Facebook post 259 (Send Tuesday September 20, 2022)
Jude, “a bondservant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, begins writing about “our common salvation”, but then feels it “necessary to write exhorting (urgently advising) us to contend (struggle or fight for) the faith once for all delivered to the saints”, because “certain men have crept in unnoticed, who long ago were marked out (satanically ordained) for this condemnation (crime), ungodly men, who turn the grace of our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ”.
Jude confesses he is slave to Jesus Christ, but warns us “certain men” were satanically called and equipped to spread false doctrine in churches and among God’s people, denying the Lordship of God and Jesus Christ; thus, spreading the doctrine that “self-believing salvation” is supersedes God’s grace, so we can do as we please, as long as we believe our “self-salvation”, which is what “the church of the Laodiceans” (Revelation 3:14-22) is today in some churches, for they have ousted Christ Jesus and made His church “their” church.
Every denomination is in some way “fractured” (split), between those who are righteous and those self-salvation, wanting leadership of the churches we never thought would become shameless, self-centered worldliness, even though Jude fully explained it was coming, so grace and faith working through love (Romans 5:1-5; Galatians 5:6; Jude 1:20-21), would no longer be accepted.
But Jude writes in, verses 5-8, how apostates (God haters) have fought against the church in every generation and will get worse as we approach the coming of a one-world currency, leader, and tracking system, so no one buys or sells anything without special permission.
Jude 1:5-8—5 But I want to remind you, though you once knew this, that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe. 6 And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode, He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day; 7 as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. 8 Likewise also these dreamers defile the flesh, reject authority, and speak evil of dignitaries.
Today’s society is “sex-possessed”, with both church and nonchurch people being slaves to some type of “sex-sin” that is being “accepted” as normal and posted on social media, rather than “prayed out” and “delivered”, as Jesus taught His disciples and church to do (Matthew 10:5-8).
But Jude goes on in verses 12-23 warning God’s people not to get involved in this ungodly, satanic, lust to wreck God’s character and the church, members of Christ’s body, so heed the warning or become one with the ungodly.
Jude 1:12-23—12 These are spots in your love feasts, while they feast with you without fear, serving only themselves. They are clouds without water, carried about by the winds; late autumn trees without fruit, twice dead, pulled up by the roots; 13 raging waves of the sea, foaming up their own shame; wandering stars for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever. 14 Now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men also, saying, “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints, 15 to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.” 16 These are grumblers, complainers, walking according to their own lusts; and they mouth great swelling words, flattering people to gain advantage. 17 But you, beloved, remember the words which were spoken before by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ: 18 how they told you there would be mockers in the last time who would walk according to their own ungodly lusts. 19 These are sensual (carnal, fleshly, worldly) persons, who cause divisions, not having the Spirit. 20 But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, 21 keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. 22 And on some have compassion, making a distinction; 23 but others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garment defiled by the flesh.
Jim Nabors
