Jude (Part 4) | Wade Branch

It's good to be here today. I'm very thankful that we are

here. We're all healthy and happy,

especially our family. We're very thankful that Daisy's

able to be here. Taylor's able to be here.

Thank you for your prayers. It's a very happy day for us and

and excited to share it all with with our family with with you.

You are our family in Christ and, and thank you for all you

mean to us and for praying for us because God answered prayers

and it's a good day. I'm excited to continue our

study together in the book of Jude and we are going to finish

it, Lord willing, this lesson. I know I thought maybe one

lesson on Jude, OK, maybe 2. But now we're on #4 and we will

finish it up today. So I do want to do a quick lead

up because if we just took the last couple verses of Jude and I

just thought on those, your mind might be trying to pull yourself

back to where we were in the flow of.

So let's get a quick run through.

I don't want to overdo it, but we started by addressing who

wrote this letter. It was a man named Jude, very,

very likely the brother of Jesus.

And along with James, he writes the letter of James.

He writes this from a perspective of humility.

He writes this as a bondservant of Jesus Christ, and he writes

to the recipients of this letter, writing a letter he

didn't want to write. He wanted to write a letter of

encouragement, of positivity and sharing in their common

salvation. But instead he had to write a

almost a battle cry, but not a battle cry against people, a

battle cry for the faith, not for my beliefs, not for what I

think is true, but but for the faith from what God has

established, from what God has delivered to the Saints once and

for all. He goes on in verse 4 to talk

about why this letter is needed is because there are people who

are ungodly men who take this beautiful thing that he's he's

referring to and they twist it and they turn it into something

that's all about them. It's all about their pleasure,

It's all about their feeling, It's all about their

satisfaction and they turn it into sensuality.

They doing so deny who God is and deny his authority over

them. And he turns to give comparisons

of people who have done this before.

He says this is nothing new. These people, don't be surprised

when they are here, don't be surprised when they show up in a

group of believers because it's been happening the whole time,

he says. That happened to the people in

Egypt. Those were the God's people.

The Israelites were God's people.

He goes on and talks about not only from God's nation, he says,

also from the spiritual realm. He gives us every category that

a human could live in or a being that God created can be in that

being at some point has failed. He says nothing new.

The Israelites did it, the angels did it.

Sodom, Gomorrah did it. Well, they're what category do

they fall under? Well, they're a non Israelite.

You have Israelite people who have fallen.

You have angels, spiritual beings who have fallen.

You have people who are non Israelites out in the world.

It happens in every category of people.

And they, he said, will suffer the vengeance of eternal fire.

We talked about in Part 2 that these people, again, all about

themselves, they're relying, are driven by their dreams.

They're driven by what matters to them.

They defile their flesh. They reject authority.

These people are all about what they want.

And he gave some more instruction to not be that way.

He says these people are following their own natural

brute instincts, like animals. Instead of being spiritually in

the image of God, they're like animals.

He places a woe upon them. And then he's given us every

category of how humans and spiritual beings can exist and

even compares it to natural things, things that aren't even

animate, things that are inanimate, things that don't

have thought. He compares them to hidden

reefs, to empty clouds, to trees without fruit.

He's making an analogy that just basically says these people are

nothing new. And last time we talked about

some of the close to home applications, they grumble.

Why do they grumble? Because they're selfish.

They think about themselves. They lift other people up.

Why? To be to be kind and be building

up others? No, because they want something

for themselves. These people are all about self

and God said this is going to happen.

They are sensual or sensually driven people and what is the

result? They cause divisions.

They do not have the Spirit of God in them.

OK, now we're up to verse 20 and this is part 4.

This is the part where he says, now here is your response.

We've talked about a lot of negatives so far.

How do we respond to all this? How do we approach this besides

just not being the previous things he says?

But you beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy

faith, praying in the Holy Spirit.

OK, let's let's stop there. Let's take this piece by piece.

His first instruction is that they build themselves up.

