Read with Me
Jude 1-2 (HCSB)
Jude, a slave of Jesus Christ and a brother of James:
To those who are the called, loved by God the Father and kept by Jesus Christ.
May mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you.
Listen with Me
Jude humbly identifies himself as the brother of James and a slave of Jesus. But he is also the brother of Jesus (Mark 6:3), one of those who didn’t believe in Jesus (John 7:5) until after the resurrection (Acts 1:14). In the days after the persecution and scattering of the church in the wake of Stephen’s murder, James had risen to a position of great authority. But Jude, although respected by the Church, was not in the limelight.
Jude’s intended audience is the Church in general as opposed to the more specific audiences addressed in many of the other epistles. He identifies the Christians first as those who have been called. This concept of calling is actually the root of the Greek word usually translated “Church”, ecclesia, literally “called out ones”. The idea is not so much about election as it is usually defined, with God choosing who can be saved and calling only them to salvation, and excluding everyone else. Instead, it speaks to the fact that those who respond to the gospel, who exercise saving faith in Jesus, now have a calling on their lives to come out of the world’s system and to live as the people of God’s kingdom.
In support of that divine calling, Jude states that those who have been called out because of their faith in Jesus are loved by God. This is far more than a mere emotional attachment. It means that God is continually working in and through each of His people to achieve for them the greatest good, the highest blessings, the most complete relationship with Him.
Jude also tells us that those who belong to God through faith in the finished work of Jesus are kept by Jesus. That means that Jesus himself, through the presence and power of the indwelling Holy Spirit, gives each of his followers the power and strength to stand firm in their faith, even in the midst of the inevitable persecutions that are part of walking with Jesus in the sin-broken world.
Jude concludes his greetings with a prayer for God’s mercy, His unmerited favor; peace, or shalom, wholeness in every dimension of life; and agape love, to be abundantly bestowed on all of them.
Pray with Me
Father, one thing that has really struck me today as I have listened to You is the concept that all who have responded to Jesus in faith have entered into a calling by You to leave the world system and to live actively as a member of Your kingdom. This necessarily means living in complete obedience to all Your commandments. It also means taking up Your mission of saving the world as our own life’s work. I’m afraid far too many of those who turn to Jesus are never told about this calling and are simply encouraged to do some devotional stuff like praying and reading their Bibles, and to attend church, and just wait till they can go to heaven. How far below Your real calling on our lives that is! Help me, Lord, to never be satisfied with living in a spiritual holding pattern until I die or until Jesus returns. Instead, help me to live the same kind of dynamic, productive, redemptive kingdom life modeled by Jesus and lived out in the power of the Holy Spirit by the great saints down through the ages after Him. Amen.