BibleProject - Final Instructions and a Soaring Doxology

Episode Date: February 9, 2026

The Letter of Jude E6 — In the final nine verses of his letter, Jude transitions from warning about corrupt members to instructing the faithful. In so many words, he encourages them to keep pressing on as the living temple of God’s Spirit and love. Jude also guides them in how to care for the doubting and deceived in their community, while taking necessary caution for their own holiness. And he concludes with confidence in God’s ability to protect the Church and make them stand as blameless priests, all to the praise, honor, and majesty of God. In this episode, Jon and Tim finish our series in this short but powerful letter.FULL SHOW NOTESFor chapter-by-chapter summaries, referenced Scriptures, and reflection questions, check out the full show notes for this episode.CHAPTERSLetter Recap and Words of the Apostles (0:00-22:25)Building Yourselves on Your Most Holy Faith (22:25-30:58)Showing Mercy to Some and Rescuing Others (30:58-45:24)Closing Doxology (45:24-1:08:56)BIBLEPROJECT JUDE TRANSLATIONView our full translation of the Letter of Jude.REFERENCED RESOURCESEternal Life: Jon and Tim reference this video when discussing language in Jude’s doxology about ages.The Last Battle by C.S. LewisCheck out Tim’s extensive collection of recommended books here.SHOW MUSIC“jazz club.” by Lofi Sunday, PAINT WITH SOUND“Church Pews” by Lofi Sunday, Oly.Lo, WISDM“little adventure” by Lofi Sunday, Cassidy GodwinBibleProject theme song by TENTS SHOW CREDITSProduction of today’s episode is by Lindsey Ponder, producer, and Cooper Peltz, managing producer. Tyler Bailey is our supervising engineer, who also edited today’s episode and provided the sound design and mix. JB Witty writes the show notes. Our host and creative director is Jon Collins, and our lead scholar is Tim Mackie. Powered and distributed by Simplecast. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The letter of Judah. It's a short letter at the end of the New Testament, written by a brother of Jesus, a man named Judah. It's an emergency letter warning his community about certain people who are causing serious problems. And what's so fascinating, he never highlights their teaching as such, like false teaching or false doctrine, bad theology as such.

What he highlights is the way they see the world. Judah shows us the way they see the world by comparing them to stories, characters, the Hebrew Bible. They're like the wilderness generation. They're like the rebellious angels. They're like the men of Sodom and Gomorrah. They think like Kane. They're motivated like Balam and they rebel like Korah. Now Judah just assumes you understand these stories and how they're all connected. All of those are really about one thing. The divine justice that holds humans accountable for destructive behavior. Judah references all these stories from the Hebrew Bible. He also quotes,

other Second Temple literature, but he ends with a quote from the apostles of Jesus, people who knew Jesus personally. And they say, and I'm paraphrasing here, watch out for people who are motivated by serving themselves rather than being motivated by the Spirit of God. The genuine message about Jesus

is so surprising to like basic human instinct and desire. And it's much easier to domesticate Jesus and create a version of Christianity that allows me to still, like, satisfy most of my appetites. And Jesus and Paul and John and Judah are saying, like, listen, this is not a surprise that people like this are in your community. You should know that Jesus warned us about this. There has been a lot of warning in this letter,

but the letter ends with a call to action, a call to build themselves up because they are a holy building. This new temple theology was woven in to the Jesus movement from the beginning. It's not just a creative little metaphor. It's actually using a deep theology that comes from the Hebrew Bible about the place where heaven and earth meet. And yes, there are troublemakers in your midst. And yes, they're fooling a lot of people. But you can withstand by being merciful, but also very careful.

It's hard to discern the truth. And so be patient and show mercy. But be very careful. You don't want to somehow find you. yourself in a situation where we're trying to help. Now you're part of the problem. Today, Tim Mackey and I wrap up this study in the letter of Judah, a unique look into the earliest communities that followed Jesus. Thanks for joining us. Here we go. Hey, Tim. Hey, John Collins. We're going to try to finish the letter of Judah. Yeah, we are. I'm optimistic. All right. We've

gone through a lot. I feel like we've gotten through the hardest things. When I read it, like the things I'm just like, what? Yeah, what's happening here? Yes, I agree. I agree. The body of the letter in verses 519 is where the most challenging stuff for modern readers is.

Yeah. Okay, so since this is the last episode, quick overview, I'm looking at a little chart I made to help myself think about the shape of the letter. Versus one and two, Judas is lie. Hey, family, those loved by God,

called by Jesus Messiah, mercy and peace and love overflow. Love you guys. Verse three, man, I wanted to write a super cool biblical theology of the Tanakh and the theme of salvation, but I had to stop because there's a problem. Do you think you ever finished that? You think you wrote that? I have no idea. It would be great to find that. I would be incredible.

What would we do with it, though? Can't put it in the Bible. No, you would do what he did. Yeah. Which is just have an expanded library around the Bible. Yeah. And read that because it's so valuable to have a wide library that helps you understand the Bible. Bible. There you go. Anyway, I had to write this letter to you because there's a crisis going on. The once and for all handed down faith is on the line here. Yeah. Because of certain people, these people, have snuck into

our communities. And what's so fascinating, he never highlights their teaching as such, like false teaching or false doctrine, bad theology as such. What he highlights is the way they see the world They have some fundamental views of reality that lead them to make moral choices. And those moral choices are going to lead to ruin and they're going to lead you to ruin. In other words, he highlights their way of life. Yeah.

And the way they see the world, we've had to infer... We have to infer it. By looking at what he's quoting and thinking about the problems that were happening in this time period. That's right. Reading the New Testament letters

requires some form of what New Testament scholar John Barclay called mirror reading. We're looking at this letter as in a mirror and it reflects back to whatever is in the background about the situation that Judah's writing into. We can't see it directly. All we can see are the reflection of the crisis in the mirror and you have to kind of look at what he's saying

and then infer what might have been the problem that he's talking about. And this is a skill of, reading the Bible's ancient literature. Especially New Testament letters. What crisis or situation were they written to? We don't have independent knowledge of that. But we have this letter.

