Join us on this episode of Classic Christianity Radio as Bob George delves into the book of Jude, unraveling the truths underlying Gnostic teachings and their contrast with biblical doctrine. Bob elaborates on the relevance of these teachings in today’s context, especially with the resurgence of interest sparked by modern literature and media. Engage in a profound discussion about how these ancient heresies stand up against the timeless truth of Jesus’s humanity and divinity.
Welcome to Classic Christianity Radio with Bob George. Bob’s clear, timeless teachings on the complete forgiveness and unconditional love of Jesus Christ will transform your life as you learn about God’s amazing grace. Let’s join Bob as he teaches us from God’s Word.
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Well, if you’ll turn to the book of Jude… It’s the book right before Revelation. In order to just review for a moment, this book was written to basically deal with the heretical teaching of Gnosticism and Gnostic type of teaching. Today, which is this big movie that has come out on the Da Vinci Code, much of the teaching that is in that movie or in the books were basically around Gnostic teaching. So it’s kind of getting a little bit more known today, which I’m glad, because you must kind of understand what Gnostic teaching is in order to many times understand what the Bible is getting at in trying to teach what is truth up against the error of Gnosticism. So Jude wrote this book, basically, he said, I’m starting to write it about one thing, but I’ve changed my mind. I’m going to write about these things that are being taught in Gnosticism that we need to hear about. But we’re going to pick up now in verse 17. Before that, you’re talking about these men, these people who have come into the assemblies. As a matter of clarification, what had taken place is Christianity started, obviously, with Jesus, and then people start spinning off of truth and kind of getting a hold of their own little doctrines and their own little concepts that are predicated not upon truth, but predicated upon your own ideas. It’s kind of like the Scripture talks about a man leaning on his own understanding instead of acknowledging God and letting God direct your paths. And so they came up with different concepts. One of the concepts of Gnosticism was that Jesus was not here in the flesh. In other words, his humanity is denied. That all flesh is matter and all matter is evil. And therefore, Jesus could not have been in the flesh because flesh is matter, matter is evil, and Jesus couldn’t be evil. So he was just a phantom. He was just an illusion. And as crazy as that sounds, that’s what the followers of Gnostic teaching believed. And there were numerous of them in that persuasion. They also, because of that premise, that false premise, believed that man did not have a sin nature. And it wouldn’t make any difference if he did because all matter is evil and doesn’t make any difference what happens anyway. The only thing that’s important is spirit. And so those were two paramount doctrines of Gnosticism along with numerous others. But those were kind of the foundational truths that they started or err that they started on. And that’s exactly why in 1 John that it starts out that that which we have seen with our eyes and touched with our hands, this we perceive concerning the word of life. We’ve seen him. We’ve touched him. We’ve been with him. Again, why would John need to write that? He certainly didn’t need to write it for you and me. We never denied the humanity of Christ, but the Gnostics did. And somebody probably in the church of Ephesus would have written to John, who was the last apostle who was alive. He was on the Isle of Patmos in exile. and would have written to him calling out help. In others, he had said, John, here’s all of these people that are entered into our assembly, and they’re teaching all of these heretical doctrines, and I need help. I need you to write to clarify these issues. And so John, being the last apostle alive, would have written to the pastor saying, of this church, probably in Ephesus, and to clear up the confusion of Gnostic teaching. And that’s precisely, as I said, why in John he would have started out the way he did and then dealt with the sin issue in 1 John 8 and 9, that if we claim to be without sin, which is what the Gnostics were claiming, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in you. You’re lost. These Gnostics were later on identified as Antichrist. And so a little difficult to be called a Christian Antichrist, isn’t it? A little bit of a contradiction of terms. And so he wasn’t referring to saved people claiming to be without sin. Saved people don’t claim to be without sin. We know better, don’t we? And so if we’re claiming to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. Now, who’s the truth? Christ Jesus, who claimed to be, I am the way and the truth and the life. And so when truth is not in you, Christ is not in you. So again, if Christ doesn’t live in you, how can you be saved? So there’s no question about it that he’s referring to lost people who are in the assemblies of God’s people claiming all of these doctrines that are heretical