Jude 1:14-25 NKJV
14 Now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men also, saying, “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints, 15 to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.”
16 These are grumblers, complainers, walking according to their own lusts; and they mouth great swelling words, flattering people to gain advantage. 17 But you, beloved, remember the words which were spoken before by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ: 18 how they told you that there would be mockers in the last time who would walk according to their own ungodly lusts. 19 These are sensual persons, who cause divisions, not having the Spirit.
20 But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, 21 keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.
22 And on some have compassion, making a distinction; 23 but others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garment defiled by the flesh.
24 Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling,
And to present you faultless
Before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy,
25 To God our Savior,
Who alone is wise,
Be glory and majesty,
Dominion and power,
Both now and forever.
Amen.
Jude continues by calling on the testimony of the pre-flood patriarch Enoch. He quotes 1 Enoch 1:9, in which Enoch prophesied about these ungodly distorters of doctrine. This doesn’t make the book of 1 Enoch canonical, no more than the seventy elders’ prophesying in Numbers 11:25-26 or Saul’s in 1 Samuel 10:10-13 Holy Scripture. In fact, Jude does not say, “As it is written” as the New Testament authors do when citing Scripture, so that we understand Enoch’s words as factual but not canonical, that is, worthy to be included in Holy Scripture.
Nor do Enoch’s words say anything different from what the Lord says throughout the Old and New Testaments. Christ and the apostles tell us “there would be mockers in the last time who would walk according to their own ungodly lusts” (18). Christ also tells us that He will judge all people when He returns in glory—“those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation” (Jn 5:29).
Jude exhorts us to build ourselves up in our most holy faith, to pray in the Holy Spirit, and to keep ourselves in the love of God, so that we are always “looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life” (21). We know that when Christ returns, we will experience His mercy when He raises us from the dead and says to us at the Final Judgment, “Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world” (Mt 25:34). Jude wants us to remain in faith, to exercise ourselves in prayer, and live with God’s promised mercy and final salvation in mind.
As our final salvation approaches, we have compassion on those who repent of their sins and keep the most holy faith. Those who refuse repentance we are to “save with fear,” that is, by preaching God’s judgment to them as Enoch, the apostles, and Christ did. If they repent of their wickedness, and experience God’s mercy and be gathered with the believing rather than convicted and condemned with the unbelieving. Let us pray: Build us up in the most holy faith and prayer, O Lord, so that we keep ourselves in God’s love and mercy. Amen.