There are ways to make this sound not positive, but I hope

you only take this as a motivational, as a stand up, get

yourself together moment because that's what his call is.

He's going to emphasize other parts of this picture that we

need to realize, but the first thing he says is pick yourself

up, build yourself up. We have a sense of

responsibility to our own faith. I need to take responsibility

for my own faith. One man said God is sovereign or

all powerful, but he doesn't expect you to lean on a shovel

and pray for a whole. Our first piece of this

instruction is to build ourselves up.

There is a perfect correlation though these draws between our

own effort and our own initiative.

Build yourself up and what we are to build ourselves on.

On your most holy faith on the right thing, if you just seek

out to build yourself up and I hear a lot of people all the

time say, man, I'm just going to love myself.

I'm going to do me. I'm going to be all about myself

and it's going to be all me, me, me.

I'm just that's the common mantra.

Love yourself, treat yourself because if you're the best, no,

build yourself up on your faith. Isn't it funny that he ties them

two together? Because sometimes we think of

faith like it's just this belief.

It's this idea that floats around and has no application.

No, you build yourself up in your faith.

There is the perfect combination of your own initiative in action

and your heart and your your faith toward God.

God, I'm going to do whatever you want me to do and I'm here

to serve you and to take it into action.

It's not enough, Jesus says, to say, Lord, Lord, to have it in

your heart. It has to meet the rubber, has

to meet the road. So we build ourselves up but on

the right thing, not on ourselves to get the glory or

that we are strong enough to do this on our own, but that we

build ourselves up on the most holy faith.

The rest of that sentence he says, praying in the Holy

Spirit. I think this is the perfect

picture as we attempt to take ourselves that are weak and

lowly and sometimes all over the place humans and to build

ourselves up and to tie ourselves to our faith and to

grow our faith. We need strength and we need

strength through God himself. And so we draw from God.

We get strength from God. It is not all about us.

We draw from God himself and he says praying in the Holy Spirit.

So as we draw from God, should we take any special notice of

how he said that in the Spirit? I believe what he's getting at

is that we need to pray with a true and deep connection to God.

If we are going to build ourselves up, we are going to

need to connect our spirit to His.

Because if we're praying just to say things that sound good and

we are not intentionally connecting our spirit to God's

Spirit, that is maybe a more surface level form of

communication. But when we talk to Him and we

pray in the Spirit to him, we are attempting to connect to God

in a way that is real and it is emotional and it is spiritual

and it is beyond a surface level connection.

We connect our Spirit to His and we're to pray like a child to a

father as we read in several places.

But in Galatians 4 verse 6 says that we cry out to him, ABBA

Galatians 4:6

Father, when we pray in the Holy Spirit.

I believe it means all these things and, and some people want

to want to focus on the fact that the Holy Spirit taught

truth. And so we're supposed to pray in

truth. That's absolutely true.

But I think it goes beyond that. It goes beyond how we connect to

God in our prayers because if we are going to build ourselves up,

it's going to take a connection to the divine that that is deep.

Here's how Roman 8 verse 25 says this.

I believe specifically in relation to the Spirit.

It says there, but if we hope for what we do not see, we wait

for it with patience. Likewise, the Spirit helps in

our weakness, for we do not know what to pray for as we ought.

We're kind of like kids asking for something.

We don't always know what's best for ourselves.

We don't always know how to pray as we ought.

But the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings

too deep for words. I believe this is the ESP and he

who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit,

because the Spirit intercedes for the Saints according to the

will of God. As we approach prayer, let's

keep that in mind that God is actively searching our heart.

Sometimes it feels like we are allowing God in when we address

him. It's like now I've established a

line of communication. God, now you can see me because

now I'm talking to you. And so go ahead, you see me.

Look at me. Now here I am.

But that's not how it is. The whole time the Spirit

searches our heart, the Spirit is searching your heart.

Right now the Spirit is searching my heart.

And when we cry out to God, the Spirit was there.

