Adriam Rogers was a motivator, an encourager, and a leader of the faith. He was also passionate about presenting scriptural application to everyday life circumstances, and you'll hear that in today's message.
Now, let's join Adriam Rogers. Want to ask you a question? What do these schools have in common? Harvard, Yale, Columbia. William and Mary, Dartmouth, Princeton.
Well, you say they're all colleges. You're right, all universities, right? But what do they have in common? You say, well, they're Ivy League schools, most of them. But what do they have in common?
They were all founded and built for the propagation of the gospel. Of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, every one of them had a Bible foundation. Every one of them was founded for the preaching of the gospel and the training of ministers and godly Christian laymen to spread the gospel across America. What a tragedy! The same thing that has happened to these schools has happened to many once great denominations.
And the same thing that has happened to many once great denominations has happened, God help us, to many churches. There has been an apostasy. The word apostasy means a falling away from the faith, a turning from the faith, and that is what the Little Book of Jude is all about. It is a warning of the apostasy. The lapsing from the faith, the turning from the faith that is going to take place in the last days.
We're going to read together, Jude, verses one through four. All right. Jude, the servant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, to them that are sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ, and called. Mercy unto you, and peace and love be multiplied, beloved. When I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and to exhort you, that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints.
For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord, Jesus Christ.
Now the devil has tried two ways to destroy the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ and the churches of the Lord Jesus Christ. First of all, he has tried through persecution. That is, he's tried to persecute the saints and to put them in danger, even of their own lives, much less of their property. But persecution has not worked very well. There's a saying among missionaries that the blood of the martyrs.
Is the seed of the church. Not only did love grow where the blood fell, but churches grow where the blood falls. I mean, when we are willing to die for the Lord Jesus Christ, rather than stopping the work of Christ, it simply impels the work of Christ. And so many times, when the enemy comes to try to stamp out the fire, he only scatters the embers, and new fires start.
So the devil backed off. And he said, "Well, if I can't beat them, I'll join them." And if I cannot work from the outside with persecution, I will work from the inside with infiltration, and I will destroy the biblical base upon which those churches operate. And that is what he has done. And you see the key in verses three and four. Jude says, "Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you and exhort you that you should earnestly contend for the faith." Now Jude wanted to write another book of Romans.
He wanted to write about our common salvation. He wanted to preach a gospel message. He was all ready to do it, and the Holy Spirit said, "Jude, you can't preach that. You can't write that. You wanted to write about the common salvation." But you're going to have to write that we're to earnestly contend for the faith that was once for all delivered unto the saints.
Because you see, here's the problem in verse four: for there certain men crept in unawares.
Now he's talking about the apostates and how they get in. This word "crept in" means that they came in the side door. Also, the word is used of a person who would slip into water without making a ripple. Oh, how clever they are! They come in very clandestinely.
They come in very quietly, very stealthily. They come in and from the inside, like termites, destroying the foundation of a building. They work.
Now Jude said, "I have written to warn you about this, that you should earnestly contend for the faith." When he says the faith. He's not talking about faith like faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, by which we're saved or through which we're saved. But he's talking about the revealed body of truth that we call the Bible.
Now, this is called. You see what I have right here? That's called the faith. That is, this is the revealed body of truth, the Bible. And the Bible says that we are to earnestly contend for the faith.
Let me tell you just a little bit about the faith. First of all, I want to speak to you about the completeness of it.
Now he says that you are to earnestly contend for the faith that was once delivered unto the saints, but literally it says once for all. Delivered unto the saints, and some translations give it this way. That is, God gave it, and God finished it, and He's not going to add anything to it. Not one jot, not one tittle shall fail from the law till all be fulfilled. But not one jot nor one tittle shall be added to the law till all be fulfilled.
This is God's word, and friend, it is complete. We don't need any more new revelation.
Now, listen to me. We live in a day and an age of charismatic excesses and a day of cultism, where people are adding to the Word of God and subtracting from the Word of God. I'm reminded of the man who stood up and read the Scriptures and said, "If there are no additions or corrections, the Scriptures stand approved as read." Now, dear friend, there are no additions, there are no corrections, and you listen to me. Listen, if it is new, it's not true.
Now, God may give you new insights into the truth. God may illumine the truth to you, but God is not going to give you or anybody else any new truth. The faith was once for all delivered unto the saints. Look in verse eight. He says, "Likewise, these filthy dreamers.
