This evening, seat to number 306, let's tell Jesus.
Hymn number 356.
♪ Tell Jesus ♪
♪ Jesus can help ♪
♪ Can help ♪
This evening, if you'd bow your heads with me.
Heavenly Father, we thank you for bringing us all safe
to service this evening.
Lord, I just pray that in this time of uncertainty
with the storms and things that have rolled through,
that you would just keep all those that are here safe
as we go home our separate ways.
And those that were not able to make it,
I pray that you'd also have your hand of protection on them
for families that may have been affected by this
and really just for our city.
Lord, that people would be safe
and that it may even humble those
to be receptive to the gospel
by going through a trial or tribulation
that these storms have brought.
Lord, I just want to pray that you'd be with us.
Keep us safe for the service this evening.
Open our ears to the message.
And these things we pray in Jesus' name, amen.
All right, for our next hymn, turn if you would to 174.
My Jesus, I love thee, number 174, 174.
My Jesus, I love thee.
We'll sing there starting on the first.
I--
[MUSIC PLAYING]
See what my tornado shelter looked like this evening.
So that will have our memory verse of the week.
Hebrews chapter 6, verse 3.
One of the two prizes made and delivered at my house.
The other is still on its way.
But I really encourage everyone to work on this.
I think you will enjoy, prize if you complete it.
On the inside is our service times listed.
Sunday morning at 10.30 a.m.
Sunday evening at 4.30 p.m.
And our Wednesday evening Bible study
through first Samuel at seven o'clock m.
All of our soul winning times are listed there.
If you have any salvations,
please let the leader of that time know.
Nursing home ministry schedules listed there as well.
If you participate in that ministry.
Our year to date statistics are listed
on the bottom left there.
Doing really well, keep up the great work with soul winning.
On the right, we have a list of our expecting ladies.
Please be in prayer for the Reed family
for Ms. Whitney's pregnancy.
Also upcoming events.
This upcoming weekend
is the Faith Forward Baptist Church Missions Conference.
November 24th is the transition from Steadfast
to Anchor Baptist Church.
Definitely looking forward to that.
December 20th is the ladies Christmas party
that's gonna be likely here at the church.
And there'll be some more information
regarding that party soon.
But this is just in the bulletin,
that way men can plan to stay home with their kiddos
and watch them for that evening
so ladies can have a good time.
December 21st, we're gonna have a Christmas
soul-winning push.
That's gonna be our regular soul-winning rally
that we have every Saturday,
where we get together, we sing a hymn,
we have a short soul-winning challenge.
We go out and preach the gospel,
but we're gonna cater some coffee and some breakfast,
and hopefully we can all go reach people
with the gospel on that day,
while people are thinking about Christ.
We do have our online giving set up.
If you'd like to do that,
you can scan that QR code there on the bulletin.
Also, we're just gonna keep this in the bulletin for a week,
just so everyone is reminded of the church rules.
No running for anyone, of course.
No children congregating by the front door.
Please make sure that you're,
you could feel free to use any of them on the baby rooms,
but they should be a temporary thing
just to correct your children,
feed your children, or calm your children.
But again, we don't want it to be a habit
where you just sit there all service.
And we want to make sure kids are being trained
to be in church.
Musical instruments and equipment are off limits
unless you are a musician practicing for a church service.
No children allowed on stage.
And I do want the safety team slash ushers
enforcing these rules and making sure
that we're correcting people that are breaking them,
just so we could have a safe environment
where we could all worship God
and not have to worry about pregnant women getting tripped
or old people getting tripped or anything like that.
I want to make sure it's a safe environment.
We do have the prayer list on the back.
Please be in prayer for all of our church members' needs.
And as always, if you have a prayer request,
email the church and I would gladly add that for you.
That's gonna be it for announcements this evening.
Let's go ahead and go to our third song.
For our third hymn this evening,
turn, if you would, to 119, hymn number 119.
And I think everybody can sing this hymn and mean it.
If you've just kind of faked it for the first two,
here's a chance 'til the storm passes by,
hymn number 119 to actually mean it
when you're singing out to the Lord, 119.
We'll sing there starting on the first.
♪ In the dark of the midnight ♪
♪ Have I thought in my faith ♪
♪ So as though I can play the thunder ♪
♪ Precious Lord, hear my cry ♪
♪ Stay strong, pass it by ♪
♪ 'Til the storm is over ♪
♪ 'Til the thunder, the horn ♪
♪ 'Til the clouds roll forever ♪
♪ From the sky, stay strong and try ♪
♪ There's no sorrow, there's no hope ♪
♪ Somewhere ♪
- Plates are being passed, if you would,
to the book of Jude.
Turn, if you would, to Jude.
- Good evening.
The book of Jude, the Bible reads,
"Jude, 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,
"mercy unto you and peace and love be multiplied.
"Beloved, 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 you should earnestly contend for the faith
"which was once delivered unto the saints.
"For 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.
"I will therefore put you in remembrance,
"though you once knew this,
"how that the Lord, having saved the people
"out of the land of Egypt afterward,
"destroyed them that believed not,
"and 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.
"Even as Sodom and Gomorrah
"and the cities about them in like manner,
"giving themselves over to fornication
"and going after strange flesh,
"are set forth, for example,
"suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.
"Likewise also, these filthy dreamers defile the flesh,
"despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities.
"Yet Michael the archangel,
"when contending with the devil,
"he disputed about the body of Moses,
"dars not bring against him a railing accusation,
"but said, 'The Lord rebuke thee.'
"But these speak evil of those things which they know not,
"but what they know naturally as brute beasts,
"and those things they corrupt themselves, woe unto them,
"for they have gone in the way of Cain,
"and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward,
"and perished in the gainsaying of Kor.
"These are spots in your feast of charity,
"when they feast with you, feeding themselves without fear,
"clouds they are without water, carried about of winds,
"trees whose fruit withereth without fruit,
"twice dead, plucked up by the roots,
"raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame,
"wandering stars, to whom is reserved
"the blackness of darkness forever.
"And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam,
"prophesied of these, saying,
"Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints,
"to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all
"that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds,
"which they have ungodly committed,
"and all their hard speeches,
"which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.
"These are murmurs, complainers,
"walking after their own lusts,
"and their mouth speaketh great swelling words,
"having men's person and admiration because of advantage.
"But, beloved, remember you the words
"which were spoken before of the apostles
"of our Lord Jesus Christ,
"how that they told you there should be mockers
"in the last time who should walk
"after their own ungodly lusts.
"These be they who separate themselves,
"sensual, having not the Spirit.
"But ye, beloved, building up yourselves
"on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost,
"keep yourselves in the love of God,
"looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ
"unto eternal life, and some having compassion,
"making a difference, and others saved with fear,
"pulling them out of the fire,
"hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.
"Now it's a hand that is able to keep you from falling
"and to present you faultless
"before the presence of His glory,
"with exceeding joy.
"To the only wise God, our Savior,
"be glory and majesty, dominion and power,
"both now and forever, amen."
Fire heads forward, prayer, Father in heaven.
- We thank you for this day, we thank you for our station.
We just have to thank everybody in here,
everybody who's at the walls,
and we just have to do this,
get together all together in the whole spirit,
and help us to be up high by the name
of Jesus and the prayer, amen.
- Amen, all right, well the sermon title tonight
is Wolves Within, Wolves Within.
We're in the Epistle of Jude,
and I have a personal goal to preach through
every chapter of the Bible to this church,
and we've been doing First Samuel on Wednesdays,
but tonight we're both gonna start and finish
a sermon series through a book of the Bible tonight
because there's only one chapter in this epistle,
but really that's what this epistle is about.
It's about Jude warning the flock about infiltrators,
about wolves within, and let's go get,
go ahead and get started here in verse number one.
The Bible says, "Jude, 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."
