This passage will require multiple posts, but to introduce the passage, it is good to review the complete section and get an overall impression of the message Jude intended his hearers to hear. Take a few seconds to slowly read through this passage as if you had just received it from the apostle and your local body of believers were hearing it for the first time.
Jude 1:4 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 1:5 Now I want to remind you, although you once fully knew it, that Jesus, who saved a people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe.
Jude 1:6 And the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day–
Jude 1:7 just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire.
Jude 1:8 Yet in like manner these people also, relying on their dreams, defile the flesh, reject authority, and blaspheme the glorious ones.
Jude 1:9 But when the archangel Michael, contending with the devil, was disputing about the body of Moses, he did not presume to pronounce a blasphemous judgment, but said, “The Lord rebuke you.”
Jude 1:10 But these people blaspheme all that they do not understand, and they are destroyed by all that they, like unreasoning animals, understand instinctively.
Jude 1:11 Woe to them! For they walked in the way of Cain and abandoned themselves for the sake of gain to Balaam’s error and perished in Korah’s rebellion.
Jude 1:12 These are hidden reefs at your love feasts, as they feast with you without fear, shepherds feeding themselves; waterless clouds, swept along by winds; fruitless trees in late autumn, twice dead, uprooted;
Jude 1:13 wild waves of the sea, casting up the foam of their own shame; wandering stars, for whom the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved forever.
My intent in this passage is to try to define if Jude is communicating to the body of believers something that has become corrupted, something that has fallen away from an original condition. Has a certain group within the body fallen away from their original standing, or has the body simply been deceived by false teachers?
Some who read may be of the persuasion that condition security is blasphemy, and I understand that thinking, for as many know, I lived in that camp for decades. To even consider this teaching, if you are of this understanding is commendable for it shows a teachable spirit, and an openness to the Word of God.
With that said, it is important for each of you to exercise discernment (and not simply an angry argumentative spirit!) when considering this (and any passages) within this topic.
Let’s consider the first two verses with this post.
Jude 1:4-5
4 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.
5 Now I want to remind you, although you once fully knew it, that Jesus, who saved a people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe.
I would like to consider the two actions taken by the ungodly people in verse 4. To pervert and to deny.
To pervert is to change, transfer, exchange or to change sides. Now of course the action of exchanging is being done on the grace of God, and it cannot be said, as far as I understand, the change described by Jude is directly described as on the people, that is from godly to ungodly. That does not make any sense, so I will not attempt to make that link. The exchange is grace into sensuality! That seems abundantly clear.
Yet is Jude speaking of people who have known the grace of God in their life and turned it into an excuse to simply live by their sensual nature? Or is he referring to people who have taken the factual truth of the grace of God and simply exchanged the truth of the grace of God it into an opportunity to tickle their audiences ears, to gain a following and to reap some type of selfish benefit? This is a question the verse actually does not addresses directly, but the fact that they “crept in” may speak of these ungodly people as never having the life we share.
Again, the term “deny” may be considered in the same manner, where the denial is a not so much as an inner truth that these ungodly people decide to act upon, but a teaching that these folk, who may have never known the life of the Spirit decide to propagate.
Yet the passage speaks of denying our Master, not the message, or the teaching, or the truth of the identity of the Lord, but Jesus Himself. Again, did they know Him and deny Him, or did they continue in their denial of true belief as they entered into this congregation?
How did they fool (having “crept” in) this group of believers?
One more verse to consider.
5 Now I want to remind you, although you once fully knew it, that Jesus, who saved a people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe.
Jesus saved a people, yet destroyed those who did not believe. Wow, there is a lot to unpack with this phrase.
My initial thinking is Jesus saved a people (multiple individuals who exercised faith in the God Moses taught) yet prior to entering the promised land, fell away into apostacy, sinned against God and became rebellious. fighting against the leadership of Moses and the Lord who rescued them. Of these who did not believe, yet exercised belief initially, Jesus destroyed them. A clear reference to the conditional security teaching topic referred to in this series.
Yet, might Jude be saying something different? Might he be speaking of “a people group” eventually known as the Israelites, who was rescued out of Egypt, and in the wilderness certain people within the group, proved by their actions to be unbelievers all along. In other words, out of the group that was rescued, certain individuals were destroyed due to their lack of personal faith.
Even as I say that, I fear I may be inserting words into the text that may not be intended. I expect my reader to take into consideration this freedom I am taking and judge rightly.
Is Jude referring to individuals who exercised faith on the night of the Passover and then fell away, only to be destroyed? Or is he speaking of the group as a whole whom Jesus rescued, out of which certain individuals showed their true colors and were judged accordingly.
What think ye? Let me know if the comment section if you see a particular phrase that helps you understand this passage clearly.
One thing that is clear to me at this point is that Jesus is a rescuing Savior and a keeping Savior. Jude refers to Him as such in the opening verse, and this is His nature to save and to keep. Will we cooperate with our Savior, seek Him and desire to follow, imperfectly as we are, with all our foibles and faults? He is the Lord of all, and He is able to keep us, He is of the nature to keep us and has died to deliver us from our doom.
Is that important to you, or is the tremendous act of grace that He has performed on our behalf something that is easily ignored in your life? Consider
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