As we consider the sea of apostasy around us and the effectiveness of faith fakers activity in today's church, it seems as though the church has little hope in stemming the tide. But according to the book of Jude, not only can we stem the tide, we can take positive action to deal directly with these faith fakers-these imposters.
READ 17-23
What can we do about faith fakers? Note that Jude begins verse 17 with the word but. This word signals a reversal. The message is that the church can have an impact on apostasy. It can deal effectively with imposters. Jude goes on to give us three important keys to survival in these days of apostasy. He calls on all true believers to be educated, insulated, and separated.
Compassion is the believer's trademark in dealing with imposters. Jude admonishes us, as followers of Jesus Christ to have compassion for imposters as we defend our faith. So, what should our response be to the apostasy of our day?
How must we deal with apostasy and the work of imposters?
Be Educated
First, we need to be educated as to who the apostate is, what he does, and why he does it. We need to know who they are. We need to know what they do. And we need to know why they do it.
Initially, we need to be educated as to who apostates are. Jude tells us they are "mockers, following after their own ungodly lusts" (v. 18). Today, some people are saying, "Well, perhaps the Bible is not the inerrant, trustworthy, and infallible revelation of God after all." Many discredit it and claim that it is not true. Others say that it contains the Word of God but that it is not really the Word of God. The irony is that every person who denies the inerrancy of Scripture is proving, in a sense, its claim to inerrancy. We can expect, in the last days, attacks on the Bible. And let me say today, that I never had a professor at seminary that ever took that position. Every single professor I had took what I consider to be the highest view of Scripture possible. Some of what we are hearing today is just not true, when it comes to liberalism in our seminaries.
This word mocker is an interesting word in the Greek language. It means to "act in a childish fashion, to be childish, to play." There is a world of difference in being childish and childlike. Our Lord said that if anyone would come after Him, he must come as a little child. The Lord honors childlikeness but abhors childlishness.
In dealing with apostasy in a sympathetic sense, we must be educated as to who the apostate really is. He is childish in his behavior because he is a "mocker."
Apostates mock at the gospel. They mock the word of God. This is certainly not novel. We should not be surprised if we are mocked, for our Lord was mocked.
He was physically brutalized but then He was stripped naked, then clothed with a scarlet robe, had a crown of thorns pressed upon His brow, and then they bowed before Him and mocked Him.
Jesus said earlier that the slave cannot expect any more than the master. A mocker is one who treats the Word either the living Word or the written Word)
in open defiance! Those who mock Scripture today are no different from those who mocked the living Word Himself.
But let me say here that I am not just talking about those who claim Scripture is untrue. I am talking about those who turn their back on Scripture and use their circumstances as an opportunity for unfaithfulness. The truth of the matter is, they are not being unfaithful, because they never truly had a relationship with the Lord to begin with. They hold their circumstances up and give them higher authority than the Word of God. They use some upset in the church, they use the other hypocrites in the church, they use their family as excuses for unfaithfulness. People when we hold our circumstances higher than we do the Word of God, we are guilty of several sins. We make our circumstances our God. We deny the authority of Scripture over our lives. That is the next subject that I would like for us to consider on these Wednesday nights.
A final insight into the character of the mocker. He follows his own ungodly lusts (vs. 18). He is a slave to sin and to self, which explains why he denies the truth. He does not want a God who tells him how to live. Peter talked about mockers in the last days when he said, "Know this first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts...." (2 Peter 3:3).
We also need to be educated as to what the apostate does. If by now, you are not able to distinguish an apostate believer from an authentic believer, we have one more description. They are sensual or worldly people who cause divisions (see v. 19). They operate simply by how they feel. They are not spiritual. One of the tragedies of today's superficial Christians is that many cannot discern between spiritual ministries and superficial ministries.
Spiritual ministries edify; while superficial or sensual ministries entertain.
Synthetic saints can only function in the feel good realm. And the problem is they believe that the good in their lives and the absence of calamity in their lives is a testimony to their faith. The problem with that kind of faith is when the person is stricken with some terminal disease, or when death comes to their loved ones, or when their family falls apart. They are devastated and think that there is some lack in their belief system. These people are always trying to delve in the supernatural. And I do not want to deny the supernatural, but to base my faithfulness on whether or not I am being blessed in some supernatural way, and then to become unfaithful because my circumstances did not turn out to my satisfaction is the height folly.
