Jude 24-25 06/14/2026

Podcast

Welcome and Prayer: Jim Calhoun

Come Lord, join us here today

The hardest thing
The hardest thing, Lord,
Is looking up from our lives
And seeing others
In their lives

Help us
To notice others
Even as we try
So hard
To follow the rules
Do right
Live honorably

Help us
Consider others
Their ups and downs
Their hopes
Their heartbreaks
Knowing you consider them
And you love them
Just the same

Help us to love
Without judging
Without trying to
Contain or
Minimize the worth
Of another person
Because we prefer
This or that
Or we do
this or that
And holding
they are
Less worthy
Because they don’t.

Help us to give freely
Just as you have given to us.
To our family
To our friends
To our neighbors.
Help us openly
welcome everyone
Knowing we are
Everyone too
With no special claims
No rights of standing
And no less need
For your love and care

Help us show our gratitude
For your loving care
With our
Tangible, daily
loving of each person
You bring into our lives
However they may arrive.
Amen

Morning Talk: chuck smith, jr.

“Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory 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

Intro: Here we are, after several weeks, at the end of Jude

There’s not another letter in the New Testament exactly like it
– a small bit of 2 Peter incorporates some of the same lines
• but the overall structure and content of Jude are unusual,
◦ and his quotations from two non-biblical books is unique
• but coming to the end, he closes with a familiar prayer
◦ it’s not his exact words that are familiar, but how the words are arranged
◦ Jude signs off with a “doxology”
– the Greek word doxa, is frequently translated “glory”
• and this word usually appears in doxologies, making it easy to identify them
• a doxology is a prayer or song in praise of God
◦ in many churches doxologies are read, recited, or sung every week

Most letters in the New Testament close with “greetings”
– Paul signs-off with the longest list of personal greetings in Romans 16
• to friends who are arriving or have arrived in Rome
• to believers who already live in Rome
• and then Paul sends regards from people who were with him
– other New Testament letters close with a benediction—the following is typical of Paul:
“The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit . . . . Amen” (Gal. 6:18)
• but the way Jude signs-off with a doxology is rare

This raises the question, Why does Jude end his letter this way?

My guess, is he realized he’d taken his readers into a dark place
– Jude warned them of enemy infiltrators
• they claimed to be the same as other Christians,
◦ but they had different beliefs, different priorities, and a different agenda
◦ they were deceptive and dangerous
• and they were rushing toward their own doom and destruction,
◦ taking with them anyone who joined them
◦ Jude has shown his “Beloved” readers how they’re not like those others
– so now that he has made his point, he pauses and reflects
• he cannot leave his readers in this religious war zone without providing them some comfort and hope
• he wants to assure them, they will not be deceived or defeated
◦ and the kingdom of God will not be overrun by barbarians
◦ they are in the strong hands of the eternal, almighty God
And that called for a doxology

What I would like, is if we can make this doxology our own

“Now to him” – the first thing the doxology does:
– it turns our attention toward God
• wherever we’ve been led up to this point, “Now,” we’re brought back to God
◦ however, what’s interesting, because the doxology does not immediately identify God as the recipient of the glory and praise
◦ rather, it begins by acknowledging his unique capacity to help us

“who is able” – this is always our human concern
– we’re faced with challenges every day
• some are small and annoying, others are huge and worrying
◦ will we have the resources to meet those challenges,
◦ enough strength, will-power, energy, or money?
• the doxology–this prayer of praise–is our reassurance
◦ yes! we will have enough, not of ourselves, but because God “is able”

Jude’s interest in what God can do for us covers two needs:
first, “to keep you from stumbling”
– and I’m going to go straight into next need because they’re connected
second, “and to present you blameless”
– in our daily lives, God is able to make us surefooted so we do not stumble
• and at the end of our lives, God finds us blameless
◦ I connect these two items because they’re connected in Psalm 18
“For who is God, but the LORD?
And who is a rock, except our God?—
the God who equipped me with strength
and made my way blameless.
He made my feet like the feet of a deer
and set me secure on the heights” (Ps. 18:31-33)
• exactly what Jude says, but in reverse order (blameless, then stable)
– I am not going to disagree with Jude, but feel the need to clarify something
• we do trip up at times–which one of the apostles never did?
James wrote, “For we all stumble in many ways” (Jas. 3:2)
◦ so what is Jude saying? I think something similar to Paul
◦ when writing about his own Jewish people, Paul said,
“So I ask, did they stumble in order that they might fall? By no means!” (Ro. 11:11)
• we can stumble without falling
◦ it’s not that we never lose our balance or make a misstep
◦ but God catches us, corrects us, stands us on our feet again

