Words of Wisdom #26

We just finished looking at the letter of James, with what many see as words of wisdom; how about Jude?

1 Jude, a servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James,
To those who are called, beloved in God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ:
2 May mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you.
3 Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints. 4 For certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.

Jude is addressing a group of people who, much like James' audience, were going through some hard times; they found themselves calling out for mercy, and their faith was being challenged.  Jude was going to remind them about how great their salvation in Christ was in order to encourage them, but something more pressing had come up: a group of people were infecting the church. These people were perverting the grace of God, twisting it into the idea that God doesn't care how we live our lives. Such a concept leads to people living in sensuality - it's what feels good to me that matters most. This is a deadly error. It denies the Lordship of Christ; it makes Him our stamp of approval to do anything we want to do. Grace doesn't do that. True grace changes our lives. We've seen the same thing happen in the American church the last couple of years, but like Jude says here, this began long ago; it has just surfaced and we need to respond to it wisely, calmly, lovingly, but with conviction. We need God's wisdom for sure.