Now, go to Matthew 13.
We're gonna find out who this author is, Jude,
because I believe that this person is referred to
by a couple different names in the New Testament.
And really who I believe this is
is the half-brother of the Lord Jesus Christ.
We know, of course, that Jesus was born of a virgin,
so all of his siblings were simply half-siblings.
And look down at, yeah, Matthew 13, verse 55.
The Bible says, "Is not this the carpenter's son?
Is not his mother, called Mary, and his brethren,
James and Joses and Simon and Judas."
So here, the brethren of Jesus Christ
are recognized as being James, Joses, Simon, and Judas.
And of course, Jude is a variation of that name, Judas.
But you could see why, after Judas Iscariot,
he would want to make his epistle known as Jude,
and not as Judas.
But he says, "Jude, the servant of Jesus Christ,
and brother of James."
So we find out that two of Jesus's half-siblings
was James and Judas.
Look at Mark chapter number six,
and we'll see this again in Mark chapter number six.
Mark chapter six, look at verse number three.
Again, this is brought up, it says,
"Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary,
the brother of James and Joseph,
and of Judah and Simon?"
So one thing you have to understand about the Bible
is that oftentimes names have a bunch of differentiations
and a bunch of variations in the Bible,
especially between Old Testament and New Testament.
But even within the New Testament itself,
sometimes there's examples of this,
and one of those is Jude.
He's known as Judas, he's known as Judah,
and he's known as Jude.
Now, there's some people who would just say
that Jude is not the half-brother of Jesus Christ,
that it's just a random person,
that the Bible doesn't talk much about.
You know, you can't really prove that 100%,
but I do believe that this is the half-brother of Jesus.
Go back to Jude.
And you know, one of the things that's interesting
about that is that if that is the case,
if this is the half-brother of Jude,
this would immediately just debunk the Catholic idea
that Mary was a perpetual virgin,
because the Catholics believe they still refer to her
right now as the Virgin Mary,
like that is still her title now in heaven,
that she is still the Virgin Mary.
But when I'm out soul winning,
I always bring up the fact that Jesus was born of a virgin.
I don't like to say, I don't like to say the Virgin Mary,
because it's kind of like giving her some sort of like title,
like the Virgin Mary.
But really the truth is she was a virgin
when Jesus Christ was born.
She was a virgin that was, you know,
come upon by the Holy Ghost,
and was basically Jesus Christ was born of the Holy Ghost.
And so of course that's a miracle,
and that's why Jesus Christ was both 100% man
and 100% God is because his mother was a virgin.
But she is not the virgin.
She is not still a virgin right now
because Joseph and Simon and Jane,
or I'm sorry, Joseph and James and Judah
are brothers of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Look at verse number two, it says,
"Mercy unto you and peace and love be multiplied."
And then it says in verse three,
"Beloved, 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 you should earnestly contend
for the faith, which was once delivered unto the saints."
So verse three, we kind of get the setup
for the rest of his epistle and we get the reason
why he's going to be writing the things that he writes.
He says, "I gave all diligence to write unto you
of the common salvation."
So when Jude sat down to write,
he wanted to talk about salvation.
He wanted to talk about the doctrine of going to heaven
and I like how he calls it the common salvation, right?
Because there's only one way to heaven
and that's faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
There's not different ways of being saved.
You know, there's no such thing as in the Old Testament,
we were saved by works, now we're saved by faith
and in the tribulation period, we'll be saved by works again.
Nope, there's just one common salvation
that man has always been saved by and that's faith
in the Lord Jesus Christ.
But he says when he wanted to do that,
it was needful that he talked about something else.
It was needful that he changed the subject
and that he actually needs to spend his time
exhorting the saints that they would earnestly contend
for the faith.
And you know, one thing we could learn
just right off the bat from that is that of course,
salvation is a very important doctrine, right?
And it's a doctrine that we should talk about
that I wanna talk about.
And most of the time when we're talking about it
is out soul winning, right?
But every once in a while,
even if we're wanting to talk about salvation,
sometimes we gotta change things up
and talk about something other than salvation.
Now there's a lot of churches
where they base their entire preaching ministry
all around the doctrine of salvation.
Who's ever been in a church like this?
Where most of the services are about salvation.
Yeah, well here's the thing about that.
That's not really super profitable
to a bunch of people that are already saved, right?
I mean, everybody's already saved for the most part.
They already know that salvation's by faith alone.
They're eternally secure.
It's not like you could lose your salvation
or anything like that.
So it'd be kind of a waste of time
to spend every service talking about salvation, right?
What we need to do today is earnestly plead with people
to contend for the faith.
Because I don't know if you've noticed,
there's a lot of things that us as Christians,
that we are in a fight over right now.
You know, one of those things recently
has been the issue of the King James Bible.
You got this guy named Mark Ward,
who he claims to have grown up
in an independent fundamental Baptist upbringing.
He claims to have been King James only most of his life,
even when he went through Bible college.
And now he's basically dedicating his life
to attacking King James onlyism,
to attacking the word of God.
And you know, he's a lot more subtle even
than a lot of these guys like James White.
Like James White will just tell you like,
you know, he's against the King James Bible.
He's like fighting against it.
But this guy, he comes to people in his debates
and he comes to people telling him
how much he loves the King James.
And he's like, we should still keep the King James.
I love the King James.
I treasure it.
It's amazing, but it served its purpose.
And we need to change the institutionalized usage
of the King James Bible.
So he's saying like, hey, keep your King James Bible.
But when it comes to the preaching at church,
when it comes to using it in Bible college,
we gotta update that thing
because he says it's unintelligible.
Weird how we keep having service after service
after service with the King James Bible
and you guys can understand it.
That's pretty weird.
It's pretty weird how my daughters who are five and younger
are learning about the plagues of Egypt.
And she's telling me when I get home from work,
what plagues she learned about today.
It's weird how she could understand
what the Bible's saying at five years old,
but Mark Ward with all his degrees,
with his Bible, the theological seminary degree or whatever,
he's saying it's too unintelligible.
Not only that, he actually went so far as to imply
that it is a sin to give a child a King James Bible.
He's like, well, I'm not saying it's a sin,
but let me quote the King James here,
"To him that knoweth to do good and doeth it not,
to him it is sin."
So just don't do it.
Just don't give a child the King James Bible
because edification requires intelligibility,
which that is true.
But guess what?
People in this room actually know
what the word edification means,
and they know what intelligibility means,
and they know the words of the King James Bible,
and we don't need to update the King James Bible right now.
But you know what?
We need some preaching
that's gonna earnestly contend for that faith.
That's gonna earnestly fight against people
like Mark Ward trying to destroy the King James,
because here's the thing.
What are we gonna replace it with?
What's better than the King James right now?
Because here's the thing.
Let's say theoretically we go on another thousand years,
another 500 years or whatever,
and our use of the English language
is actually unintelligible,
and we actually don't understand this King James Bible,
then sure, you can make an argument
that hey, it's time to update it
because the whole point of having a translation
is understanding the words that you're reading, right?
So I'm not coming here from a position saying
that it's absolutely impossible
that this would ever be the case,
but it's certainly not the case right now.
Because here we are,
we all understand the King James Bible.
My children understand the King James Bible.
So it seems like it's coming from a wicked heart
to try to change that right now
and to say that it's basically a sin
to give a child a King James Bible.
What a wicked thing that is.
You know, there's a lot to earnestly contend for today.
There's a lot of churches today
that are dialing back soul winning
and promoting this idea of lifestyle evangelism, right?
And I've heard this lots in my life.
I know lots of people that believe this where they think,
hey, you don't have to go out
and preach someone the gospel.
You don't have to open your mouth boldly
to make known the mystery of the gospel.
You just simply have to live a really good life
and people will just see
that there's something different about you.
And then they'll just get saved.
