20111019:Jude 1-6 "Called+ Loved + Kept" by God "Mercy x Peace x Love"

Jude 1

¹Jude, the servant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, to them that are sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ, and called:

²Mercy unto you, and peace, and love, be multiplied.

³Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints.

⁴For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.

⁵I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not.

⁶And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day.

Reflections

In the NIV version, Jude writes to us : to those who have been called, who are loved by God the Father and kept by Jesus Christ" in KJV, "called" was sanctified, "loved" was preserved and "called" was kept. Thank YHWH for this indeed!

This is the days of the increasing immorality and godlessness that we are seeing. False teachers arising. Truth of God is attacked. So after being saved, what next? Well Jude exhorts us to CONTEND for the faith. Yes ERNESTLY CONTEND! Not passive but active - the more we see the surrounding changes around us.

We have guardian angels watching over us. But there is also a group of fallen angels (disobedient) which did not keep their positions of authority but abandoned their own home which the Lord had kept in darkness. The spiritual battle is REAL.

Rom 5:20

"But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound"

Amen! So we take heart. Mercy, Peace and Love will be multiplied instead. These 3 will be ours in abundance as we contend for the faith that has been entrusted to us.

Our Father has sanctified us;

His Son Jesus has preserved us; And

may His Holy Spirit keep us.