Who are you? People find identity in all sorts of ways today. Some good, some bad. Husband, wife, dad, mom, grandpa, grandma. Careers can define us: lawyer, builder, doctor, teacher, accountant, agent, manager, mechanic, business owner. Politics defines us: conservative or liberal, far right or far left, woke, patriot, progressive, Christian Nationalist, Marxist. Many seek to find their identity in their sexuality: gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer and on into even greater perversions and confusion. Maybe our strongest identities are in our favorite teams, and the fastest way to ruin a holiday (or church!) is not politics and religion but whether you wear Green or Maze and Blue! No one who loves Ohio can even be saved so don’t even bring up that armpit of America.
Who are you? Next week Sunday it will be 20 years since I was saved. And that night I came to a verse that has been tattooed on my heart ever since: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old man is gone, and the new man has come forth.” Second Corinthians 5:17. For 20 years now I am something entirely new from what I was. Who I am is not who I was.
I read this last week a story about Augustine, the early church father and theologian. Augustine had a scandalous past, and after his conversion one day he walked by one of his former mistresses on the street. She saw him and began yelling out to him, “Augustine, it’s me!” Without stopping or turning around, Augustine replied, “Yes, but it is no longer me!” I don’t know if the story is true, but the point is definitely true: because of Christ we are no longer who we once were.
Now we could spend months exploring who we are in Christ. We spent a good 6-7 weeks last fall in our 10am class and you can go back and watch those. But today we are going to look at the greeting Jude gives in his letter. He is writing to Christians and his greeting could only be given to Christians because what he says is true only of Christians.
READ verses 1-2, and GREET EFC WITH THOSE VERSES!
Jude is clearly fond of triplets. Can you see the 3 “threes” in the first two verses? 1) Jude, Jesus, James, 2) called, loved, kept, 3) mercy, peace, love.
Our sermon title today is “The Called, The Loved & The Kept. That’s you EFC. That’s Jude’s readers, and that’s us today. We who have called on Jesus were called by Him; we who love Jesus are loved by His Father; we who keep ourselves in Christ’s love (John 15:10; v21) are also kept for him. Lets go through them one by one
THE CALLED (“those who have been called”)
First notice he says, “To those who have been called.” I don’t know if you notice it too, but notice the nuances of time in this triplet “HAVE BEEN called” (past); “ARE loved” (present); “kept FOR” (future).
If you are a real Christian then you were called and you responded in faith. What does that mean? It’s real simple: you were called out of this world, out of your sin, out of slavery to the devil, to leave it all behind and go to Christ so you could be forgiven, pardoned, washed, and set apart in Him. You have been called BY Christ TO Christ FOR Christ. We see this when we start looking up what the word for called means and finding it in other passages. It is used about 10 or 11 times in the NT. Paul says twice that he was “called to be an apostle” (Romans 1:1; 1 Cor 1:1). So the calling had to do with his apostleship – that God had selected and planned from before he was born that Paul would be his servant as an Apostle.
But we see that as Christians in general we were called. And we see in these other verses how we were called TO Christ and FOR Christ. You could say its a calling to a new purpose for our lives. Turn with me to Romans 1:6. Look at the very next verse, “To all in Rome who are loved by God and called TO BE HIS holy people.” Notice the similarity with Jude as Jude also has loved by God and called in his greeting. But notice there the language, “called TO BE HIS…” That is the language of belonging. “You are not your own” 1 Corinthians 6:20 says, “You were bought at a price.” You belong to Jesus because with His blood He purchased you.
This raises two points I want to share with you. First, you can see that the idea of being the “servant of Jesus” we looked at last week is connected to being called to belong to Jesus this week. Servants belong to their Master, and those who are called are called to belong to Jesus.