I've literally had people tell me this.
Hey, you know, I just go to the grocery store
and I have a really good attitude
and I'm just really radiant
and people will just notice something different about me.
It's like, no, that's not how life works, okay?
What if I told you that there's people
that are really radiant and happy and excited
and they're not saved?
They're called cheerleaders.
I mean, cheerleaders are really excited
and happy about life, aren't they?
Well, I mean, everyone's just walking up to you.
What's different about you?
It's like, this isn't Christianity.
This is not how things work.
But you know, churches today
have just made everything so emotional, right?
Everything so emotional, everything so feminized,
where churches think like we should be walking around
like cheerleaders in life,
and like that's what's gonna draw people to Christ.
No, actually, Jesus said to preach the word.
Jesus said to go into all the world
and preach the gospel to every creature.
You know, I'm gonna listen to Jesus,
not what a lot of these churches are saying.
And of course, another big fight
that we need to fight against today
is the fight against false prophets.
The fight against false teachers.
And that's what Jude is gonna transition
into talking about here.
Look at verse number four.
(coughs)
Verse number four, he says four.
So saying, why are we fighting?
Why are we earnestly contending?
Because there are certain men crept in,
unawares, who are 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.
Go to Galatians chapter number two.
So here we see that one of the attributes
of these ungodly men that deny God,
that turn the grace of God into lasciviousness,
is that they creep in unawares.
And here is the thing you have to realize oftentimes
about wicked people that creep into church,
is that oftentimes you won't know
that they're wicked at first.
You won't necessarily know right off the bat,
hey, this is an infiltrator, this is a Judas.
Oftentimes, they're just completely under the radar.
Why?
Because the Bible says they're crept in unawares.
Here you go Mark Ward,
that means you're unaware of the fact that they're a wolf.
There, it's not that hard to understand
the King James Bible, right?
But you know, that's the whole point.
Oftentimes, I feel like people don't get this,
like a wolf in sheep's clothing
means like they appear like a sheep.
They appear like they're great.
You think like, hey, this is a brother in Christ,
this is a good person,
but eventually things will start to slip, right?
And go to Galatians chapter two, look at verse two,
the Bible says, then 14 years after I went up again
to Jerusalem with Barnabas and took Titus with me also,
and I went up by revelation,
that just means God told him to,
and communicated unto them that gospel
which I preach among the Gentiles,
but privately to them which were of reputation,
lest by any means I should run or had run in vain.
But neither Titus who was with me being a Greek
was compelled to be circumcised,
and that because of false brethren, unawares brought in,
who came in privily to spy out our liberty,
which we have in Christ Jesus,
that they might bring us into bondage,
to whom we gave place by subjection,
no, not for an hour,
that the truth of the gospel might continue with you.
So, at this time there was these false brethren
crept in unawares, and what were they doing
is they were perverting the doctrine of salvation.
They were perverting the gospel,
and throughout the New Testament,
there was a faction of people that were Judaizers
that were kind of fighting against the move
into the New Testament from the law,
and they were trying to constantly bring Christians
back under the law, bring them back into bondage,
trying to get them to do things like circumcision, right?
Which, of course, we know circumcision
is an Old Testament thing that's completely done away
in the New Testament.
The Bible says circumcision avails you nothing, right?
So, there's literally no profit whatsoever
in getting circumcised in the New Testament.
It has nothing to do with salvation.
It was a picture of salvation in the Old Testament,
but here there's people coming in saying like,
yeah, you have to be circumcised.
In the book of Acts, there was people saying like,
unless you get circumcised, you can in no wise be saved.
And Paul's saying, look,
we didn't put up with these people for a single hour, right?
We're not putting up with this false doctrine.
We're not putting up with people that wanna creep in
and change the doctrine of salvation.
Why?
He says that the truth of the gospel
might continue with you.
And look, that is the most important thing.
The most important thing is that this church
continues holding up the gospel of Jesus Christ.
And if the gospel gets corrupted in this church,
you know what?
Then this church is gonna cease to be profitable.
You know, if we stop believing the gospel,
or you know, some new generation comes in here
that believes that you have to repent of your sins
to be saved,
or that you have to work your way to heaven,
or that you could lose your salvation,
well, guess what?
Soul winning's not gonna really work saying that.
You know, hey, are you 100% sure if you die today,
you're going to heaven?
Let me show you from the Bible, it's really good news.
You just have to be perfect.
You have to never sin.
You have to repent of all your sins.
And if you mess up at all, you will lose your salvation.
Have a good day.
That's not good news, right?
At that point, the gospel's completely corrupted.
And so we can't allow that to happen.
So in order for that not to happen,
we can't put up with anyone coming into this church,
preaching another gospel.
And look, we could disagree about plenty of things
in this church.
But one thing that we absolutely must be in agreement on
is the gospel, is how to get to heaven.
And you know, like I said,
we could disagree about things like Zionism,
though I believe that our church is right
on our stance on that.
And the pre-trib rapture, I believe that that's a fraud.
I believe that it's post-trib.
I could still have fellowship though
with a Christian that believes in the pre-trib rapture.
But you know what, there's a line drawn in the sand
when it comes to salvation.
And we do not put up with those people for a single hour.
If an unsaved person comes in here, they're welcome.
They're welcome to learn for a while.
We wanna get them saved, but if someone in here
starts coming around and starts preaching to other people,
oh no, you have to repent of your sins,
that's not gonna be tolerated.
Why?
Because Jew told us to earnestly contend for the faith.
Go to Titus chapter number two.
Also, in that verse we read,
it talks about how these men crept in unawares.
They turn the grace of God into lasciviousness.
Now, lasciviousness, let me define it for you,
it says unrestrained sexual behavior
or a habitual inclination to such behavior, lustfulness.
So one of the attributes of these people
that creep in unawares is that they're usually perverted.
They usually have serious issues in this area.
And you know, I don't really think it's a coincidence
that when you look at big churches today,
like the New Evangelical Movement,
churches like Andy Stanley's church,
churches that have the big mega church,
mega pastor, celebrity pastor,
they usually have very loose standards
when it comes to things like fornication and adultery.
And the modern Bible versions themselves
are very loose when it comes to this kind of stuff.
And to me, it fits with what Jude is saying
that these false brethren that creep in unaware,
they like to twist the grace of God into lasciviousness.
They like to say, hey, we're under grace,
so we're not gonna judge you for committing fornication.
What are they doing?
They're literally twisting,
they're turning the grace of God into lasciviousness.
See, the truth is, you can commit fornication
and go to heaven.
You absolutely can, because salvation's not of works,
lest any man should boast.
For by grace are you saved through faith
and that not of yourselves.
It is the gift of God, not of works,
lest any man should boast.
We know that.
We know that, technically speaking,
you can commit any sin you want,
and if you've put your faith in Jesus Christ,
you are saved, all your sins are forgiven,
you can never lose your salvation.
We know that.
But here's the question.
Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?
God forbid is what Paul says in the book of Romans.
You know, those of us that actually fear God
and love God,
yes, we recognize technically we can do anything we want,
but no, we love God, we want to honor him.
We don't want to be punished by him as well, right?
And we don't want to be a stumbling block
to our brothers and sisters in Christ,
where they say,
"Brother so-and-so is out living a wicked life,
maybe I'll do the same thing."
No, we don't want to twist the grace of God
into lasciviousness.
Did I have you go to Titus 2?
Look at verse 11, it says,
"For the grace of God that bringeth salvation
hath appeared to all men."
Teaching us, so what's teaching us?
The grace of God.
So the grace of God is teaching us
that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts,
we should live soberly, righteously,
and godly in this present world.
You know what the grace of God actually teaches us?
Is that, hey, since Jesus Christ
has forgiven all of our sins,
since we do deserve hell,
since we did receive a free gift that we didn't deserve,
what we should do now is live soberly,
righteously, and godly in this present world.
