ASSURANCE OF SALVATION

JUDE’S LETTER

When he wrote his brief letter, Jude really wanted to write ‘about the salvation we share’. But there was something more important that he had to write about urgently, something that compromised the truth. Indeed, something that threatened to undermine and destroy the truth. He says ‘I felt I had to write and urge you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints’ – verse 3.

He was deeply concerned that there were people in the church who were not true believers. He was not concerned by the fact that there were unbelievers in the church fellowship. His concern, rather, was that these people were presenting themselves as believers, even though, from their words and actions, it was obvious that they were not believers.

About these people, Jude says:

They had secretly slipped in among the believers – verse 4.
They were godless – verse 4.
They changed the grace of God into a license for immorality – verse 4.
They denied Jesus Christ, our only Sovereign and Lord – verse 4.
They are ‘dreamers’ – verse 8.
They pollute their own bodies – verse 8.
They reject authority – verse 8.
They slander celestial beings – verse 8.
They speak abusively about whatever they do not understand – verse 10.
They act/think by instinct, like unreasoning animals – verse 10.
They have no conscience – verse 12.
They are concerned only about themselves -verse 12.
Their promises are empty – verse 12.
They are ‘twice dead’ – verse 12.
They speak harsh words against the Lord – verse 15.
They are grumblers and fault-finders – verse 16.
They boast about themselves – verse 16.
They flatter others for their own advantage – verse 16.
They follow their own ungodly desires – verse 18.
They divide the believers – verse 19.
They do not have the Spirit – verse 19.

From Jude’s description of these people, we can see that they fail on the two criteria for genuine believers that John identified in his first letter: what they believe about Jesus Christ and how they live. Their visibly godless life flowed out of their denial of our Lord Jesus Christ. Their denial of Jesus, our only Sovereign and Lord, means that they were never believers. Their deliberate and shameless persistence in sin, and their twisted and powerless message, exposed their wrong belief.

Jude is very definite about their fate:

Condemnation – verse 3.
The punishment of eternal fire – verse 7.
Woe – verse 11.
Blackest darkness forever – verse 13.
Judgement and conviction – verse 15.

Jude’s purpose is not to make the believers afraid that they themselves might lose their salvation, but to urge them to ‘contend for the faith’ – that is, to fight for the truth. This they will do by:

Remembering that the apostles had taught that such godless scoffers would come – verse17, 18.
Building themselves up in their holy faith – verse 20.
Praying in the Holy Spirit – verse 20.
Keeping themselves in God’s love – verse 21.
Waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to being them eternal life – verse 21.
Being merciful and trying to save those who are being lured away by the false believers – verse 22.
Being very wary not to be contaminated by the false believers – verse 22.

Jude closes off his letter with a benediction full of assurance for those who are genuine believers: that God, the only God our Saviour, ‘is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy’ – verse 24, 25.

Even when our faith is being threatened by false teaching.