So there are limits in what we can infer, but we can infer a lot. That's what we've been trying to do. He tells us that they've got a meeting with God's justice coming. And actually, that meeting with God's justice was written about long ago. And now we begin to understand like, oh, that's why. he's appealing to the stories of all these Hebrew Bible stories. The future, like, justice that God's going to bring, we can know what that's going to be like by looking at the past and seeing how God's done in the past. How God brought justice in the past. primarily the flood. Then he also goes to Sodom and Gomorrah, but also the wandering for 40 years and the Israelites dying in the wilderness or the rebellion of Korah or what happened to Baylam or what happened to Kane.

Yeah. All of those are really about one thing for him. The divine justice that holds humans accountable for destructive patterns of behavior. They've distorted God's generosity into a lack of self-control. And so living that way, they deny the Lord Jesus, their master in the way that he called his followers to live. So that's what he said, these people, that's essentially what they're doing. and then he worked through two sets of biblical patterns. And you referenced most of them just now.

Just right there. Yep, that's right. I think you just missed the Sons of Cora. Oh, the Sons of Cora. Yep, that's right. So let me give you three stories, and then he applies it to these people. Let me give you three more characters,

apply it to these people. Yeah. And then he moved into two prophecies, one ancient, one contemporary, that reaffirms that these are the kinds of people that were anticipated long ago. Okay, and the ancient prophecy was reading from Enoch. Yeah.

That was from the first literary unit of Enoch. Yep. So there's another way to see. I'm zooming in now to just this little section, verse 14 and 19. So you have an ancient prophecy. Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied, and even that word, the pro, right there.

So prophesai is a compound word in Greek. Oh. The facade comes from famous. or phases in Greek, which means to utter. Okay. And then pro means before, to utter beforehand. Okay. To prophesae.

And then he quotes from Enot, and then he applied it to these people. And that's what we read last time. Now he's going to quote from what the apostles spoke beforehand. And they pro spoke. So there's that pro, there's before. And then the word speak, pro amy men on, so they spoke beforehand. Okay. So ancient speaking beforehand and a recent speaking beforehand.

Two different words, but they mean similar things. Yep. Yeah, they're synonyms. Exactly right. So let's read what the apostles said recently, shall we? Verse 17, but you, loved ones, remember the words spoken beforehand by the apostles of our Lord Jesus, Messiah. So the first people called apostles are the 12 disciples. The disciples.

Mm-hmm. And then apostles refers to their role. It just means people who are sent from the Greek word apostello. Okay. So before Jesus went to Jerusalem to get killed, he went around Galilee announcing the kingdom of God and was told one story in Matthew, and Luke where he sends out the 12 ahead of him to go get people ready. He sends them out. Then he also sent out the 72 in Luke.

Right. So the apostles is a way of talking about both the 12 and then about, his whole discipleship community who was sent out to represent him to a larger group. Okay. And the Apostles is a term that can sometimes mean the smaller group, sometimes mean the larger group. I think probably here he's thinking about the larger group, so not just the 12. Okay. It's anyone who has a designation have, I'm sent by Jesus, or they need to be a part of Jesus' crew in some way when he was alive.

It seems like the phrase apostles, if you track it in the book of Acts, it refers to, first of all, somebody who had an encounter with the risen Jesus. Okay. And in that first generation, it meant like you either saw Jesus before his execution or after his resurrection. And you witnessed him, you encountered him, and now you were so changed by that encounter. You were going and dedicated your life to sharing the news about him. But the apostles are known in the New Testament, both as the 12 and as a larger circle, of people who are preserving the true teaching about Jesus, the faithful representation of his story of how he, like, presented himself. Because already in the first generation, you're going to have questions about somebody goes and says,

Hey, I heard from Jesus, I saw him. Here's what he says, let's live this way and let's stake our whole lives on it. That's a pretty big demand, challenge to make. How do you know if they're representing who Jesus really said he is? And so in the early generations, the circle of the apostles was really significant because they were sort of like the living witnesses to who Jesus really was. So he's saying, listen, they had a message. to speak to the Jesus movement everywhere in all its forms.

And what they said is this, verse 18. At the end of time, there are going to be mockers, who are going to walk according to their irreverent, that's again our word, godless, anti-divine authority, walk according to their desires. It's a familiar theme by now. Then he applies it, again, these people, He uses the phrase, these people.

Well, and where does this quote come from? Exactly. We don't know. Yeah, I'll finish reading it, and then we'll get there. These people... Oh, I thought that was the end of the quote. That is the end of the quote. Then verse 19 comes and follows...

He applies it. Remember, because he had the Enoch quote, and then he applied it to these people. Okay. Now it's the quote from the apostles. He applies it. These people, here's what they do. Here's how you know.

They live just driven by their desires. Not by representing Jesus, but by representing their desires. They generate division everywhere they go. They are, this is a hard word to translate, sikiki. They are bound. Sikiki. From their, from their body, their embodiedness.

They're, yes, yeah. They're bound to what their physical senses and desires. The world as presented to them by their five senses and the desires generated. That's their universe. and they can't see anything above and beyond that. Your body drives your decisions. Yeah.

That's what he's describing. Okay. So notice they generate division. They are driven by wherever their body and appetite guides them. That's where they go. They don't have the spirit. Huh. You don't have the spirit.

Yeah. Okay. Which on one level is not true. Because everyone is alive. If you're breathing, according to, Genesis 1 and 2, you are borrowing God's spirit. Okay. So what they mean is they don't have the spirit that leads you to life eternal

that has been made available to us through the risen Jesus Messiah. Yeah. That's what he means. Right. Yeah. Because the spirit of Jesus is the spirit of God that allows you to transcend the limits and boundaries of the current out of Eden order. and reconnect you to the eternal life of the garden, so to speak,

and they're not in touch with anything outside of their own physical bodies and appetites. So that's what that little triad means there. Okay. So, man, if you have somebody who's not connected to a spirit that transcends their bodily breath and nothing that transcends their bodily desires, they're just going to leave a wake of broken relationships wherever they go in division. and Jesus and the apostles

tried to say like beware of people who live that way because they're going to do real damage to our communities and how we're trying to bear witness to a different way of living as a human. So that's the basic idea of this paragraph. What's he quoting from?

