The book of Jude begins with an earnest plea that everyone should contend for the faith which was once for all time delivered to the saints. Then it proceeds to show the erosion of that faith in the minds and hearts of the people, and it urges us to follow the steps whereby we may get back to it.
The faith which was once for all delivered to the saints contains principles and truths. It involves the provision that God has made for us. It does not change. We have fallen away from the faith, and therefore the restoration is not a matter of restoring the faith, but of our being restored to the faith. This is a distinction that we must see.
The truth that the just shall live by faith has stood for centuries. If you believe in your heart and confess with your mouth, you will be saved (Romans 10:9). Throughout the Dark Ages, people were not believing that truth; instead they were doing penance to merit favor with God. However, that did not alter the truth one iota. The faith had once for all been delivered to the saints. The fact that it was not being preached and it was not believed did not alter it. If God were to state a truth that no one agreed with, if everyone in the world believed something contrary to that truth, we would still have to say, “Let God be true, but every man a liar” (Romans 3:4). The faith still stands. It does not need to be restored. It is the people who have to be restored to the faith which was delivered to the saints.
Once and for all time that faith was delivered to us. It does not change. Everything that God has ever said is still true and valid today, and it is repeatable in our experience. We can see it happen again and again and again. Even if only one person believed God’s promises and expected to see the glorious miracles and provisions come forth in this day, that would not make the promises invalid. They are still true, even if everyone else would say, “I don’t believe it; it is not working in my life.” The faith was once for all delivered to the saints. The fact that it is not working in some people’s lives is irrelevant. There is something wrong in their application of it, and they are the ones who must be restored to the faith which was once delivered to the saints. The faith is there; they are the ones who are afar off. We move progressively into new levels, into succeeding phases of this faith.
The book of Jude first presents negative pictures. It portrays certain men who have crept in unnoticed and robbed us of the faith; it tells of the coming of the Lord and the judgments that are going to be visited upon the ungodly. Then it leaves the negative, and in verses 20–25 it gives seven specific steps whereby we can exercise ourselves in the Lord and return to that faith which was once delivered to the saints.
But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith. This first step is a positive instruction telling you what you should do. Whatever degree of the faith has been made real to you, begin by building yourself up on that. Spiritually, we have been walking around in a little walker. When a small child is put in a walker, it holds him up. He can run without falling down and bumping himself. We have been able to do that spiritually for quite a while. We may feel that we have been walking with the Lord—even running, sometimes. But what will happen when God takes us out of the walker? Then the assault against us will become more vicious than ever. Everything that man has ever leaned upon is being taken away. When the Lord takes away your walker and says, “Come on, now; walk with Me,” you will have to build yourself up on your most holy faith. You will have to practice what you preach. You will have to start walking, building yourself up in the truths you really believe.
No one knows what will happen in the coming days, but that does not mean we should be fearful. One thing I would recommend for the difficult days ahead, above the storage of food or anything else, is having an ample supply of living Word tapes for the future. Time and time again, as you listen to those tapes, you will find the answer to help build you up in your faith. They will keep you on your feet. Job’s ministry is vividly described in Moffatt’s translation: “Your words have kept men on their feet” (Job 4:4). There will be days when you will have to review the teaching that has come, and that Word will keep you on your feet. That Word will also keep others on their feet.
Any potentially successful enterprise which would enable us to get through the tribulation on our own, without having to trust God at all, will probably not be allowed by God. God will not bless any business where there is the lack of real conformity to divine order. If there is not absolute submission and dedication to the Body, without any ambition, God will blow on it, because it will be just another project of Babylon for Him to bring down. He will not let it come forth in the name of a walk with God. Since we do not have a million-dollar enterprise, what will we do? We will have to trust the Lord. Build yourself up. Do everything you can to keep your spirit set on God and to keep your feet set firmly on the foundation of what God is saying. When the testings come, you may feel like getting rebellious and running. It is not good to be rebellious; besides, there is no place to run! God maneuvers you right where He wants you. He wants you to walk with Him.
The only thing that really counts is the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ as it comes forth in a many—membered Body. The Lord has been speaking about divine order for a long time. It is not enough to have religion or even a spiritual experience; you must have a walk with God in divine order.
The best way for God to get through to arrogant America is to deal with her on the one thing she loves above everything else: her materialistic love of money. We cannot go further into the Kingdom of God until the old establishment is removed. It may look fine, and propaganda will make it seem fine, but it is dead; it has been smitten by the Lord. When God lays an ax to the root of the tree, it dries up. We are deeper into the days of the Parousia, the days of great judgments on the earth, than we realize.