We should repent of our sins.
We should live a separated life.
We should live a life that's holy and clean
and pleasing to the Lord,
even though of course we know
that those things don't save us.
But what's funny is these people don't understand grace
'cause they say, oh, because we're under grace,
that means God is just totally cool
with you getting a tattoo.
Nevermind that the Bible says
not to print any marks upon you.
Well, we're living under grace,
so it's totally cool that you get divorced and remarried.
If you're not in love anymore,
God probably wants you to find someone else.
That's the type of things being said
in these churches today.
That God's okay with it, God will forgive you.
You know, hey, yeah, it's best not to commit fornication,
but you know what, we're under grace,
so we're just not gonna judge you.
We're definitely not gonna have church discipline.
We're definitely not gonna kick anyone out of church
like 1 Corinthians 5 commands us to
for things like fornication.
Meanwhile, the Bible in the New Testament
actually tells us that the grace of God
is what teaches us to live a righteous, holy life.
And so anyone that's sitting here using grace
as an excuse to sin would be falling
into the category of Jude here.
People that turn the grace of God into lasciviousness.
Go back to Jude.
Also in verse four, at the end of it,
it says denying the only Lord God
and our Lord Jesus Christ.
Verse five, I will put you,
I 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.
So he's kind of drawing a parallel here saying like,
hey, these wicked people creep in,
they deny the Lord God.
And he's saying, don't you remember
how God destroyed the people that didn't believe in him?
And another thing you could learn about a false prophet
is that they do not believe in Jesus.
They may believe that he exists,
they may believe that he's real,
but false prophets do not put their trust in Jesus Christ.
That's the whole point of being a false prophet.
They wanna teach people to put their faith in their works.
Or like the Catholic Church, they want to put their faith
in the fact that they're doing all these rituals,
that they're bowing down to idols,
that they're confessing their sins to the priest.
This is what a false prophet does is they deny the Lord.
They deny God.
And oftentimes you could tell what a false prophet is
when they're denying doctrine
relating to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Because you have to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
to be saved, but you don't get to just make up
any Jesus you want.
It has to be the Jesus of the Bible.
And when you're denying things about Christ,
you're denying God and you're not saved.
Go to 2 John chapter number one,
2 John chapter number one.
Notice what it says in verse nine,
"Whosoever transgresseth and abideth not
in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God.
He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ,
he hath both the Father and the Son."
So notice, you must abide in the doctrine of Christ.
You can't just make up any Jesus you want.
You know, the truth is, if you believe that you're a sinner,
deserving of hell, but you believe that the Mormon Jesus
died on the cross for your sins, you're not saved.
If you believe that the Jesus that Islam pays homage to
and respects, that he's just a good man,
that he's a prophet, if you believe in that Jesus,
you will go to hell.
If you believe in a Jesus that is not the eternal Son of God,
but is this modalism Jesus that he became the Son
and that he puts a hat back on and becomes the Father
and he's like this shape-shifting Jesus,
that's not the Jesus of the Bible.
You have to believe the doctrine of Christ
according to the scriptures.
If you believe in a Jesus that didn't die
for all of your sins, you know,
you can lose your salvation, that's a different Jesus.
In order to be saved,
you must believe in the Jesus of the Bible.
And these false prophets, they deny the Lord God,
and they may not say to you,
"Hey, I deny the Lord God."
But what they'll say is things like,
"Well, you know, Jesus wasn't fully God,"
like Martin Luther King, right?
Or, "You know, Jesus wasn't born of a virgin,"
like Martin Luther King taught.
These are people that are denying Jesus Christ.
Whether they say that or not doesn't matter.
When you're denying doctrines about his deity
and important things like that,
you're not abiding in the doctrine of Christ.
And look what the Bible says,
that if you abide not in the doctrine of Christ,
you have not God.
Other way of saying, you're not saved.
You are going to hell.
Go back to Jude, back to Jude.
And this is what they do.
They creep in, unawares,
but eventually they start to leak damnable heresy.
And this is how you can spot someone
that is a wolf within our congregation,
is when they're bringing in damnable heresy.
Not just someone that disagrees with you
on a tertiary doctrine
or kind of an obscure scripture or something like that.
But people that are bringing damnable heresies
are wolves within.
Look at verse six.
It says, "And 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."
So remember, he's talking about these false prophets.
They denied the Lord.
He's saying, remember the people in Egypt
that didn't believe in God, God destroyed those people.
Now he's bringing up the concept of angels
that left that, sorry, yeah, did not keep their first estate
but left their own habitation.
Of course we know that the devil desired to be
like the most high and so he was cast down.
And the Bible infers that it's not just the devil,
there was lots and lots of angels
that did that with the devil
who we now refer to as demons, right, unclean spirits.
These are angels that kept not their first estate
but left their own habitation.
So he's saying, look, what I'm gonna do to those angels
that fell, those demons now,
is I've reserved everlasting chains under darkness
for the judgment of the great day for them.
So he's saying these people deny the Lord God,
the people in leaving Egypt that didn't believe in him,
God destroyed them and God is gonna destroy these angels
by burning them in hell.
He's saying that, hey, that's the final destination
for false prophets as well.
He's kind of like putting all these three groups together
and saying like, what do all these three groups have
in common is that God is going to destroy them.
God is going to burn these people in hell.
Go to Matthew chapter number seven, Matthew seven.
And you know, for those of us that have been saved
for a long time, you've heard preaching,
you've read the Bible.
It's just the most obvious statement for me to just tell you,
hey, not everyone preaching the Bible saved, right?
Not everyone that stands up and claims to be a preacher
or a pastor is a good person or is saved.
That's obvious to us.
But you know, we have to continually preach these things
because as we reach new people,
this is something that not everyone knows.
And even yesterday, I was looking at a used car
and this man asked me what I do.
I told him I preach.
And I didn't have my car insurance on me.
And he wanted to see that for me to test drive the vehicle.
And I was like, hey, sorry,
I don't have my car insurance on me.
And he says, well, you're a preacher, so I trust you.
And I was like, don't trust someone
just because they're a preacher.
I was just like, I appreciate that.
And yeah, of course, I am not gonna rip you off
or do anything weird to you.
I am gonna be straight with you.
But just because someone's a preacher
does not mean you should trust them.
In fact, the vast majority of preachers are terrible people.
The vast majority of pastors are false prophets.
And so there's a lot of people that have been hurt
by churches and ministries and pastors and priests,
Catholic priests, because people just have
this disarmed mentality like, oh, someone's a preacher,
I'll automatically trust them.
Bad idea, bad idea.
Matthew chapter seven, verse 21.
Not everyone that saith unto me, Lord, Lord,
shall enter into the kingdom of heaven,
but he that doeth the will of my father, which is in heaven.
So not everyone that acknowledges even the fact
that Jesus Christ is Lord is going to go to heaven.
Why?
Because you could believe that Jesus is real.
You could even believe that he's Lord.
But if you think that you have to do works to get to heaven,
you're not saved.
Or if you believe some sort of damnable heresy about Christ,
you're not saved.
Look at verse number 22.
Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord,
have we not prophesied in thy name, saying,
hey, didn't we preach sermons about you?
And in thy name have cast out devils.
And in thy name have done many wonderful works.
So notice these people, when they're justifying themselves
and they want to know why they're not saved,
why they're not being allowed into heaven,
what is it in their heart that they're using
as justification why they should be saved?
Saying, hey, we did all these great works.
What are they trusting in?
They're trusting in their works to get to heaven.
And notice the result of these people, verse 23.
And then, while I profess unto them, I never knew you.
Depart from me, ye that work iniquity.
Jesus didn't say, hey, you were saved
and you lost your salvation.
He says, nope, I never knew you.
Yeah, you were saying, Lord.