Yeah, what's he quoting from? Isn't that interesting? Yeah. Like, where did he get this? Yeah. What does he mean here? Was there a scroll of the apostle's sayings? Yeah, so let's think.

So here I've just pulled together kind of like the top greatest hits list of moments where Jesus or other apostles said things like this. These would be familiar passages to you. In Matthew 24, the night before Jesus gets arrested, he's telling his disciples, listen, false messiahs and false prophets are going to arise after me. They might even do signs and wonders like I've been doing. but they are going to mislead you, even if it's possible mislead God's chosen ones. That is the elect.

So Jesus sees himself preparing the righteous remnant among Israel that's going to survive the flood of the Roman onslaught of Jerusalem. People are going to lead you into all kinds of ways and say, this is how God's rescuing the world now. I'm telling you in advance. If it doesn't look, smell, or sound like me, Jesus says, it's not me. The Apostle Paul, when he was under arrest,

he was on a ship going to Rome, stand on trial. He stopped by the southern coast of Greece, and a whole bunch of people came to him from Ephesus, from the church he planted there, and he gives the speech in Acts chapter 20. It's very powerful. And he says, I know that after my departure, savage wolves will come among you,

not sparing the flock. Oh, Jesus also used that image. In the sermon on the mount. Yeah. That's right. Look out for the wolves. There like trees with no fruit. With no fruit.

Doubably dead, as Jude says. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. A letter that Paul wrote to Timothy, he said, listen, the spirit has been telling us that in the last days, in the times of the end, some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits, even theology. and doctrines that do not come from the spirit of God, come from an opposite spirit, and by means of liars and hypocrites that have seared their own conscience like with an iron.

It's not a vivid image. Seared their own conscience like with an iron. Yeah. What does that mean? Well, your conscience is the voice inside of you that tells you the difference between right and wrong. Yeah. Oh, I think the idea is,

Have you ever had a wound? I'm thinking of... Oh, cauterizing? Yeah, it's like cauterizing skin, and you can turn it into kind of a numb, almost like skin that has no nerves anymore. I see, right. It's not sensitive.

Oh. Yeah, if you burn your hand with an iron, it could make your skin become calloused and not sensitive. Yeah. Though I suppose sometimes people have scars and they're like extra sensitive. But he's talking about the opposite. Okay, right, right.

All their nerves and sensitivity to the difference between good and bad, it's gone. And then they lead others down the same path. So you can kind of see the theme here. I have another passage from 2 Timothy, another passage from John. So this is a theme in the New Testament about warning. And it's true, man, the message, the genuine message about Jesus is so surprising to like basic human instinct. Right? and desire, loving your enemies, giving away things that gives you security and comfort, right?

It's just wildly counterintuitive to follow the way of Jesus. And it's much easier to domesticate Jesus and create a version of Christianity that allows me to still like satisfy most of my appetites and doesn't demand much of me at all. It doesn't make much of a difference in the world. as a result. And Jesus and Paul and John and Judah are saying, like, listen, this is not a surprise that people like this are in your community. You should know that Jesus warned us about this. That's what he's saying. Yeah. In essence. Okay. And likely there was some sort of quote. Did they write these things down? Yeah, it's interesting. Or is it just in the air? It's like we know this saying from the apostles. Yeah. It seems like what he's saying is this is a theme

in the teaching that comes to us from Jesus and the apostles, and here's the basic idea. Yeah. We're living at the end of days. Yeah. The resurrection of the Messiah has come. Final justice is, well, you don't know exactly when, but it will come,

and there are people that are living as if it's not true, that God won't bring that kind of final justice. So the structure of this is really interesting. The body of the letter in verses 5 to 19, he had two sets of three narrative hyperlinked analogies, right? He had rebellion of the spies, the rebellion of the rebel sons of God, the watchers, and then rebellion of Sodom. Okay.

And all those were about people who met judgment, divine justice. Yeah. Then he applied it to these people. Then he did the three short analogies of Cain, Balaam, and Cora, because they have gone on the way of Cain. Then he gave the six short little wordpaping. pictures. Yeah. Then we had the two prophecies, long, ancient prophecy of Enoch. Oh, Enoch just happened to live in the days of the watchers, right? The rebel sons of God. Yeah, it's connected to that. Then a longer application

to these people. Then he had a shorter prophecy of the apostles about people who go after their own desires. Oh, it's like, just like a lot like pain. So he's really wrapped the section. tight together. Now also notice the narrative analogies all come from the Hebrew Bible. Oh, the prophecies don't. They come from, as it were, extra Tanakh source, prophecy of Enoch, but still valuable, even like coming to us as God's wisdom.

And then he quotes from the apostles, which are also not yet writings that are considered part of a biblical collection. Yeah, because they're not part of the Hebrew Bible. But they do have a divine wisdom and authority to bring us, because they represent the Lord Jesus. There are some scholars who think, and I think there's something to it, that this is another little piece of evidence to say,

just because Judah and his community valued the Enoch scroll, even as offering divine wisdom, doesn't necessarily mean that he thought it was part of the Hebrew Bible. Okay, because it's separated here. He's separated out. Here's the stuff from the Hebrew Bible. This is what these people are like. Here's some stuff that's additional to the Hebrew Bible.

Enoch, the apostles. It just so happens the apostles end up writing stuff that becomes part of the Christian Bible. Exactly. But Judah's writing when the documents of the New Testament are being written. Yeah, yeah. They don't exist as a collection. They don't exist as a collection. So he's writing before the collection of the New Testament.

Okay. So remember he said, I need you guys to struggle for the faith, wrestle for the faith. Remember that? Back up here. Let's go back up to verse 3 and 4. I was making every effort to write to you all this really cool book, but I had to write to you all to contend for the faith that was handed down once and for all. Because these people, everything in verses 5 and 19 has been about these people. These people. So contend for the faith. It's literally the word for like grapple. Grapple for the faith. It's going to require hard work and wrestling. So we know why they need to wrestle. What does it look like? He hasn't said to do anything yet. Right. Finally.

Okay. In verse 20, he's going to like tell them to do something. Okay. And here's what he says. This is the only positive instruction in the whole letter. It's verses 20 to 23. But you, loved ones, there's two things. Building yourselves on your most holy faith

and praying by means of the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God while you're waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Messiah resulting in life of the age. That's kind of interesting set of sentences. You are loved, so keep yourself... You're the loved one. Yeah, you are loved, so keep yourself in the love of God.

There's a little riddle right there. Yeah. You are those who are loved by God. That's what the loved ones means. So stay there. So stay there. Yeah. then there's kind of three ways to do that.

Three ways to do that. Building yourselves on your most holy faith and praying by means of the spirit. And waiting. Motivated by that anticipation of the mercy that's coming our way. So real quick, building. This is architectural metaphor.

You're making a structure on a foundation. You're creating something. Yeah, you're building walls in a structure structure on a foundation, build yourselves on. So he goes back to that phrase, the faith, which means both the ideas and the story that you see yourself living within, learning that, and then also responding to it with faithfulness and trust. And the word faith is a way of getting at both of those. So maybe it's just easiest to see other apostles using the same metaphor. So in Ephesians, too, for example, Paul will talk to a bunch of non-Israelites who are

followers of Jesus and say, hey, listen, you're no longer strangers and aliens in the family of God. You're actually fellow citizens. And by aliens it means immigrants, right? Yes, exactly right. You're not a refugee or an immigrant in the family of God. You are a fellow citizen with the holy ones, and you're a part of God's household, his oikos. You are being built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets. That is Jesus and the apostles, and then Moses and the prophets. He's holding the old and new together. Okay. As one foundation. Messiah himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole building is fitted together into a holy temple in whom you are being built together into a dwelling of God in the spirit. It's the same set of ideas, right?

Yeah, yeah. Right here. Building referring to them. They're the building. The people are the temple. Yeah, and then what they're building is a temple. And because of a temple, the purpose of a temple is the place you go to dwell with God, to meet God, to live with God, to encounter God. That's what you guys are, that place. Exactly. Yeah. So it's not just a creative little metaphor. It's actually using a deep theology that comes from the Hebrew Bible about the place where heaven and earth meet. Now, Judah here wouldn't necessarily have known Paul's metaphor of the body and the temple. No, what I'm saying is both Paul and Judah are pulling on a much deeper theme from the Hebrew Bible itself about the new temple. This new temple theology was woven in to the Jesus movement from the beginning, from Jesus himself.

he was claiming to be the temple like when he went to Jerusalem and pulled that stunt there by driving out all the money changers and remember John whispers in John chapter 2 and earth says the temple he's talking about is his body yeah so the temple was a symbol and a pointer to the union of heaven and earth through a portal and Jesus called himself actually one greater than the temple

Where was that? That story is in Matthew's Gospel, in Matthew 15, calls himself one greater than the temple, which is just stunning thing to say. So these two actually go together. You're building yourselves on your most holy faith. And what's saying is, y'all are the temple of God, and you're built on this foundational teaching and claim

about who Jesus is as the new human, the portal of heaven and earth. So behaviors, that go to building healthy community relationships and networks of support so that we can embody the way of Jesus together. It's really hard to follow the sermon on the Mount by yourself. But get a, right, a crew of a few dozen around you and you commit to this. Make it the normal? Yeah, it becomes plausible in your little social world that you create.

And then you really discover that giving is better than receiving. and that sexual integrity and faithfulness is better than meeting your sexual appetite every time your body tells you to meet that need or desire. And you start discovering what real life is together. These are all the things I think what do you mean? That's the building. It's the building. And then as you are building yourselves, you are praying by means of the spirit.

Remember, he just said in the previous line, these people cause division. and they're driven by their appetites. They don't have the spirit. And now here we get the flip. Yeah. So the spirit is about recognizing that the very presence, the glory that within the temple

is among you all. So he joins those together, building and praying. Yeah. And as you build and pray, that's connected to keeping yourselves in the love of God while you wait for the day of the Lord.

He calls it the mercy of the Lord. Oh, interesting. I've asked this question. kind of before, like, is the day of the Lord and the Old Testament prophets, good news or bad news? And it's kind of like, wow, what kind of world are you building? What kind of life are you building? Depends on what you're holding on to and what you've built, yeah.

Yeah, if most of your life needs to get dismantled because of how you've been building it, it's going to be a tough day. But if you've been at least trying to build a life trajectory along the way of Jesus, then a lot of that stuff's going to shine on the day of the Lord. I guess in either way, it's a mercy. Totally. Actually, I think that's true.

Yeah. But typically, it's justice when it's assigned to dismantling, and it's mercy when it's assigned to rebirthing and honoring. So anyway, that's a cool little lines. You loved ones, building yourself on the most holy faith, praying by means of the spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God while waiting for the mercy of Messiah resulting in life of the age.

Yeah. It's rad. It's got a cadence to it. Yeah. He's getting his preaching hat on. Do you think that then maybe existed as some sort of benediction or prayer or liturgy? Because it does have that kind of sense to. Yeah.

Yeah. Again, first five, I want to remind you all of stuff you all already know. Yeah. So it seems like he's pulling on phrases that already have familiar ideas underneath them. He then moves on to something a little more specific. It's interesting, versus 22 and 23. To those who are wavering, show mercy. And others, you should rescue, snatching them from the fire.

And to others, show mercy with fear, hating even the garment polluted by the flesh. Okay. We're back to like code language here. Code speaker. Yeah. What? Okay. Okay.

This is a fascinating little rabbit hole. Maybe I'll just flagged. I kind of knew this. I remembered this from maybe my survey class on these letters from Bible College. But in diving into this, again, I realized how deep the rabbit hole is here. The letter of Jude versus 22 and 23 has probably what is one of the most complicated textual manuscript problems in the entire new test. Really? Yes.

Oh, I didn't know. that? It is so fascinating. Okay. So what I mean by that is going back to our earliest text witnesses for Jude, some of them come from second century, like fragments, and then I'll ride on through into the medieval period. There is such a huge diversity of variant readings of these verses that is not typical. They're wildly different from each other in a way that's more extreme than most. Am I going to find pretty different translations then? What this means is you're going to find different translations,

and I first came across this randomly. The first kind of like cross-cultural Bible teaching experience I ever did back this a couple decades ago, I went to Ukraine. One of my seminary professors have asked me to co-teach a class with him. Okay. Like late 90s? Ukraine. It was 90.

No, Jessica and I were first married. So it was actually the fall of time. 2001. Okay. Somehow, at some point, these verses came up. Okay. In the session, I was teaching. Oh, wow.

So they were reading to me in English on the spot, translating what their Ukrainian Bible said, and I was like, what? What did that say? Okay. It was wild, and that's how I learned about this first. All right. On the ground. Yeah.

On the ground. On the ground. Okay. The difference is really in verse 23. So verse 23, here's NIV. save others by snatching them from the fire to others show mercy mixed with fear hating even the clothing stained by corrupted flesh

That's NIV. Similar to actually what I have in my translation. King James Actually, most of the modern translations that I have here all go that same route. Essentially have it as a three-part saying. There are many manuscripts and importantly, the oldest manuscripts of Jude

have it as a two-line saying, not a three-part saying. So they're just missing first? Mm-hmm. They're missing a line. So here's the fifth-century manuscript, Codex Ephraimi. Some who are wavering rebuke,

and others rescue from the fire snatching them in fear. So it's even like more terse? It's two lines instead of three, and instead of show mercy on those who are wavering, it's rebuke. those who were wavering.

Okay. And actually, this is how this came up in that Ukrainian classroom. Oh, because they had rebuke. They had those who are doubting rebuke. Oh. And maybe that was the theme. Something about doubt and faith came up, and I was talking about the importance of doubt. Oh.

And, yeah, this was it. And then a couple of pastors said, like, wait, what? You, like, try to, like, honor people or honor people's doubts when they have doubts. And I was like, yeah, man, you got to help people. because their questions are important. And then one of them said, well, what about Jude? Verse 22, rebuke those who are doubting. And I was like, what?

And I just had my Greek Bible in front of me, and I was like, that's not what it says at all. And then we had this whole thing where I realized that the Ukrainian translation was based on Greek manuscripts that were different than anyway. Super interesting. It's possible that the two-line poem

that actually said, Rebuk Those Who Doubt got turned into a three. line poem that says show mercy on those who doubt? I think it's most likely, and if you look in most commentaries, the word rebuke and the word show mercy are just a couple letters different in Greek. It's more likely that show mercy got like mangled in a manuscript transmission into rebuke. Because the word mercy is a word to watch in this whole letter.

It's repeated. It's one of the most repeated words. And he just said, we're waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Messiah. He's going to show mercy on us. Yeah. So, man, those who are wavering or doubting, show mercy. So maybe I'll just say, this version I have in front of you of verse 21 to 22 is a very plausible, I think even probable reading, but I can't guarantee that this is exactly what Judah wrote. Some Ukrainian pastors differ.

Yeah. Or the translators who made that translation chose the Greek text base. Yeah, yeah. and but it's yeah it's complicated okay so what i think judah's going for here is verse of 22 and 23 are become very practical yeah right now on the ground in our community we've got people in a bunch of different positions yeah situations in light of the presence of these people in our community we have some people who are wavering de creano they don't know which who's telling the truth Yeah.

I've got, these people are so nice. They've come, they're flat. They're like, yeah, they're got some charisma. They seem really nice. Yeah. They're easy to get along with. They invite me to their parties. Right.

They got a good party. Yeah. But you're telling me that actually this other part of our church community is actually really represents the way of Jesus. How am I supposed to know? Okay. So have mercy on them. Yeah, show mercy.

Like, um, that's hard. It's a hard place to be. Sometimes it's hard to discern the truth. Okay. And so be patient and show mercy. Mercy, this is... It's exactly from the beatitudes in the sermon on the mount. And remind me, the word underneath that.

It's about going above and beyond obligation or duty. Okay. You know, there's a general duty. Is this the word that translates Hesed or Loyola? Yes, yeah, exactly. Okay. Yeah. Show an overabundant, kind of like the way a parent will show just a little more.

leniency towards their own kid for their misbehavior. Okay. Yes. Because they're their kid. Got it. This is your sibling and the Messiah. Yeah. So, they may be making a poor decision about who to hang out with now. But don't lay

into them. Be gentle. Yeah. Be kind about it. That's step one. Now, others, there are some others where maybe you need to do an intervention. They actually have become so clouded and they're thinking, they think that following Jesus

doesn't have anything to do with how you spend your money. And they've been hanging out with these people now, the ones who snuck in, and I can see patterns of greed, and whatever, I don't know. Think of the stories that you could fill in. They're like, some people,

you just need to get in there and rescue them. Okay. Like intervene. And they calls it snatching them from the fire. So meeting the... the divine fire of justice that Paul calls like the day of, like in 1st Corinthians 3, the day of the Lord is like fire that's going to burn away all of the wood, hay, and straw. And it won't be pleasant if you're mostly invested in your life and wood hay and straw.

So intervene. Some show mercy. Some show mercy. They're kind of wavering back and forth. Be patient. Be patient. Some are like, they stopped wavering. They're in it.

Yeah. Like rescue mission. Rescue mission. Yep. Okay. Yep. And others show mercy, but be very careful. Hmm.

Hmm. And then he uses this what is to us an odd figure of speech, hating even the garment polluted by the flesh. Okay. So I think, we talked about this phrase. Pollution of the flesh refers to sex. Yeah. Yeah. Primiscuous sex.

So I think, again, because he said these people, their sexual ethic is basically guided by their appetites. And for somebody who's fallen into that pattern with them, show mercy on them, like get involved, help, point them to the right direction, but be very careful. Essentially what I was saying is be really careful. Yeah.

Hating even the garment. Okay. So these phrases, snatching from the fire, hating the garment. These, of course, are hyperlinks. Oh, okay. Yeah, which kind of helps. It's really interesting.

So both of these lines right here come from, a passage in Zechariah 3. We already looked at Zechariah 3 a number of episodes ago, but I think let's upload it again because these details are super important for what Jude is doing right here. Here's the scene.

Zechariah is the prophet is living in the days of Ezra and Nehemiah after the exile. They've rebuilt the temple. They've reinstated the priesthood. And he has this vision, this dream, that shows him the high priest of Israel standing right in front of the messenger of Yahweh. But then the Satan is right there standing beside him to accuse him at his right hand.

So you got this scene where you have God's chosen one, the representative, right, who's supposed to represent God to Israel and Israel to God. You've got a messenger of God on one side and you've got the evil one. And the evil ones trying to accuse the... high priest before God. And Yahweh said to the accuser, may Yahweh rebuke you, oh, Satan. So, Yahweh responds to the accuser by saying, may Yahweh rebuke you. Yeah, and the third person. That's right. Yeah. So likely what that means is, do you remember the messenger of Yahweh and Yahweh or like? Yeah, this is ambiguity. Two sides of the same coin. Yeah. That's right. So I think when it says

Yahweh said to the accuser what we're meant to see is the angel of Yahweh. Representing Yahweh. Okay. And so he says, may Yahweh rebuke you. This is the section quoted by Judah, but connected with the death and the burial of Moses. Yeah, that we read earlier. Earlier. Michael, the angel quotes this.

That's right. So he already has this passage on the brain. Okay. This, Yehoshua, Joshua, he's a smoldering stick. that has been snatched out of the fire. So this is a poetic way of describing, he's the representative of the Israelites who just got pulled out of Babylon.

Oh, okay. Which was the fire of God's justice. So you've got Israel's high priest that's just been snatched out of Babylon along with his people, and he was standing there in my dream, closed with filthy, polluted garments, standing there before God.

Okay. It's the idea of, Israel just went through exile because of centuries of covenant violation, idolatry, injustice, neglect of the poor. Yeah. They've been rescued from that. They've come back, snatched out of the fire, and now they're going to rebuild the temple. And essentially, this is like the satan standing before them, or the snake coming and saying,

you have no right to be God's represent. You have no right to be God's people. Your garments are filthy. The accuser. Yeah. And so then this goes on about removing the garments. Yes. What God's response is, well, then let's change this guy's clothes.

So that he can stand before me. In fact, clothes him with festival robes. Like, get this guy ready for Passover. Get this guy ready for... The real party. Yeah. It's really cool. And so he gets all new clothing and then the pure turban on his head.

And the turban, you know, of the high priest had the phrase on it, holy and set apart for Yahweh. So this is the network of text, Jude's relying on here. So rescue others, snatching them out of fire. Just like God rescued our ancestors out of exile. Do that for others. Okay. Save them from a life of exile. That's right, yes.

And for people who are making choices, especially with regard to sex, that are going down that road. Just be very, very careful. Because it's very polluting. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, you don't want to somehow find yourself in a situation where your sexual desires overtake you

and you're trying to help. Now you're part of the problem. Okay. And these are all referring to not these people. No, he's referring to... Just the community that's trying to figure out what to do in light of these people. Yep, you got it.

Okay. So these are the only, like, positive, practical instructions that he gives. And they're both general, but they're also very practical and makes sense in light of the situation that he's been scrapping. And is that the end of the letter? There's a little doxology. Okay. So, to God, be. That's the basic form.

He's made up much longer than that, but... That's the basic form. of this doxology. To God be glory, majestic greatness, strength and authority. That's the basic thing that he said. But he's filled out, he's made it longer in all these really cool ways.

But that phrase right there, the doxology, to God be praised. I don't know who first showed me Monty Python's the Holy Grail. Have you seen it? It's been a long time. Yeah. It holds. It's so funny, man. It holds up. Anyway, there's a moment when

the actor, where he says, may God be praised. I watched it kind of scanning through certain parts with my kids, and we are just on the floor laughing the whole time. And that line now, we say all the time to each other, may God be praised. Okay. But this is a common doxology. To God. To God be. To God be. To God be.

To God be. To God be. To God be. Okay. So Judah, he is taking what, you know, we don't know. Are we a decade? Are we two? three into the Jesus movement post-resurrection. We don't know. But, you know, there's classic Roman, Greek-style conclusions to how you finish writing a letter. And the early Christian authors took that tradition from Greek and Roman letter writing and provided these uniquely Christian tweaks on them. And so Jude is giving his own. Well, remind me, what would be a common way to end a new Disimal letter.

Yeah, so here. I've got a whole bunch right here. Yeah, so the end of Philippians. Now to our God and Father, be glory forever and ever. Amen. There's a little one in Paul. It's actually not a conclusion, but it is a doxology near the beginning of Paul's letter to Timothy.

Now, to the king, eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, beyond our glory forever and ever amen. The end of Romans. Now, and you'll see some similarities. Now, to him who is able to establish you according to my gospel, to the only wise God through Jesus Messiah, be glory forever. Amen. It's got some similarities to Jews. To the God who is able, that's what, so Judah says, to the one who is able to protect you from stumbling and to make you stand blameless, to God our rescuer through Jesus, be glory. It's very similar. So notice what we're doing is we're filling out the identity of God

and with different activities, things that God has done. And also we're joining together the uniquely Christian claim that to know God's identity, you also need to know Jesus' identity. To know Jesus is to know God and to know God is know Jesus. Judah doesn't mark God as Father at the end here. He did at the beginning. Oh, beginning. Yeah, because those who are beloved in God the Father.

But here it's just God and Jesus, I think meaning God the Father and Jesus our Lord. So the point is that these doxologies allowed early Christian authors to add certain descriptions of God that made it relevant. to the context of what they're writing. So it's interesting that Judah highlights God's ability to keep you from stumbling.

Thinking of the context of this emergency letter he wrote, which is about the potential of these house church communities to have people who stumble and fall down. Do you use the word stumble? No, I was going to say. That's not a great...

How I would say it. Okay. Tripping? Get tripped up. Tripped. You're walking and you, Your foot hit something and you fall down. What would you call that?

Yeah, tripping. Tripping. To the one who can protect you from falling down. Falling down would be a decent way to do it. Tripping can make you feel like, oh, I tripped. Like an accident? Yeah. Where, oh, stumbling's not accidental?

Just the word they uses, Ptaio is like you fall down. Just falling down. But because you tripped. But because you tripped. Falling down. you tripped. But you never mean to do that. That's exactly right. Okay. Yeah. You're not trying to, but something can happen out of your control and you end up on the ground. Okay. What would you say? Man, I was walking, I tripped and I fell down. I see. That's really what we're talking about.

Falling down. Yeah. It protects you from falling down. Okay. Yeah. That makes sense. You don't quite get the tripping idea in falling down because you can fall down for any number of reasons. Yeah. Not necessarily tripping. Right. But you're walking on a path. Yeah. your foot hit something, you didn't plan for it to be there, and now all of a sudden you're on the ground and it hurts. We do talk about face planting. It's like a real bad trend. To the one, yeah.

So notice actually, the opposite is standing up. The one who can protect you from falling down. Okay, that makes sense. And to the one who's able to make you stand up. Okay. So these churches are in danger of falling down because of these people in their midst. The ship can go down. Yeah, that's right.

But God can both protect you. and God can give you strength and ability to withstand this as a community and come out the other side, and so you can stand before God blameless in the presence of His glory. Notice standing before God in the presence of His glory, this is the language of the priests. Oh. Or the sacrifices, the animals. They're supposed to be blameless. That's right.

too so we're taking language used of of what the priests would do when they would bring the gifts and offerings to god and you can stand before god without any doubt or any insecurity about your relationship before god in fact you can stand blameless with joy you're just stoked all of a sudden the divine glory is not a threat anymore it's just cause for celebration yeah it's a cool idea yeah being able to stand to doesn't feel that exciting. I stand every day. Oh, sure. Yeah, yeah.

And if I fall down, okay, I might bruise my knee, but I could stand right back up. For some reason, it doesn't evoke a lot of like, oh, yes, okay, I'm not going to fall. I guess when you get older, falling does suck more. Yeah. But then when you bring in these pictures of standing in the glory, like a priest, that evokes a lot more emotion.

Yeah. And then the joyfulness of that, that's a cool kind of standing. Yeah, because often when people experience God's powerful glory in the Bible, they freak out. They think they might die. Right. And this is the opposite of that. Okay. So in the middle of this crisis that could really damage a lot of people, he's ending on a note of confidence, not in their ability, but in God's ability.

both protect them and to give them the strength, the courage, resilience to stand through this challenge and trust that they're going to stand blameless in the presence of its glory. Yeah. And he kind of sneaks in their identity there then as priests. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, totally. Yeah. Remember, he just said, build yourselves up on the foundation of the Most Holy Faith.

And that's temple language too. So they are the temple that's hosting God's presence, and they are the priest. experiencing God's presence in the temple that they are. That's cool. So, two, now that he's described God in that way, relevant to the crisis that the letter, you know, is all about, and he says, to the only God, you see the Shma peeking out there. So, hero Israel, the Lord, our God is the one. The only one. Yeah, the only one.

The only God through Jesus Messiah, our Lord. So who is the one God? the father and the son. To that God. Our rescuer? God, our rescuer. Yeah, he's rescued us through Jesus. And that's the word we use for salvation?

Yes, it is the word salvation. Savior. Okay. God or Savior. Okay. Would be a standard English translation. That's probably what I'll find. Okay.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Four things. Glory. That is honor. Majestic greatness, like royal, awesome.

Awesomeness. Strength. Wait, hold on. And authority. Majestic greatness, royal awesomeness. Yeah. I mean, it is the word greatness, but we're talking about the greatness of like people of high status. King, this royal language.

This is what people would say when they entered into the court of the Roman emperor, stuff like this. All right. Oh, wise emperor, you know, all beneficent one to you be honor and great. Greatness and strength and authority. Yeah. That's kind of the language that this belongs to. The world that this language belongs to. Okay.

Mm-hmm. And how, for how long should God be given glory, greatness, strength, and authority? What do you mean given? We can't give God anything. No, to God be. Okay, to God be. To God be to glory. So we're just kind of, what is that, what are we doing there?

We're just recognizing. Yeah, God is worthy of the greatest honor and adoration and praise. Yeah, we're just squarely in the language of Christian worship because God is just the infinite source of goodness and life, power. And that is the God that's chosen to share himself, his very self with us through Jesus Messiah. So it's just reveling in the beauty of God. Yeah, but this is coming to us from a world, an honor, shame culture, where verbal expression to increase the honor and status of another is part of how you express loyalty and devotion and love.

Yeah, but I can imagine it being done out of just obligation and fear and duty. Oh, sure. Right? Sure. Walking into a king's or emperor's palace would be like, oh, great one and powerful one. And just feeling like, I don't cross this person. I'm sure that happens. That probably happens in churches all over.

And that still happens in churches. Right? Yeah. Yeah. What do you, yeah, what's the attitude here, do you think, for Jude? I think it's 100% genuine. Yeah. The guy he grew up with, he confesses as the divine lord of the world.

who out of love was sent by the father to lay down his life for the sins of the world. And then rose victorious over death and sin and the grave and loves us and his sharing his very life being with us. Yeah. Like you come to terms with that in any little way. And yeah, it seems like there would be this moment of delight. And then it's expressed out of that delight. Yeah. Yeah, verbally expressing someone's greatness and power and in a form of lavish public praise. This is not native to me as Upper West Coast American of the 21st century.

I don't relate to anybody like this. Right. And the people I respect, if I did that to them, they'd be like, dude, chill out. Okay, like we're just hanging out. Okay, but we do have these moments, Even if we don't live in a culture or subculture that expresses honor to each other, we do know there are moments to give public honor to someone when they've done something really cool.

And you've been in those situations where someone's being honored publicly in a really beautiful way. And it's awesome. It's awesome. So imagine you lived in a culture where you experience words like this in that way. Yeah, okay. You're just like, yeah, man, God, God is so generous. and Jesus is so beautiful and cool and good. And then to him be glory and majestic greatness and strength and authority.

Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting that I have to live into a different psyche a little bit for that to feel authentic. Yeah. It probably says more about me. I mean, but everything we say is in a way about us. It's a reflection of, right, who we are in our culture, and that's okay. Yeah. For how long is God worthy of all of this greatness and glory? Well, before every age, right now, and for all the ages. That is eternity.

Everywhere. Anytime. Yeah. So tell me about ages real quick. Okay. This is our word aeon. Ione. Yeah. We get Eon from it to English. This is, let's see, we did a video on this. Eternal life. Yeah. Eternal life. Yeah. So this is a Greek word and then in Jewish Greek it translates the Hebrew word, Olam.

It refers to a period of time. Yeah. It can be in the past, present, or future. It's a period of time and then usually it's a period of time defined by some particular attribute or... The age of childhood. Exactly. Yes. Yes. of a certain kingdom or a king.

Okay. And you can have ages, therefore, in the past, or ages in the future. So before every age means however many periods of time you want to carve up time into all the way back, God is before that. And even before that, he was worthy of this when there were no humans around to say it. Before we carved up any time at all, even now, and for any future carving up of time. Yeah, God is worthy of honor, greatness, strength, and authority. Yeah.

It's never not been that. Right now, in the present, it's definitely worthy of that. And for all the ages, plural, Ionian. Yeah. However many ages there are going to be. We mentioned earlier, this first generation of Jesus followers thought, this is the last age. Ah, this is it. Ah, sure.

Like, in fact, any minute now, like the end of history, as we know it is happening. Jesus is coming back. By end of history, the fulfillment of history. Sure. I mean, that's what the word end means, but sometimes that phrase end of history can make us think a whole bunch of things.

Yes, yeah. Well, it's an us-centered view of time. Our age is the most important time. So whenever our time ends, well, that's just the end. Right? And the biblical authors think differently about time. It's the end meaning fulfillment. of history.

Okay. No, that's good. That's probably not even what I meant. It's a fulfillment. So is it interesting here that there's still a sense of there might be ages? Oh, well, the new creation is called the age. The age. To come. That's usually what age means in the singular. And then I think this plural then is a way of imagining that...

The age to come. The age to come and however many, whatever God has in store, it might be ages that we had even imagine. But however many there are to come, and before every one that every was, so he's just pushing it out, extending as far as you can go past and future. Yeah, because what's the phrase that's translated eternal life? Age-ish life. Age-ish life.

It's the word age as an adjective. So I think in English, the most helpful way is life of the age. Life of the age. Technically, when you see eternal life in our English translations, it's life of the age. is eternal is probably not the most helpful translation of this word, aeon. And so life of the age, the heavens and earth uniting in a culminating fulfilled way, that's life of the age. So here, for all the ages, you're saying the life of the age and whatever beyond that. That's wild to think about.

It is. Yeah, this is the equivalent of the final pages of the last battle in Narnia. where it's like further up and further in and further up and further in and this is actually not the last chapter of the story

it's rather just the first chapter is just now beginning there's this rad little meditation on how the real story of Aslan and his people is finally now

just beginning and it's a story in which each chapter is better than the rest that's how Lewis ends it and it's like however many chapters there are

to come now? How can we even know? Yeah. Yeah. It's a rad conception of time. It is. It's a cool way to end something.

It's just to remind yourself like, time is big. Yeah. Yes. Right? We get so, like, trapped in our little moment in time. Time is so big.

Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Man, I think, I can't tell if it's middle age and like, I know. Or if it's, You think about death so much more than I ever have.

Yeah, me too. Me too. And then the smallness and the shortness of a human life. Yeah. And how much bigger time span, just the history of the human family, of the universe, much less the categories of existence that break time and space that are before and after us. It's for we're really vapor. It's vapor, man. for Weber

Yeah Hevel Yeah I guess if you bring it back To the theme of this letter We have this moment Mm-hmm Like we have this community

We get to be Followers of Jesus We get to be the temple We get to be the priests Like don't let this opportunity Go by Don't let some people These people

Come in And like When you over In a way That's just actually Gonna sink the ship Yeah And when you get

Myopic and you just think about like, well, my day and my week and what do I want right now? And what's my appetite right now? It's easier to kind of fall into that versus like opening the aperture to all the ages and thinking about the majesty of God.

And you just kind of end in that frame. And you're like, yeah, what am I doing? Yeah, that's right. And the focus of Judah's critique wasn't primarily their teaching or their theology. It was the life choices they were making with regards to money and social influence, power, and sex. And somehow, their choices in those areas informed by some worldview or story around it, probably it's one way of describing that's the main idea of the letter.

And then the way that he communicates that to Jewish messianic house churches is so Bible to knock hyperlinked design. pattern nerdiness. It's the coolest. It's so cool. Yeah. Yeah. It's a great cross-cultural learning opportunity for many of us modern westernized Christians. Because I just love how it makes you work for it. And then when you work for it, it just comes to life more in my mind, my imagination. And that's powerful. Yep. Yeah. This letter stands there as a testament to the thought. and culture and passion of the earliest Jewish messianic house churches in Jerusalem up in Galilee connected to the relatives of Jesus. It's such a precious little window. And I'm just so, I love this letter. It's one of my favorite pages in the whole Bible, the letter of Judah.

So, cheers. Thanks for going through that with me. Thank you, Tim. Yeah. Thanks for listening to this episode of Bible Project podcast. That's it for the letter of Jude. Thanks for hanging with us in this really cool and unique passage in the New Testament. Bible Project is a crowdfunded nonprofit, and we exist to help people experience the Bible as a unified story that leads to Jesus. Everything that we create is free because of the generous support of thousands of people just like you. Thank you so much for being a part of this with us. Hello, my name is Leroy, and I'm from Camby, Oregon. Hey, my name is Anubia, and I'm from the

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