The Spirit does see then and it sees all the time so that when

we talk to him, we can be at peace and we can have confidence

and we can have a deeper connection with him.

And that's the source of a prayer that will help us build

ourselves up in our in our faith.

That's a prayer that will draw us near to him and he will draw

near to us. And maybe the most simple

application is don't pray to yourself.

Sometimes I catch myself just talking to myself.

It feels like I have to remember I'm talking to the God of the

universe. We are to pray to God in the

Holy Spirit. Some considerations for our

prayer just kind of in passing. If we only pray in the peaceful

moments, we will not tap into the real and present help.

Maybe your prayer life is difficult sometimes because you

feel like everything is hectic all the time.

Maybe you feel like you're too busy and you have too many

things going on and you have too much to do.

But if you only pray when things are not hectic, you're not going

to get the real and present in the help that is always there

for you. But on the other hand, if we

only pray in the hectic moments and we don't take concerted time

with God to stop and slow down and take time alone with God, we

will start to associate Him with the stress itself.

Maybe you, you pray all the time when you're stressed and

stressed and stressed is the point that you never take time

to go be alone with God and take peace in him so that you think,

man, it's time to pray, it's time to be stressed.

And your body can react like that.

Your mind can turn into God is just there for stress, but he

wants you and the peace and the hectic and everyone in between

so that our spirit can truly connect to him.

In prayer, we draw from God himself.

OK, I want to hit on one idea that I think we've talked about,

but I want to bring together as we consider our responsibility

to build ourselves up here, sometimes we get that confused,

like it's all about God. Well, no, you have action, so

it's all about you. No, it's not.

Works and faiths should never contradict.

And do not let anybody ever corner you into thinking or

talking like your works and your faith go against each other.

Your works should be of faith. Your faith should be meeting

application in your works. The Jews had a problem because

they were leaning on the Old Law and making it all about their

works, and they were trying to pull the Old Law back into the

New Testament. But if but if we do not have an

application, as James says, faith without works is dead.

He says it word for word like that.

Don't let people tell you your faith and works are contrary to

one another. They are if you make them be,

but our goal is that they work perfectly in unison.

But on the other hand, after saying faith without works is

dead, Jesus basically claims works without faith is dead.

And here's how He says it. He says woe to you scribes and

Pharisees. Matthew 23, verse 27.

Matthew 23:27

Hypocrites, for you are like whitewashed tombs, which indeed

appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men's

bones and all uncleanness. You see that either side of the

equation, you get deadness, you get lifelessness.

Now their problem was that they were hypocrites.

You might say the problem. How do you know the problem was

their faith? Well, if you're a hypocrite,

it's not inward. If you're a hypocrite, you don't

have true faith. You're not developing inwardly,

you are just developing outwardly.

Or maybe not even that at all. Maybe they're just not even

doing anything outward that looks right.

But we cannot let faith in works become contrary to one another.

Galatians 5 verse 6 says very concisely.

Galatians 5:6

For in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision

avails anything but faith working through love.

Like what is what he's talking about circumcision.

He's talking about the old law, the Old Testament law.

He said that that's that's doesn't change anything.

Your faith working through love. That's it.

What a beautiful balance the Scripture provides.

Verse 21, he goes on to say, so after praying in the Holy Spirit

Spirit building yourself up, he says keep yourselves in the love

of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus unto eternal

life. I believe this phrase keep

yourselves in the love of God is intentionally a little bit

vague. Like what does it mean to keep

yourself in the love of God? It doesn't have a a very

specific application where you can nail down exactly what he's

saying. And I think that's I think

that's a good thing. So what does it mean?

Does it mean that I sit and I soak in the love of God?

Doesn't mean that I talk to Him with love toward Him.

Doesn't mean that I talk to Him knowing He loves me?

Doesn't mean that I live with His peace in my heart guarding

me. Doesn't mean that I live with

His love going toward others. Then I take that love of God and

I give it to others. Does it mean that doesn't mean

that I live with His words in me?