Who are these dreamers? What does the word dreamer mean? Are these people who go to sleep in church, who come and sit down, look so reverent? They make the pastor think they're meditating. I know what kind of meditation you're doing.
You ought to pray when you sit down.
Now I lay me down to sleep. That's not what he's talking about." That's not what he's talking about when he calls them dreamers. He's talking about people who have visions, people who have extra biblical revelation, things that they have dreamed up.
Now, friend, the Bible is signed, sealed, and delivered. It is the faith that is once for all delivered unto the saints. It is complete, and not only is it complete, it is correct.
Now, you see, if you are a dreamer. If you're a visionary, if you think you have some new revelation, you're going to be wrong because that is all subjective. This is objective truth. It is never wrong. It is always right.
It is correct. You see, there's a difference in being certain and being right. Did you know that? Did you know that you can be certain and be wrong? I was in New Orleans one time when I was in seminary.
I think I'd been preaching at a rescue mission. I was going back to home, I thought, but I got confused. They call it the Crescent City. It's built on the arc in the river, there of New Orleans, and I thought I was headed in one direction away from the river, but I kept on ending up at the river, and kept on ending up at the river. And I said, "But I just know I'm going in the right direction." I'd turn around again.
My gyro in my mind, my compass in my mind was all confused. And have you ever just lost a sense of direction? I was so certain I was going in the right direction, but I kept ending at the river. Do you know what I did? I just decided I'd start going by the signs, and I got straight home.
All I had to do is just read. You know, friend, listen.
Sometimes you will be dead certain you are right, and you are dead wrong. That's the reason the Bible is here. That's the reason we have the faith that is not only complete, it is correct. The Apostle Peter was on the Mount of Transfiguration. He saw the Lord transfigured before him.
He heard God speak from heaven. But then he said in Second Peter chapter one and verse nineteen, "We have a more sure word of prophecy." More sure than what you've seen, more sure than what you've heard, valid as it may be, more sure is the word of God. It is complete, it is correct. But now listen, it is committed to you.
Now he said, "We are to earnestly contend for the faith which was once for all delivered unto the saints." Do you see it right there in verse three? It has been committed to you. That means that you are steward over this. I hear people say, "Oh, you don't need to defend the Bible; the Bible will defend itself." That sounds good. I've been guilty of saying the same thing, but Old Jude didn't say that.
Jude said, "Contend for the faith. Stand up for the faith. Speak up for the Bible." John Calvin, from whom we get the term Calvinism, said, "A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I heard the word of God attacked and did not stand up." For the Bible, because many of us today don't want to seem contentious, and because many of us don't want to enter in anything distasteful, we are seeing the faith of our fathers. We are seeing that eroded and disappearing.
Now, I want to tell you, dear friend, the apostasy is very real. Jot these scriptures down in the margin of your Bible. Second Thessalonians chapter two and verse three. The apostle Paul is speaking of the end time, and he says. That the end time cannot come, the antichrist cannot come, all of the cataclysmic things of the end time cannot come until the apostasy comes first.
Second Thessalonians two verse three: Let no man deceive you by any means, for that day shall not come except there come a falling away first. The word falling away comes from our Greek word that we get the word apostasy from. The end times cannot come until that apostasy comes. Paul told Timothy the same thing. Second Timothy four verse three: For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own lusts, shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears.
And again, the apostle Peter warned in Second Peter chapter two and verse one. For there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction.
Now that's the setting for the book.
Now it's a very frightening book, and therefore. Jude wants to give his people assurance.
Now, what God does here in this little book of Jude, and through Jude, is just to give to God's people a security blanket. He just wraps this book up in some verses that deal with security. The first verse and the last two verses deal with the security of the believer. That is, he just wraps it up in a little blanket that I want to call a security blanket. Why is this?
Because you see, when you read the book of Jude, if you're not careful, you just get to wondering if anybody's saved, even you. I mean, because Jude is so strong, this book is so powerful. When he speaks of the apostasy and the heresy and the falling away, you might get to thinking, well, maybe I could lose my salvation because. Jude is going to talk about some who seem like they were once saved, but they lost their salvation. And I believe that Jude wants to make it very, very clear that once you are a child of God, once you are born again, once you are born of the Spirit, once you've truly become a partaker of the divine nature, you can never, ever again be a lost soul.
