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Reading Jude 7 and considering the example of Sodom and Gomorrah, showing that God is a great and righteous judge. Visit wwutt.com for all our videos!
When God poured out His wrath on Sodom and Gomorrah, Christ was not absent. He was there. He is a righteous judge who feels indignation every day and will pour out His wrath on the Day of Judgment when we understand the text.
You are listening to When We Understand the Text, committed to sound teaching of the word of God. For questions and comments, email whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com. And don't forget our website, www .txt .com.
Here's our host, Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky.
And greetings, everybody. As we continue our study of Jude, we are in that particular paragraph that consists of the verses 5, 6, and 7, Jude's three examples of God's judgment and how His promised judgment will come upon those who teach falsely and lead others astray.
So let's come again to Jude, beginning in verse 5, where he says,. Now I want to remind you, although you once fully knew it, that Jesus, who saved a people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe, and the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority but left their proper dwelling, He has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of that great day, just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire.
So we come back once again to the three examples that we have. That first one we looked at on Monday is Christ delivering a people out of the land of Egypt, but He destroyed those in the wilderness who continued in their unbelief.
So even though they were delivered, they had not yet fully reached the promised land, but because they still had minds that were enslaved in Egypt, Christ destroyed them in the wilderness. And so the judgment will also come upon those who at one point may have had some kind of profession of faith, but by the fruit that they bear, the bad fruit that comes from bad trees, it is evident that they were never actually rooted in Christ and they will be destroyed before they make it into the eternal kingdom.
Jude is saying, warning his readers, do not be named among them and do not follow the teaching of those who will be destroyed. So then yesterday we looked at verse six, where he says the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority but left their proper dwelling, He has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of that great day.
And so those who align themselves falsely with the teaching of Satan, following the prince of the power of the air, they are following him to their own destruction. And they likewise are being kept until the judgment.
As we read in Proverbs, the Lord has made everything for its purpose, even the wicked for the day of trouble, trouble. Proverbs 16, for the apostle Peter also talks about those who stumble against the stone of stumbling.
He talks about this in first Peter two, as they were destined to do. So those who are being kept for destruction have been destined for this destruction to show the glory of God in this way, when he pours out his wrath on the evildoer.
So now verse seven is the example of judgment that we're looking at today. Just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire.
And what an example Sodom and Gomorrah have been throughout the scriptures. They're mentioned some 50 times in the scriptures related to the judgment of God that comes against the unrighteous. The very first time Sodom is mentioned in the scriptures is Genesis 10, 19, and it's mentioned as a location bordering the territory of the Canaanites.
The next time it's mentioned is Genesis 13, 10. So three chapters later, and it's when Abraham and Lot are deciding between each other which direction that they will go. So whichever direction Lot goes, Abraham is going to go the other way.
And in verse 10 of chapter 13, Lot lifted up his eyes and saw that the Jordan Valley was well watered everywhere, like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt in the direction of Zoar. This was before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.
So the writer of Genesis, which we believe to be Moses, likely the one who wrote Genesis, found it necessary to add this parenthetical reference and make sure the reader understood that what was happening here in the story was before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.
So anybody who had picked up Genesis and reads about these cities is going, hang on, I thought Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed. So Moses found it necessary to add this was before they were destroyed.
Sodom and Gomorrah had such a reputation that everybody knew of those cities as having been destroyed by the wrath of God. In fact, you'll find this fascinating that at the time that Jude is writing his letter.
So we're talking a time frame sometime in the the first century, likely between 60 and 70 AD. So this was probably in the late 60s, about that same time Peter and Paul wrote their last letters. Jude also wrote his 67 or 68 AD.
And so at the time that Jude wrote this letter, smoke was still rising from the area where Sodom and Gomorrah once stood. You're talking 2000 years after Christ had destroyed these cities and smoke was still rising from the region where they once were.
We get this from a Hellenistic Jewish scholar named Philo, who lived in the early first century. And he wrote on Abraham. That's that's the name of his writing on Abraham and life of Moses and wisdom of Solomon.