The path that Jude’s readers had to traverse was risky
– like traversing a steep downhill path over rough terrain or loose dirt
• deception was widespread, and some believers had been drawn into it
• so if any of Jude’s Beloved friends ever feared for their own safety,
◦ the doxology is reassurance that God wouldn’t let them fall
Lonnie Frisbee in his autobiography said, “We need to pay attention, we need to obey, we need to keep our hearts right with God. Believe me, I failed many times in every department—but I tried. When I would fail, God would pick me up and instruct me with this truth: We fail our way into the kingdom of God. It starts with grace and ends with grace.”
– take a deep breath, relax, and listen to Psalm 121:
“My help comes from the LORD,
who made heaven and earth.
He will not let your foot be moved;
he who keeps you will not slumber.
Behold, he who keeps Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.
The LORD is your keeper;
the LORD is your shade on your right hand.
The sun shall not strike you by day,
nor the moon by night.
The LORD will keep you from all evil;
he will keep your life.
The LORD will keep your going out and your coming in
from this time forth and forevermore” (Ps. 121:2-8)

Notice that Jude says we will be “presented” blameless
(I imagine it will be Jesus who does the “presenting”)
– and that will happen where it matters most
“before the presence of his glory” – Jesus warned,
“And I tell you, everyone who acknowledges me before men, the Son of Man also will acknowledge before the angels of God, but the one who denies me before men will be denied before the angels of God” (Lk. 12:8-9)
• so the doxology gives us reassurance for that moment
◦ and Jude adds, “with great joy”

I’ve known Michael Herbert for many years. When he was eighteen years old he crashed a motorcycle that he was not expected to survive. While unconscious, he experienced a Near-Death Event (he refers to it as a Near-Life Event). Often, after one of my talks, he would approach me and begin by saying,
“In heaven what that looks (or sounds like, or feels like) is this . . .” and then describe what he had experienced. Just hearing descriptions of what he experienced would again overwhelm with joy, which I also felt.
▫ I have no more to say about this joy – it’s beyond me

At last Jude introduces God as the One who enables us

“to the only God” – the Gnostics proposed a series of gods,
– and Jude’s readers lived in a culture of many gods
• Paul puts that in Christian perspective in 1 Corinthians:
“For although there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth–as indeed there are many ‘gods’ and many ‘lords’–yet for us there is one God, the Father from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist” (1 Cor. 8:5-6)
• Jude adds to God, “our Savior” – God has always been our Savior
◦ the great saving event in the Hebrew Scriptures is God’s rescue of his people from Egypt
◦ in the Christian New Testament, his saving event occurs on Mount Calvary
– Paul’s letter to Titus has been divided into three chapters
once, in each chapter, Paul says “God our Savior” and then nearby, “Jesus our Savior”
• our salvation is a divine priority and perfectly coordinated

“be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority”
– if we try to describe how God would appear to us,
we run out of superlatives – we become like Isaiah, who said,
“Woe is me! For I am lost; . . . for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!” (Isa. 6:5)
– the last line of the doxology covers all of eternity:
“before all time – and now – and forever. Amen”

Conclusion: I will leave us with a question – as much for myself as for you

Is it possible for us to live in an awareness and attitude of doxology?
Music may be an helpful aid, but worship doesn’t always have a musical soundtrack behind it
I think for many Christians today, their total worship is only in song
That is not what we find in the Scriptures
where worship is sometimes in speech, sometimes physical gestures and sometimes silence
Doxology–with or without music–lifts us to a higher level of awareness, and experience of God in the present moment
Let’s go there often!

Michael Herbert’s book is entitled Caught Up to Paradise: The Story of a Near-Life Event