Read with Me
Jude 8-11
Nevertheless, these dreamers likewise defile their flesh, reject authority, and blaspheme glorious ones. Yet Michael the archangel, when he was disputing with the Devil in a debate about Moses’ body, did not dare bring an abusive condemnation against him but said, “The Lord rebuke you!” But these people blaspheme anything they don’t understand. What they know by instinct like unreasoning animals—they destroy themselves with these things. Woe to them! For they have traveled in the way of Cain, have abandoned themselves to the error of Balaam for profit, and have perished in Korah’s rebellion.
Listen with Me
Jude has just finished talking about how effective God is in punishing those whom He finds to be evil, while protecting those who are righteous. Now he segues to showing more reasons why these false teachers are actually deserving of judgment and punishment.
Jude’s condemnation comes under three headings, one of which he outlines more extensively than the rest. The first is at these false teachers, mostly gnostic heretics, pollute their own bodies. They do this by engaging in sexual sins and other sins that lead to physical ills. God designed sex to be expressed within the confines of a marriage covenant formed between one man and one woman for life. Anything outside those boundaries is forbidden, going against God’s design.
But these false teachers had elevated sexuality to an end in itself, claiming that, at best it was spiritual freedom to not be bound by religious mores regarding sexuality, and at worst, it was merely indulging a physical craving that didn’t affect one’s soul, and so was not judged as really wrong by God. They were wrong on both counts.
God’s standards were not designed to ruin people’s fun, but to help them to express the gift of sexuality in ways that do not cause physical, emotional, or spiritual damage, all of which can be long-lasting, and some of which is eternal. The only way to avoid that damage is to use sexual expression as God designed it to be used.
The second way in which these false teachers make themselves deserving of judgment is by rejecting authority. This was done under the rubric of spiritual freedom, believing that each person should be able to decide for themselves what is acceptable without rules being imposed by external authorities like the Scriptures, tradition, or laws.
But by considering themselves independent of the moral requirements God laid down in His word, many of which were specifically reemphasized by Jesus as binding on His followers, these people were actually rejecting God and His authority over them.
The third area is slandering celestial beings. Some of this, specifically pointed to by Jude was not simply resisting satan and rejecting his authority, but speaking abusively about him to demonstrate their fearlessness, something even the Archangel Michael did not dare to do. But these false teachers also denigrated the power of the Holy Spirit, claiming that He was a force or power instead of a person, and that He was powerless to really transform a person’s life, something that both Jesus and God claimed He could do. This speaking against the Holy Spirit is so damaging to the hearts and minds of those hearing and learning, and it betrays such a heart of rebellion against God and his authority, that Jesus pronounced it an eternal sin, one that could never be forgiven (Matthew 12:31-32).
Verse 11 is a doom song pronounced over those whose sin is so violent and whose hearts are so hard that they have fallen beyond hope of restoration, barring a profound miracle. They are like Cain who fell so far as to murder his brother and then who played the victim, claiming that his punishment was too heavy for him to bear. They are like Balaam who plotted with the Midianites to lead the Israelites into sin so that God’s protection would be stripped away from them, and who was then killed by the armies of Israel. And they are like Korah, who rejected the God-given authority of Moses and Aaron and tried to take control of God’s people. For his efforts, he was consumed by fire from the Lord, while the ground split open and consumed his co-conspirators, his family, and all he possessed (Numbers 16). All in all, these false teachers had placed themselves in opposition to God, and had doomed themselves to destruction. And Jude was warning everyone else to stay far away from them, so that they didn’t share the same fate.
Pray with Me
Father, these are some pretty dire warnings! It is easy for us to allow ourselves to be swayed by fine sounding arguments and charismatic speakers, and to even turn away from your clear word, either being persuaded that it doesn’t apply to us today, or that we have somehow been freed from it’s clear commandments, or even that it needs to be reinterpreted for this new generation. Some today even claim that all the believers for the last 3000 years have misunderstood the Scriptures, what they mean and what they require, but that they have somehow discovered the key, the truth. These men and women are the direct spiritual descendants of the false teachers Jude is grieving over here. Help us, Lord, to heed the warning he gives, and to stay far away from these false teachers and their destructive teachings. Amen.