in nature. If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves. The truth is not in us. But if we agree with God concerning our sins, today, tomorrow, whenever it may be, and the inference in that passage is, I don’t know if you’re ever going to come to your senses or not, but if you do, He is faithful and just to have, not to forgive, but to have forgiven your sins and to have cleansed you of all unrighteousness. That’s the tense of the Greek language, and you cannot argue with the tense of the Greek language. And so that’s the interpretation of 1 John 1, 8 and 9. Now, we have taken that. and perverted it by dragging it over into the christian community and saying that is averse to christians and we call it the christian bar of soap and we call it that’s the way you stay in fellowship although there’s nothing in the scripture talking about bouncing in and out of fellowship but we had to do something because we know that you couldn’t lose your relationship so we had to come up with something so we came up with losing your fellowship So if you’re not trying to keep yourself saved, you’re trying to keep yourself in fellowship. In either case, God’s hacked at you, and you’ve got to do something to get him unhacked. In either one of the cases, unless you come to truth and understand what truth is, and that is Christ Jesus is alive, living in you. Your sins have been taken away from the cross, at the cross, and the only thing that’s attributable to man, sin-wise, is the rejection of Christ Jesus. So these people came in. He said they’re men of grumblers. They’re fault finders. They follow their own evil desires. They boast about themselves, flatter others for their own advantage. Verse 17 now, dear friends, remember what the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ foretold. They said to you, in the last times… there will be scoffers who will follow their own ungodly desires. These are the men who divide you, who follow mere natural instincts and do not have the spirit. What is that referring to? It’s people who are religious sounding, religious acting, but they do not possess the spirit of God living in them. You’re not alive spiritually, you’re dead spiritually. but you’re in the assemblies of the living. And that is true today. There are people who come into the assemblies, try to, in order to pervert the truth. Amy last week was confronted by some lady that came in, was just insistent on seeing me. in order to talk about the fact that our do we do we cast out demons and we do all that stuff now why she was here she knows we didn’t know we can assume why she was here except she was here to try to divide the body uh… you have all kinds of things if you knew the letters that i receive over a period of time you’d you’d have a heart attack has got one i didn’t know i was going to hell until friday But I found out I was going to hell on Friday. And so you’ve got these. And here’s this guy that’s saying, you know, you’ve got to love each other. He was telling me I was going to hell. And I think he was glad of it, too. But you get all kinds of letters from people who believe they’re on truth. But they lack the spirit of God living in them. Religious, but not born again. And so these are people who divide the body. They don’t have the Spirit of God living in them. But you, dear friends, build yourself up in your most holy faith and pray in the Holy Spirit. Now, again, what is praying in the Spirit? The opposite of praying in the flesh. It’s not complicated at all. What is walking in the Spirit? The opposite of walking in the flesh. And so when you’re talking about praying in the Spirit, it isn’t some kind of a mystical thing. It says pray in the Spirit. Now, if you’re praying in the Spirit, what are you going to be praying in accordance with? The will of God. That anything we ask in accordance with the will of God, He will hear and answer you. So when I’m praying in the Spirit, then I’m praying in harmony with the Spirit of God. When I’m praying in the flesh, I’m praying in harmony with the desires of my flesh. Are we together on that? So it isn’t some kind of a mystical prayer. It’s just instead of praying for your own fleshly desires, you’re praying in the will of God. I want to know what God’s will is, and so I pray in accordance with God’s will. Do we know always what God’s will is? No, not always. One thing I know, it’s God’s will that I give thanks in all things. Don’t we know that? Because it goes ahead to say, for this is the will of God concerning you in Christ Jesus. So one of the things that we know is God’s will is for us to be thankful people, to be thankful people. There’s many places in the scripture where it talks about it is God’s will. Grab a hold of those because that you don’t have to wonder what his will is. On other things, I believe that one of the guides that we use is to delight yourself in the Lord, and he’ll give you the desires of your heart. And I believe that to be true. If I’m delighting myself in the Lord, what am I doing? Walking in accordance with God’s will. You’re back to that again. And he says, I’ll give you the desires of your heart. And so, you know, I believe when you go back to the Garden of Eden, you see all