Enoch's Prophecy - 9

Well, today in our journey through the book of Jude, we come to a rather intriguing and, to some people, puzzling text, where Jude refers to a prophecy of Enoch, one of the saints of God who lived before the flood, before the days of Noah, a prophecy that is not recorded anywhere else in Scripture, which he uses to reinforce what he's already declared about the judgment that will come upon those who are unbelievers and an especially severe judgment upon those who try to do damage to the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. It seems at times that the godly operate without any severe consequences, but that is not the case, and they are headed for the severest judgment possible, and the Bible tells us that, and Jude reminds us of that, even as he talks about the work of these intruders into the churches of the Lord Jesus Christ. So the warning is, don't you be among them.

Don't you join them in this judgment because it is an awful judgment indeed. And so our text today is Jude verses 14 and 15, which says, Now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men also, saying, Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of his saints to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds, which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against him. To examine this particular two verse text today, we are going to look at three things. Number one, Jude's source, number two, the biblical record, and number three, Enoch's prophecy. Jude's source, that seems to generate a lot of interest among commentators.

I can only declare that to you and you can probably take my word for it. But that seems to generate an awful lot of interest among commentators as to where did Jude get this information about Enoch, which is not found anyplace else in the Bible? And in arriving at a possible answer to that question, which we'll look at in a moment, then the second question is, how does that answer relate to the doctrine of the inspiration of scripture? Jude's source. And the question is, number one, did Jude utilize a book called First Enoch to get this information? And secondly, if he did, did Jude endorse First Enoch?

That is, as if it is inspired scripture because he quotes it here in the Bible. Or, number three, did Jude authenticate just this one statement? And that's what we're going to look at as we consider the source for Jude's information about Enoch, the seventh from Adam, who prophesied concerning God's judgment upon the ungodly.

Did Jude get this information from a book by the title First Enoch, obviously largely about this man Enoch? And what about that book, which most of us have never heard of? It's not found in either the Catholic or the Protestant Apocrypha, those extra books that are found between the Old and the New Testament in the Catholic Bible. And it will come as a great surprise to some of you to know that there is actually a Protestant Apocrypha as well as a Catholic one, which you will find in the original King James translation of the Bible, a double surprise to those who are strong in their King James only sentiments. Did you know that your original King James Bible included the Apocrypha, but a different Apocrypha? Some of the books the same, some of them different from the Catholic Apocrypha. But the Apocrypha, or the Apocryphal books, have never been considered inspired scripture, at least not by Protestants, even though sometimes they are included in the volume of books we call the Bible. Do any of you have a Bible that contains the Apocrypha?

I actually do. I was browsing through Holly Hill Mall decades ago, and the bookstore there had a sale table pulled out into the mall, out from their store, and I was looking at the books on it. And lo and behold, I found a nice volume of the Bible in the Revised Standard Version, including the Apocrypha.

And it was on sale, and I thought, I can buy that, and that's something I'd like to have. I don't have at this time a Revised Standard Version of scripture. And back in those days, you couldn't go click, click, and there it was.

We didn't have that opportunity back then. And so I really wanted to have that particular version, but I was even more interested in getting a copy of the Apocrypha. So it's on my shelf.

I'll be glad to show it to you if you want to see it. But first Enoch is not included in either of those collections of books that are known as the Apocrypha. But it is a Jewish intertestamental book. It was written between the Old and the New Testament.

It falls in that period of time. And was evidently highly regarded by the Jews in that period of time, though there's no evidence that any of them considered it to be scripture either. But it was studied, it was collected, and it was sometimes exposited in Jewish synagogues. However, though originally written in Greek, there is no complete Greek manuscript that has survived, that has yet been uncovered. Only pieces in Greek and other pieces in Aramaic. The only complete volume we have is in Ethiopic.

You say, what is that? Well, that's the language that they used in Ethiopia. And the Coptic Christians did revere and include first Enoch. Some of them actually considered it to be scripture. And so the only copy we have, the complete copy of first Enoch, is actually a translation out of the original Greek, which all adds in. The only reason I'm including this information, I'm not trying to bore you with scholarly details, but it all has to do with this question of, did Jude quote first Enoch?