Now let's look at those verses. Jude, the servant of Jesus Christ. And brother of James, to them that are sanctified by God the Father and preserved in Jesus Christ and called—three things Jude says about us—that tells us about the security of the believer. The very first is this: we are called. We're called.
Now, in this sentence, it's the last word, called. But it was put last in the Greek language for emphasis.
Now we put things first for emphasis, and so some translators and some of you have a more modern translation where the word called is the first word because that's being fair. That is giving the English sense of what the Greek meant. This is the emphasis. It is the very first thing. And so, what is the first reason for my security and your security?
God's sovereign purpose.
Now the word sovereign means the decree of a king, a ruler against whom there is no rising up. God has a purpose, and that purpose is seen in that God called you.
Now this word called here does not mean call like I call Paul and I say hi, Paul, come over here. No, no, no, no. The word "called" means an official summons. You see, your salvation did not begin with you; it began with God. If it began with you, you might lose it.
But since it began with God, you can never lose it because the Bible says He is able to finish what He begins. And God called you. You see, had he not called us, none of us would have been here. We love him because he first loved us.
Now I want us to think a little bit about this word "calling." It means something official. It reminds us of another verse right away, Romans chapter eight and verses twenty-eight through thirty. Listen to it. And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, who are the what's that next word? Called.
To those who are the called according to His purpose, now I'm talking about God's sovereign purpose. Are you listening? Those who are the called according to His purpose, for whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He, that is God's Son, might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, whom He did predestinate, them He also called, and whom He called, them He also justified. And whom he justified, then he also glorified.
First of all, the Bible says here that God has foreknowledge. God knows the future as well as the past and the present. God has foreknowledge, and God knows things that will transpire as though they've already transpired. And so, God is the great omniscient God.
Now, the Bible says when God foreknows. That one whom he has set his affection upon shall come to him. He predestines that person to be like the Lord Jesus.
So whom God foreknows, them he also predestines. That is, it is determined ahead of time that you're going to be like the Lord Jesus, that you're going to be conformed to the image of the Lord Jesus.
Now, when God foreknows and God predestines, then God calls and God sends the gospel to that person, so they can hear it, so they can believe it, so they can receive it, and so God calls that person. Then the one that God calls, He justifies.
Now, what does it mean to be justified? It means to be made like the Lord Jesus Christ, and God makes you in His Absolutely, totally righteous, justified by the grace of God.
Somebody said, just as if I had never sinned, justified. All right, and then those who who are justified, the Bible says He has glorified, not will glorify, has glorified. Because God lives in eternity, it's already done, friend. In God's mind, God sees you already glorified. You say, "Well, I don't think I understand all of that." I am glad you don't because I don't either, and I wouldn't want you to get ahead of me.
As a matter of fact, I wouldn't have any confidence in a God I could understand. I am glad that there is some things about God that I don't understand, but dear friend, there are some things that we do know, and I'll tell you what we do know: that which has been settled in eternity cannot be undone in time. Amen. And that that has been decreed by heaven cannot be annulled by hell. God has called you, and those that God calls will come.
Well, you say, now wait a minute. That's wonderful for those who are called, but maybe I'm not one of the called. What'll I do, Pastor? He doesn't call me. Hey, I've got good news for you.
Do you want to come? You may. You say that that's so wonderful. Let me give it to you in a verse in John chapter six and verse fifty-seven. Jesus said, "All that the Father hath given me will come to me; shall come to me." As a matter of fact, it's stronger.
All that the Father hath given me shall come to me. They're coming. That's one of the exciting things about preaching the gospel, folks. They're coming. All that the Father hath given me shall come to me.
But now listen to the second part of that verse: "And him that cometh unto me, I will in no wise cast out." You want to come? Come, and he'll receive you. Isn't that beautiful? Anybody wants to come to just get up and come, he will receive you. And the Bible says, "Hallelujah!
Whosoever will may come." Now listen, friend. That's true. God has a sovereign purpose. But the reason that I'm so secure is that my salvation did not initiate with me; it initiated with God, and it is predestined that I'm going to be like the Lord Jesus Christ. He foreknew me; he predestined me; he called me; he justified me; he glorified me already in His sight.
And so, our salvation, number one, is rooted. Our security blanket is this. God's sovereign purpose.
Second reason: not only God's sovereign purpose, but God's special people.
