Soli Deo Gloria
What
we know about St. Jude, the author of today’s epistle, would fit
into a thimble, with room left over.
In the introduction to his epistle Jude gives us all the
facts about himself that he and the Holy Spirit want us to know.
He tells us simply that he is a
servant of Jesus Christ and a brother of James, and
nothing more. Apparently
Jude relished his position
outside the limelight. He
was content to remain obscure.
After all, it was Jesus who died on the Cross for the sins
of the world – not Jude. It
was Jesus who came to save us from the coming wrath of God – not
Jude. Servant of Jesus
Christ and brother of James – that was all the recognition Jude
wanted.
There
was only one James prominent enough in the early Church to be
instantly recognized by his first name alone.
That was James, half-brother of our Lord.
If this was the James
who was Jude’s brother, that means Jude also was a half-brother
of Jesus. But true to
form, Jude doesn’t put himself on a pedestal by claiming family
ties to Jesus. He
doesn’t assume any special authority because he and Jesus sat
together as boys at the family dinner table and he asked Jesus to
pass the salt. Jude
claims nothing more for himself than that he is a simple servant
of Jesus Christ.
So
what we know about Jude hardly provides material for a
best-selling biography. But
that’s all right with Jude.
The details of his life are secondary to the message he
preached and taught. And
his message was this: it’s
time to take the Christian Faith seriously.
No more shilly-shallying around, no more complacency.
If Christ is indeed the Savior of the world, if He’s the
only one who could possibly reconcile us poor sinners to God by
His death on the Cross, if He’s returning to judge the living
and the dead -- then let’s be serious about the Faith into which
we have been baptized.
Jude’s
message is one that we need constantly to be reminded of– not
just on this last Sunday in the Church Year, when each of the
Scripture readings exhorts us to be watchful and ready for the
return of our Lord. We
live in a time when many churches are throwing out essential
biblical doctrines as well as orthodox standards of Christian
behavior. The message
of Jude, therefore, is doubly important for us to hear.
In
his epistle Jude gets to the heart of the matter at once by urging
his readers in verse 3 to contend
earnestly for the Faith which was once and for all delivered to
the saints. You
athletes and sports fans take note – in the Greek, those two
words “contend earnestly” are taken from the world of athletic
competition. Jude
exhorts us believers to contend for the Christian Faith as
earnestly and with as much dedication as an athlete prepares
himself or herself for competition.
Jude
then proceeds to describe in pretty unflattering terms the
heretics, false prophets and libertines who threatened the
integrity of the Christian Faith.
According to Jude, these false teachers pollute
their own bodies by their embrace and approval of the
sexual immorality prevalent in their day.
They reject
authority – casting aside the teachings of the apostles
who had themselves been taught directly by our Lord Jesus Christ.
These heretics speak
abusively against whatever they do not understand.
Apparently, they reviled those articles of the
apostolic Faith they didn’t immediately comprehend.
They spoke derisively against those who taught that pure
doctrine and practice are important.
Go with the spirit of the age – that’s what these false
prophets taught.
And
Jude stood against them. He
stood for orthodoxy. He
stood for correct doctrine and practice.
And he urged those to whom he wrote to do the same.
Jude’s
message in this epistle is really quite contemporary, isn’t it?
He could have written it today to a typical American
congregation, tempted to laziness, self-indulgence, and doctrinal
indifference. He
could have written it to a church that has lost sight of the
saving Gospel of Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
He could have written it to a church that thinks success is
measured by numbers and programs, rather than in faithfulness to
the Word of God as it is rightly taught and received with joy and
gladness. Jude could
have written his epistle to an “anything goes” church that
just wants to keep everyone happy and in order to do so is willing
to compromise the truth of the holy Christian Faith.
There’s
only one problem with all that.
It plays right into the hands of the devil.
The truth of God’s Word, and the truth of the saving
Gospel of Jesus Christ, are under violent assault today from the
world, the flesh and the devil.
Because if God’s Word can be weakened and gutted, then so
will our Faith. If the
pure Gospel of Jesus Christ can be diluted and adulterated with
false teaching, then our Faith will likewise be adulterated –
even to the point of being no Faith at all.
Is
it any wonder then that Jude exhorts us Christians to contend
earnestly for the Faith once for all delivered to the saints?
Is it any wonder that he exhorts us to build
[our]selves up in
[our] most holy Faith and [to] pray in the Holy Spirit?
Lay aside complacency! Jude tells us.
The devil wants to gobble up your faith and send you to
hell. A world in
rebellion against God hates your faith and wants to stomp it out.
