Today you should read: Jude 1:17-25
Warning! Warning! Warning!
Jude is a book warning the people of God about perversiveness among the believers. Jude is writing to remind believers about how easy it is to fall away and to become enslaved to the things of this world. Yesterday you read the first part of Jude where He was warning them against their perverse sin. To illustrate his point, he reminded them that after God delievered the people of Israel from Egypt they turned back to their sinful desires and became a nation much like that of Sodom and Gamorah (Genesis 19).
This is not the first time we see this kind of admonition in the New Testament… Paul warns Timothy against such sinful desires:
But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, 4treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. Avoid such people. For among them are those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth. Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth, men corrupted in mind and disqualified regarding the faith. But they will not get very far, for their folly will be plain to all, as was that of those two men. 2 Timothy 3:1-9
Jude understands something very essential about the human heart…It is wicked! Even as followers of Christ if we are not constantly seeking God and submitting to the Lordship of Christ in our lives then we will be no different than Israel after the Exodus. We will become enslaved to our perverse sin of our hearts. So what are we to do? How can we be sure not to fall prey to this? We do it by humbling our hearts.
In our passage today we see a few clear instructions:
(1) Listen to the warnings of the Apostles. (v. 18-19)
We must humbly come to the scriptures with fear and trembling. As we are convicted and warned about our sin we must submit and repent of our sin. Confessing our sin to the Lord should be something we do daily.
(2) We must pray and rely on the Holy Spirit to help us. (v. 20)
Prayer is essential to our spiritual well being. We have to pray daily and rely on the Holy Spirit to help us. Prayer should be the first thing we do every day because to go through the day without it is prideful. It is saying to God that we can do life without His help. Let me warn you in love….NO YOU CAN’T!
(3) Remember the one who keeps us from stumbling is Jesus Christ. (v. 24-25)
We simply have to make him Lord over every aspect of our lives.
Posted by: Chad Wiles
JumpstartCPC.com 