Imposters also cause division.
They create disturbances in the fellowship of the church. They want their way.
They disrupt meetings and storm out if they don't get their way. They begin telephone campaigns. I have seen churches destroyed because of imposters in the church who claim to be followers of Jesus, but who create dissension and division in the church.
Jude tells us we need to be educated as to why apostates do what they do.
Verse 19 informs us that they do not have the Spirit. That is, they simply do not have the Holy Spirit resident within them. That explains why they can be immoral in body, insubordinate in soul, and irreverent in spirit. It is no wonder that they are sensual or that they cause division. They walk according to their own ungodly lusts.
Since God is not resident in the apostate's life, nothing about this imposter is spiritual. It soon becomes blatantly obvious that no matter how much the apostate professes with his lips, he is not an authentic believer. Paul emphasizes this point. "If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Jesus" (Rom. 8:9).
The residence of God is what makes the difference between the synthetic and the sincere saint. How thankful we should be as true believers that "God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts" (Gal. 4:6). No wonder Paul said, "Christ in you, the hope glory" (Col. 1:27).
Be Insulated
It is not enough simply to be educated; we must also safeguard ourselves by insulation. What is our insulation in days of apostasy? Jude says, "Keep yourselves in the love of God" (v. 21). Our Lord referred to this the evening before the crucifixion when He admonished us saying, "... abide in My love" (John 15:9). We are to keep ourselves in the love of God, which is our protection against the activities of imposters. Note that Jude did not say,
"Keep on loving God." It is not our love for Him but His love for us that is at issue here.
As true believers we can know that love. Paul revealed in Ephesians that he wanted us to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge and gave us four ways by which to do so. He referred to the "width and length and depth and height of God's love." (3:18). The breadth of His love is seen in the fact that "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him shall have everlasting life" (John 3:16).
God loves everyone.
The length of His love is seen in the fact that none of us can sin ourselves out of the love of God; He just keeps on loving us. The depth of His love is seen in the fact that He came down, past solar systems and constellations to become helpless as a tiny seed planted in the virgin's womb. He then demonstrated His own love toward that "while we were yet sinners, Christ died us." The height of His love is seen in the fact that He has raised us to set in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus. It is in this love that we are to "keep ourselves."
Note that Jude's admonition is to "keep ourselves." That places the burden on us. While it is true that He "keeps us from stumbling" on the divine side, there is also the human side. We are to keep ourselves in His love.
The best illustration of this is found in Luke 15 in the well-known story of the Prodigal Son. The point of the story is simple. When the son left home it did not mean that his father stopped loving him. But, it did mean he had gotten himself outside of the environment of that love. All the while the son was away, the father's love for him never changed! What had changed was that the boy had removed himself from the place of blessing and the benefit of the father's love.
That is the same way it is with us. We can know nothing of His love when we are in the "far country."
Many of us have removed ourselves from the place of blessing and love and are no longer "abiding in the love of God." When the prodigal returned home he once again experienced the father's love. The same can be true for us. To "keep ourselves in the love of God" is to stay in His will and be what He wants us to be and where He wants us to be.
The secret of staying in His love is wrapped up in three important words in Jude 20-21: building, praying, and anticipating or looking or as it is expressed here, waiting anxiously. These words are participles describing how we are to keep ourselves in the love of God.
First, is an inward look of edification: "building yourselves up on your most holy faith." Second, is an upward look of supplication: "praying in the Holy Spirit." Third, is the forward look of anticipation: "waiting anxiously for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life." The way to keep ourselves in the Father's love is to build ourselves in the Word of God, pray in the Holy Spirit, and keep on looking for Jesus!
We are to stay insulated by keeping ourselves in the love of Christ and the first step in doing that is to build our faith upon the Word of God. The more we build ourselves up, the better insulated we will be from the effects of apostasy. Scripture is powerful. In his letter to a young preacher boy, the apostle Paul said, "All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; that he man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work" (2 Timothy 3:16-17).
We also learn from Jude that we are to be "praying in the Holy Spirit." There are too many people today who reading books about the Bible and reading books about prayer but they never open God's Word and read for themselves and they never simply sit down and spend good quality time with God in prayer. We sing about "Sweet Hour of Prayer", but I doubt many of us spend five minutes a day,
and that includes the blessing for the food. The only way that we are ever going to be built up in Him is to spend time reading and studying our Bible, as Paul put it to the Ephesians, we are to put on the full armor of God. And we must devote ourselves to prayer.
