Hey Jude! – A Bible Study
A Tiny Epistle with a Big Message for Today
Today’s Bible Study, Authored by M.T. Clark 05/05/2024
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At the end of the New Testament, just before the book of Revelation, lies a short letter to the early church, whose message is short and poignant but may not receive a lot of time at your church on Sunday, perhaps because of its short length, but perhaps it is not preached about because of its content.
So who is this Jude character whose short letter made it into the Bible and what does his letter to the body of Christ say and is its message relevant for today?
To answer these questions, we will look to the text and also utilize material that we gathered from The MacArthur Study Bible by John MacArthur.
So who is Jude?
Jude was one of the four half-brothers of Jesus. Yes, that Jesus, our Lord and Savior. MacArthur’s commentary tells us: “He is to be differentiated from the Apostle Judas, the son of James (Lk 6:16; Ac 1:13). Several lines of thought lead to this conclusion: 1) Jude’s appeal to being the “brother of James,” the leader of the Jerusalem Council (Ac 15) and another half-brother of Jesus (v. 1; cf. Gal 1:19); 2) Jude’s salutation being similar to James (cf. Jas 1:1); and 3) Jude’s not identifying himself as an apostle (v. 1), but rather distinguishing between himself and the apostles (v. 17).[1]
While I can only speculate on what Jude believed about his brother Jesus, He was not the Apostle Jude and He like His brother James, appears not to have been a disciple until after Christ was resurrected, but clearly he had a change of mind and declares himself to be identified as a “slave” to and saved by Jesus and a member of the church. He writes:
Jude 1:1-3 (NKJV)
1 Jude, a bondservant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, To those who are called, sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ:
2 Mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you.
3 Beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you concerning our common salvation, 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.
Jude is a believer. He is a saint. He has the salvation that is common to all Christians, and he exhorts his brethren to contend earnestly for the faith. Why? He tells us in
Jude 1:4 (NKJV)
4 For certain men have crept in unnoticed, who long ago were marked out for this condemnation, ungodly men, who turn the grace of our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ.
It was the early church but already the body was being infiltrated by “ungodly men” who were turning the grace of God into “lewdness” that in essence was denying the Lordship of God and Jesus, indicating that they were licentious in their sins – just enthusiastic “sinners saved by grace” whose conduct revealed that God and Jesus was NOT their Lord – Jude indicates that these “carnal Christians” were not Christians at all – they were “false converts” or apostates. MacArthur’s commentary indicates that Jude’s letter could be referred to as the “Acts of the Apostates” because Jude’s letter warns of false teachers of ungodly character.
Macarthur writes: “Jude also vividly described the apostates in terms of their character and unconscionable activities (vv. 4, 8, 10, 16, 18, 19). Additionally, he borrowed from nature to illustrate the futility of their teaching (vv. 12, 13). While Jude never commented on the specific content of their false teaching, it was enough to demonstrate that their degenerate personal lives and fruitless ministries betrayed their attempts to teach error as though it were truth. This emphasis on character repeats the constant theme regarding false teachers—their personal corruption. While their teaching is clever, subtle, deceptive, enticing, and delivered in myriads of forms, the common way to recognize them is to look behind their false spiritual fronts and see their wicked lives (2Pe 2:10, 12, 18, 19).[2]”
Jude 1:5-16 (NKJV)
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.
9 Yet Michael the archangel, in contending with the devil, when he disputed about the body of Moses, dared not bring against him a reviling accusation, but said, “The Lord rebuke you!”
10 But these speak evil of whatever they do not know; and whatever they know naturally, like brute beasts, in these things they corrupt themselves.
11 Woe to them! For they have gone in the way of Cain, have run greedily in the error of Balaam for profit, and perished in the rebellion of Korah.
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.