His love in the form of His words doesn't mean that I live

with His attitude in me. What does it mean to keep

yourself in the love of God? I think the answer is yes.

I think if you are not doing any of the any one of these things,

you are going to miss out on a piece of the.

I mean a piece of the puzzle to stay and abide in the love of

God. If the action is not there, you

can't be in the love of God. But if you're not taking time to

enjoy and accept and be at peace in the love of God, there's no

way you can be. And I find personally, when I

and not doing this part, staying in the love of God, it's going

to manifest itself in one of these ways.

Why do I say that? Because it's not just an action

and it's not just a feeling. It is a place you stay.

It's a place in your mind. It's a place you abide in.

It's a, it's a location of the spirit that you stay in.

Then I'm going to stay in the love of God.

I'm going to abide in this place in which all these things will

happen at some point and which all these things are part of my

life. And when I don't keep myself in

a place of love of God's love, I find maybe I lack in this area

or maybe in this one, but at some point there will be a hole

in that. And so may we keep ourselves in

the love of God. Notice again, he keeps going

back to the source of whatever we're trying to do.

If the if we were trying to build ourselves up, the source

was our faith and in the Holy Spirit.

If we're trying to keep ourselves somewhere, where does

the source of the strength? It's in the love of God.

The source is always back to him.

Now again, you might ask, is that putting too much emphasis

on us? Let's think about this fire.

It is possible for me to be cold away from a fire, and it'd be my

fault. If I if I were to stand far away

from this fire and say it's the fire's fault, then I'm not warm.

That'll be ridiculous. We all admit that, but at the

same time, if I were to stand close to this fire, I wouldn't

say I get the credit because I'm standing so close to the fire.

Look at how good I am at keeping myself close to the fire.

No, you'd say I'm warm because look at this fire.

The fire kept me warm. In the same way, we are intended

to keep ourselves in God's love, and it's not to our glory that

we keep ourselves there. We don't praise ourselves and

say that I'm strong because I stay close to the fire.

My right standing was so to my glory.

No, the source of the warmth, the source of the love gets all

the glory. It is just our responsibility to

stay there. And as we do that, we are

looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal

life. So as we keep ourselves close to

the fire, we're looking for credit for how great we were,

right? No.

As much as we may try to stay in His love, and as much as we may

try to build ourselves up in Him and our holy faith, all we still

have yet to say is I still need mercy.

I don't need credit. I don't need.

I don't deserve glory for any good thing.

We still look for mercy despite anything we ever do, despite any

right standing or how built up we might be at the time.

We still look for and we rely on mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ

unto eternal life. Who is the source here?

It's our King Jesus, our high and humble Lord, who is the

source of our mercy. OK, so that's what he says about

how we are to respond. He says that we are to build

ourselves up and we are to abide in the love of God.

But what about others? That's what he goes on to talk

about next. The application of all these

things leads into something he says to do with other people.

Verse 22 and have mercy on those who doubt, save others by

snatching them out of the fire. And to others show mercy with

fear, hating even the garment stained by the flesh.

I use the ESV here because I think it's more clear with the

meaning. When I read through this, the

general idea I get is I'm supposed to have a personalized

support. The support I provide for people

should be different depending on the person.

And sometimes you might, you know, like me might tend to

think, man, that means I'm supposed to give everyone

different treatment. How can I possibly do that?

How can I possibly handle everyone with a unique and a

specialized approach? That's what he calls us to do.

He calls us to handle everybody in a very specific way.

How is that possible? Well, I think first of all, we

need to kind of knock off a couple things we need to get out

of our head. It's not going to be quick if we

are going to respond to this letter in a way that allows us

to support people who are brethren in the right way.

It's not going to be quick. It's not going to be easy.

It's not going to be efficient. If you, if you need a quick way

to bounce through every way, knock everybody out.

Boom. I, I got my spreadsheet and

everybody's taken care of. It's not going to be efficient

and it's not always going to be clean.