of those trees back there that he said you can eat from any of them, except one, and that’s the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And the day that you, man, determine that you do not need me, God, to determine right from wrong and good from evil, you will surely die. You will die, and what is death? The absence of life. The life of God will depart from you, and you’ll be on your own just as you want it to be. You’re going to be the determining factor of right and wrong and good and evil. And you will ignore my instruction, and you’ll be left to your own understanding. And that’s what happened with Adam and Eve. And we are born in Adam and Eve, dead spiritually. We all know that. And so we realize that when that has occurred… that you have a vast majority of the population of this world that is living not with the Spirit of God living in them, but living without the Spirit of God living in them, and they have nothing to lean on except their own understanding. The thing, as we talked about last week, that sets you and me apart from the world is not because we’re so sweet and we’re so obedient. It’s because we know the Word of God. We know him and we know his word. And when you know the word of God, you are separated from the thinking of the world. Are we right or wrong? And when you claim yourself to be a Christian, you just draw the line. You are separated from the world. And if you’re out in the marketplace, you’ve just separated yourself from most of the people that you work with. Right or wrong?
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SPEAKER 01 :
And so he says that these are people that come and have come, scoffers, who will follow their own natural instincts and do not have the Spirit of God living in them. But you, dear friends, build yourself up in your most holy faith. Pray in the Holy Spirit. Keep yourself in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life, to finalize the eternal life that you have. When will that take place? On the day that you’re absent from the body and present with the Lord, seeing him as he is and becoming like him. Your eternal life has now been, in essence, realized in its fullness when we are out of this body and present with the Lord. In the meantime, do we have eternal life now? Yes. He who has the Son has what? Life. And he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. So eternal life begins the very moment that you accept Christ Jesus into your heart as your Lord and Savior. Keep yourself in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life. Be merciful to those who doubt. Do we run into people who doubt? Sure. What’s he say that our attitude should be to them? To be merciful. In other words, there was a time when I didn’t understand either. And to be merciful to those people. Don’t tell them you’re going to hell. Snatch others from the fire. It tells us where the destination of those that haven’t been snatched from the fire are going. And what it’s going to be like. Save them. In other words, he’s saying to be merciful to those who doubt. But reach out to them with the good news of the gospel. Don’t be afraid to share the good news of Christ Jesus with people. Be merciful in their doubting, but be bold in your proclamation. Save them. To others show mercy mixed with fear. That means when you’re talking about the fear of God, you’re talking about the awe of God. You see, folks, Jesus has come to extend us mercy, has he not? But the other side of that is the wrath of God to those who do not receive mercy. And what is the wrath of God to those who do not receive mercy? It’s called hell. And it seems like it’s a pretty warm place to be. And I think that what we have to understand is we’re presenting to the world a wonderful message that God was in Christ, reconciling you unto himself, not counting your sins against you. And that God loves you. And that God came to save you. And that God is for you. And if God’s for you, who can be against you? Those are all wonderful truths. But also connected with that truth is to those who do not accept that. To those who have gone their own way, acknowledging not him, but their own way, that there is a place called hell that is the final destiny for those who refuse to accept the mercy and the goodness and the love of God. That’s putting the balance in the message. You’re telling of the good news and you’re also explaining the bad news. And God never sends a person to hell. We send ourselves to hell by refusing the life that is offered to us in Christ Jesus. We choose, while we are here, where we want to live in eternity. That’s our choice. I want to live separated from God in a place hotter than Phoenix. That’s where I want to live. Well, you’re going to get your opportunity. That’s the deal. That opportunity is available. And that’s where people are going to go who refuse life. And as we’ve said before, you get people that are all hung up on the do’s and don’ts. And again, God expects us as a child of God and gives us what we need to live a life that is commensurate with who we are, to live a godly life. But the issue is you’re saved or lost. That’s the issue. Are you saved or lost? And the only sin attributable to man is that sin of