Now look again in verse one. Jude, the servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James, to them that are sanctified. Look at that word "sanctified." Bible scholars tell us that's not the best translation. It should be. Rather than sanctified, it should be beloved, and some translations have it that way.
Perhaps yours does. It is the same word that begins verse three, beloved. It's the same word. They're translated beloved.
Now, sanctified is good, but beloved is better in this particular instance because it tells something of the nature of God's special people.
Now, folks, God loves the lost. But the saved are His beloved. You say, "Well, what's the difference?" Well, I want to tell you. See that young guy sitting there on the front row? I love him, but Joyce is my beloved, and there's a difference, and I like the difference.
She is my beloved. She is special.
Now God loves the world, but for Him, when we get saved, we are made accepted in the beloved. And who is the beloved? The Lord Jesus. This is my beloved Son, and whom I am well pleased. And we are accepted in Him, and therefore God sees us as God sees Him.
And God's name for His own dear children: we are His special people. We are beloved.
Now this word beloved is what we call a perfect participle. What does that mean? What it means there is finished action in the past that has a result on the present. It is something that cannot be changed. It is fixed.
It is settled. Because it is settled in the past, it affects us right now. We are God's beloved. Every now and then, I'll say something profound, and I'm about to do it. And I want to warn you.
Okay.
Now listen. You are child of God.
Now pay attention. There is nothing you can do to make God love you more. I want to tell you something else. There is nothing you can do that will make him love you less. Isn't that a beautiful thought?
Nothing you can do that will make him love you more. And there is nothing you can do that will make him love you less. Because, dear friend, he can't love you any more, and he will not love you any less. He doesn't love us because we're valuable. We're valuable because he loves us.
He doesn't. Changes so he can love us. He loves us, so he can change us. He just loves us. He just loves us.
We are his beloved. How much does he love us? John seventeen, verses twenty two and twenty three. Jesus Christ is praying his high priestly prayer, and he says to the Father, "And the glory which Thou gavest me, I have given them. That is my beloved, that they may be one, even as we are one." I in them and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know.
Now listen to this, and that the world may know that thou has sent me and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.
Now, folks, did you hear that? How does God love you as He loved Jesus? The same way thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me. God loves you as He loves the Lord Jesus. That's too much to take in, isn't it?
That's the reason the Apostle John, in First John chapter three verse one, got to thinking about this love. And he said, "Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us." Do you know why he said, "Behold, what manner of love?" He was fishing for an adjective to describe that love, and he couldn't find one. He he started to say, "I suppose, behold, what super love, or what fantastic love, or what colossal love, or what spectacular love." He might have even thought a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious love. What love? And he couldn't find a word.
I heard of an Indian who was sending a love message to his girlfriend by smoke signals. He had a little fire on one hill, and she was way over there across the plain on the other hill. He was sending up little puffs of smoke, trying to tell her how much he loved her. Was out in the desert. When they were testing atomic bombs, about that time he looked on the horizon and saw a tremendous mushroom cloud.
He said, "Boy, I wish I had said that." That's the way. That's the way old John was. He's sending up little smoke signals, and there is this atomic bomb kind of love, and he doesn't even know how to express it.
So he just simply says, "Behold, what manner of love?" And that word, "manner of love," literally means, "What foreign kind of love is this? From another place? What kind of unearthly love? What otherworldly love is this? What kind of non-human love is this?
Behold, what manner of love?" That we should be called the sons of God, and you want me to tell you another reason that Jude says that we're secure, folks. We are in the beloved, and God feels about us the same way He feels about the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now that brings me to a wonderful verse, Romans chapter eight, verses twenty-eight and twenty-nine. Listen to it. The Apostle Paul said, "For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities," Nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. He didn't leave anything out, did he, folks? He mentions ten strong enemies: death, life, angels, principalities, powers, things present, things to come, height, depth, or any other creature.
There is nothing. That can separate you from the love of God. Nothing you can do to make Him love you more. Nothing you can do to make Him love you less. You are in the beloved, and God loves you as He loved the Lord Jesus Christ.
That's a pretty good security blanket.
Now, first of all, we've talked about God's sovereign purpose. You're called. Secondly, we've talked about God's special people. You are beloved. And then, thirdly, I want you to think about God's strong power.
You are preserved. Look here, if you will, and preserved in Jesus Christ.