Secondly, this idea of belonging to Jesus raises the important concept in the Bible called “Redemption.” Redemption means to be purchased out of slavery with a price. In the NT times slaves were bought and sold every day. Sometimes a slave could be redeemed where someone else would pay a price for them to be set free. We were all slaves of sin and Someone else paid the price for us to go free from sin. We are set free from the power and grip of sin and now we belong to Jesus Christ to serve Him
So when Jude says “to those who are called” he knows it is loaded up with all of these concepts: called to belong to Jesus, called to be His holy people, called for His purposes. We do not belong anymore to Satan, his domain of darkness, the world, or to sin. We belong to the Savior – crucified, resurrected, seen, ascended and seated in eternal glory at the Father’s right hand.
APPLICATION: You belong to Jesus. When you were called to Jesus you were called to belong to Him. He set you free so you could be His.
APPLICATION: You were called to belong to Jesus in order to serve Jesus and His purposes. When Paul says “called to be his holy people” that has two ideas in it. One, you are perfectly, completely holy in Christ – that is your standing before God. But being “his holy people” also has the idea of living holy to show that you are his holy people. We are set apart in Christ and how we live is to be set apart. God help someone who is set apart in their standing before God but stands with the world in how they live and think. Is that even possible?
THE LOVED (“loved by God the Father”)
Secondly, we see that we are loved. Notice verse 1, “…To those who have been called, who are loved in God the Father…” Other translations say we are “beloved in God the Father” (NASB) or “wrapped in the love of God the Father.” (NET). Interestingly, the KJV and NKJV have “sanctified by God the Father.” Which is different, but related. We are set apart (sanctified) by God’s love to now be placed in God’s love. So all is not lost!
First, I want you to see that “love” is on Jude’s mind. He says, “Hey, you guys are loved in and by God the Father.” Then in verse 2 he says, “mercy, peace and love be yours in abundance.” He wants them to have an abundance of the love of God in their fellowship. Then towards the end he comes back to love in verse 21 and says, “Keep yourselves in God’s love…” Jude’s has hurricanes in his eyes as he talks about false teachers. But he has love in his eyes as he talks to his fellow believers.
Another thought I want to bring out is that it is quite fascinating that Jude is pointing out the love of God the Father. We are loved by the whole Trinity and that is clear as we read the Bible: the Father, the Son and the Spirit love us. Here though Jude is pointing out that we are the objects of the Father’s love. He has set His love on us. “No, the Father Himself loves you” Jesus said in John 16:27. If you turn to Ephesians 1:3-5 we read, “….” It is God’s design and purpose that we would stand before Him “holy and blameless in his sight” and that we would be adopted into sonship through Jesus Christ. Now we can debate predestination and election, that’s fine. But what we should all be seeing here is that God has established us as “sons” and we are all going to be established as “holy and blameless” when we stand in His presence. Isn’t that the purpose of Jude’s letter by the way? That we would all be prepared to stand in the presence of our Lord? And does not “prepared” have everything to do with being “holy and blameless?” Yes, yes it does. And that is how we will stand in His presence without fault and with great joy, as Jude 24 says.
Tell me the love of God is not the most powerful and transforming force in all the universe? “For God so loved the world that he gave His one and only Son…” (John 3:16). “But God demonstrates His love for us in this: that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us!” (Romans 5:8). God’s love leads people to repentance: “Or do you show contempt for the riches of God’s kindness, forbearance and patience, not realizing that his kindness is intended to lead you to repentance?” The word love is not there but kindness, forbearance, and patience are all expressions of love (1 Cor 13:4-7)…God’s love for those He leads to repentance! What is one of my favorite love verses? Ephesians 3, all day long. “I pray that you may have power to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge – so that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.”
APPLICATION: Would you finally begin to let yourself see that you are loved?
APPLICATION: God’s love does mean God’s discipline. Turn to Hebrews 12 with me
APPLICATION: Your enemies will know God loves you. Jesus said in Revelation 2:9, “I will make them come and fall down at your feet and acknowledge that I have loved you.” Stand fast knowing Christ’s love for you now. He is going to prove His love for you to your enemies in the end.