the rejection of the Son of God, the rejection of the mercy of God and the kindness of God and the goodness of God that has been given to us in His fullness in Christ Jesus. The only sin, the only unpardonable sin is the rejection of Christ Jesus. You’re not going to go to hell ever because of your sins. Only the sin of the rejection of the Son of God. That ought to be good news to people. Now, so it says, Be merciful to those who doubt. Snatch others from the fire and save them. And to others show mercy mixed with fear, hating even the clothing stained by corrupt flesh. Now to him who is able to keep you from falling… and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power, and authority through Jesus Christ our Lord before all ages now and forevermore. Amen. I told you I was going to finish this. Man of his word. Now, let’s go back to not only the condition of the world, but to go back to a subject that’s very pertinent to this Memorial Day celebration. You have people in this world who say, I hate war. Well, I say to them, who doesn’t? Why do you think that is so unusual to think that you hate war? We all hate war. We all hate war, do we not? So a person saying, I hate war, I’m against the war, it’s like saying, who isn’t? Who in their right mind says, hey, I’m going to go have some fun today. Let’s go have a war. Hey, I’m going to really have a good time today. Let me get in a fight with my wife. That makes me just feel good. I’m going to have a fight with my husband. What do you think we are, idiots? See, everybody hates war. That’s not the issue. The issue is, why do we have it? I’ll tell you why we have it. Turn to James. Gospel or Book of James. Let’s begin in chapter 3. beginning in verse 13. You all got it? James 3, verse 13. Who is the wise and understanding among you? Let him show it by his good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom. So humility, a humble spirit, comes from wisdom. But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, don’t boast about it or deny the truth. Such wisdom does not come down from heaven, but is earthly. That comes from the earth, unspiritual and of the devil. So whenever we harbor bitter envy toward one another, selfish ambition in our hearts… And we all know what selfish ambition is. It’s get ahead at any cost. Do unto others before they do unto you. Selfish ambition, he says, does not come from God. It comes from the earth. It’s of the devil. For where you have envy and selfish ambition… There you will find disorder and every evil practice. Every evil practice and disorder comes from envy and selfish ambition. Well, what causes fights and quarrels among you? What causes war among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You want something, but you don’t get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. And when you ask, you do not receive because you ask with the wrong motives that you might spend what you get on your own pleasures. You adulterous people. Calls us adulterers. In other words, we’re married to God, but we’re having an affair with the world. Don’t you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? And anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God? Think about that. You choose to be a friend of the world, you become an enemy of God automatically. Why? Because the world and God aren’t in harmony with one another. Do you think that the scripture says without reason that the spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely? That the spirit of God is the cause of your envy and strife and selfish ambition? He said, no. But he gives us more than grace. And that’s why the scripture says that God opposes the proud, but he gives grace to the humble. Now again, where does humility come from? Well, we just talked about it comes from wisdom. Submit yourself then to God. Resist the devil and he’ll flee from you. Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn, and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will lift you up. And brothers, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against his brother or judges him speaks against the law and judges it. And when you judge the law, you’re not keeping it but sitting in judgment on it. There’s only one lawgiver and judge. It’s the one who is able to save and destroy. But you, who are you to judge your brother? So we’re talking about In our own lives, do we have the capability of getting along every day of our lives with other people? Do we do that? I mean, is there anyone here that says, I’ve never had a disagreement with anybody? Well, then you don’t have an opinion on anything. If you’ve never had a disagreement, you obviously don’t have an opinion. Never had a disagreement with anybody? I just love everybody? I’ve never been in a fight or a quarrel with anybody. I’ve had people, and maybe they’re right, I’ve had people who have said, we’ve been married for 50 years, never had a fight. Do you believe that? One of you is unnecessary.
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Until next time, walk in faith, be good to one another, and praise the Lord. Amen.
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Put Jesus first in your life and turn your life around.
