Monday, March 18, 2013

Monday, March 18 - Jude 1:1 - Tiffany

Today's passage from the Bible In a Year Reading Plan is Numbers 35-36, Psalm 55, Luke 11
Today's scripture focus is Jude 1:1
 
It is very rare that I turn to the King James version to read my Bible, or even the New King James version.  Unless I've been recently studying/reading Shakespeare, it is a hard thing to read smoothly and catch the meaning of what I am reading.
But I had to use it for today's verse.  I love how it reads:
Jude, a bondservant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, to those who are called, sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ:
Jude is writing to the followers of Christ.  He is writing to those who have been called by God, as we know, God calls us ALL to Him.  So Jude is writing to those who have answered that call to follow Jesus and His way. 
 
What is great is what comes next.  Right away, in the first verse, he reminds them that as followers of Christ, as those who have answered the call, they are sanctified by God!  They are saved, they are sanctified.  They CAN live a life free from sin TODAY because God has sanctified them.  There is no need to hang your head and say "I can't live free from sin, I will always just be a worthless sinner," because God has sanctified us!

And better yet, Jesus preserves us in that sanctification!  He is WITH US ALWAYS in the form of the Holy Spirit, and He gives daily guidance and strength to turn from sin, to live free of that slavery, and to live freely in the love of God.
 
I had a hard time just stopping there, because Jude has such a contemporary warning and current encouragement for us all.  So I have to mention verses 24.  They restate what Jude tells us in verse one - God has called us, we've answered that and been sanctified through the sacrifice of Jesus, who now preserves us for Himself:
 
Jude 1:24 (emphasis mine)
"To Him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you before His glorious presence without fault and with great joy -"
 
How glad I am to know today that while, yes, I am human, with Jesus preserving me, with the Holy Spirit guiding me, I can stay in that sanctification I have already received from God Himself.
 
~Tiffany
Tomorrow's scripture focus: Jude 1:2
Tomorrow's Bible In a Year Passage passage: Duet 1-2, Psalm 56, Luke 12

3 comments:

tammi said...

What always catches my attention about this verse is that Jude doesn't introduce himself the way we'd most likely introduce ourselves if we were in his position. I mean, if he really wanted to prove his credentials to his audience, why didn't he say, "Jude, a brother of Jesus"!! Humanly speaking, that would've carried far more weight as far as his authority to speak on matters of faith and relationship to God. But he doesn't give us the biological pedigree he could have, and I think that speaks volumes to how far Jude has come since the account in John 7 where Jesus' brothers reject Him and His message. From that, to Jude's current testimony here of fealty to his Lord and Savior is just so beautiful.

Tammy said...

Tammi - no doubt!!

Tiffany - thanks so much for your thoughts today.

I read in a couple of different sermons that sanctified here would actually be better translated "beloved of God". We are called, we are loved (or sanctified, either way both are true anyway!), we are kept. Awesome.

I liked this quote by David Legge
Now as you look through this epistle, you will find that Jude is fond of threes - he clubs these clusters together in three: called, loved, kept. Now that word 'called' simply means 'an official summons'. We were thinking about it last week, where you are walking along life's pathway dead in trespasses and in sins, and then God's Holy Spirit comes and makes you unhappy in your sin. And then He gets you to such a low point in your sin, that He begins to take you to places, and crosses your path with people who are able to reveal to you the remedy for sin - the Lord Jesus Christ and Him crucified - and He enables you, by faith, to cry upon the name of the Lord and you're saved. You're called - isn't that what the church is? 'Ecclesia', the 'called-out-ones'. He calls them the loved, the beloved as it says - sanctified here - and you're not called because you look well, or because you talk well, or because you think Christian things well, or because you're good living, or because your parents were Christians - we all know that, that we're called because we're loved. Loved of God! 'For God so loved the world that He gave' - we are precious in His eyes. Now, I think this is lovely, we are loved of God the Father - we live in an age of a world of insecurity, a world where children are born into homes without a mother or without a father. And there are children that grow up with a complex, because they don't have a Daddy and all those at school do have a Daddy - but what a great delight to be able to sit down with those people, with the open word of God, and to show them that they have an eternal love of an Eternal Father!

We live in an age of a world of insecurity, a world where children are born into homes without a mother or without a father...but what a great delight to be able to sit down with those people, with the open word of God, and to show them that they have an eternal love of an Eternal Father!
You see, this book is enough for all. We're called, we're loved - and this is the seal on it - we're kept. 'Preserved', look at the verse, 'in Jesus Christ' - He hasn't bought us with His own blood to leave us, or to lose us. And I say, God help those who believe that you can be saved at this moment, and damned the next! But can you see the context of it, how relevant in the midst of apostasy - and he's talking about falling away - that he first of all reassures these believers: 'We're talking about those around you that are falling away. Those within you that are falling away, but if you're of God, if you're called, loved - you're kept! Because He is able to save to the uttermost!'.

Pamela said...

Great thoughts!

Tammi and Tammy-great thoughts as well.