Because all of these little details are important. And it appears in this text that Jude may indeed be quoting first Enoch 1.9. But we can't be certain because of the missing manuscripts. What Jude quotes doesn't follow the Ethiopic exactly, but of course he wasn't quoting from that translation. And we don't have enough of the Greek and the Aramaic to know for sure that he's quoting either one of those exactly. So we can only speculate, and nearly all commentators are pretty well convinced that he was quoting first Enoch, but we can't be absolutely certain of that either, and I'll explain more why in a moment. So the question, where did Jude get this information about Enoch, is possibly, maybe even probably from the book of first Enoch, but not certainly. We can't say that absolutely. But assuming that he did get it from first Enoch, the second question is, does that mean therefore that Jude is endorsing the book of first Enoch as part of scripture?

And the answer is no. The fact that he quoted one statement, assuming that he quoted one statement out of it, and if he did that, that would not indicate that he was endorsing all of the first Enoch as a part of the inspired writings that have come to us from God. And we have other examples that we can compare that to, particularly in the ministry of the apostle Paul, who quoted three times, that I can locate, Greek philosophers and poets, as, for example, two of them in Acts chapter 17 in his sermon on Mars Hill. And speaking there, he says in verse 28 of Acts 17, For in him we live and move and have our being, as also some of your own poets have said.

Some of you quote that. In God we live and move and have our being. I know you are quoting a pagan philosopher, a pagan poet, who said that. But Paul quotes that in his sermon and said, the poet has also said, one of your poets have said, wait a minute, I back up again. For in him we live and move and have our being, as also some of your own poets have said.

For we are also his offspring. Now, there Paul seems to have brought together statements from Aretas and Epitames. And I'm trying to remember, I think Epitames wrote around 600 B.C.

and Aretas around 300 B.C., if my memory serves me correctly. And then Paul also quoted, I don't know if I brought this one to the pulpit with me, but he also quoted from Epitames in Titus 1.12 that, he says, it's also one of your own poets who said, cretins are always liars and so forth, and not very flattering. So three times we know of, Paul quoted pagan philosophers and poets. Does that mean that Paul was endorsing everything they wrote?

Well, nobody would claim that, I don't think. What it does mean is that even pagan philosophers and poets sometimes say something that is true, and Paul could use it on this occasion because it resonated with the audience that he was speaking to. They heard him quoting from their own poets, and they agreed with what Paul said because they agreed with what their philosophers have said. And so he used it as a good entry point into his message or a good confirmation about what he was saying, but clearly was not endorsing everything that was written by those men. And in like fashion, the fact that, or the supposition that, the probability that, Jude was quoting from 1 Enoch does not mean that he's endorsing the whole book of 1 Enoch.

I think you understand now why I can say that. So did Jude endorse 1 Enoch? No. Did he endorse one statement out of 1 Enoch? Yes. Yes, the one that's in our Bible.

The answer there clearly is yes. And because he is an inspired author of scripture, he has the ability and authority to endorse this statement and to include it in what has now come down to us as the inspired infallible word of God. Peter tells us that in regard to the writings of scripture, holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. Paul tells us that all scripture is given by inspiration of God. In other words, chosen authors, whom God chose to communicate his revelation, his written word to men, were guided and guarded in what they wrote. God didn't just dictate his word to them word for word.

We don't believe in mechanical dictation. God prepared the minds of these people and the experiences of these people and the education of these people and the reading of these people and incorporated all of that. In the case of Paul, Paul was a learned man and God incorporated his education and statements from pagan philosophers into his words. And likewise, Jude, surprisingly, there's a lot of things about Jude that I haven't even mentioned, but he was obviously a well-educated man. He writes very high-quality Greek, and yet who was he?

Half-brother of James, half-brother of Jesus Christ. In other words, in Christ's day, fishermen and carpenters received a better education than a lot of college graduates do in America today. Another subject for another day, but I just point that out. These blue-collar workers who never went to what we would call university show evidence of a higher level of education than most college graduates do in our day.

Something has happened in the wrong direction in America. But chosen men were guided and guarded in what they wrote so that the Bible, in its final form, is at the same time the word of men and the word of God. Did the men who wrote the Scriptures speak infallibly in everything they said? No. But in the part that the Holy Spirit included in the Scriptures, in the Bible, they spoke infallibly.

Why? Because they were guided and guarded by the Holy Spirit. He filtered out anything in their thinking and writing that would not be true and would not be infallibly inspired by God. And he guided them to include in their writings everything that God wanted to be preserved and wanted to be considered the word of truth. And so ultimately, here's what we get to finally to answer that question, where did Jude get his material about Enoch?

