Jude 1:5-7 - God Gets the Final Word

“But I want to remind you, though you once knew this, that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe. And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode, He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day; as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. Jude starts out these three verses with, “I want to remind you”. Today, I want to remind us that, even though God is a God of infinite love and great mercy, He is also a just and Holy God Who must punish sin and is also a God of wrath! That what these next verses we are looking at are about. Jude has identified the apostate and false teachers as ungodly, and condemned to judgement because of their denial of Jesus Christ and their immorality. (Vs. 3-4) Now, like the Apostle Peter, Jude reaches back into Old Testament history and gives three examples of God's judgment on those who had resisted his authority and turned from the truth. Peter referred to the fallen angels, Noah, and Lot and followed the historical order. He also emphasized God's deliverance of the righteous as well as His judgment of the ungodly. Read 2 Peter 2:4-10 carefully and see the similarities: “For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but saved Noah, one ofeight people, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood on the world of the ungodly; and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, making them an example to those who afterward would live ungodly; and delivered righteous Lot, who wasoppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked (for that righteous man, dwelling among them, tormented hisrighteous soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds)-- thenthe Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment, and especially those who walk according to the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise authority. They are presumptuous, self-willed. They are not afraid to speak evil of dignitaries.” Jude, however, did not mention Noah and the Flood, but instead used the nation Israel as his example. The point Jude was making is that God judges apostates. Therefore, the false teachers who had crept into the church would also one day be judged. Their seeming success would not last; God would have the last word. This also reminds me of Psalm 2:1-6 “Why do the nations rage, And the people plot a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, And the rulers take counsel together, Against the LORD and against His Anointed, saying, "Let us break Their bonds in pieces And cast away Their cords from us." He who sits in the heavens shall laugh; The LORD shall hold them in derision. Then He shall speak to them in His wrath, And distress them in His deep displeasure: "Yet I have set My King On My holy hill of Zion." Especially today, as the voices of the present anti-God culture and the immoral, ungodly people around us are loudly proclaiming their freedom from God and His archaic Word, and mocking those who would stand up for truth, we need to be reminded that “God has the final word!” Yes, God is a God of love and mercy and “is not willing that any should perish” (2 Peter 3:9), but He will one day call to account all those who deny Him and His Word! Keep looking up! Jesus is still sitting on His throne and is coming soon! God bless!