// Read: Jude 11-24; Gen. 4:1-8; Numbers 16:1; 22:15 //
11 Woe to them! They have taken the way of Cain; they have rushed for profit into Balaam’s error; they have been destroyed in Korah’s rebellion.
12 These people are blemishes at your love feasts, eating with you without the slightest qualm—shepherds who feed only themselves. They are clouds without rain, blown along by the wind; autumn trees, without fruit and uprooted—twice dead. 13 They are wild waves of the sea, foaming up their shame; wandering stars, for whom blackest darkness has been reserved forever.
14 Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about them: “See, the Lord is coming with thousands upon thousands of his holy ones 15 to judge everyone, and to convict all of them of all the ungodly acts they have committed in their ungodliness, and of all the defiant words ungodly sinners have spoken against him.”[a] 16 These people are grumblers and faultfinders; they follow their own evil desires; they boast about themselves and flatter others for their own advantage.
A Call to Persevere
17 But, dear friends, remember what the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ foretold. 18 They said to you, “In the last times there will be scoffers who will follow their own ungodly desires.” 19 These are the people who divide you, who follow mere natural instincts and do not have the Spirit.
20 But you, dear friends, by building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, 21 keep yourselves in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life.
22 Be merciful to those who doubt; 23 save others by snatching them from the fire; to others show mercy, mixed with fear—hating even the clothing stained by corrupted flesh.[b]
Doxology
24 To him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy—
MEDITATION:
The book of Jude gives us a vivid revelation of the operations of the enemy in these last days. By bringing the major figure of the kind of spirit that will work in men in the church in these last days. These tripartite evil are:
Spirit of Cain – Comparison
Spirit of Balaam – Compensation
Spirit of Korah – Competition
You cannot carry any of these spirits and succeed in the church as a minister or brother or sister. Be watchful!
PRAYER: Oh Lord, deliver me from the error of Balaam, the rebellion of Korah and the wickedness of Cain.