Ultimately, the source was God for this material. Did Jude get it from the book of 1 Enoch? Probably. Did he have to?

No. God could have revealed it to him some other way. The ultimate source is God who guided and guarded Jude and what he said. So this all becomes a reminder of the details of the doctrine of inspiration. But we move from Jude's source to the biblical record regarding Enoch. And there's not a lot told us about Enoch in the Bible, but there are actually two Old Testament and two New Testament references to him. Beginning with the Genesis account, Genesis chapter 5, which contains the genealogy of Adam from Adam down to Noah and his three sons.

It's all recorded there. I'll read just a portion of it so you get an idea of how it goes. This is the book of the genealogy of Adam. In the day that God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. He created the male and female and blessed them and called them mankind in the day they were created. And Adam lived 130 years and begot a son in his own likeness after his image and named him Seth. After he begot Seth, the days of Adam were 800 years and he had sons and daughters. So all the days that Adam lived were 930 years and he died. Seth lived 105 years and begot Enoch. After he begot Enosh, Seth lived 807 years and had sons and daughters. So all the days of Seth were 912 years and he died. Enosh lived 90 years and begot Canaan and so forth. It goes on down through the genealogy. I'm not going to read it all.

I wanted you to understand the gist of it. But now I'm going to read, skipping down to verse 18. We come to a man named Jared. Jared lived 162 years and begot Enoch. That's the name we're looking for, Enoch. After he begot Enoch, Jared lived 800 years and had sons and daughters. So all the days of Jared were 962 years and he died. Enoch lived 65 years and begot Methuselah.

We all know that name, the oldest man in the Bible. After he begot Methuselah, Enoch walked with God 300 years and had sons and daughters. So all the days of Enoch were 365 years and Enoch walked with God and he was not, for God took him.

Interesting. What do we learn from this Genesis genealogy that includes the name of Enoch? Well, we learn that indeed Enoch was the seventh from Adam, exactly as Jude tells us in his epistle. We also notice as we study this genealogy that of each of the other names that are there, all of them have these facts about them. They have a record of their birth, a record of their fatherhood, in the case of at least one of their sons, his name and sometimes reference to other sons and daughters and so forth, and then a record of their death. So so and so was born. So and so begot the next one in line and lived X number of years and he died. He was born, he fathered children, and he died. He was born, he fathered children, and he died.

He was born, he fathered children, and he died. Until we come to Enoch, we read he was born, he fathered a son like the others, but he didn't die. And there's also this insertion into his record that's not found in any of the others, and he walked with God, evidently to an unusual degree. I think we'd have to say all of these walked with God.

They all are in the line of Seth and they all give evidence of being godly men, but Enoch stood out among the others, above the others I should say, in his godliness. He walked with God, and the Genesis account just says very cryptically, and he was not, for God took him that in the place of the record of the others, and he died. Of Enoch, he did not die, but he was taken by God. In other words, he went straight to heaven without dying. He was raptured to heaven without death. That's what we learn about Enoch in Genesis, an unusual departure.

He was not, for God took him. The second reference to Enoch in the Old Testament is simply another genealogy in the Book of Chronicles. This is one of those passages that you probably skip over pretty lightly when you're reading the Bible.

But here's how the Book of 1 Chronicles begins. Adam, Seth, Enosh, Canaan, Mahalalel, Jared, Enoch. If you're counting from Adam to Enoch, seven. Methuselah, Lamech, Noah, Shem, Haman, Japheth, and so forth. Here is another genealogy that includes the name of Enoch and confirms that he was the seventh from Adam, but no details are given here, just a listing of the names. But it is a second record of these names, this genealogy, and confirms that Enoch is indeed the seventh from Adam. And so, though fewer details are given, the genealogy is confirmed in 1 Chronicles. The third mention of Enoch is found in the Book of Hebrews in the New Testament. And his name is found in Hebrews chapter 11, that great hall of faith, as we often call it, that records men and women who were exemplary in their faith.

Some of them are surprising. Maybe I shouldn't say they were all exemplary in their faith. What we can certify is they were all people of genuine faith. And some of these people were not particularly exemplary.

In fact, Lot isn't included in here. He's included in Peter's epistle as a godly man whose righteous soul was vexed day to day by the ungodly deeds in Sodom and Gomorrah. But there are some in here, Samson, for example. We don't really read his life and say there was a godly man, but we do know that his faith was genuine because of his inclusion here. Now, here's what it says about Enoch, verse 5. By faith, Enoch was taken away so that he did not see death and was not found because God had taken him.

