Recipe For Revival by Brother Curtis Hansen

         This morning we are going to turn to the book of Jude. For those here unsure where the book is located in the Bible, it is right before the book of Revelation. Jude is a very short book, containing no chapter headings. We will begin to read at verse 1.

        Jude, the servant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, to them that are sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ, and called:

        2 Mercy unto you, and peace, and love, be multiplied.

        3 Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should honestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints.

        It is somewhat common for people today to speculate what kind of letter the apostle Paul would write to the christian church at large in America today. I want to say that the letter of Jude comes pretty close to addressing issues within the church today. Now, Jude was the brother of James who was also the brother of Jesus.

        Every denomination began with an individual man who had an idea or interpretation of the scripture. You and I have access to Jesus through the scripture, through prayer, through intercession and fasting. All these actions are enabled by our faith in him. Many people apply their faith in the wrong things. Many confuse two separate things in their relationship with Jesus.

        This morning there are people who have been called to speak to various sized crowds. It's a gift of public speaking to keep a group of people hold their dwindling attention spans on you for 30 minutes or longer. These people may have a calling, but they may not all be anointed though. There is a difference between calling and an anointing.

        If your faith is strong, there will be a fierce resistance form your flesh. If you allow your flesh to sink into apathy, and that spirit spreads in the church body it begins to transform the solid rock of the Bible into something else entirely. There's overlap and blending of worldly elements which occur. The sound doctrine presented in scripture is completely lost for earthly pursuits. Speakers have taken the simple and basic truth of the Bible and have grafted their own personal opinions or customer to that truth. What you think is not the truth. What occurs in church houses among the many different denominations today in our country, were playing out similar in the days when Jude wrote this letter.

        So, if you know someone who has a defeatist mindset or apathetic views, how do you get through to them? You cannot do anything to bring them to the truth. God will call to the point of their listening or he breaks them down into submission. You can intercede for them. You can pray without ceasing for them.         

        Neurologists have mapped out the human brain over time and discovered that the frontal lobe of the brain produces gratitude or anxiety. These emotions are done separately and not together. Salvation is what Jude writes as his main theme of the letter and salvation is still important in this day. The press to speak salvation is man's sinful nature continues to muddy the clear and simple of the gospel. The fight to retain your faith is more out away from others and should not be in the sanctuary. The church is your place of shelter rather than your coliseum to fight. Let's get back to the letter of Jude with verse 4.

        4 For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.

        Men from other places had come into the church. Bad teaching can corrupt your faith and detour your walk with God.

        5 I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not.

        6 And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgement of the great day.

        7 Even Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.

        The verses here are the judgement given to those whom had turned God's grace into lasciviousness and denying Jesus. Verse 6 states the angels leaving their habitation. Those were the angels which were cast out by God and who are now among the people today. Verse 5 speaks about the rebellion among the Israelites outside of Egypt. Verse 7, Jude writes about the judgement of Sodom and Gomorrah.

        8 Likewise also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities.

        The term of "filthy dreamers" is for everything dreamt up and envisioned to satisfy man's flesh. Defiling the flesh can be any number of things that turns your attention, your love from God onto yourself. Despising dominion is fighting or resisting those who rule over you. There are principles and standards written in the Bible which should be held in high regard by you and I. The ones which our flesh despises, we should cleave to even more. The dignities Jude writes about which are spoken evil of are angelic beings. He addresses them further in the next verse.

        9 Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee.

        If you are sitting here and in the midst of a trial, not knowing when it will end or if there is an end, read the book of Job. Trials are made to pull you out of or bring you in your walk. You are standing in a trial to speak your testimony.

        10 But these speak evil of those things which they know not: but what they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves.

        Jude is still pointing out facets of character traits. There is a knowledge of the spiritual side of things. They know the basics in the flesh of being hungry or being comfortable.

        11 Woe unto them! for they have gone the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in raw gainsaying of Core.

        I don't know woe personally nor do I want to know it. Woe is God having enough. I want to keep knowing grace. Many want the outcome and blessing without any of the work. The error of Balaam is a prophet who is unfaithful and false and loved money. Core was a man who led a rebellion against Moses while in the wilderness. You can read that account in the book of Numbers chapter 16.

        12 These are spots in your feasts of charity, when they feast with you, feeding themselves without fear: clouds they are without water, carried about of winds; trees whose fruit withers, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots.

        The spot at your feast. People who resemble clouds without water, who look fruitful at first glance but barren. Those who proclaim the faith but are all flash with no substance. They are all sizzle and no steak.

        13 Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.

        14 And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied these, saying, Behold the Lord cometh, with then thousands of his saints.

        Jude writes how even back thousands of years previous in the time of Enoch, Enoch knew there would be judgment in the world. He didn't realize how and what the particular judgement would be. The judgement was the great flood in the time of Noah.

        15 To execute judgement upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.

        16 These are murmurers, complainers, walking after their own lusts; and their mouth speakers great swelling words, having men's persons in admiration because of advantage.

        How many of the character traits in verse 16 are in your life? Be they family, your social circle, your acquaintances, your co-workers? You need to be aware and vigilant of these types in your life. Look and keep your spiritual guard up. Apathy and false teachers are some of the greatest and dangerous threats. Your faith is your most valuable trait. Faith gives you community.