Build up and save

                                                                                                                            

Preachers may sound like a broken record when they tell you to read your Bible over and over, but they care for your soul because you need to remember the words of the apostles of Christ (Jude 17-23). Keep their truths in mind and remember God’s promises and warnings. Remember, there will be mockers in the last times who walk, not after the way of Christ but after the way of flesh. They separate themselves from truth, authority, the church, from Christian fellowship, and  yoke themselves to the world. They may have a testimony, but they don’t have the Holy Spirit.

Instead of being disheartened, build yourselves up on the most holy faith and use the call for preparedness as an opportunity to strengthen yourself. You accomplish this by the Word of God (Acts 20:32)  and by God’s grace (I Corinthians 3:10). You build yourself up in Christ (Colossians 2:6-7), in His church (Ephesians 4:16) and by praying  in the Spirit. By doing this, you keep yourself in the love of God (Jude 21), or, in other words, we keep our minds and hearts in the love of God. We guard our affections against anything that pulls us from the thoughts of the love of Christ Jesus.  While nothing can eternally separate us from the love of God in Christ, we can wander and be led from magnifying God’s love in our life. Read the Bible, pray, meditate on the Scripture, fellowship with other Christians, join the church and attend the worship services, look to Christ and His promises, and look for Christ and his return.

Plus, you need to stay ready for the good of your friends. Someone needs to be strong to protect them (Jude 22-23)!  With some, we need to move with pity, mercy, grace. Being tender hearted because  they may be caught up unawares. Romans 16:18, “by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple”. Some will be deceived and fall off the path of orthodoxy. Others are too close to the edge, or too hardheaded to pick up the tender and gentle warnings.  In Jude 22-23, there are two types of people with basically the same problem, but we wisdom to determine how to deal with different people in different situations. Ignoring the issue and hoping it goes away is not an option if we love our friends. Sometimes a gentle reproof is enough to do the trick and sometimes you have to yank them out of the fire (Jude 23). If a one year old baby is waddling toward an open fire, mere feet from going headfirst into the flame, you don’t suggest in a soft spoken gentlemanly manner, for the babe to reconsider their life choices. You grab them and pull them away from danger. You have to treat sin like a leprous garment. It’s diseased and dangerous. Hate it for what it is and instead of falling in the flames, toss the garment of sin in the bonfire.