For before he was taken, he had this testimony that he pleased God. So this reinforces what is said in Genesis chapter 5 and even gives some confirming explanation of what we think we're seeing in Genesis 5. And this makes it very clear, yes, he did walk with God, described here as he had this testimony that he pleased God, and he did not see death.

We concluded that the statement in Genesis, he was not found, and the fact that there's no record of his death meant that he did not see death. Well, Hebrews makes that explicitly clear. And that God took him, we read that in Genesis, we read that again in Hebrews. So in Hebrews chapter 11, we learn that Enoch is an example of genuine faith, that he lived an exemplary life, and that he did not experience death. And then the only other mention of Enoch is in our text.

Jude 14 and 15, I read it again. Now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men also saying, Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of his saints to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against him. Jude expands upon the other information we have about Enoch to tell us, number one, that Enoch was a prophet. We haven't learned that until we come to Jude.

It's not surprising. He was unusually exemplary. He walked with God. It's not surprising, therefore, that he was a prophet. That is that God gave him divine revelation to communicate to others. But now we are told that explicitly that he was a prophet, and that among his prophecies he foretold a triumphal appearance of Christ. You say now, did Enoch prophesy the coming of Christ, or was this in relationship to God? Well, since we don't have a record of Enoch's prophecy, but in the Book of 1 Enoch, this statement about God coming with ten thousands of his holy ones is attributed to Jehovah, but when Jude quotes it, assuming it's a quotation, when Jude cites this information, he attributes this coming to Jesus Christ, another testimony that Jesus Christ is God.

When Christ comes, God comes. And it is the New Testament revelation that Christ is particularly the member, the second member of the Trinity, who is coming again to judge and to rule and to reign and to be seen in majestic glory upon his throne. So Enoch was a prophet. Enoch foretold a triumphal appearance of Christ, and Enoch proclaimed a severe judgment upon the ungodly. That's the biblical record about Enoch, which moves us therefore to our third consideration, which is Enoch's prophecy.

Now we look at it more carefully. And Enoch's prophecy is indeed a prophecy of judgment, and we can study it by asking some of the detective words. Who is Enoch prophesying about? When will Enoch's prophecy take place? What is the reason for the coming of Christ, and why is he coming in this way?

First of all, who? We read in verse 14, now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about, and here's the answer, these men also. He's prophesying about these men like Jude has been prophesying about these men. Jude has mentioned their judgment several times before he now supports his statements by this prophecy from Enoch. These men, who are they?

Well, let's just remind ourselves. Verse 4, for certain men crept in unnoticed, who long ago were marked out for this condemnation. Ungodly men who turn the grace of our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God in our Lord Jesus Christ. Those men.

Or, verse 8, likewise also these dreamers defile the flesh, reject authority, and speak evil of dignities. What men? Those men. Or, verse 10, but these speak evil of whatever they do not know and whatever they know naturally like brute beasts.

In these things they corrupt themselves. What men? Those men. Verse 11, woe to them, for they have gone in the way of Cain, have run greedily in the air of Balaam for profit, and perished in the rebellion of Korah. What men? Those men. And finally, verses 12 and 13. These are spots in your love feast, while they feast with you without fear, serving only themselves.

They are clouds without water, carried about by the winds, laid autumn trees without fruit, twice dead, pulled up by the roots, raging waves of the sea, foaming up their own shame, wandering stars for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever. Now Enoch the seventh from Adam prophesied about these men. What men? Those men. Those are the men.

That's the who. But Enoch's prophecy is not only directed toward these counterfeit intruders into the churches who are defiling the gospel and defiling the honor of the Lord Jesus Christ and seeking to lead God's people astray, but he pronounces judgment upon them and he tells us when that judgment is going to take place and when is that? It is, according to verse 14, when the Lord comes with ten thousands of his saints. Behold, the Lord is coming with ten thousands of his saints. Now that's a brief description of Christ's coming, and by the word saints here is literally holy ones.

Which term is sometimes used to refer to angels, sometimes is used to refer to saints, could include, could mean either one or the other or both, and I think probably both is the best answer here. But this description is similar to descriptions we find in both the Old and the New Testament. I'll pick out a couple from the Old Testament.

