Jude, Bluntly Speaking  

   Author of the last letter in the New Testament before Revelation, Jude identifies himself as brother of James. The only two brothers by those names in the NT were half-brothers of Jesus.

   After urging his "friends" to contend for the faith, Jude reminds them of those who "suffer the punishment of eternal fire. Godless men who change the grace of our God into a license for immorality and deny Jesus Christ..." 

   He mentions the angels who did not keep their positions of authority...Sodom and Gomorrah...dreamers who pollute their own bodies, reject authority and slander celestial beings." 

   "Woe to them!" he exclaims. "These men who speak abusively against whatever they do not understand. They have taken the way of Cain; they have rushed into Balaam's error; they have been destroyed in Korah's rebellion." 

   Jude reminds them - "Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men. See, the Lord is coming with thousands upon thousands of his holy ones to judge everyone, and to convict all the ungodly of all the ungodly acts they have done in the ungodly way, and of all the harsh words ungodly sinners have spoken against him." 

   Then he looks to the future - "In the last times there will be scoffers who will follow their own ungodly desires. These are the men who divide you, who follow mere natural instincts and do not have the Spirit." 

   Warnings delivered, Jude ends his short letter - "Keep yourselves in God's love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life. Be merciful to those who doubt; snatch others from the fire and save them; to others show mercy, mixed with fear..."