You were calling Jesus Lord.
You were preaching sermons about him.
You were even casting out devils.
You were even doing many wonderful works.
But Jesus Christ never knew you
because your faith at the end of the day was in yourself
or in your religion or in anything else
other than Jesus Christ.
And you know what, many, many people
who claim to be Christians today are not saved.
Many preachers today that claim to be righteous men of God
are not saved and in fact are false prophets,
are children of Satan.
Go back to Jude.
The idea of a false prophet
is something that the Bible talks so much about.
But for some reason, going to church in my teens
at a old IFB church,
I never really heard sermons about false prophets.
It's not something that's ever really taught about.
But you know, the Bible talks about it a lot.
Look at verse number seven.
It starts with those two words, even as.
So now he's comparing these group of people,
these false prophets to some other group.
It says this, even as in the same way
as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities about them
in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication
and going after strange flesh are set forth for an example,
suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.
Here's another reason why you should not just trust
all pastors, trust all preachers,
because the Bible talks about these wicked men
prepped in unawares, turning the grace of our God
into lasciviousness and denying the only Lord God, okay?
These people are just like Sodomites.
That's what the Bible's saying.
And in what way are they like Sodomites?
Well, one way is that they're reprobate.
False prophets are reprobate.
They are rejected.
Their eternity, their eternal destiny is hell.
That's why he said, hey, just like these angels
that left their first estate,
God has reserved everlasting chains and darkness for them.
The same thing is reserved for false prophets.
And he's saying false prophets are just like Sodomites
in the sense that they're both reprobate.
They're both going to hell.
And it says this, giving themselves over to fornication
and going after strange flesh.
You know, the Bible talks about in 2 Peter 2,
false prophets having eyes full of adultery
that cannot cease from sin.
And the truth is, and this has been highlighted many times
over the last several years, is that false prophets
are often involved in all sorts of debauchery
and abominable sexual sins.
You got guys coming out like Ravi Zacharias busted
in this kind of stuff, all sorts of false prophets.
I told you about that guy's name is, oh, Mark Driscoll,
where he's preaching.
And he's saying that he's getting these weird visions
in his mind of rape and all sorts of other disgusting
things while he's preaching, while he's counseling people.
This is him leaking his heart.
And this is, this is a red flag.
Like, Hey, this guy is a false prophet.
Why? Because they're just like Sodom and Gomorrah,
who gave themselves over to fornication
and go after strange flesh.
Strange is something that's not convenient,
something that's not natural.
What's natural is obviously a man and a woman.
And while fornication is completely sinful,
it also is completely natural, right?
That is a completely natural sin.
But you know what's strange flesh is like a man and a child,
or a man and a man, or a woman and a woman.
That is strange flesh,
and that is not something the average person can do.
Even the average unsaved person,
the average unsaved person cannot go around
committing acts of sodomy, go around with a child.
The average unsaved person would never,
in a million years, walk into a school
and start shooting up children in a school, right?
There's certain things that is just a governor
on our conscience and on our heart
that human beings just don't do
unless they're given over to a reprobate mind,
unless they're like these sodomites
and these false prophets who are capable
of things that normal people are never capable of.
And just think about the people you know in life
that are unsaved, your average Joe coworker,
they're probably just normal people, right?
Maybe there's some wicked person you work with,
but oftentimes, the guys that I'm around,
they're just normal guys, normal girls,
they're unsaved, they're confused
about a lot of stuff in life,
but you know, even myself, before I was saved,
I never could've ever fathomed
doing disgusting things like that.
No, rather, I would've given my life for a child,
even when I was unsaved,
rather than go into a school and shoot it up, right?
These are activities that reprobates do.
These are activities that false prophets do,
and the Bible is comparing a false prophet to a sodomite.
And so, you definitely don't wanna just trust someone
because they're a pastor.
You don't wanna just trust someone
just because they're a preacher,
because if they're one of these man-crept-in unawares,
if they're one of these false prophets,
then they are the absolute scum of the earth.
The lowest, the lowest human being on this earth
is a false prophet.
The lowest human being on the earth
is someone that gets up in a position,
acting like you wanna help people,
acting like you're a charitable person,
acting like you love the Bible and love God,
meanwhile you're preaching a false gospel,
sending people to hell.
That's the worst person on this planet.
The worst person on the planet
is someone who uses their trust
as an authority figure, as a pastor,
to counsel some teenage girl and take advantage of her,
like happens all the time in America.
And so you know what?
You don't need to just trust someone
just because they're a preacher or because they're a pastor.
And you know what?
When you start going to a church
or you're listening to a preacher
and you start hearing damnable heresy come out of his mouth,
that is a red flag to know
that there's probably other things going on
that you don't see right away.
And better it is to just trust the Bible.
And you say like, but he looks so nice.
He seems so kind.
Look, don't trust in your own heart.
Trust what the Bible says
because this is how false prophets get you.
Oh, I'm just a happy-go-lucky Mormon white guy.
You know, I'm just a happy-go-lucky
Mormon white girl at your door.
And I'm just smiling.
It's just like, hey, you wanna go to Kolob?
And it's just like, oh yeah, they seem like so nice,
but no, they're false prophets.
They're actually giving you a gospel
that's gonna send you to hell for all of eternity
if you believe in it.
So you don't wanna just trust someone
because of their demeanor.
You actually wanna check the fruit.
You actually wanna check the things that they say.
Verse number eight of Jude says,
"Likewise, also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh,
"despise dominion and speak evil of dignities."
So again, we talked about defiling the flesh.
Another thing they do is despise dominion,
meaning that they hate authority.
This is why I'm very concerned about a preacher
that wants to get away from the authority
of the King James Bible.
I'm very concerned about a preacher that wants to say,
"Well, you know, the Bible isn't our final authority.
Jesus is our final authority."
Like Andy Stanley likes to say.
These are people that despise dominion,
because the truth is a pastor is not the one
that really runs the show.
If you're a biblical pastor, Jesus is.
You are to submit yourself to Jesus Christ.
How do you do that?
By the words of God.
But if you're someone that despises authority,
you know what you're gonna despise?
The Bible.
And anyone who despises the Bible,
whether they tell you they love the Bible or not,
if they're despising the Bible
by not preaching it faithfully,
by twisting passages,
by ignoring parts of scripture that you don't like,
you are a person that despises authority
and you're someone that needs to be avoided.
It also says they speak evil of dignities.
You know, it's a red flag
when people start speaking evil of authority,
of legitimate authority that God has instituted.
That is a serious red flag.
You know, ladies, you shouldn't be friends with women
that just talk crap about their husbands.
It's a bad idea.
It's gonna rub off on you.
It's a serious red flag when a woman just wants to sit there
and just despise authority, despise her husband.
Children, you should not be friends with kids
that wanna talk negatively about their parents.
This is a bad influence.
When you get older, you become a teenager or young adult,
don't hang out with the people that say,
you know, F the police or whatever.
These are bad people.
People that despise authority are bad people.
And look, dead sure, don't go to a church
where the pastor wants to despise the Bible
by not preaching it,
by despising the authority of the King James Bible.
That is a bad person.
That is a person to run away
from screaming the opposite direction.
Verse nine, "Yet Michael, the archangel,
when contending with the devil,
he disputed about the body of Moses,
durst not bring against him a railing accusation,
but said, 'The Lord rebuke thee.'"
So he's contrasting this with a righteous person,
Michael, the archangel,
and he's saying what a righteous person would do
is even when he's contending with the devil himself
about the body of Moses, whatever that means,
wherever Moses was buried,
they're arguing about it seems like,
even when he's contending with the devil himself,
Michael, the archangel is not gonna bring
a railing accusation against the devil,
but rather he said, the Lord rebuke thee.
Which by the way, this proves that railing
does not mean rebuke, because many people teach,
oh, railing on someone is just rebuking them.
But the Bible's saying here,
he's not bringing a railing accusation,
but he did say the Lord rebuke thee.
Okay, so railing is simply lying.
This is what railing is,
it's a false accusation against someone.
And so the principle there is that we ourselves,
we should not despise dominion,
we should not speak evil of dignities,
and we should not rail even against people we don't like.
We should be people that stick to the truth,
stick to the facts.
You know, I preached this before,
don't go around and lie even about reprobates.
Don't even go give a false accusation against a sodomite.
Don't make something up, don't exaggerate.
You know, don't bring railing accusations
even against the Jews, right?
Unless, you know, people are just like,
oh, I stubbed my toe on Ikea furniture, the Jews,
because they were cutting corners and costs,
and they made those square, you know, parts of the furniture.
And if they weren't such lovers of money,
it would have been round and I wouldn't have hurt my toe.
And so the Jews are at fault here.
It's like, whoa, man, okay.
Don't bring a railing accusation against the Jews even.
If you have something legit against them
with proof and evidence, yeah.
I'll say whatever against anyone
that actually has proof and evidence,
but we don't wanna just blow our mouths off
speaking evil of people, railing against people.
You know, that's something that should never be
an attribute of a Christian.
And these wicked people, they're not afraid
to speak evil of dignities, verse 10.
But these, these false prophets speak evil
of those things which they know not,
but what they know naturally as brute beasts
and those things, they corrupt themselves.
So notice wicked people, they will blow their mouth off
about anyone and everything.
They'll speak evil about things that they don't even know.
They'll just make stuff up.
They'll speak evil about things that they don't understand.
And you know, it is a red flag when someone starts blowing
their mouth off about things that they don't understand,
things that they don't know.
This is an attribute of a wicked person.
And so us as God's people go to Ecclesiastes, chapter five.
And let's see what the Bible has to say about this.
Ecclesiastes, chapter five, Ecclesiastes five, verse two.
The Bible says, Be not rash with thy mouth
and let not thine heart be hasty to utter anything before God,
for God is in heaven and thou upon earth.
Therefore, let thy words be few.
So we should not be people that are just rash with our words,
rash with our mouth.
We're just hasty to say anything against anyone for any reason.
No, we should be people where our words are very thoughtful,
calculated, that we're actually thinking about the things that we say,
realizing that God's in heaven.
We're on earth. God hears everything.
God is judging everything.
And we don't want to be found guilty of being one of these people
that speak evil of things we know not.
We don't want to be guilty of speaking against dominion
or despising authority.
Go to verse 11. Back to you. Verse 11.
Verse 11 says, woe unto them.
So he's pronouncing a curse against these people.
He says, for they have gone in the way of Cain and ran greedily
after the error of Balaam for reward and perished in the gainsaying of Korah.
And so he brings up three false prophets
that are kind of just types of different false prophets that are out there.
And again, we know that these people are unsaved
because they're brought up as examples of false prophets
in a chapter entirely dedicated to false prophets.
Some people like to teach, well, Balaam was safe.
No, that would make zero sense if he's brought up as a false prophet
example in the Epistle of Jude.
So first, he brings up Cain, which, of course, Cain,
he brought the fruit of the ground as an offering to God.
Picturing works salvation.
This is one type of false prophet.
How do you know they're false prophet?
Because they get up and preach work salvation.
That's pretty simple, right?
Then he brings up Balaam Balaam was someone that loved money, right?
He was willing to preach anything for a paycheck.
Now, of course, he couldn't go beyond what God allowed him to,
because God is in control.
But Balaam pictures someone that just loves money.
This is your Kenneth Copeland's.
This is your Joel Osteen's.
This is your T.D. Jakes.
These are false prophets who they don't do what they do
because they love God or because they love people.
They do it because they love the almighty dollar.
And this is their niche.
This is their business that they have created in this world
to make money and to become rich.
And while there's nothing wrong
inherently with having money or being rich,
there's something very wrong with wanting to preach
the word of God with the desire of getting rich.
Like I'm going to ministry so that I can get rich.
Big problem with that, because if you actually faithfully preach
the word of God, you're not going to blow up into this megachurch
million, you know, well, inflation in a few years.
I can't really say a million billion dollar pastor.
You know, maybe in 10 years, we'll all have million dollar
houses thanks to this economy.
But you get what I'm trying to say.
These guys that just live over the top, luxurious lifestyles
that is just not seemly for a pastor.
There's nothing wrong with living good and being comfortable
or anything like that. Don't get me wrong.
But you know, the Bible talks about how a pastor is not supposed to be given
to much wine.
And what I believe that's talking about is luxury, not necessarily alcohol,
though that's obviously also applicable, but just not given to much wine.
You know, if you went to T.D. Jake's house, something tells me that the rest
of his congregants in South Dallas are not living anywhere close
to how T.D. Jake's is living.
But T.D.
Jake's is just fleecing the flock for covetousness,
making merchandise of people because he loves money.
Then he brings up the game saying of Cora.
This is another type of a false prophet where they speak against real men of God.
Right. They attack real godly people.
Stay there. I'll read for you.
Number 16, three, Cora said this, he said, you take too much upon you,
seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them.
And the Lord is among them.
Wherefore, then lift up yourselves above the congregation of the Lord.
Cora is the infiltrator that comes into church
and starts trying to divide everyone against the pastor
that comes into church and starts saying, oh, Moses has taken way too much upon him.
Don't you know we're all just as holy as him?
You know, these this is the type of person that will usually infiltrate a church.
This is the most low level that come in and they'll just start to divide the church,
talk crap about the pastor.
And look, it's a red flag when someone preaches false doctrine.
It's a red flag when someone loves money.
And it's a red flag when someone comes into your church
and starts talking crap about your pastor.
That is a red flag.
And what they'll do is they'll flatter you.
They'll make it seem like you're in on some sort of little secret.
Like they think you're special.
But really what they think is you're stupid.
That's really what they think.
And if someone starts coming up to you, talking crap about your pastor,
you should be offended that they even thought that they could get away with
that with you, you should rebuke that person better yet.
You should just go to the pastor and be like, hey, this person saying this about
you, there you go, and then it could just be dealt with right there.
But these people, they don't like to go to people that will do that.
They like to prey on people that they think they can convince.
Sometimes they're successful.
But just know this now that if in the future
someone comes up to you and starts talking crap about your pastor,
that is a bad person because we're not even supposed to receive an accusation
against an elder, but before two or three witnesses.
So when someone just wants to come up and whisper in your ear
something negative about the man of God, that is a serious red flag.
And Cora is a picture of that person.
And how did God feel about that person?
Well, he opened up the earth and Cora fell alive straight into hell.
And then the next day, everyone was so
sad that God destroyed the people of the Lord.
It's like newsflash, the people of the Lord don't go to hell.
Cora was never saved.
Cora was never a person of God.
He was a wicked, false prophet.
In verse 12 of Jude, these are spots in your feasts of charity.
When they feast with you, feeding themselves without fear.
You know, these people that creep in,
they often take advantage of people's charity.
And this is this is one of the saddest things to see people come into church,
which our church is a loving place with people that actually care for each other.
We're willing to help each other.
And so someone will come in and they'll take advantage of people's charity,
feeding themselves without fear.
And, you know, I've seen over the years people where I'm like, man,
I shared a meal with that person and then they turn on the pastor.
They turn on the church.
They're exposed to be some false prophet or some heretic or something like that.
And, you know, it hurts.
But at the end of the day, we shouldn't
cease to be charitable just because these people exist, because for every one
Judas that's at our table at our feast of charity, you know, there's 30, 40 other
people that are God's children that love the Lord.
And, you know, it's worth it for those people.
So don't ever feel burnt out when you're betrayed by these people.
It says clouds. They are without water.
I think that's referring to the fact that they're just fake.
Right. Because they lack substance.
Because when you see a cloud, you kind of expect some rain.
Right. But cloud cloud that has no water.
It's just saying like it's empty, it's vain, it's fake.
And you could tell these false prophets, you know, there's just oftentimes there's
just something off about them.
There might be something off about their sermons.
There might be something off about their soul winning because they're fake.
Right. They're not actually saved.
They're chameleons.
And so they're just trying to say the right things to blend in, to be accepted.
But it's not necessarily that they actually believe the things that they're saying.
They're just trying to say things to fit in.
Carried about of wins.
Again, they're not grounded to any truth.
They don't have any real beliefs.
It's just, hey, if people want me to believe this, I'm just carried about.
And I'll say this, if that's going to get me accepted by the people.
Oh, OK, you guys believe this doctrine at this church will all just be a chameleon
and be carried about with this win to trees whose fruit withereth.
They're not getting anyone saved without fruit twice dead plucked up by the roots.
So of course, they are reprobates.
Verse 13, raging waves of the sea foaming out their own shame,
wandering stars to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.
Dude is like, by the way, did I mention they're going to hell?
He's just constantly telling us that they're cursed, that they're reserved
under judgment, that they're going to be in the blackness of darkness forever.
And it talks about how these false prophets,
they're raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame.
And I think what this is referring to is
the fact that false prophets or false brethren crept in unawares.
They usually expose themselves by with what they say.
They usually foam out their own shame.
Go to Matthew, chapter number 12.
You know, you could judge people's hearts by what they say.
I'll show you that in the Bible, Matthew 12, verse 31.
Wherefore I say unto you, all manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto
men, but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men.
And whosoever speaketh a word against
the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him.
But whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him.
Neither in this world, neither in the world to come.
So Jesus is making abundantly clear people that blaspheme the Holy Ghost.
They have no chance.
They're reprobates. They're not going to heaven.
And so you were living at this time.
You heard someone blaspheme the Holy Ghost.
You can judge by what they said that they're unsaved.
Right. You know, judgment's not a bad word.
Judgment is a good thing. Judgment brings safety, actually.
Look at verse number 33.
Either make the tree good and his fruit good or else make the tree corrupt
and his fruit corrupt for the tree is known by his fruit.
This is a phrase that Jesus also used
in Matthew seven when he said to beware false prophets.
He said, you'll know them by their fruits.
Verse thirty four. Oh, generation of vipers.
How can ye being evil notice, speak good things for out of the abundance
of the heart, the mouth speaking.
So how can you tell what's in someone's heart by what comes out of their mouth?
Verse thirty five.
A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things.
And an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things.
But I say unto you that every idle word that men shall speak,
they shall give a counter of in the day of judgment.
For by thy words thou shalt be justified and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.
So in Jude, when it's talking about false prophets foaming out their own shame,
I think that's referring to the things that they say.
Why? Because you could judge someone's heart by the words that come out of their
mouth. And you know what?
There are some things that are just never going to come out of a Christian's mouth.
How about blasphemy against the Holy Ghost?
How about damnable heresy?
Right. Or how about these six sodomites?
The things that they say, foaming out their own shame.
You know, you could just tell someone has a wicked heart by the things that they
say. And usually those people, you know, if you've ever been to Steadfast Baptist
Church, when we were protested, you saw a bunch of people foaming out their own
shame, saying a bunch of sick and disgusting things, making it evident by the words
coming out of their mouth that they have wicked hearts, that they are children of
Satan. Go back to Jude.
So when Jesus is talking about the trees known by his fruits, you'll know them by
their fruits, that's talking about the words that come out of their mouth.
Now, often, obviously, excuse me.
You could also apply that to converts
because the byproduct of preaching and the things that you say is converts.
But here he's very specifically talking about words.
In Matthew, Chapter 12, verse 14, he says in Enoch, also the seventh from Adam
prophesied of these, saying, behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his
saints, so he brings up Enoch, the seventh from Adam.
And notice all the way in the Old Testament, all the way back to Enoch.
People were preaching about Jesus Christ.
Why? Because Jesus Christ has always
existed and he is the lamb slain from the foundation of the world where even Enoch
is preaching about the coming of Jesus Christ.
Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints.
Who's that talking about? Of course, Jesus.
Look at verse fifteen to execute judgment upon all and to convince all that are
ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds, which they have ungodly committed
and of all their hard speeches, which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.
Doesn't sound like Enoch likes the ungodly very much.
And here, you know, Enoch is preaching
in the Old Testament, but you want to know what God he's preaching about.
He's preaching about the New Testament God because people want to act like, oh,
you know, the Old Testament God is so mean and angry.
But the New Testament God is so loving.
Hold on a second.
He's talking about the Lord Jesus Christ in his return,
which newsflash is going to be at the end of the New Testament.
OK. And he's saying that Jesus is going to come to execute judgment upon all.
Jesus isn't coming to hold anyone's hand.
He's coming to execute judgment.
He's coming to rule and reign with a rod of iron.
He's coming to convince all that are ungodly.
It means to convict all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds,
which they have ungodly committed and of all their hard speeches,
which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.
You know, the first time Jesus came,
he came meek and in humility and here to serve.
But the second time he's coming, he's coming to crack some skulls.
He's coming to judge.
He's coming to convict.
And you know what?
You better get saved if you're not saved
because this is not the Jesus you want to meet.
People that are going to be on this earth when the Lord returns that are unsaved.
They're going to meet a different Jesus
than their long haired false prophet pastor told them about.
They're meeting a Jesus that's going to come crack some heads.
And so you know what? We talked about fearing God.
This is the God you need to fear right here, the Lord Jesus Christ,
because when he comes, there's not going to be any preachers
preaching that it's OK to commit adultery.
There's not going to be any churches preaching.
Yeah, it's fine to get divorced and remarried.
There's not going to be any pride parades
because the law of God is coming back, not for salvation.
But it's coming back.
He's coming to convict all of all their ungodly deeds.
Kind of sounds like a court convicting people of crimes, right?
It's like, hey, all right, Leviticus 2013, you're convicted.
Line them up against the wall and shoot them in the back of the head.
Legally, lawfully, of course, that's what Jesus is coming to do.
He's coming to convict.
He's coming to judge all.
And that is the New Testament God that Enoch preached about.
Verse 16, these are murmurs, complainers
walking after their own lusts in their mouth, speak of great swelling words,
having men's persons in admiration because of advantage.
This is what people do that creep in.
They target a person that they think they
could gain some sort of advantage from, whether that's some sort of illicit
relationship that happens, whether that's someone's money,
whether they just want to get accolades by being close to someone
or authority or power, they are just users of people.
These false prophets don't care about anyone.
These men that creep in, they don't love you.
They have persons in admiration because of advantage.
Stay there. I'll read for you Proverbs twenty nine five.
The Bible says a man that flattereth his neighbor, spreadeth a net for his feet.
And you just need to be aware that when people flatter you, when people are just
over the top, insincere compliments to you, this is a person that does not have
your back. This is a person that's not going to be loyal to you.
This is a person that is trying to get something from you.
And I'll just be honest, even since the short time that I've been here, I've seen
this happen to me and these people are no longer here.
And guess what? The first time they flattered me, I knew I was like, this is
not going to work. This is not going to last.
That was the best sermon I've ever heard on this topic.
I'm like, nah, it definitely wasn't.
And that person immediately turned their back on me.
What a shock because someone that flatters spreads a net for your feet.
They don't love you. They don't care about you.
People have men's persons in admiration
because of advantage, whatever advantage they want to try to get.
You know what? We don't want flatterers in this church.
We don't want to we want people that are trying to use us for anything like that.
We want sincere people that love God,
that love the Bible, that love our brethren.
But we're not going to flatter our brethren because that's not a loving thing to do.
It's actually a hateful thing to do.
Jude, verse 17.
But beloved, remember you, the words which
were spoken before of the Apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ, how that they told you
there should be mockers in the last time who should walk after their own ungodly
lusts, these be they who separate themselves sensual, having not the spirit.
But ye, beloved, building up yourselves
on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost.
So notice he just got done telling us about what false prophets are like.
And he explains all the attributes about them.
He explains the fact that they're going to go to hell, explains the fact that
they're harming people, that they're like sodomites.
And sometimes that truth can cause us to fret or to be worried about serving God
or be worried to go to church or to feel kind of burned out about the battle.
But notice the response for us is he
tells us, but ye beloved, he's like, I'm talking about these false prophets.
But you, those of you that are saved,
building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost.
Go to Psalm thirty seven.
The admonition to us is like, yes, these people exist.
Yes, they're terrible.
Yes, there are people you need to be warned about and you need to avoid,
but it shouldn't just consume you.
You should still be worried about yourself,
about building up your faith in the Holy Ghost, focusing on your faith,
focusing on your walk with God and not fret yourself because of evildoers.
Look at Psalm thirty seven.
Verse one says fret not thyself because of evildoers.
You know, why would the Bible tell us not to do that?
If people weren't experiencing that, people are feeling those emotions.
They're fretting themselves because of evildoers.
Neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity,
for they shall soon be cut down like the grass and wither as the green herb.
Trust in the Lord and do good.
So shall thou dwell in the land and verily thou shall be fed.
Delight thyself also in the Lord and he shall give thee the desires of thine
heart, commit thy way unto the Lord, trust also in him and he shall bring it
to pass and he shall bring forth thy righteousness as the light and thy
judgment as the noonday. Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for him.
Fret not thyself because of him who
prospereth in his way because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass.
Cease from anger and forsake wrath.
Fret not thyself and any wise to do evil for evildoers shall be cut off.
But those that wait upon the Lord, they shall inherit the earth.
Forget a little while and the wicked shall not be.
Yea, thou shalt diligently consider his place and it shall not be.
But the meek shall inherit the earth and shall
delight themselves in the abundance of peace.
So the Bible is telling us, hey, don't worry about these wicked people.
Don't fret yourself because of them.
Don't cause yourself to be overwhelmed or
anxiety ridden because these people exist, because guess what?
Pretty soon these people are going to be cut down like grass.
Pretty soon you're going to go to the place of the wicked,
Joel Osean's church, and you say, where is it?
It's gone. You know, when Jesus returns, it'll be gone.
You know, soon you're going to go to Georgia and look at Andy Stanley's
megachurch. Hey, where's Andy Stanley's megachurch?
Oh, yeah, it's cut down.
It's gone. These men that turn the grace of God into lasciviousness,
these men that creep in, these people will be cut off someday.
And so, you know what? We know that the Lord is going to take care of them.
We know that the Lord is going to judge them.
We know that the Lord has reserved hell for them.
And so because of that, there's nothing we can really do about them other than
just expose who they are, warn God's people about them and then just avoid those
people. That's really all we have to do.
But you know what, our lives should not be consumed and obsessive over thinking
about false prophets.
And sometimes people that get newly saved, they come to a church like this, they
could just be obsessed with being like the false prophet hunter.
Right. Where like all they want to talk about is false prophets.
They get a chance to preach every sermon is exposing a false prophet, which, hey,
we need that. Right.
But you don't want to get to the point where you're fretting yourself because of
evildoers. You know what?
Still focus on the Lord, still focus on building up your faith, building up your
evildoers, building up your church.
That's the majority of the focus we should have.
Go to verse twenty one of Jude. We're almost done here.
Verse twenty one of Jude says, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking
for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.
Bible says, hey, rather than thinking
about all these people, keep yourself in the love of God.
And of course, that's not God's love
for us, because we know nothing can separate us from the love of God.
God is always going to love us.
But you know what? There's things that we
could do to show that we don't really love him.
Right. If we follow Jesus's commandments, we're loving him.
If we're not friends with the world, then we're not at enmity against God.
We're loving God.
You know, the Bible says love, not the world.
Neither things that are in the world.
OK, so we need to keep ourselves in the love of God.
Verse number 22.
And if some have compassion making a difference and others save with fear,
pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.
So don't miss the continuity here.
He's saying, look, don't think about this kind of stuff too much.
Build up yourselves, build up your own faith, praying in the Holy Ghost.
Keep yourself in the love of God.
What's one of the ways you can keep yourself in the love of God and show that
you love God? Well, it's called soul winning.
It's called having compassion on other people.
And you say, I'm so mad about false prophets.
I'm so angry about people creeping in and preaching damnable heresy and damning
people to hell. Hey, well, if you're so mad about it,
why don't you go soul winning? Why don't you go reach someone with the
gospel before they get reached by John MacArthur, before they get reached by Andy
Stanley, before they get reached by all these false prophets.
You could just go to their door and have compassion on them and save them.
But notice others
save with fear, pulling them out of the fire,
hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.
So, you know, there's different methods of soul winning.
Some people are going to respond more
to a really loving, compassionate message of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
And, hey, the gospel is very loving and compassionate,
explaining to them how a loving God without sin became sin for them and died for
their sins. That's very loving, very compassionate.
But others we need to save with fear.
Other people, we need to explain to them
how bad hell really is and tell them, nope, it's not purgatory Catholic.
It's eternal fire and damnation.
It's everlasting burnings.
It's no rest day nor night.
That is the terrible reality of hell.
And some people are going to respond well to the message of love and compassion.
And other people are going to respond to the fear of God and the fear of hell.
I don't care how you do it.
As long as you get people saved, as long as people are getting saved,
I don't care if they got saved because they love Jesus so much or if they're
scared of God so much, as long as they're not going to hell, I'm happy.
Verse 24, now into him that is able to keep you from falling and to present you
faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy to the only wise
God, our savior, be glory and majesty, dominion and power both now and ever.
Amen.
So the thought that he wants to leave
them with is not thinking about false prophets.
I mean, think about he started the chapter saying, I want to talk to you guys about
salvation and he did not do that, that train swerve.
And he spent the whole chapter talking about false prophets.
But he doesn't want to end it on that note.
What is he ended on?
He says, look, don't focus on this too much.
Focus on building up yourselves on your
faith, focus on other people and focus on God himself.
Because look at this beautiful passage, verse 25.
This is some beautiful, powerful language here.
To the only wise God, our savior, by the way, Jesus is God.
He's our savior, is he not?
To him be glory and majesty, dominion and power both now and ever.
Amen.
You know, as a church, we need to expose false prophets.
We need to preach against people.
We need to warn the flock of people that creep in unawares.
But you know what? Let's not make that the focus of our ministry.
Let's make the Lord the focus of our ministry.
Thinking about God, thinking about his glory, his majesty,
his dominion and his power.
With that, let's have a word of prayer, Lord.
Thank you for this day and thank you for this great chapter in the word of God.
I pray that our church would always be
vigilant and paying attention to evil men crept in unawares that those people
would not come in here and harm us, but we would be strong in the scriptures
and be able to see the warning signs and to cast those people out from among us.
But I pray that we wouldn't obsess over these things, that we would focus more on
winning people to Christ and loving you.
I pray that you get us all home safely this evening.
We love you in Jesus name we pray. Amen.
For our last hymn this evening, if you would turn to number two hundred
forty six, redeemed hymn number two hundred forty six, two, four, six, redeemed.
We'll sing there starting on the first.
Redeemed now our love to proclaim, redeemed by the blood of the Lamb in mercy. His child and forever I'm so happy in Jesus.
The language my rapture can tell, the light spread with me, the continually glad bloody sky. His love, the theme of my song and I.