Deuteronomy 32. Now this is the blessing with which Moses, the man of God, blessed the children of Israel before his death and he said, The Lord came from Sinai and dawned on them from Seir. He shone forth from Mount Paran, and he came with ten thousands of saints.

From his right hand came a fiery law for them. He came with ten thousands of his saints, a picture of God's coming in judgment. Or the book of Daniel, chapter 7. In verse 9, Daniel says, I watched till thrones were put in place, and the ancient of days was seated. His garment was white as snow, and the hair of his head was like pure wool.

That sounds like the description of Christ out of the book of Revelation, doesn't it? His throne was a fiery flame, his sweals of burning fire. A fiery stream issued forth and came forth from before him. A thousand thousands ministered to him. Ten thousand times, ten thousand stood before him.

The court was seated, and the books were opened. Solemn, majestic, God coming to judge, accompanied by multiple thousands of angels and saints, and the time for judgment has come. When are these counterfeit unbelievers going to be judged? When the Lord comes in that final day with his judgment. As described by Jesus in Matthew 25, in verse 31, when the Son of Man comes in his glory and all the holy angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory.

Another similar description. Or this one in 2 Thessalonians 1, verse 7. And to give you who are troubled, rest with us when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, taking vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.

They shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power when he comes in that day to be glorified in his saints and to be admired by all those who believe because our testimony among you was believed. When will Enoch's prophecy be fulfilled? When the Lord comes in this majestic, glorious, triumphant coming. We call that the second coming because, of course, when Enoch wrote, the first coming had not appeared and not happened. But now Christ came in his humility and death and sacrifice upon the cross, but he's coming again, and he's coming in unimaginable majesty and glory and splendor.

It will be quite a time, quite a sight. And thirdly, what is the purpose for his coming? Well, it's very clear, verse 15, to execute judgment on all who are ungodly among them, of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.

To execute judgment upon all and to convict all, we read. The purpose of his coming is judgment. You say, is that the only purpose of his coming? It's the only one that Jude mentions.

It's the only one that Enoch mentions. If you comb the Scriptures, you will also find another purpose to exalt his saints. There will be a judgment for the saints to bestow rewards upon them for faithful service, but that's not mentioned here. But the primary purpose of his coming is to rain down the severest but most just judgment upon the ungodly who are unbelievers.

All is repeated several times. To execute judgment on all, to convict all of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against him. All unbelievers are going to be judged.

Clearly not a single one is going to escape this judgment. As an aside, another place in the Bible where all does not mean every individual without exception, it means all of a certain category. If you'll pick up interpretive clues from the Bible itself, you won't have as much trouble with the doctrine of election or the doctrine of sovereignty of God and so forth.

You won't pit against yourself this statement about all who believe and other all statements or world statements. When you come to understand how the Bible itself uses these terms, then you'll come to a clear understanding of what the Bible actually teaches. And here we have a good example of how the Bible uses the word all.

And it uses it in different ways at different times. Sometimes it will be used as an all-inclusive word that means every individual without exception, but that actually is pretty rare. Most of the time the word all is used. It means all of a certain category, and that's clear here. All the ungodly, all the unbelievers, all of those who are deserving of the judgment of God, every one of them is going to be judged without exception.

Nobody's going to escape. That's the what of Enoch's prophecy. And finally, the why. And that is also explained in verse 15. And notice how often the word ungodly is repeated. Even more than the word all. Look at it again.

Verse 15, to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against him. Four times. You say, oh, what's that look like in the Greek?

Pretty much the same. Four times ungodly. Slightly different variations on the same word. Ungodly, ungodly, ungodly, ungodly. Emphasis upon the ungodly repeated for arresting emphasis to convict them or to convince them with evidence that their judgment is completely deserved.

And the evidence is found in two categories. It is described as their ungodly deeds on the one hand and their sinful words, all the harsh things spoken against him on the other hand. That's what God in his day of judgment is going to set before each ungodly sinner and evidently before all who are gathered in his presence for that judgment. That's what God's going to set before all of the ungodly. He's going to show them a record of all of their sinful deeds. He's going to show them a record of all of their sinful words, particularly those that were spoken against God himself. I can't explain why the third category of sins, sinful thoughts, is not mentioned here because God certainly knows all thoughts and has every right to judge our sinful thoughts as well. But it may be, and this is only speculation, that because the emphasis here seems to be upon producing verifiable evidence that God is just going to confine himself to the certifiable deeds which he has a record of and can show them for others to see and certifiable words which he has a record of and have been spoken and others have heard them, all of which have proceeded from sinful thoughts. But here is the evidence, the sinful acts and the sinful words which have been spoken by unbelievers. Now that's a pretty good exposition of this text, but now let's draw a few applications from it.