And it is there in his writings where he mentions the smoke that still rose from the region that formerly belonged to Sodom and Gomorrah. God used his utter destruction of those two cities to serve as a sign and a warning against anyone who would sin against the Lord, who would do such unnatural things as the Sodomites did.
Jude references that here, just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire. So we're not just talking about any kind of fornication or adultery.
We're specifically talking about homosexuality. That's what it was that the Sodomites were guilty of. If you remember the story, God had seen the depravity of the Sodomites. And he said to Abraham, I am going to destroy this city.
Abraham pleaded on behalf of the city. He said, what if 50 righteous people are there? Will you destroy the city if there are 50 righteous people among them? And God said, if there are 50 righteous people there, I will spare the city.
So Abraham whittles it down a little bit more. What about 45? Well, even for the sake of five, you still wipe the city out. How about if 45 righteous are there? And God said, I'll spare the city if there's 45.
Abraham says, what about 40? Then 30, then 20, whittles it all the way down to 10. And God says, if there are 10 righteous people in the city, I will not destroy it. But of course, God knows there are not 10 righteous people in the city.
And so the two angels God sent into Sodom and Gomorrah to retrieve Lot and his family for the sake of Abraham, because of the covenant that God made with Abraham. And when those angels came into the city, the people of Sodom came upon the house of Lot.
And they found out there's these two angels that are staying with Lot. And they said, we're the two men, the two strangers that came in to be with you. Send them out to us so that we may know them, is the way that you read it in the scriptures, it means they wanted to rape them.
And Lot tried to dissuade the men by offering his own two daughters. And the men said, no, you're a wicked stranger who's been living among us ever since the days that you came here to Sodom. And they tried to break down the door, but the angels had stricken the men outside with blindness, yet they're still clamoring at this door and suddenly are stricken blind.
So the angels grab Lot and his family, his daughters, his wife. So they take him to the edge of the city. They say, escape for your life. Do not look back or stop anywhere in the valley. Escape to the hills, lest you be swept away.
But Lot says, no, no, this is this is too serious a thing for me. I will die out here in the wilderness. Let us go to this little town over here. It's very small. Just let us get to that town and then we will be OK.
And they let him go to a city that was called Zoar. And so, as it says in Genesis 19, verse 23, the sun had risen on the earth when Lot came to Zoar. And then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah, sulfur and fire from the Lord out of heaven.
And you get the way that verse is worded there. Genesis 19, 24, the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah, sulfur and fire from the Lord out of heaven. This is God, the father and God, the son who are there present at the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.
We must stay away from any concept of the God of the Old Testament being one kind of God and the God of the New Testament being a different kind of God. It's the same God, the same yesterday, today and forever.
The God on the left side of the book is the same God as the God on the right side of the book. And Jesus Christ is not absent from the Old Testament. He's not the version of God that shows up in Matthew and has not been in the previous 37 books up to that point.
He was there from the very beginning of creation. Genesis 1, 1, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. John 1, 1, in the beginning was the word and the word was God and the word was with God.
Colossians 1, by him were all things made and through him were all things made. Hebrews 1 says the same. So Christ was present at creation from Genesis 1 to Revelation 22. Christ is in the story of the Bible.
And so he is there at Sodom and Gomorrah. This is not the father doing one thing and the son sitting back and going, you know, I don't really agree with that. So why don't we try something different and then pops up on the scene in the book of Matthew?
That is not the way that Christ has been in the story. And there are many teachers out there who are going to try to tell you that that Jesus is not a judge, that he is not a God who feels indignation every day, as it says in Psalm 711, that that doesn't describe God, the father or God, the son.
Beware of teachers who say such things. And one of such teacher teachers is not too far away from me. Just a couple of hours down the road. Brian Zond, as a matter of fact, a listener had sent me a link to one of Zond's articles earlier, either earlier this week or the latter part of last week.
The title of the article is Sinners in the Hands of a Loving God. And in this article, Zond talks about how early on in his ministry, he clung to the sermon of Jonathan Edwards, probably the most famous sermon ever delivered on American soil, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.