KEPT (kept for Jesus Christ)
Then lastly look at verse 1 where Jude says they are “kept for Jesus Christ.” We Christians are being kept for Jesus Christ. The same Greek word is used twice in verse 6 when it speaks of rebellious angels, “…..” Kept has has two primary uses: our obedience to God’s commands is described as “keeping” his commands. It’s what WE do. You see that a lot in the NT, such as Paul saying, “I have KEPT the faith” or “keep the unity of the faith” (Eph. 4:3), or “keep yourself from being stained by the world” (James 1:27), and even Jude verse 21 says “keep yourselves in God’s love”.
But that’s not the meaning of us being kept for Jesus that Jude says in verse 1. Jude is referring to the second use of the word “kept” which is not what we do, but what God does for us: God keeps us. The first use describes our faithfulness to God, but this use describes God’s faithfulness to us TO KEEP US FOR CHRIST. “Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be PRESERVED (kept) complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Thessalonians 5:23). Or John 17:11 when Jesus prayed, “Holy Father, keep them in your name…”
This idea of kept is used not just for believers, but God keeps other things for future events as well: rebellious angels, the current heavens and earth, false teachers.
- Heavens & Earth – In 2 Peter 3:7 it says, “But by His word the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, KEPT for the day of judgment…” Same word, same concept: God preserving something for some future event.
- Condemned angels – Jude 6, “these he has KEPT in darkness FOR the day of Judgment..”
- False Teachers – Did you see Jude 13 talking about false teachers? “They are wild waves of the sea foaming up their shame; wandering stars, for whom blackest darkness has been reserved forever.” Reserved is the same word: “…for whom blackest darkness has been KEPT forever.” These false teachers will arrive to judgment day and find that an eternal place of blackness has been “kept” for them (preserved, reserved).
The heavens and earth are kept by God for the day of fire (2 Pet 3:7); and the condemned angels are kept in darkness for the day of fire, and blackest darkness is kept for false teachers. But the same God who keeps all these for a day of judgment keeps us not for judgment but FOR His Son. Those angels, those false teachers, the heavens and the earth will all be “presented” to the day of Judgment. But not us. We are kept for Jesus in order to be presented to Jesus. What is the theme of Jude? Presented, as verse 24 says, “to present us before His glorious presence without fault and with great joy.”
Now notice that in verse 24: without fault and with great joy. Those believers who first read Jude’s letter were to apply the instructions Jude gave them in his letter in order for it to turn out for them that they would be without fault and have great joy on the day they were presented to Jesus. BUT, notice that Jude starts his letter by addressing them the way he does BEFORE he gives them instructions. He addresses them for who they are: CALLED, LOVED, and KEPT. This was not “stock” intros for writing letters to Christians. Jude wanted to frame their mind right away so that they would hear his instructions the way they should. In other words, they needed to be reminded of WHO they were in Christ BEFORE they lived for Christ. His readers should heed the instructions of Jude because of who they are: called, loved, kept. His guidance is appropriate for them, and in seeing themselves this way at the outset they would then respond to Jude’s letter rightly. this is who we are and because of who we are this is what we do. nt always emphasizes seeing God correctly and ourselves correctly first and out of that then living correctly. **This is why the story of Augustine is so true: He no longer saw himself as the former man he used to be who ran around with that mistress. THEREFORE he no longer would act the way he did when he WAS that man and run with that mistress. We must see WHO we are to know HOW we should live. “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light.” That’s Ephesians 5:8. See the formula?! Now you ARE light (who you are) therefore LIVE as light (how you act).
EFC: You are called, you are loved, and you are kept. And with Jude I want you to stand in the glorious presence of Jesus Christ without fault and with great joy. You are
CONCLUSION:
Take Aways:
- Hear the call of God and come to Jesus
- Live knowing the Father loves you
- Be confident you are kept for Jesus
*Silent reflection*