Number one, what do I learn from this text? I learn that evil loses. In the final analysis, it doesn't win. It looks like it is triumphing. You look at the world around us and you say, the forces of evil, the forces of anti-Christianity, godlessness, they are making progress all around us. They are triumphing. It looks like they're going to win.

Don't you believe it? Evil loses. Mark it down, believe it, certify it, hang your hat upon it, it's not going to change. Evil loses. The messengers of Satan will not triumph. Christ has already won the victory on the cross. It will only be finalized in this day of final judgment when his triumph will be seen and certified on this day of final judgment. And as we learn elsewhere in scripture, Christ's people will be vindicated with him. Christ's righteous rule, Christ's justice, Christ's law that is a good law, his commandments, will all be vindicated on that day along with all of his saints who believe in him. All of them who've been vilified by those who hate Christ are going to be honored and exalted in unimaginable ways upon that day.

Evil loses, Christ wins, righteousness wins, truth wins, God's people win, we are exalted in that day. Hallelujah. Be patient. Be patient. When the Lord comes, everything will be made right.

Lesson number two. Final justice is certain and severe. Final justice is certain and severe. You don't want to be in the company upon whom this judgment falls. How do you escape it? Repent and believe. How do you escape it? Repent and surrender to the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the way to escape it.

It's the only way to escape it, but it's a wonderful way to escape it. We're all sinners. We're all deserving of this judgment, but there are two companies in that day. Those who refuse to believe, who refuse to repent, who refuse to surrender to the Lord Jesus Christ, and those who have repented, who have acknowledged their sin, who have cried out to Christ for mercy, who have embraced him for their salvation, who have surrendered to his authority, and all those who have done that, all of their judgment has already been placed upon Christ and has been satisfied.

The righteousness of God, the holy wrath of God, has been satisfied for all who believe in Christ. But for every unbeliever, that severe judgment will fall, which company will you be in on that day? And it would appear to be a valid inference from this text that hypocritical Christians will be some of the most severely judged. Church members, choir directors, excuse me, and members, preachers, Sunday school teachers, deacons, who have hypocritically professed Christ without truly believing in him, without fully embracing him, without truly surrendering to his authority. Hypocritical Christians, counterfeit Christians, are going to be the most severely judged in this day. Now I ask the question again. Are you going to be in that company?

And a third application. Christ knows every harsh word that has been spoken against him. What are harsh words? Well, certainly blasphemous words, including cursing.

Are you guilty of that? Condemning words, expressing your disapproval of the way God did this and the way God did this, and I don't know why he did this and why he doesn't do that. Those are harsh words spoken against him. Questioning words, I don't know about this and I don't know about that, which are simply words that expose your basic unbelief. And if you are guilty of those kinds of words against God and against his Christ, then you are going to be in the company who is judged on that day regardless of what you profess to know and believe. And if you are guilty of that, and probably all of us have been and are, I'm sure all of us are guilty of that in times and in some ways, then what's the remedy, same remedy? Repent, acknowledge your sin, acknowledge your guilt, confess it, cry out for the mercy of Christ who will always pardon those who come to him in believing faith.

But for everyone who hardens his heart and will not acknowledge his sinfulness in those blasphemous harsh words spoken against God, there will be the severest judgment falling in that day. And how do we know that? Because the Bible tells us so. How do we know that? Because an inspired author of Scripture, Jude, the brother of James and half-brother of Christ, inspired by the Spirit of God, tells us so. How do we know that?

Because Enoch, way back before the flood, a prophet of God, seventh from Adam, said so. And it's certified here by the words of Jude. This is the word of the living and eternal God. You better listen. You better heed it.

You better obey. Shall we pray? Father, thank you for giving us your word. Thank you for warning us about judgment. Thank you for exposing our sinfulness, our hypocrisy, our wrong thoughts and wrong words and wrong deeds. Thank you for giving us a remedy where sinners washed beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains. And, O Lord, rescue from among those who are hearing these words at this time. And rescue those who are yet in unbelief and bring them to sweet, repentant faith and surrender to the Lord Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen.