A sermon preached at Covenant Presbyterian Church of Fort Smith, Arkansas on January 14, 2024.
Jude, a servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James, To those who are called, beloved in God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ: May mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you. Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints. For certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ (Jude 1–4).[1]
Jude begins his short epistle identifying himself as the “brother of James,” which means he was also the half-brother of Jesus. In humility he simply says he is a “servant of Jesus Christ,” as are we to whom he writes. In love for Christ’s church, he writes to the called with concern, with confidence yet caution. But his concern is not in God’s powerful preserving a people redeemed for his possession. No, just as those who are predestined are called, and those called justified, and those justified promised glory (Rom. 8:30), Jude writes with confidence in the sovereign grace of God, knowing that he works all things together for our good and his glory (Rom. 8:28). He knows that the Lord is our keeper (Ps. 121:3-5), and those whom the Lord keeps no one will snatch out of his hand (John 10:28). All who believe on the Lord Jesus Christ “are called, beloved in God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ” (Jude 2).
Rightly then, do we receive Jude’s blessing of multiplied mercy, peace, and love, for they are gifts given from God for his people. We have not received what we deserve but God has mercifully saved us by his grace, through faith, leading us to await Christ’s return for us in mercy and motivating us to show mercy to those ensnared by sin (21-23). For, we who enjoy peace with God pursue peace, seeking to live peaceably with all (Rom. 12:18), and show peace to a world that does not know it. And, we proclaim the peace of Christ as his beloved: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).
So, Jude is confident that “he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1:6), but trust and assurance in the sovereign grace of God do not negate concern and caution in the church. Our faith is not a blind faith nor does our assurance dismiss discernment. While our enemy may not snatch us from our Father’s hand (John 10:2a), he prowls about, even in the church, “like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour” (1 Pet. 5:8). That we are kept does not mean we should not keep watch. That we are secure does not mean we should not be sober minded. Because, as Jude warns us, the corrupt creep into the church unnoticed, the ungodly garner support, the lewd lobby the most vulnerable in the church, seeking to undermine our Lord’s authority. Claiming to be recipients of God’s grace, they pervert it. Professing to believe in Jesus Christ our Lord, they deny his lordship.
And so, Jude writes to us with concern, that we may exercise caution, but he does not write to make us fearful. Beloved, “God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control” (2 Tim. 1:7). If you are prone to fear and worry, know that it comes not from God but sin, not from good but evil. We who trust in Christ are indwelled by the Spirit of Christ, and through his presence we have the power to withstand the temptations of our flesh and the attacks of our enemy. We are not helpless victims but redeemed conquerors! When you are tempted to fear, remember this truth: neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 8:37-39). Since this is the truth, and if Satan hates Christ’s church, seeks to undermine her ministry, and sends his pawns amidst us to do his bidding, how then shall we live? We shall live as loved.
Live as Loved
Jude addresses us as “Beloved,” conveying his love for Christ’s church but also the love of God for us; we are “beloved in God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ” (Jude 1). Our identity is beloved. The distinction is key, as the apostle John writes, “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us (1 John 4:10a). God’s love is not in response to ours but precedes it from eternity past. Before the foundation of the world, “in love, he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will” (Eph 1:4-5). And God’s eternal love for us then motivates our love: “We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19).
It is important for us to understand this at the outset of our study of Jude because Jude has much to say about the sinful behavior of deceivers in the church. We, who are in Christ, have a different motive in the church than those who creep in unnoticed, those who “pervert the grace of our God.” The difference is love; the object of our love motivates our behavior. Jesus said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” (John 14:15). But if a love for Christ is not present in your heart, then obedience to him will be absent, no matter your lip service.
As God’s beloved in Christ, we love him who loved us first. And this eternal, unmerited, steadfast love leads us not to sin but to grow in godliness. God does not motivate us by guilt or shame, but Satan and our sinful flesh does. God does not coerce us into obedience with the enticement of love, “but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8). The more we grow in our love for God the more we desire to please him, to obey him, to live for him and his glory.
Beware the Perversion of Grace
Sadly, being in a church does not guarantee a love for our Lord. Easy-believism can breed increased attendance but unconverted hearts, and unconverted hearts don’t love the Lord or desire to obey him. But what Jude describes is something more sinister, deceivers who have intentionally crept into the church, with such skillful deception as to go unnoticed. They profess to be Christians, even act like Christians, and they can even deceive less discerning Christians, even gathering a following of unsuspecting followers, yet ultimately leading to strife in the church and an undermining of ministry.
But though they creep in unnoticed to us, they did not deceive God. For, he who “according to the counsel of his will, whereby, for his own glory…foreordained whatsoever comes to pass”[2]; he who preserves and governs “all his creatures, and all their actions”[3] is not surprised by the tactics of the ungodly. In fact, Jude says these demonic deceivers were “designated for this condemnation,” “marked out for this judgment.”[4] Jude will elaborate on this “condemnation” or “judgment” as we continue through his epistle but suffice it to say such heretics are doomed for destruction.
Here, at the beginning of his epistle, Jude explains not their condemnation but their perversion, not only for identification but also as a warning: Beware the perversion of God’s grace. In the second chapter of Ephesians, the apostle Paul explains that we are saved by grace through faith, not of our own doing, not a result of works (Eph. 2:8-9). In sum, grace is the unmerited favor of God in our salvation. It is one of the essential doctrines of the Christian faith. It’s also a doctrine that you would distort if you desired to undermine the ministry of the church. It’s that important.
Such sinister thinking, devoid of love for God, pits God’s grace against obedience to him, and replaces it with sin. So the argument goes: If you are saved by grace, then you may live and sin as you please. Some even argue that by sinning grace abounds (Rom. 6:1). Such perversion thrives in submission to the sensual appetites of the flesh, especially sexual immorality. Obedience to Christ under his lordship is replaced with a justification of gratifying the flesh under the auspices of the grace of God.
If you are wondering how churches today can confess they believe the gospel of Jesus Christ and yet define homosexuality as identity rather than sin, perform marriage ceremonies between two people of the same sex, and embrace the myriad of other sexual perversions of our day all under the auspices of Christian love, then wonder no more: “certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ” (2-3). This is how it happens; this is how entire denominations implode. This is how the church loses its saltiness, how the church no longer shines light into the darkness, and then the church becomes no church at all but a synagogue of Satan.
Contend for the Faith
That such perversion has, does, and will infiltrate the church is a fact. That we are at the mercy of such perversion is false. Beloved, in the salvation that we share in Christ, in the common union of our faith, we must “contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” (3)! Perversion in the church is as old as Adam and as new as gender pronouns. But as the enemy would have us think otherwise, “we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places” (Eph. 6:12). We do not contend by political power or persuasion nor contend for the transformation of culture. We seek the conversion of souls by the supernatural power of the preaching of the gospel.
The only way to protect the church from deception and perversion is to believe and trust in, preach and proclaim, live in conformity to and obey the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ. For, “None is righteous, no, not one (Rom 3:10), and all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). Do not be misled: “the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 6:23). Don’t ever forget: “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us: (Rom. 5:8). God’s grace is not to be perverted but received, for “if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. …For ‘everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved’” (Rom. 10:9,13). “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:1), and “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 8:1). For, as his Beloved, we know that “neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 8:38-39).
By God’s grace, we believe “the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints,” and though old it never gets old, because the gospel that saves us, sustains us, and protects us. Let us then, as Jude puts it, build ourselves up in the faith (Jude 20). Read the Word, study the Word, meditate, and memorize the Word, and be faithful to be under the preaching of God’s Word every Sunday. As Paul taught Timothy, “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth” (2 Tim. 2:15). For, only the Word of God has the power to teach, train, rebuke, and correct us in righteousness so that as God’s servants that we may be equipped for every good work (2 Tim. 3:16-17).
And let us pray in the Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20), that is in submission to the Holy Spirit’s direction. We, like the early New Testament church, are vulnerable to deception and need help in our weakness. Our prayers must be guided by the Holy Spirit who is the Spirit of truth that we may not be led astray by the ungodly.
And let us keep ourselves in God’s love (Jude 1:21), by faith living in obedience to his commands. Our Lord Jesus said, “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). And in keeping ourselves in the love of God, let us with hope await our Lord’s return.
By God’s grace then, let us contend for the faith, for it is in the end all that matters.
[1] Unless referenced otherwise, all Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (Wheaton: Crossway Bibles, 2001).
[2] “The Shorter Catechism” Q. 7, The Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms (Lawrenceville: PCA Christian Education and Publications, 2007), 361.
[3] Ibid., Q. 11, 362.
[4] Gene L. Green, Jude and 2 Peter (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008), 58.
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