Saturday 17 Dec 2022

December 17: Jude 1:3-4

Key Verse: Jude 1:4
For certain individuals whose condemnation was written about long ago have secretly slipped in among you. They are ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into a licence for immorality and deny Jesus Christ our only Sovereign and Lord.

Devotion:
If this epistle was written by Jude the brother of James, and hence Jesus, the words hold so much more meaning than if they were not. Not because it would make him ‘famous’ but because of the inside knowledge he would have had as the brother of James and Jesus! He would have been able to hear all about what was going on through direct news through the family!

The epistle warns of the ungodly people who are going to infiltrate the church, at this stage the early Christian church! He writes these words warning of ungodly people who will take up positions of power and trust and damage things from the inside. This same warning Jesus gave to the disciples by telling them of the effect a little yeast would have in the bread mixture; it would spread throughout the dough and cause the whole mixture to be different.

The Jews mostly ate unleavened bread, so they knew the affect a little yeast would make on the dough mixture. This is the effect a single ungodly person can have on a church or congregation. I can remember doing into a church in Zimbabwe and being horrified by one or two people who were doing things which did not make sense to me; to me they were destroying the church from the inside…

These are the type of people Jude is warning about, one or two who will change the way the church exists, making it something the original designer did not intend it to be.

Points to Ponder:
Do you follow God’s rules?

Will you try to keep following God’s instructions?