Jude's Warnings - Jude 5 - 7

Today's verses from Jude (verse 5 to 7) are hard to get our heads round. To understand them it is best to think in terms of warnings. In life we have warning or danger signs, in sport we have the referee's red or yellow cards - all telling us to be careful and consider our ways.

Jude is also wanting to say 'watch out'. For last time we heard how people were now among their number who didn't understand the way of grace, and instead were pursuing a path of licence that fundamentally denies Jesus as Lord. These people might look like they are saying the right things, but actually no longer have Jesus as number 1 in their lives.

So Jude chooses 3 examples from Jewish history and writings, and holds them up to say 'Look at these - let these be examples and warnings to us'. They are all examples that say "Don't abandon the call that God has put on our lives - instead live carefully by His grace".

The first example is the Israelites - miraculously led out of slavery to be His people, but they gave up on their calling, turned to other gods, and didn't press into all that God was calling them into. Having abandoned their call God couldn't let them continue - so they ended up wandering the desert until a generation had died off.

The second example has Jude drawing on Jewish thought and writings that are not in our Bible. That makes it tricky for us to understand, but the basic point is that angels were given specific roles by God, but they deserted them for their own rebellious thing. It is not hard to see how God would not be happy with that. However little we know about angels, we know that God cannot allow such direct rebellion.

The third example is the twin towns of Sodom and Gemorrah - with Jude referring to the Genesis story (see Genesis 18 & 19). Here whole towns had abandoned even basic standards of behaving - the Genesis story talks of the 'outcry' coming up against these towns. So the story has God destroying them - wiping them out so they are no more. We should not simply translate that into thinking that God is looking at towns today, with finger poised on the 'smite' button. Instead see that Jude uses the story as a pointer to God eventually wrapping up the world at the end of time: God's desire is surely for every place (town and city) to be living in His grace, but places that have abandoned that call and descended to chaos cannot be allowed to continue for ever.

So in summary Jude's 3 examples of warning show:

1. The called people of God abandoning their call
2. Angels giving up their God-assigned posts
3. Ancient towns that have wholly abandoned even the basic standards

Called people / angels / the wider world ... in each case it is not simply people not meeting a certain standard, but abandoning whatever God had put in them. God does not let that continue!

What does this mean for us today? It shows us that where there is stuff or people that actually leads away from Christ and His call, we need to take heed of the stories of the past. Just as God didn't let past examples of abandonment continue, we should not assume we can go that way with impunity either. Instead we want to ensure we remain living carefully in the grace of God.

That is one reason why we return to communion over and over. For one it gives that personal reset opportunity (God honours genuine repentance), and it rehearses what God has done in Christ. That is the basis of our call, and the basis in which we want to remain.