Maybe it's going to be a messy process and part of the most

difficult part with, with us as people, as we present in ways

that aren't always the way that we really think or feel.

Sometimes we are angry, but we're really hurt.

Sometimes we're sad, but we're really, I don't know, our, our

things don't always present the same way.

It's not always clear. We are complicated sometimes.

So I think #1 we have to approach with understanding.

And I think this is a wonderful passage to help us illustrate

the mindset that we should go into whenever we reach a point

where we're trying to do God's will.

And we say, man, how do I do this?

Here's what Solomon said. He prayed in First Kings 3,

1 Kings 3:9

verse 9. He says, therefore, give to your

servant an understanding heart, literally a heart that

understands to judge your people that I may discern between good

and evil. For who is able to judge this

great people of yours? Now Solomon is taking this as a

leader of a, of a, of a Kingdom. So his phrasing might be a

little bit different than than we might say.

We're not just here to judge between right and wrong because

we don't, we're not responsible for the courts of people.

But the principle is the same that we need a heart that

understands the responsibility is great.

The need is great. We need to ask God for a heart

that understands and and just look at how God responds.

Verse 10, the speech, please, the Lord that Solomon had asked

this thing. Then God said to him, because

you have asked this thing and he goes on to say, I will give you

everything you didn't ask for. You didn't ask for riches.

I'll give them to you. You didn't ask for all these

things in your Kingdom. I'm going to give out all to

you. And yes, absolutely I will give

you the wisdom you seek. Darren prayed this morning.

I appreciate it for wisdom because as we seek God's will,

we are flawed not just in understanding, but our ability

to take it from understanding to application.

And in the context of dealing with one another that is even

more so. It can be complicated.

May we seek understanding the way Solomon sought it with

prayerfulness. And this is an interesting

situation because Solomon was a mixed bag.

He was not a perfect guy. A lot of times we pick put him

as the picture of wisdom. Yeah, but he also messed up a

lot. And even in this scenario, right

before this, he was doing things that were not good.

There was worship going on that was not good.

But he hit a sweet spot, a gold mine of God's pleasure when he

asked for this thing in the midst of whatever ever wrong he

was in the middle of. He saw God in a way that was

pleasing to him by asking for wisdom to do what was right.

That should be encouraging to us, that even if you think you

know what, how can I ask for God for wisdom right now?

I'm not perfect. I haven't figured it all out.

He's probably not going to hear me.

Seek Him and you will find him. Knock and God will honour a

request that is made from a sincere heart with the right

approach. So let's break down he he gave

us all these ways to respond. Let's take them piece by piece

and we're going to spend more time on the first one.

So if you think, you know we're running out of time here we are.

We're not going to spend a whole lot of time on these, but we're

taking going to take each of these different people piece by

piece. So he said the first group of

people and and and Jude verse 22.

He says on some having compassion, make a distinction.

If you're in the new King James, that's what he says, make a

distinction. What does that mean?

Well, I think that's why the ESV is more helpful.

It says have mercy on those who doubt.

We're talking about people who are doubting.

We're talking about, I don't want to say doubters as their

way of life, but maybe it's a position they're in.

They're having doubt. And the first thing I think we

should acknowledge is we are here for nothing if we are not

here for people in their difficult times, if we are here

for each other only when things are easy, what are we even

doing? Is that bearing one another's

burdens? Absolutely not.

So as we approach people, this is our responsibility to bear

their burden. Jesus says.

So as we approach those who doubt, that's what we're here

for. But what is doubt?

And I think first and foremost, doubt comes when you are

concerned about a matter. So as we approach people and

ourselves even who are dealing with doubt, maybe it's good to

start with the fact that, hey, this person cares.

They could not care at all. And if I treat them the wrong

way, maybe I can make them not care.

And that's a big danger. These people care and they care

enough to be concerned and maybe maybe feeling some kind of

mental anguish about an issue or maybe it's about their faith or

whatever it might be. So in my experience, here's what

doubt is. It's kind of represented by one

of these two pictures. Doubt is either coming from a

place of I'm trying to hold on and my grip is weakening on

whatever I'm trying to hold on to.

