, Lord willing.
If not, hey, then.
Then we're with him in glory.
Uh, so.
So we're gonna look at more.
We're gonna look at verse number 22 next week, which actually,
actually has.
Has been misinterpreted in many ways.
Uh, I believe specifically, if you look at it from the perspective
of what Jude is talking about here.
Uh, so, so there are.
There.
There is a way that we.
And there's different ways that we deal with people.
There's some people that we need to give compassion to.
There's some people that we need to save with fear, as it says.
There are some people that we need to pull out of the fire.
Um, so.
So there, there.
There are some different paths that we take when we deal with certain
people depending on the Holy Spirit's guidance.
And so that's what we will talk about next week.
I will stop there.
Could love to talk about it more, but we are at our limit tonight,
so appreciate your attention here, contending for the faith.
If you followed along with us here in the study of Jude, I.
I hope that it's been beneficial to you.
If you have any questions about any of this, I will try to
answer the ones that I know and the ones that I don't know.
I will let you know that I will look it up.
After we get through the Book of Jude, we are going to this is
kind of just a a plea for those that, you know, maybe are on
the fence of coming back out for another study.
We are going to be studying the the Book of Philemon and and
that's a book that is not talked about very often, but it's
actually a very, very interesting book, one that I believe
there's a really important message for us to learn there.
So a lot of times left out because of the uniqueness of the
story.
So if you've never heard that or if you have heard it, appreciate
you coming back and studying it together with me.
Thank you again for listening to the Middletown Baptist Church
podcast.
I hope that this sermon has been a blessing for you.
You you would like to find out more information about our church
or this sermon, you can find us at middletownbaptistchurch.org.
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Thank you so much.
God Bless.
Have a wonderful day.