FHBC Sermon Notes

We often question ourselves when hard decisions arise. So it is at the start of this letter. He begins it reminding the readers that they are kept in Christ. He then tells them that they are to contend for the faith.


v. 3 A clarification - What does it mean to contend for the faith.
The Greek word for contend is to strive earnestly, to struggle. It is where we get the word for agony from. It also has military implications. Yet, what is clear here is that that contention is not a physical one, it is not a call to arms, but it is a spiritual contention. It is just as real, and in some ways the most real of the conflicts in which we participate.

For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.- Ephesians 6:12

Why must we contend for the faith?


1. Because there is only one true faith. (v.3-4)
We often talk of faith subjectively. We think of it as our response to the gospel. Therefore to us we think of faith as individual personal. Yet that is not Jude is talking about here. This faith is not our belief, but what we believe. The story of this begins at the start of history, from Genesis on, told through the prophets, and fulfilled in Jesus. It is the whole of what we believe.

When we talk of faith individually, we make it a cold thing. But this is faith that came to us through the gospel. It is complete, "once for all delivered to the saints." Faith is not a multiple choice test, or a choose your own adventure.

Because it is beyond us, it is a faith given for all the saints, protected, preserved, proclaimed from the time of Christ until now. Amen.

2. Because all deviation of the one true faith are condemned. (v.4-16)
This is serious. If we do nothing, and receive the false gospel, the result is judgment. The same judgment for speaker and listener.

Lots of examples

• v14-15 God does judge those that ere.
• V. 6 References fallen angels.
• V. 5 The judgment in the Exodus.
• v. 11 Balaam's error. Koran's rebellion.

Remember that these people are not ungodly for preaching a false gospel, but are preach a false gospel because they are ungodly. See v. 16.

So, what is the antidote?
It is to study to the truth, the faith once for all delivered to the saints. To recognize the truth, we don't need to study what is false, but what is true.

Let us check our own hearts, our own speech. Do our mouths display the glory of God, or our own individual faith, a doctrine of our lips and making,.