That emphasis there being my grip, my strength, and my

ability to hold on to something that I know is solid, I'm

slipping. Or maybe it's on the other hand

is maybe I'm holding on to something and I'm starting to

doubt the structural integrity of whatever I'm holding on to.

And these are both ways in which doubt can creep in.

One is a weakening of the connection to something, and

another one is a weakening or a a perception that the supporting

material, what I'm holding onto, is not strong enough.

That doesn't mean that God's word is not strong.

That means that in people's minds, in my mind, I can have

something that is not strongly built enough to where it's not

holding me anymore. That thing that once held my my

small spiritual weight, I'm heavier spiritually now.

I'm requiring more responsibility.

There's more burdens now and I need a thicker, a more

substantial thing to hold onto. And doubt can come in that form.

And if we do not acknowledge that and provide people the

support that is in the Scripture, that is in their life

of faith to be provided, they might let go the thing that

they're holding onto. A deeper commitment requires a

deeper dig. So doubts are often a natural

part of the process that makes someone seek out and reach for a

deeper connection. The reason doubt is complicated,

as I believe, because of many factors, but here's just a

couple #1 the time factor of faith.

Our faith requires so much time to develop, so many things that

just you don't see in certain seasons of life.

There are things that I know now at 27, almost 28, that you

couldn't tell me at age 1718. It just took time.

And you older folks in here are like, yeah, you think you've,

you think you've learned a couple of things.

You got to get ready. Time is required for certain

things to happen in your faith and in your life to develop

beyond certain doubts or certain dilemmas.

So time is a big factor and we need to acknowledge this and

always just going to be an answer that makes people click.

What about suffering? People can doubt because of

suffering. Maybe there's something they've

been through or something they're going through that has

caused them to rethink everything.

You have that moment. I think it's described of as

disillusionment where someone starts to question everything

that's going on because something in their life snapped

and that can have a trickle effect on their faith.

What about a confusing experience that goes along with

this very same thing? Or maybe it's it's just like the

reality got twisted a little bit.

Someone they thought was who they were not is not who they

thought they were. Maybe something got turned up

and upside down in their life. Maybe it's information

deficiency. Maybe that there's just so much

the mind can handle it once and they're lacking information.

There's so many factors that go into doubt.

That's why it's important for us to have mercy on those who

doubt. That's what he says the

instruction is have mercy on them.

It's not fix them. It's not give them the answer

today so they stop doubting. It's have mercy, have mercy.

Here's what Jesus did, Matthew 11 verse 2.

Matthew 11:2

And when John had heard in prison about the works of

Christ, he sent two of his disciples and said to him, are

you the coming one or do we look for another?

John at this point may have been in prison up to two years.

He was preparing the way for the Messiah.

He was ready to be involved in the work and he gets shut into

prison and eventually he starts to doubt, Are you the coming

one? And Jesus answered and said to

them, Go and tell John the things which you hear and see.

The blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed and the

deaf hear, the dead are raised up and the poor have the gospel

preached to them. And blessed is he who is not

offended because of me. Jesus sends a message to him.

Now rebuke. Not a condemnation, not a

frustration which just says take some information back to him.

Maybe it's just he needs some more information to help support

his faith. Give him this news.

That's how Jesus responded, with mercy and with information to

support him. How many of these things do you

think John was facing at the time?

How about the time factor of faith?

How about how much time it took John to be in prison and and sit

with his own thoughts in a cold prison cell day after day?

The time that acquired to that his faith was enduring.

What about the suffering he was experienced?

What about the confusion of what's going on?

The mind starts to play tricks when you're going through

suffering. What about the disillusionment

that he was facing? John had a lot going on that was

causing his doubt. We need to be careful with how

we handle those who doubt because they might think things

like this. If I don't have mercy on them,

maybe they're going to think. Rethinking things is not OK.

