Study in the Epistle of Jude # 19: Verse 5

by Chris McCann

EBible Fellowship (http://www.ebiblefellowship.com)

Welcome to the Electronic Bible Fellowship’s Bible study. We are currently going through the one-chapter book of Jude. We have reached verse 5 of this little Epistle, where we read:

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.

We have been looking at the beginning part of the verse, which says, “I will therefore put you in remembrance.” I think that it is no coincidence that we find this kind of language in the book of Jude. The Apostle Judas (not Iscariot, but another one of the Apostles named Judas) was mostly in the background for most of the time that Christ was ministering the Gospel. In the Gospels, we rarely see him mentioned or in the forefront. However, in John 14:22-26, we read that he does take center stage. It says there:

Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world? Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him. He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father’s which sent me. These things have I spoken unto you, being yet present with you. But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.

One of the tasks of the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, is to bring things that Christ has said to remembrance. Judas certainly remembered Christ’s answer to his question, and he says here in verse 5:

I will therefore put you in remembrance…

Let us remember that Jude is writing under the inspiration of God (2 Timothy 3:16). He is writing what the Holy Spirit, the Holy Ghost, is moving him to write. He is bringing up that same idea that Christ mentioned in John 14—that one of the jobs of the Holy Spirit is to put the people of God in remembrance of what Christ has said.

It is very important that we do remember what Jesus has said, what the Word of God has said. Again and again, God reminds us in the Bible. He constantly is referring to past events and historical occurrences, trying to stir up our memories and bring us into remembrance. As we have seen, though, there is a tendency in man to overlook the things that are repetitious—the things that he thinks that he has learned.

It is the same idea as when we are in school. We go to school and learn the basics of spelling and reading and writing and arithmetic, and then we move on. If you had some ninth or tenth grade students, and the math instructor began teaching them very elementary math that grade school students learn, they would get bored. They would even be insulted that this man was going back to the basics and trying to remind them of these simple math formulas. That is how it is in the world. The world always wants to move on and to learn something new and different.

It was that way in the city of Athens. In Acts 17, which speaks of the Apostle Paul’s visit to Athens, we read in verse 21:

(For all the Athenians and strangers which were there spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell, or to hear some new thing.)

“Some new thing,” the world says, “tell us something new. We do not want to hear an old story. We do not want to hear a story that we know the ending of. We want to hear some new and interesting and exciting things. Tell us something different; tell us something strange and unusual.” That is how the world is, and that is why there are so many novels and movies and fairy tale stories. Something new, something different—man’s mind is constantly working to think of something original, something that has never been done before. This interests man greatly. The tendency of man’s mind is to look for the new.

In contrast, God again and again repeats Himself. He impresses certain truths upon the reader of the Bible over and over. This can get very repetitious. As we read the book of Jeremiah, we see in chapter after chapter, verse after verse, that God is underscoring the point that He is judging His people. As you go on in the book of Jeremiah, it becomes almost a burden to read all that information. God is continually saying the same thing—the people of God have been unfaithful, so He is judging them; and His judgment is a severe and terrible judgment.

This is how God has written the Bible. We do not want to come to a position or develop a point of view in which we are not interested in hearing the same things reviewed, the same doctrines talked of again. We want to do as God says, and be put in remembrance.

We have to be careful if we continually dismiss a topic. We cannot say, “I know that; I do not need to hear that” each time something is brought up. Before long, we will not have any knowledge regarding it. That topic will be gone from us; we will lose it. It is necessary for the people of God, who have very frail memories when it comes to spiritual things, to continually look again and again at the same truths that the Bible presents. That is why Jude writes:

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.

God is talking to the New Testament believers. He is saying, “Take notice—look at this and consider it. Remember what happened to Israel. I did greatly deliver My people and I miraculously saved them out of the land of Egypt. I sent sore plagues upon the Egyptians. I destroyed the great and mighty nation of Egypt, for all intents and purposes, in bringing forth My people out of that house of bondage. I parted the Red Sea. Great and mighty miracles were done as I delivered My people out of Egypt.”

Yet, was that the end of the story? Did they go on to live happily ever after as the people of God? Were they a faithful and obedient people? No. We must be put in remembrance, and keep in mind, that after all those wonderful things that God did in rescuing His people out of Egypt, He had to destroy them in the wilderness. They had begun to murmur and lust after evil things. They were constantly rebelling against God in the wilderness. Consequently, God destroyed them that believed not.

God is telling us, and thereby warning the New Testament believers and the New Testament churches and congregations, “Look at the Israelites who came out of Egypt—what about them? Have you forgotten them? Have you forgotten what I have done to them? Do you not remember?” This is similar to what God says in Hebrew 4:1‑2. It says there:

Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it. For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it.

“For unto us was the gospel preached”—this is being directed to the New Testament church. “As well as unto them”—”them” here is the Old Testament church. They likewise had the Gospel preached unto them. God preached the Gospel to the Old Testament church just as He is preaching the Gospel to the New Testament church.

What is the difference? There is no difference. He delivered the Israelites out of Egypt. Likewise, He provided deliverance through the Word of God, which lays out God’s salvation plan, to the many individuals who came into the churches and congregations of the world. Those individuals are saying that spiritually, they have come out of that house of bondage (their sin and the kingdom of darkness), exactly as the Israelites, historically, came out of the Egypt. Yet, those in the churches are continuing on in their rebellion, just as the Israelites did in the wilderness. Have they forgotten that God destroyed the Israelites? They seem to have overlooked this. They are not being put “in remembrance.” Perhaps they do not think that this applies to them, but God certainly does.

Let us turn to 1 Corinthians 10:4 where, speaking of the Israelites, it says:

And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ.

This is an interesting verse all by itself. There are those who say that the true believers who are coming out of the church are spiritualizing. Yet, how do you have a rock following a nation? God calls it a “spiritual Rock.” However, we do not read about any spiritual rock back in the book of Numbers or Exodus. We see that God is giving the rock a spiritual meaning—that Rock was the Lord Jesus Christ. This is just another one of those verses that tells us how God has written the Bible, and that we are to look for the deeper spiritual meaning.

Then it says in verses 5-6 of the same chapter:

But with many of them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the wilderness. Now these things were our examples, to the intent we should not lust after evil things, as they also lusted.

This is very important. God is saying, “Look at Israel, they are your example.” He is saying, “Look, they lusted and sinned and rebelled against Me, and I destroyed them. They were overthrown in the wilderness.” This is the example that the New Testament church needs to look at. That is the example that the churches and congregations of the world need to remember. They need to keep in mind that they cannot simply do as they please. They cannot go about developing their own doctrines and devising gospels out of their own minds and doing just about anything and everything under the sun that they so wish. They should take a look at the example of the nation of Israel, which fell lusting in the wilderness and was destroyed. None of those men who were twenty years old and over, except for Caleb and Joshua, made it into the Promised Land (Numbers 32:11-12). They were destroyed by God.

Let us go on to read 1 Corinthians 10:7-8, which says:

Neither be ye idolaters, as were some of them; as it is written, The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play. Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed, and fell in one day three and twenty thousand.

God here is warning the church that if they continue on in their spiritual fornication and their spiritual adultery against the law of God—in other words, if they continue going after their own high-place doctrines that they have developed—then they will be brought into judgment.

The number twenty-three is a number that identifies with the Great Tribulation. We read in Daniel 8 that the sanctuary would be cleansed after twenty-three hundred evening mornings. Also, we know that God is giving us this number in a special way in 1 Corinthians 10:8, because twenty-four thousand people actually died in that plague after God brought His judgment. However, God says here that twenty-three thousand died in one day. Is there a contradiction? No. In one day, twenty-three thousand people did die, and the other thousand people would have died the next day.

God makes the statement that twenty-three thousand people died in one day, and He does so for a very particular purpose—so that the number twenty-three will be featured. This is a strong warning to the church. “Watch out,” the warning cautions. “Remember Israel. Remember their idolatry and their fornication. Remember how they lusted after evil things in the wilderness. If you forget, I will cast you into great tribulation and bring my judgment upon you exactly as I have done to Israel.”

We go on to read in verses 9-10:

Neither let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed of serpents. Neither murmur ye, as some of them also murmured, and were destroyed of the destroyer.