Now look at the word "in." That's a dative, and it it most likely means preserved by Jesus Christ. Either way you put it, in Jesus Christ, for Jesus Christ, or by Jesus Christ, all are tremendous truths. But the idea is that it is Jesus Christ who is doing the preserving. His strong power. You see, you're no safer than the one who's keeping.
This word "preserved" literally means kept, kept, and it has the idea not of a guard who's keeping a prison, but it has the idea of a mother who's watching over a little baby with tender loving care.
Now, if you are a baby and your mother's taking care of you, where is the source of your security in you or in the one who's taking care of you? You see, listen, pay attention. Your security is no better than the one who is making you secure, isn't that true?
Now, if you're kept by Jesus Christ, do you think you're secure? You see, do you think He's going to lose them? That's the reason He said in John chapter ten, verses twenty-eight and thirty, "And I give unto them, talking about His own beloved, I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall any pluck them out of My hand. Out of My hand." My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all, and none is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand. I and my Father are one.
You're in better hands than all state, friend. You're in His hand. You're in His hand. It is not that you keep your salvation; it is that He keeps you. You are preserved by Jesus Christ.
And to feel insecure is really to doubt Him. Let me give you some other scriptures. Second Timothy chapter four verse eighteen, and the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work and preserve me unto His heavenly kingdom. Who delivers us? The Lord.
Who preserves us? The Lord. Second Timothy one twelve, for the which cause I also suffer these things, nevertheless I am not ashamed. For I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him. Not I am persuaded that I am going to hold out faithful to the end.
I know whom I have believed. Not in whom I just know whom. Paul didn't know about Jesus. He knew Jesus. I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.
Now the Lord Jesus prayed in John chapter seventeen and verse fifteen to the Father concerning us. I pray not that Thou shouldst take them out of the world, but that Thou shouldst keep them from the evil one. Did Jesus ever pray out of the will of God? Of course not. Did He ever pray a prayer that wasn't answered?
Of course not. He said, "Father, I thank You that You always hear me." And Jesus prayed, "Father, keep." And that prayer is an answered prayer. And so, look how Jude brings the blanket around at the tail end of the book.
Now, the first part of the book—that's one side of the blanket.
Now, at the tail end of the book, look how he sums it up in verse 24.
Now, unto him that is able to keep you from falling, do you see that? Who keeps you from falling? You? No.
Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, to the only wise God and our Savior, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen. You see, dear friend, listen. When you put the two of these truths that we've learned together, you're going to see something tremendous. On the one hand is God's fathomless love; He loves us as He loves the Lord Jesus.
We are in the beloved. On the other side is God's unlimited power. He has glory and majesty and dominion and power.
Now, when you put that love and that power together, do you see why we're secure?
Now, I would do anything I could do to protect one of my children. But I'm only human. I would do anything I could do to keep one of my children from perishing. But I'm only human. But God has a love that makes my love for my children pale into insignificance.
He has that kind of love for you, and God has tremendous power. He's able to keep you from falling.
Well, you say, well then, if I believe that doctrine of once saved, always saved, I just get saved and sin all I want to.
Well, I sin all I want to. I sin more than I want to. I don't want to. If you still want to, you've never been saved. You better get your wanner fixed.
Oh, you need a new wanner. You need to be born again. I want you to see the man who wrote this book. His name was Jude, and he described himself, Jude, a servant of Jesus Christ, in verse one. A servant, and the word that he used is the Greek word doulos, which means a bondslave.
We call it translated sounds a little nicer, a servant of Jesus Christ. But what it literally means is a bondslave of Jesus Christ.
Now, let me tell you about a bondslave. A bondslave had no personal possessions and no personal rights. I mean, if his master wanted to, he had to die for his master. He was a man under orders.
Now Jude was that kind of a man. Jude believed in eternal security, but it did not make him a rebel. It made him a bondslave of Jesus Christ. Amen. This kind of security doesn't make you want to sin.
It is a great, great, great impetus to holiness.
Now you pay attention to me. The same God who saves you is the God who will keep you. If you want to be saved today, I promise you, on the authority of the Word of God, that if you come to Him, He'll not cast you out, and He will receive you. And if He receives you, He will keep you. What a security blanket we're wrapped up in!
Hallelujah. If you would like to learn more about how you can know Jesus or deepen your relationship with Him, simply click the Discover Jesus link on our website lwf.org. For a copy of this message or additional resources, visit our online store at lwf.org or call 1-800-274-5683. Thank you.
