JUDE: An Introduction
A Study of the Letter of Jude
Teaching Lesson 1
May 9, 2012
The Book of Jude… how many of you have read it? How many of you have ever studied it?
Tonight we are going to look at an overview of the book of Jude and over the next several weeks we are going to look at each verse in this very short, but powerful letter!
Have you ever wondered about how Satan can get into a church? I believe Satan attempts to sneak in ‘secret agents’ into the church to confuse the fellowship and poison the unity and ultimately crush the witness of the believers!
Sometimes these agents KNOW that is what they are doing and then other times Satan deceives believers into actions that are contrary to a godly and close fellowship… and they are used by Satan to destroy the fellowship that God has built.
With that being said, Jude is a book/letter that contains a greeting or salutation with Jude’s reasons for writing the letter in the 1st place (v.4)
Then Jude gives 3 examples of punitive justice from God, which we will get into later...
but Following this line of thought Jude brings out the wicked ways of certain false teachers within the church and he wanted the true believers to SEE them and know that they were in harm’s way;
after this comes a concluding portion in which disciples are warned and exhorted, and the whole closes with one of the most sublime doxologies of the Bible.
There are passages within this short book that can be found nowhere else in the Bible. We will look at how God is calling us to live and the witness we are called to become… and we will see what God’s word has to say about it…
Before we dive into these verses… I want to give you a brief summary of the Book of Jude…
Author: Jude, the brother of James. (v.1)
Scripture points out that Jesus had brothers named both Judas (Jude) and James (Mark 6:3)
Scholars speculate that Jude uses his brother’s name because he had not been active in the early church, but James had been. This gives him credibility with the readers.
But now Jude has surrendered to Christ as Savior and is serving God through spreading the good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ!
Who Letter Was Written To: To those who are called, sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ… (v.1)
What we do know: Jude was writing to a group of believers who were facing difficulty within their fellowship, this letter was DEFINITELY for believers… those who were saved!
What we do NOT know: Although we know he was writing to believers, it is not known what group he was writing to… theologians and scholars have speculated that the letter from Jude and 2 Peter were to the same, if not very similar churches.
It seems as if to indicate that Jude was writing to a group of Jewish believers. But the exact destination and people is NOT known.
Why Letter Was Written: I found it necessary to write to you exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints… (v.3)
To exhort or encourage this unknown group of believers and to challenge them as well to ‘contend earnestly’ [to battle for] the faith!
Now the dating of this letter is not an issue that can be known for sure, but it is believed that Jude was either the basis for 2 Peter or they were both authored around the same time and that the approx date for writing was sometime between AD67-70.
WHY ARE WE STUDYING THIS LETTER?
Jude is a book of the Bible… a letter inspired through the pen of Jude the brother of James by the Holy Spirit, and yet how many sermons or how many Bible studies have YOU done in Jude?
Tonight we are going to begin a study of this somewhat unknown book of the Bible and we are going to learn… verse by verse… of what God desires us to know.
Some of it is going to make you very uncomfortable, but let us pray that our study in Jude will open our eyes to the desire of our Savior and that we will submit ourselves to His plan and desire for our lives…
OUTLINE FOR STUDY:
A Strong Warning Against Nominal (Casual) Christianity (v.1-25)
Purpose of letter (v.1-3)
Don’t be a Destroyer (v.4-19)
Be a Builder (v.20-25)
What is NOMINAL Christianity?
Nominal is defined as acting or being something in name only, but not in reality… another way of saying Nominal Christianity is a ‘so called’ Christian.
This is a believer who makes a public profession of faith and outwardly attempts to meet all the criteria required to LOOK like a Christian but in reality they have NEVER been changed by the blood of Christ and are lost and without God.
Nominal Christians live DUAL lives, they say and act one way in the church, but in the world they say and act another way! Jesus warned about this in Mark 7 when He quotes Is 29:13 – “This people honor Me with their lips, but their heart is FAR from Me…”
Nominal Christians are not a new phenomenon, but they have been around since the beginning of the church in the book of Acts. The 1st ‘nominal’ Christian written about in Scripture are Annanias and Saphira in Acts 5.
