Take Five with Jude, Lesson 26

 Take Five with Jude: Verses 24-25

 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.

 

As we come to the end of this short letter it is good to remind ourselves of Jude’s overarching theme: Christian! Be on the alert. Satan has his children busy infiltrating the fellowship of true followers of Christ. Their express mission is to dilute truth, sow distrust among the faithful, and destroy the work of God among the Church.

 

But now Jude closes his message with a profound promise and an abundant assurance of God’s unbridled power to keep us from stumbling, from giving up, from turning away from our walk toward the Celestial City.

 

This is not a trivial promise. Job remarked, “Man, who is born of woman, is short-lived and full of turmoil,” (14:1) and everyone reading this knows that to be true. And most every Christians knows how difficult the walk of faith is when life is not as rosy and smooth as many false teaches have led us to believe.

But Jude’s promise remains ever true: Our omnipotent, almighty Father God is able to keep every one of His children from stumbling so as to fall. Hear what the psalmist wrote: (Psalm 37:23-25, NIV) “The Lord makes firm the steps of the one who delights in him; though he may stumble, he will not fall, for the Lord upholds him with his hand. I was young and now I am old, yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken . . . .”

 

I wonder if Jude was not also thinking of St. Paul’s promise to the church at Corinth when Paul wrote: “No testing has overtaken you that is not common to everyone. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it.” (1 Corinthians 10:13, NRSV)

 

Over the years I have spoken with Christians, some of whom were enmeshed in the most horrible life-situations. Sudden brain injuries of children or spouse, devastating financial upheavals, chronic and unremitting physical pain. The list of Job-like traumas they had to endure goes on and on and on.

 

Some weathered them with Jesus; but others turned away, and as they left, they told me, “God has given me more than I can handle.”

 

Listen: Either God is true ALL the time, or He is true only part of the time. And if He is true only part of the time then it is fair to call Him a liar. But God is never a liar. He is Truth itself. And that is why when Jude tells us He is able to keep us from stumbling, from losing the same faith that sustained the Heroes of Faith we read of in Hebrews 11 – when Jude tells us God is able to keep us from stumbling, we can rest our souls firmly on that vow from God’s lips to our hearts.

 

But there is yet more that God vows to us. We find it in the next clause, and we look at that next time.