The Kingdom of God, the coming order of things, is within you. It has not come by observation. It has been a deep, silent work. God’s Kingdom is not in anything that can be salvaged out of selfish, ambitious capitalism, or out of the fierce regimentation of Communism. Not a thing in this world system will be saved. The Kingdom of God is like a rock cut out of the mountain without hands (Daniel 2:45). It will smite the governments and grind them to powder. In Daniel’s vision, he saw that the whole image was consumed. Everything that we have in our culture, from the days of ancient Babylon until now, will come down. There will be an entirely new heritage.
In a vision that the Lord gave me in 1972, I saw that we would be sustained in the days ahead by two things: by reaching into the family spirit in the way we help one another, and by becoming a prophetic community and prophesying. We will be led as certainly as Israel was led by a pillar of fire. The prophets must come forth. We must see the young fledglings become full-fledged prophets of God. The family of God, the prophetic community, will be brought through as they are led by the Spirit of the Lord.
The only hope you have is to be led by God. You will never be able to figure out the answers. God will confound the wise and make them look like fools. He will bring down man’s wisdom. We must stand fast as a family and love one another, help one another, and share with one another. When God gives us a Word by the law of confirmation, we must carefully follow it so that we know exactly what to do. If we do this, we will make it.
Within us is the Kingdom of God, the coming order of things. The other has to go. It will be hard for us while God circumcises our hearts. But do not stop prophesying the deliverance of the nation. God is after the antichrist spirit. Prophesy against Babylon. Believe God to deliver this country out of the things that are scheduled to happen.
Are you afraid? Do as Noah did. Hebrews 11:7 tells us, “Noah, being warned of God concerning things not seen as yet, moved with godly fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his own household, by which he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness which is by faith.” That is what we have to do. There ought to be a healthy fear in every one of us so that we do not fool around anymore, but get down to business and walk with God. You know what you have. You know what the faith is. You know what God’s end-time move is all about. Do not sit back in such a passive state that the enemy can assault you with confusion and doubts and fears. Snap out of it! You know what to believe, and you have a faith. Build on that faith. Step out on it. Believe God. Walk with God. If you do not, you will be very sorry. Be moved with godly fear, as Noah was. Prepare the ark of faith that will get you through the floodwaters of tribulation into the next age.
Jude gives the second step we should take in returning to the faith: praying in the Holy Spirit. There will be all kinds of prayers now, many of them like the squeals of a pig caught in a fence. God does not want those kinds of prayers. Heaven has already blocked out thousands of those prayers. God wants the prayers in the Spirit, the prophetic flow. Lift up your voice with faith and let the Holy Spirit bring forth a torrent of prayer for this country. A handful of people can turn the tide and save this nation as they pray in the Holy Spirit. We do not pray because we are in a corner; we pray because we are believing for a nation to be stripped of everything that God wants to strip it of, and to see it come through under God right into the days of the Kingdom.
Third, keep yourselves in the love of God. To illustrate, consider what you must do if you want to get a tan. You will never get a tan by sitting in the shade or in the house. The only way you can get a tan is by staying in the sunshine. Similarly, you have to keep yourself in the love of God if you want to blossom in the faith that was once delivered to the saints. Hebrews 10:25 tells us not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together. You have to come to the house of the Lord. You will not solve your problems or get over your discouragement by staying away from the church. You can only get a tan when you expose yourself to the sun. And only by exposing yourself to God can you receive the things you seek from Him.
Do not withdraw. Do not run. Do not be rebellious. Avoid becoming clouded and unable to receive a blessing. Do not build up walls against God and everyone else. Do not do that! Get into the services and keep exposing yourself to the Word, regardless of how many problems you have. Problems have nothing to do with it. Stay in the sunshine of God’s love. That is the way you grow.
Do not become discouraged with the spiritual battle, and say that you cannot stand it anymore. You will have to stand it. And it may get a lot worse! Why does God put us through this battle? We are the ones upon whom the ends of the ages are come (1 Corinthians 10:11), and God is doing a work in us. The faith and the dedication of this generation of people in the remnant must exceed anything that has been seen on the face of the earth since the dawn of history. God has never brought a people to such a place of perfection. Many will be purified and they will walk with God. They will be His instruments.
A new age is ready to be born. It will not be brought forth by people who are soft in their thinking, who eat soft foods, who sleep on soft beds, who look for the softest way of living they can possibly find. God is saying, “You will endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ” (2 Timothy 2:3). He is helping you to shape up. Keep praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourself in the love of God, keep building yourself up on your holy faith.