And what we want people to consider all around us is

rethink where you're at. It doesn't mean that you like

doubtfully question everything, but it's it's OK to rethink, to

go back and study through. Is this what I believe?

Is this right? OK, cool.

I believe that it's great. Scripture says that.

And we encourage rethinking in a positive, healthy way.

And if we tell people you're doubting that's not OK, that's

not going to help them. We might make them feel that

there's no compassion for me. I don't know about you, but the

times that that I have felt the most kind of concerned in my

life or the most alone was when I thought I had a a doubt that

was going to make other people think, oh, he's not solid or

he's he's unsteady or it wasn't going to be handled well.

Those are the times that I felt my weakest.

And it wasn't anybody's fault necessarily.

Nobody did that. But those fears are real in

people who are having doubts or working through something new,

and they may feel an overwhelming pressure.

If we don't have mercy on them, the pressure can cause them to

break doubt. One person described it as like

a foot that is poised. When you're doubt, it's like

your feet are ready to go somewhere.

If you're in a crouched possession ready to move, you're

either going to move here or you're going to move there.

And doubt can be a place where you launch into your future in a

positive way spiritually, or doubt can be a position in which

you launch into the opposite direction and say, this is not

good. I I need to get away from here.

We need to be careful how doubt is handled because it can propel

people in a positive way that their previous plateau did not

allow. Change is coming.

Where is the change going to take them?

Here's how Jesus, the second example handled this in Matthew

Matthew 14:25

14 verse 25. Now in the 4th watch of the

night, late into the night Jesus went to them walking on the sea.

And when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were

troubled, saying It is a ghost. And they cried out for fear.

But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, Be of good cheer,

it is, I do not be afraid. And Peter answered him and said,

Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.

So he said, come. And when Peter had come down out

of the boat, he walked on the water to go to Jesus.

But when he saw the wind was boisterous, he was afraid and

began to sink. He cried out, saying, Lord, save

me. And immediately Jesus stretched

out his hand and caught him and said to him, Oh, you have a

little faith. Why did you doubt?

And when they got into the boat, the wind ceased.

I'm confident that God orchestrated this situation.

And this, I believe, is a great attempt to strengthen his faith

and their faith from the doubt that might have been existing,

that they didn't even realize. And so Jesus walked on water,

calmed a storm, and rescued a drowning man to address and

alleviate doubt, doubt from Peter's end and doubt from the

people around him. It takes mercy, it takes time.

May we learn mercy too, the second group of people.

And we're going to move through these other ones pretty quickly

because it's not a lot said about it.

And I don't want to overstate. He says save others by snatching

them out of the fire. I've never had to snatch a

person per SE out of the fire. But typically you get this

reaction when you're around kids who are by the fire.

Like I never had to snatch an adult, but when you were to

snatch a child, it's because they don't realize what they're

doing and you need to catch them quick.

Your reaction, you're reacting to what the situation they're

in. It's not it's not a it's not a

I'll intent thing. It's you're snatching for safety

and sometimes people are in the position they just need somebody

to catch them and show them, hey, watch out, you didn't know

this maybe before, but there's a fire in your way.

You were going toward that. Sometimes that's the recipe.

Maybe that's the First Corinthians scandal where they

needed to be snapped up real quick.

Maybe think about who would benefit from this.

Don't just handle anybody with this approach because it might

not work for somebody who's in a different position.

But maybe think about who is this person I'm about to snatch

out of the fire? Is it?

Will they benefit from that? This isn't the recipe for

everyone, but there are people who need to be snatched out of

the fire to save them from what they don't even see coming to

others. Show mercy with fear.

Thinking merciful things is not always enough.

I don't know about you, but I can have sometimes in my mind

like I'm trying to have a disposition towards someone, I'm

trying to think about them in a positive way that show that has

like merciful, but it's not always enough just to have that

in your head. He says show them mercy somehow.

Approach them with the right guidance from God and words.