To be insulated by the love of God in these days of apostasy, it is not enough to look back; we must also look forward. As believers, we have something to look forward to. Jude alludes to the Second Coming of Christ here because apostasy is one of the major signs of the last days which signal the Lord's return from glory.
Eager anticipation of the return of our Lord will keep us insulated in the love of God in the days of apostasy.
In his letter to Titus, Paul referred to this great event: "Looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus" (2:13). But today, few who profess Jesus Christ seem to be looking for Him. In fact, some give the impression that the mention of the Second Coming is a bit old-fashioned.
Jude reveals that this is one reason some are not keeping themselves in the love of God. They have no forward look of anticipation. As believers look for our Lord, it makes a difference in the way they live. When they are sincerely looking for Christ to return at any time, it moves them to live a godly life.
There are a lot of believers that never get past the cross in the Christian experience. It is important to look back in appreciation, but it is also important to look forward in anticipation. The way to keep insulated is to keep our eyes on Jesus who said, "If I go...I will come again and receive you to myself" (John 14:3).
These three words ... building, praying, and looking ... are present-tense participles. That simply means they should continually characterize our behavior.
Be Separated
It is not enough to be educated or insulated; we must also be separated.
We are not speaking here of a hard, cold separation, but of a warm living sacrifice consumed with love for the lost. Paul put it this way, "I urge you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but by transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect" (Romans 12:1-2). To that we can add Jude's words, "And have mercy on some, who are doubting; save others, snatching them out of the fire; and on some have mercy with fear, hating even the garment polluted by the flesh" (Jude 22-23).
The church today is too often silent with its witness. What should be our response to those who are influenced by the spirit of apostasy? We should respond to them sympathetically, for one of the most hypocritical things in the world is orthodoxy without compassion. A lot of people who speak the truth today do not do it in love. Our admonition from Paul through the Ephesian epistle is to "speak the truth in love." Thus, Jude turns now to reveal to us that we are to be soul winners. We are to have compassion. And, the best way to do this is to be living a separated life that is a warm living sacrifice. We must be educated, insulated and separated.
Solomon said, "He that winneth souls is wise." I'm so glad someone cared enough about me to share Jesus Christ with me. I never heard anyone saved without a verbal witness. Someone must have the compassion to go and tell others. We need to stop living with the cop-out of "my life is my witness." Yes, it most certainly is, but that does not excuse any one of us from the task of telling others with the witness of our mouths.
Somewhere there are people to be reached for Christ that no one else can reach in the same as you can.
Perhaps, some are sincere doubters who should be approached with compassion. Perhaps some are living in open rebellion in sin, on the very edge of hell and should be dealt with courage and urgency. Or perhaps, they are wallowing in the filth of sin and should be approached with caution. May God grant that, as authentic believers, we be educated, insulated, and separated so we might deal with the lost in a sympathetic sense. Orthodoxy without compassion is sheer hypocrisy.
The story is told of a lady who left her small boy asleep in the backseat of her car while she made a quick stop at a local store. Upon returning, she found the car gone. Within an hour dozens of people were involved in the search for her boy. A short time later the car was found, but without the boy. As darkness approached and panic began to set in, one of the search volunteers, a veteran of the Vietnam War, thought to himself, Perhaps, this is not a kidnapping at all, but someone who simply stole a car, unaware of the child until he had driven away. The Vietnam vet took a flashlight and walked up a dirt road not far from where the car had been found. He spotted an abandoned house with its windows boarded up. The swing on the porch was stacked with what looked to be newspapers and a silhouette of someone lying in the swing. He shined the flashlight toward the swing and called out, "Billy!" The reply was immediate, "Is that you Daddy?"
The vet replied, "No, Billy, I am not your daddy, but I'm here to take you to your daddy!"
Folks, that illustrates the job of the church. We are to rescue the perishing. It was for that cause that our Lord Jesus Christ came into this world, and it is for that cause that the church exists.
As we safeguard against faith fakers in the church we must purpose to be educated, insulated, and separated. But let us not forget that we need to be consistent with our calling; and that is to win the lost.