Then in verse 11, God stresses the same thing that He did earlier in verse 6. Verse 11 says:

Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.

What is God saying here? He is definitely, without question, saying, “You in the New Testament church, look at Israel.” Who else is God talking to when He says that these things are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come? Is He talking to Israel? No, they are not in view in the New Testament. God is dealing with the churches and congregations. He is saying, “Take warning; take heed.”

We see this again in verse 12, which says:

Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.

These things are written for our warning. What is the warning? That when the nation of Israel received the Gospel, yet it was not mixed with faith, and when they fell into all sorts of apostasy, then God judged them. The warning is to the church. They may also experience that same type of judgment.

A big problem with the church today as they are hearing the news and the information that God is judging the church is that they simply cannot believe it. They have the very mistaken idea that the churches stand in a grace relationship towards God and towards the Law of God. They take what is true of the individual believer and apply it to themselves. The true child of God is saved by grace. Any sin that a child of God commits is forgiven and no sin can break the relationship between a true child of God and the Father. They are once saved and eternally saved; they will never lose their salvation. The church has adopted the mistaken understanding that the things that are true of the individual child of God’s relationship with God are true of themselves. They have concluded that the church stands in a grace relationship with God, and that the church is the recipient of God’s grace. They have concluded that God will never break apart that relationship if the church sins or fails to keep the law of God.

However, what is true of the individual child of God is not true of the corporate body, the church. In no way does the corporate body stand in a grace relationship towards God. The corporate body stands in a works relationship. That is why Christ would say to them in Revelation, “Return to your first love, and if you do not, I will take away the candlestick” (Revelation 2:4-5).

When individual churches or congregations, or even whole denominations, begin to fall astray and develop other kinds of doctrines, which is sin, why are those sins not forgiven if there is a grace relationship? Why are those churches not forgiven of their error, and why are those errors not overlooked if they are standing by grace in the sight of God? Why is it that God removes the candlestick as He has done throughout the Church Age from a church when it loses all sight of truth, or from a whole denomination when it becomes another gospel where God’s presence is no longer found? How can that be if they stand by grace? Should not their sins, their errors in doctrine, be forgiven?

No, because they do not stand by grace. They are accountable to God and must maintain a right relationship with Him through His Word. When they fail to do so, it was God’s prerogative during the Church Age to give up and hand over a church, or even a whole denomination. This is God’s prerogative to do, and He has done it. It is also His prerogative to give up the entire church, the whole corporate body, and deliver it to Satan during the Great Tribulation.

Now is the time to examine the churches to see if they are maintaining a faithful relationship with the Word of God. When God, in the fullness of time—in the time that He has selected—chooses to hold the whole corporate body accountable to Himself, He finds high places. He finds doctrines that are not true and faithful. He finds all manner of sin in the church. This is where the example of Israel comes into play. The churches have forgotten, they have not been brought to remembrance that Israel was their example. God had given them warning through His judgments on Israel, but they have forgotten these things. They have repeated history, and they also now are coming under the fierce judgment of God. The wrath of God is being poured out upon the churches and congregations.

They cannot believe this; they cannot fathom it. They cannot understand how this could be possible. How could it be that God would judge His people? Many times they confuse God’s relationship to the elect, the eternal Church, with His relationship to the corporate church. This is because they have adopted the understanding that what is true of the individual believer is true of the whole corporate body.

This is an error that is causing them to not see. It is causing them to not understand that they do not stand by grace and that they cannot do as they please. The church cannot do what it is doing today and expect to get away with it. They cannot expect God to be smiling down from Heaven upon them. They cannot expect God to continue blessing them as they totally disregard His Word on just about every point of doctrine. It is only the church in its blindness that can have that type of expectation.

Lord willing, we are going to pick this up in our next study and look a little more at Romans chapter 11. We will see there that, once again, God warns the New Testament church very clearly and plainly that there is a possibility they might be cut off just as national Israel was. These are the plain statements that those in the churches claim they would like to see in the Scriptures. In Romans 11, we will see it very plainly, but I am afraid that for a great many in the church, it still will not do any good. They have closed their ears, and their eyes are likewise shut. Until our next study, may the Lord richly bless you.