These passages of Jude’s letter indicate that these “ungodly men” never believed – false converts and the thing that reveals the fact that they are not Christians are primarily their sins of the flesh. Not only are these apostates identified by the things they say, being grumblers, complainers, rejecting authority and speaking ill of leaders – thus Jude alludes to their association with the rebellion of Korah, who tried to usurp Moses in the wilderness, Jude clearly points to their sexual sin – by mentioning Sodom and Gomorrah which was destroyed with the very specific sin of homosexuality highlighted in Genesis 19, and the sin of Balaam – who encouraged the pagan nations to corrupt the nation of Israel through enticing them with sexual sin (Number 31:6) and the “doctrine of Balaam” is said to be the believe that a little sin doesn’t matter – that because of grace we can be promiscuous – that we can fully cooperate with the world and still serve God (https://www.gotquestions.org/doctrine-of-Balaam.html_ ).
So although the specific doctrinal subtleties of these false teachers are not exposed by Jude, their rebellion against the Lordship of God and Jesus (I’ll do what I want –“I’m forgiven! and their sexual sins are.
And unfortunately, I would have to say that this problem of apostate believers didn’t go away, if anything it may have become starker and clearer, although our society’s progressive moral decline may have anesthetized us to its shame. The prevalence of casual sex, pornography, nonmarried heterosexual couples, and homosexuals in the church today may cause us to believe that Jude is writing to us today. He goes on to say:
Jude 1:17-19 (NKJV)
17 But you, beloved, remember the words which were spoken before by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ:
18 how they told you that there would be mockers in the last time who would walk according to their own ungodly lusts.
19 These are sensual persons, who cause divisions, not having the Spirit.
Jude indicates that these people who have no regard for the sexual ethics of Biblical morality are mockers, and they cause division. We see that today with “rainbow flag churches” dividing entire denominations into different synods as they have cause to corrupt “love” into acceptance of wanton sin, warned in about in Jude’s epistle.
Listen, I was a huge sinner – steep in alcohol addiction and sexual immorality – it was my lifestyle – and believe me, it is not my heart to point out any specific form of sexual immorality as better or worse than another. I would call all of them out – masturbation, fornication (unmarried heterosexual sex) and homosexuality and it’s not because I am a hater. It’s because of what Jude says about people who practice these things: “not having the Spirit”. If your sex life doesn’t follow the Bible, and you are hardened to the idea of repenting of your sexual sins, it may indicate that you are not in the kingdom at all. As Paul warns in
1 Corinthians 6:9-11 (NKJV)
9 Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, 10 nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God.
11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.
The word of God warns sinners that if they live in their sins, they will die in their sins and that Christians are to repent turn from them – thus verse 11’s and such WERE some of you.
Instead of ignoring God’s word when it comes to those who would claim the faith, who are walking in the sins of the flesh, by turning a blind eye to their sin, we should be compassionate and loving as Jude instructs us.
Jude 1:20-25 (NKJV)
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.
24 Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, And to present you faultless Before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy,
25 To God our Savior, Who alone is wise, Be glory and majesty, Dominion and power, Both now and forever. Amen.
As Christians, we are to build ourselves up in our faith through prayer and love, and we are to have compassion on those who are walking in darkness but are claiming to be saved by “saving them with fear” – warning them to repent as gently but as truthfully as we can because as painful as it may be to tell someone that their choices are wrong, it will be a lot less painful for them to hear from Jesus that he never knew them. In
Matthew 7:23 (NKJV), Jesus said.
23 And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’
In that passage, the people in question did good deeds for the kingdom, but their practicing “lawlessness” made it clear that they weren’t really children of God – or as Jude says, “not having the Spirit”.
So why isn’t Jude preached very often? I think you would have to ask your pastor that. But it may have to do something with the state of our society today and what Jude warns about, and it may have to do with the sin that is openly or silently accepted in churches that teach more about being a “sinner saved by grace” than being a “saint” who keeps “the most holy faith”.
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Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship
[1] John F. MacArthur Jr., The MacArthur Study Bible: New American Standard Bible. (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2006).
[2] John F. MacArthur Jr., The MacArthur Study Bible: New American Standard Bible. (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2006).
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