Many believers focus on the privileges of being a Christian and forget that there are conditions attached to the blessings. **
In short, blessings come with responsibilities.
We’d rather ask what God can do
for us rather than what we have to do to please Him.
Akin to JFK’s famous quote, we’d
rather ask what God can do for us, rather than what we need to do in obedience.
In the words of President John F. Kennedy
during his inaugural address on Jan. 20, 1961:
“My fellow Americans: Ask not what your country
can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.”
We like to harp on the fact that God keeps us in the faith: “Now to him who is able to keep you
from stumbling and to
present you blameless
before the presence of his glory with great joy” (Jude 1:24).
But we tend to downplay personal responsibility though it is clearly stated: “But you, beloved, building
yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal
life” (Jude 1:20-21).
Throughout
the Bible, this theme is evident: There is God’s part and our part. Each has a
role to play. Just as a coin has two sides.
In John chapter
8, Jesus forgave the woman caught in adultery. Jesus asked her, “Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither
do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.”
Who does not
want to be forgiven? But forgiveness comes with a condition. We must repent and
turn away from sin. We must not continue living a sinful lifestyle. In this
case, the woman had to forsake her immoral lifestyle and return to her husband.
Though
His divine power has granted us all things that pertain to life and godliness (2
Peter 1:3), we still have to make every
effort to supplement our faith with
virtue, and virtue with
knowledge, and
knowledge with self-control, and self-control with
steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and
godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love
(2 Peter 1:5-7).
Though, like
Paul, we believe that He who began a good work in us will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ (Philippians 1:6), we still have to
run the race. We need to forget what lies behind, strain forward to what
lies ahead and press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. (Philippians
3:13-14). We have to be personally accountable to God—to live a life worthy of the gospel of Christ
(Philippians 1:27).
Though God is at work within us, both to will and
to work for his good pleasure, we still have work out your own salvation
with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12-13).
Though
we have been saved through faith, not through works, we must not forget we are
his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared
beforehand, that we should walk in them (Ephesians 2:8-10).
At this juncture, I hope that the point about God’s part and our part has become clear.
Returning to the book of Jude, where we
started off, though we are preserved for Jesus (Jude 1:1), we need to persevere in our
faith so that we do not fall away like the Exodus generation who were saved and later destroyed (Jude 1:5). http://bit.ly/1jxUIEK
We
are preserved safe in God:
"I
am writing to all who have been called by God the Father, who loves you and
keeps you
safe in the care of Jesus Christ" (Jude 1:1).
We
need to persevere in the faith:
"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
1:5)..Jude did not mince his words when he uses various examples to illustrate the consequences of rebellion and sin, which will definitely incur God’s judgment:
-False
teachers who pervert God’s grace and deny Christ
-Fallen
angels
-Homosexuals
of Sodom and Gomorrah
-Cain—sin of murder
-Balaam—greed for material gain
-Korah—rebellion against God’s appointed authority
Even
if the sinful and rebellious manage to escape judgment while they are on earth,
there will be a final judgment awaiting them (Revelation 21:8).
To recap:
In
this short book of Jude, which has only one chapter and 25 verses, the
privileges and responsibilities of a believer are spelled out clearly for us.
God keeps us in the faith but we too have to play our part.
The believer's responsibilities as laid out in Jude:
- Build ourselves in the faith (Jude 1:20-21).
- Contend for the faith (Jude 1:3).
- Snatch from fire (judgment) those who have been deceived or have backslided (Jude 1:23). After all, we are our brother’s keeper, unlike Cain’s attitude.
- God saves us but we need to persevere in the faith lest we are destroyed like the Exodus crowd—who were saved but later destroyed (Jude 1:5).
To
drive home this point about God’s inevitable judgment, Jude provides many
examples. He does not merely dwell on the privileges of the believer, which he does
in the beginning and the end of the book (benediction).
In
studying Jude, I can’t help but allude to the gross error of hypergrace and the
Once Saved, Always Saved (OSAS) premise.
The crucial
flaw in hypergrace and the Once Saved, Always Saved (OSAS) premise is that
it focuses
on what God can do for believers and downplays human responsibility.
Furthermore,
the theme of judgment is downplayed.
In its place, we have ‘feel good’ teaching which tickles itching ears (2 Timothy 4:3).
Tozer warns, "Heresy is not so much
rejecting as selecting.” By
examining the whole Bible, we
do not dwell on half-truths or emphasise one truth at the expense of another
equally fundamental truth.
That’s
why we need to do in-depth study of the book of Jude which is so relevant in
these
end times when we have many false teachers who pervert the grace of God and lead
believers along the path of destructive heresy.
False Teachers
Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints. 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
1:3-4)
** This post is mainly based on the book of Jude.
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