Your sinful nature gags on your faith and wants to vomit it
out. And the only way
you can stand firm in your faith in Jesus Christ is to be
continually built up in that faith even as the world, the flesh,
and the devil are trying to tear it all down.
The only way you can stand firm is to pray
in the Holy Spirit. The
only way to stand firm is to keep yourselves in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord
Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life.
We
build ourselves up in our most holy Christian Faith as we place
ourselves in the setting where faith is constructed.
It’s not out on the lake that this happens; it’s not at
the football stadium; it’s not parked in front of the
television. It’s in
the house of God, the place where the Triune God meets us in Word
and Sacrament to forgive and strengthen us for the sake of our
crucified and risen Savior Jesus Christ.
It’s in Bible Class and Sunday School where we are
instructed in the true doctrines of the Christian Faith and are
taught to recognize false doctrine as the destructive, poisonous
thing it is. To learn
apostolic doctrine is to learn the doctrine of Christ Himself who
taught the apostles in person.
Come to the Divine Service!
Be instructed in the Word of God!
In this way you will be built up in your most holy faith.
Jude
also tells us to pray in the Holy Spirit.
To pray in the Holy Spirit is to pray as Jesus taught us to
pray. We have a model
of that in the Lord’s Prayer, where we petition our Father in
heaven, that we would hallow His Name by teaching His Word in its
truth and purity, and by living holy lives according to that Word.
We pray that His kingdom would come to us as He gives us
His Holy Spirit so that by grace we believe His holy Word and lead
godly lives here in time and there in eternity.
We pray that God’s will would be done, and that He would
break and hinder every evil plan and purpose of the devil, the
world and our sinful nature. We
pray that He would keep us firm in His Word and Faith until we
die.
As
believers, we pray that we would be taught to recognize and be
thankful for all the many blessings God bestows upon us each day.
We pray that even though we daily sin much and deserve
nothing but punishment, our Father in heaven would not look at our
sins or deny our prayer because of them. We pray that as we have
been forgiven by God, we would sincerely forgive and gladly do
good to those who sin against us.
We pray that our Father in heaven would guard and keep us
from the deceits of the devil, the world, and our sinful nature so
that we would overcome these threats to our faith.
And finally we pray that God would deliver us from evil by
giving us a blessed end and taking us out of this sorrowful world
to Himself in heaven.
In
short, to pray in the Spirit is to pray for the grace and aid that
our heavenly Father provides through the Gospel of His dear Son.
It’s to recognize how weak we are, how formidable are the
enemies arrayed against us, and how desperately we need God’s
grace and forgiveness in Christ Jesus as they come to us in Word
and Sacrament.
The
Bible teaches that Jesus came to live a holy life on our behalf
and to sacrifice Himself on the Cross to pay for our sins.
We are forgiven and saved through faith in Him alone.
The doctrines of the Christian Faith are not abstract
propositions you can dispense with if they don’t interest you.
No, Christian doctrine anchors you to Jesus, to His
salvation, and to His Means of Grace by which He delivers
salvation to you. False
doctrine, on the other hand – innocent and harmless though it
may seem -- pulls you away from Jesus and will make you trust in
something else – to the utter peril of your soul.
Listen
to how Jude concludes his epistle:
To
him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before
his glorious presence without fault and with great joy-- to
the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority,
through Jesus Christ our Lord. . . Here
Jude directs us to the only One who can bring us to life eternal,
the only One who can keep us standing firm in our Faith, the only
One who can take away our sins and present us before His glorious
presence without fault or blemish -- God our Savior through Jesus
Christ our Lord. For
Christ has certainly fulfilled all righteousness on behalf of us
sinners. He has
certainly taken away our sins by the shedding of His holy precious
blood and by His innocent suffering and death.
He has certainly been raised again as proof from heaven
that we are justified and reconciled to God through faith in His
Name.
And
the Triune God accomplishes all this for us by uniting us to
Himself at the font, by the preaching and teaching of His Word of
forgiveness, and by feeding us with our Savior’s Body and Blood
in Holy Communion. In
His grace and mercy, He does these things because He wants us to
attain the goal of our Faith – the resurrection of the body and
life eternal.
So,
brothers and sisters in Christ – listen to Jude.
Take your faith seriously.
Take seriously what God has done in Christ Jesus to deliver
you from sin and death and hell.
And by God’s grace in Christ, build yourselves up in your
most holy Faith by receiving the heavenly gifts God gives in Word
and in Sacrament. What
better way to end the present Church year than by resolving to
begin the new Church year anchored in our most holy Faith through
faithful, regular use of God’s Means of Grace.
May God in His mercy grant each of us exactly that.
Gloria Patri.
. .