Pray and ask guidance from other people for wisdom to use words

that will show them mercy somehow, not always show them

the wrong, show their mercy. I think we're good at showing

people they're wrong. I think it's really hard to show

people mercy actively because it's like, well, what do you

say? There's no issue to address when

you're trying to show mercy, but it's a disposition and it takes

guidance and wisdom from God himself, I believe, to use the

right approach to somehow get mercy to come out.

And that's, that's general, I don't know.

I don't have a clear situation to give you, but may I remember

to act intentionally and show mercy beyond just having a

thought in my head? How do we do this with anger

toward them because of their sin?

No, he says with fear. That word is translated terror.

Are we doing it angry at them, or are we doing it that we are

afraid for them? That we are concerned about them

in a way that is has nothing to do with anger or us being right

and then being wrong? We need terror for them, not

anger out of them. And we are to hate even the

garments stained by the flesh. I like how he addresses this

like it's something that they can take off.

When people feel stuck in sin, that's the last thing they feel

is like they have a way out. They feel like it defines them.

They feel like it's part of them.

But it can be taken off. It can be laid down and walked

away from and wait, may we talk to them in a way that shows them

the way out? Take that garment off, friend.

You have value. You don't need to be defined by

your sin anymore. You don't need to be defined by

that relationship you're in, by the habits you've been doing for

the last six years in a row. Now.

That doesn't have to be who you are anymore.

And the devil wants to accuse you.

He's called the accuser of the brethren.

You can take that off. That doesn't need to be you.

You are a person created in the image of God, and you were just

being covered by a garment of sinfulness that can be taken off

today, stained by the flesh and his closing statements.

Now to him again, every time we go back to the source of all

this strength. 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.

He is the one who gets the glory for this.

He said keep yourself. Now he's saying now he's keeping

you. Who's doing the keeping?

It's both. We keep ourselves the love of

God. He has a keeping power.

They work together. It doesn't have to be 1 or the

other. It's both to Him who is able to

keep you from stumbling and to present you faultless before the

presence of His glory with exceeding joy.

I love this image. Jesus is able to and wants to

present you to the Father with exceeding joy.

He is so excited. Jesus is so excited to bring you

to the Father, to present you to him, and he's going to be so

happy about it. He wants to be so excited to

show you to the Father. It's like showing people my new

baby. I'm so excited to see this

perfect, faultless new baby. Jesus is able to present you

perfect and flawless, brand new, and He's so excited to do it.

That's who we're addressing to Him who's able to do that?

To God our Savior, who alone is wise, be glory and majesty,

dominion and power, both now and forever.

Amen. We don't close a thought without

bringing it back to where all the glory belongs.

There are people who's caused problems.

They're nothing new. We need to be doing the

instruction for ourselves and for other people around us.

But it all goes back to Him at the end of every thought, at the

end of every work, at the end of every misery, every suffering,

at the end of every concern over people who are wrong.

The thought always goes back to bring glory to God, majesty and

glory, dominion and power that He would have, dominion that He

would have control in our lives both now and forever.

Amen. And so Jude closes his letter.

And if you have not started this walk today to become a pure and

faultless child of God that He is ready to present to the

Father, like if you today are not ready to be presented to the

Father, you can today, if you haven't started that walk, you

have to 1st hear the Word and you've heard the word in song

and in prayer that you need to come in faith that comes by

hearing the word of God that produces belief that Jesus

Christ is the Son of God. There's no salvation any other.

And you can repent of your past life, as we've talked about

here, making change that will be godly, that will show true

faith. You can make a change and repent

and confess that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, the source of

our life. You can do that today.

And you can be baptized for the remission of your sins according

to Acts 238, be added to the Kingdom, and to have your sins

washed away. You can do that today.

But if you've already done that and you feel a slip, you feel

like you maybe need to come back to God, we can take care of

that. If you need the prayers of the

brethren, maybe for some of the things we've even talked about

today, we're happy to pray with you and for you while we stand

and see.