Jude is fully and deeply concerned here in this letter in encouraging believers to NOT fall prey to the lie and trap of the Evil One, Satan… when he convinces people to merely ‘go thru the motions’… Jude counters this lie by writing a dynamic and powerful teaching about faith in Jesus Christ!
Jude lists his reasons for writing this letter in v.1-3, 1st identifying himself as a servant of Jesus Christ and then a brother of James (whom all the readers would have known… speculation by scholars point toward James of Jerusalem, brother of Jesus as the James that Jude is pointing towards in this verse)
Jude’s initial desire for writing was NOT admonishment or teaching but one of encouragement. However, Jude has heard of a struggle within the church that he feels he needs to address directly through this letter… found it necessary to write to you exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints…”
When we look at this letter from Jude to these probably Jewish group of believers…we can see 2 things that Jude wishes to focus upon and teach:
Don’t DRIFT in your faith in Christ, and
Don’t be led astray by false teaching/teachers
In the 1st part of this letter Jude uncovers the characteristics of these false teachers and then shares with his readers just how God is going to deal with these heretical people.
SLOWLY GO THRU---SHOWING SCRIPTURE...
Characteristics of a False teacher:
Ungodly (v.4)
Turn from the grace of God (v.4)
Defilers of the flesh (v.4)
Reject authority over them (v.8)
Evil speech toward leaders (v.8)
Evil speech with great ignorance (v.10)
Brutish beast who corrupt themselves (v.10)
Selfish, serving only themselves (v.12)
Empty and deceptive
like clouds without water (rain) (v.12)
like late autumn trees without fruit (v.12)
like the raging waves of the sea (v.13)
like wandering stars (v.13)
walking according to their own lust/desire (v. 16, 18
Egotistical – mouth great swelling words (v.16)
Manipulative – flatter others to gain advantage/power (v.16)
Polarizing – causing division instead of unity (v.19)
Sensual – living to please flesh instead of pleasing God (v.19)
Empty – they do NOT have Christ in their lives (v.19)
God’s Judgments of False teacher: Judgments which shall surely come to these false teachers (v.5-11). SLOWLY GO THRU---SHOWING SCRIPTURE...
Destruction – The Lord destroyed those who did NOT believe. (v.5)
Angel Punishment – God doesn’t even spare Angels when they fail…(v.6)
Suffer the vengeance of ETERNAL fire… (v.7)
Woe be to those who fit this category (v.11)
Eternal blackness is their destination (v.13)
God will judge ALL people… he is NOT mocked! (v14-15)
The 1st part of this message is simple… There ARE false teachers! Here is what they look like and here is what God is going to do to them! Jude deals with the destroyers of the church first and then he begins a section on encouragement and edification of the church (edification means to encourage and lift up those within)
The next section Jude deals NOT with those who DESTROY, but with those who BUILD… He calls on believers to be builders!
By the building up of our faith…(v.20) which Jude calls a ‘most holy’ faith!
‘holy’ means separate… we are separated by God from the world
By praying in the Holy Spirit…(v.20) this was for discernment for the believers to defeat these false teachers… the false teaching would not be defeated by mere intellectual reasoning, but only thru prayer and the guidance of the HS
By keeping themselves in the love of God… (v. 21)to build is to love! We cannot build up the body of Christ without loving them…
By looking for the mercy of Jesus… (v.21) The mercy of Christ carries us through and helps us to forgive and move forward, but this cannot be done if we do not love…but finally about the mercy of God that is revealed in His gift of Eternal life
By having compassion, (v. 22) not just with other believers but with the lost of the world around us
By seeking to save the lost… (v.23) like snatching the unaware from grave danger, our focus should be to ‘save’ those who are headed toward eternal fire…
Finally Jude concludes his letter with a great doxology…
Lifting up God in many ways:
The One who can keep you from stumbling
The One who can present you faultless before God
The One who is our Savior
The One who alone is WISE
The One who is due all glory and majesty
The One who has all dominion and power
The One who was, is and forever will be… that is Jesus!
Over the next several weeks we are going to dive into the book of Jude and we are going to mine this book for the jewels that are there for the taking…
I pray you will not only join me for this study BUT also invite others to join us… God is going to bless this time and He is going to reveal to us great things we can use in our lives and in our service to His kingdom!
My prayer is that we don't become a fellowship of believers like this young man SHOW VIDEO HERE
Pray…