Fourth, waiting anxiously for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life. An element of anticipation is required. We are waiting anxiously, expecting it to happen momentarily. We do not accept the spirit of the “pie-in-the-sky” teaching that is reflected in many songs which speak about getting to heaven. Of course, that teaching is true, but it is harmful, for it tends to make you look at all Scriptures through a telescope, as though they were afar off, and it will be a long time before anything is ever worked out. Then you will not be alert to believe for something now; you will not make the application that God wants you to make at this present moment. We should be awaiting anxiously the deliverance and the blessings that the Lord is going to bring unto eternal life. There should be an eager looking to the Lord, pulling those blessings into manifestation now.
In this day God is constantly speaking to us. We are being brought back to the faith that was once delivered to the saints. When we read a story in the Bible, we expect it to happen again. We ask God to let it happen now. We do not project it way off into heaven or into another distant time. We are believing for it right now.
Consequently, we have drawn the fire of principalities and powers and witchcraft. Satanic hordes come against us, because we have finally seen the faith that was once for all time delivered to the saints. It is not a faith in distant, future things, but it is waiting anxiously, in a moment-by-moment anticipation and appropriation, and almost a demand on our part that it happen now.
In all reverence we say, “Lord, You are righteous and You are just and You are fair. Why would a righteous and just God reveal in this generation all the truth that You have revealed, and then hold back from fulfilling it? Why would You sadistically stir up a people to hope for something, only to say, ‘You can have it in the sweet by-and-by.’ ” We refuse to adjust our theology to believe in a God who would torment men with promises that can never be fulfilled. The faith which touches the hem of His garment refuses to be discouraged. It is waiting anxiously. You will find yourself restored to the faith that was once delivered to the saints, not only by your individual action, but also by collective action.
The fifth step: And have mercy on some, who are doubting. The margin says that some manuscripts read, “Convince some who are doubting.” Strangely enough, once a spiritual disaster starts in a few, it seems to sweep through the whole church. It is extremely contagious. Therefore we must be on the alert to watch for a demonic or spiritual infection that might hit any individual, and try to take care of it at once. This is for your benefit as well as for the person who may be in trouble. Try to help those who are confused or doubting. Keep encouraging them and help them up on their feet. There may be a day later when someone will help you when you are in trouble. This is the family spirit that God gave in vision. Because all stood together and helped one another in any kind of need, they made it.
The sixth step: Save others, snatching them out of the fire. This goes beyond helping those who are confused and doubting. These you virtually have to snatch out of the fire. At this particular time, an individual does not make it alone, nor does he fail alone, because God has brought forth a many-membered Body. You cannot say, “I am a thumb; I am going to make it, and I don’t care what the rest of the body does.” If you make it, they all make it. If they do not make it, you do not make it either. It is impossible for anyone to make it alone. That day is over. Even the ministries of authority cannot function without the prayers and faith and ministry of the people. The further they go and the more they develop, the more there is an interdependence. We are dependent upon one another to survive. There is a flow of life that is ministered through Christ to us. The Body is built up by that which every joint supplies (Ephesians 4:16).
You may not realize that the world has been moving into the age of collectivism during the past generation. We saw Satan’s perversion of it in the Communist revolution. We see evidences of this new age in the economic and business world. Chain stores monopolize trade, making it almost impossible for the individual merchant to succeed. In many cases the small corner grocery store cannot buy groceries wholesale as cheap as the big chain stores can sell them retail.
The Church moves as one Body. We all help each other. We all make it together. We do not stand as individuals. God has said, “Let the Body prophesy! See the visions! Dream the dreams! Stand and prophesy against Babylon.”
A generation ago a handful of believers prophesied, and as a result many things are happening today in the religious world. Continue to prophesy. Stand and speak the Word of the Lord. Have mercy on those who are doubting. Save others, snatching them out of the fire.
Step seven: And on some have mercy with fear, hating even the garment polluted by the flesh. We must hate the contagious quality of corruption that hits different members in the Body, and we must try to get them out of it as fast as possible. This is the way we will return to the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints. Notice that three of these seven points deal with our relationships together in helping one another and holding one another up. There is no better way. If you want a glorious surge of God’s blessing, and the whole Body of people touching God as never before, start praying for one another. James tells us, “Confess your faults one to another, praying for one another, that you may be healed” (James 5:16). The whole Body gains by a sense of the other brother’s need.
If you are in spiritual trouble, you may think that you need to look after yourself. However, if you look after yourself, you will not do as well as if you look after your brother. Find someone in need, take a burden for him, and start praying for him. Then see what the Lord will do for you.
Note how the book of Jude ends: Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen. Jude 24–25.
This last message, which gives us the positive steps, needed the framework of the previous messages that gave the warning and the negative side. They provided a dark background for the portrait of the man who is contending for the faith that was once delivered to the saints. His face is luminous as he prays. As he keeps himself in the love of God, his face is aglow. In the sad, dark picture of the end-time, God is bringing forth a people who glow, because they are keeping themselves in the love of God.