From Jude 2 / Mercy, Peace and Love

Due to the urgency and seriousness of the subject matter of Jude’s letter, The Spirit saw fit to give some preparatory material.

So in verse 1, in the letter’s first triad, Jude helps anchor his readers in the what genuine salvation consists in. Those who are true Believers in Christ Jesus have been called to that position by God’s sovereign grace, they are as loved as God can love by The Father, and they are being kept both by and for Jesus Christ and the final day. It is a glorious foundation indeed.

Verse 2 gives us the second triad or triplet of ideas.

Notice first: Given what Jude is about to discuss as both urgent and deadly serious, he is concerned that the subject matter will lead his readers into a merciless war against those he’ll be exposing, that their peace will be upset and that love will take a back seat. He is preparing them for what they are about to hear. How do we contend earnestly for core Gospel issues, without losing the need to be merciful to the deceived, at peace that the Lord is still Lord over His Church, and that God’s love never fails, nor should ours?

It is a massive lesson for us today when dealing with what may be dangerous ideas or trends in the Church. One thinks immediately of the way the political divide in America has fueled bitter debate and division in Churches.

This triad of things we need to have multiplied to us always, are a great means of preventing our being swept up into the false doctrines of false teachers. False teachers will major on personal worthiness, secrets to better peace with God for gain, and means to be better loved by God, or experience His love. This, because Christ is His fullness is not constantly brought before us.

Notice second: The need for multiplying Mercy.

Believers must never lose sight of how it is they are believers, by virtue of God’s mercy. There is never room for boasting. Never room for comparison. No place for any species of self-justification. And no minimizing our guilt and desert of eternal damnation. The realization of our guilt and that our salvation is the result of pure mercy needs to be magnified in our sight over and over. It must be multiplied. Herein is one of the great paradoxes of true Christianity – that we can only really understand God’s goodness, when we unsparingly embrace our fallenness. When we recognize that salvation is all of grace. And it is only when we are saturated with a sense of how mercied we are – that we will overflow with mercy toward others in their darkness, deception and straying from the central truths of the Faith.

May our sense of being the unworthy recipients of mercy in light of our own sins color the way we deal with others.

Notice third: The need for multiplying peace.

We must constantly remind ourselves of the wonder of Romans 5. Nothing so keeps and encourages the heart in all circumstances as does knowing that our peace with God is rooted in the finished work of Christ. That we are not on probation, but reconciled. The war with God is over, so that we can battle sin instead. And because we are the objects of His mercy, we can have peace even in the fiercest moments of that battle.

When the Church is troubled, we need peace regarding how we are kept in Him. Peace that His promise to complete His work in us cannot fail. Peace that our everlasting inheritance is secure. Peace that His Spirit always attends us, and that His Word is steadfast and sure. Peace that even in death, the resurrection to new life awaits us. Peace that even when this world is coming apart at the seams, and when life is at its hardest, He will not leave us nor forsake us. Peace, that even when the Church is challenged by the very ones Jude is about to mention, that Christ is still our great High Priest, and we are still held in his hands.

Notice fourth: The need for multiplying Love.

In concert with Paul’s prayer in Eph. 3:14-21, it is the knowledge of His great love multiplied to us so that we might be filled with all the fullness of God Himself. And this alone. We are not filled with His fullness through seminars, individual experiences, etc. We are so filled, when according to the riches of His own glory, and strengthened by the Spirit in the inner man so that Christ is at home in us as He is on His throne in Heaven – we are exposed to the height, depth, length and breadth of a love that surpasses knowledge. When we come to know we are loved by the Father even as The Son. Adopted heirs and co-heirs with Christ. Loved beyond all possible human imagination. Loved, not in the sense of merely felt for – but in the sense that the universe is ordered so as to advance our highest blessing in Him. Rom. 8:28.

O that we would be ever drinking at these fountains. How much less contentious we would be. For Jude will call us to contend for the faith, but not to be contentious, combative or pugnacious with those who oppose us. Only in this will we be merciful toward those who may foolishly stray for a time, and forget to love those caught in deceptions – while being merciless to the deceptions themselves. Such a balance comes only when mercy, peace and love are multiplied to us.

And in Christ, they surely are!