And it's in that sermon that Edwards says, the God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you and is dreadfully provoked. His wrath towards you burns like fire.
He looks upon you as worthy of nothing else but to be cast into the fire. He is of purer eyes than to bear you in his sight. You are 10 ,000 times as abominable in his eyes as the most hateful, venomous serpent is in ours.
And there's at one point in the in the article that Zond says, does the sadistic monster in the angry God sermon look like Jesus? Of course not. So we are free to reject it. We must reject it. This is Zond saying that Jesus is a different God than Jonathan Edwards preached about and is a different God than we read about in the Old Testament.
And that that is heresy, that Zond would divide the scriptures in that way, that would divide these different definitions of God. So he tries to explain Psalm 7, which I just quoted you a portion of Psalm 711.
God is a righteous judge who feels indignation every day. So we read it in the translation that that Zond gives here. God is a righteous judge. God sits in judgment every day. If they will not repent, God will wet his sword.
He will bend his bow and make it ready. He has prepared his weapons of death. He makes his arrows shafts of fire. And Zond says these three verses make it sound like God directly visits retribution upon sinners.
But look at the next three verses. And here they are. Look at those who are in labor with wickedness, who conceive evil and give birth to a lie. They dig a pit and make it deep and fall into the hole they have made.
Their malice turns back upon their own head. Their violence falls on their own scalp. He says the psalmist shows that what we might think of as God's wetted sword is in reality the pit of self-inflicted punishment that we dig with our own hands.
Sin has consequences. We dig a pit of sin and eventually we fall in. We act in malice and eventually it returns to haunt us. We employ violence and eventually it boomerangs back on us. We can call this the wrath of God.
The Bible does. But it should not cause us to think that the father of Jesus is the vindictive and retributive God of Edwards infamous sermon. What a horrible dissecting of scripture that Zond has just done.
Trying to say that any mention of sin or or the wages of sin is something that we bring upon ourself. It's not what God does to us. No, the wages of sin is death. The scripture says that. And if you incur the wrath of God, it is because you deserved it.
But God does indeed pour his wrath out on the unrighteous and make no mistake about it. And in fact, it is not just the father who does this, but Jesus Christ himself has on never read Revelation 19 beginning in verse 11.
Then I saw heaven opened and behold, a white horse. The one sitting on it is called faithful and true. And in righteousness, he judges and makes war. His eyes are like a flame of fire and on his head are many diadems.
And he has a name written that no one knows but himself. He is clothed in a robe dipped in blood. And the name by which he is called is the word of God. And the armies of heaven arrayed in fine linen, white and pure were following him on white horses.
From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God, the Almighty on his robe and on his thigh.
He has a name written King of Kings and Lord of Lords. That is Jesus Christ. And he will come with judgment and he will destroy all those who did the works of the devil instead of those who were clothed in his righteousness.
When the Apostle Paul spoke at the Areopagus, when he addressed the men of Athens, he walked among the idols that were there, all these idols that they had erected to these false gods. And he found one that was even raised to an unknown God because the Greeks wanted to make sure they had all their bases covered.
So just in case there's a God out there that we forgot who would be mad at us because we didn't make an idol to him. Here's one to an unknown God. And so as Paul addressed the men of Athens, he said, I perceive that in every way you are very religious.
For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription to the unknown God. What therefore you worship is unknown. I proclaim to you as known. And Paul goes on and says the times of ignorance God overlooked.
But now he commands all people everywhere to repent because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed. And of this, he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.
So Christ's resurrection from the grave is not just a promise to those who believe in him that the grave is not our final resting place and we will rise again with him to dwell in his eternal kingdom.
It is not just a promise of the resurrection of the dead. Christ's resurrection from the grave is also a promise of his judgment that is coming against those who do not repent and do the works that God has commanded us to do in Christ Jesus.
Because Christ is resurrected from the grave, he has the power over life and death itself. That means he has the power to destroy and take life. And so he will do for those who do not repent. That was what Paul was saying there to the men of Athens at the Areopagus.
The judgment of God is every bit in Christ's hands. Jesus at the Great Commission saying to his disciples, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. He has the authority over life and death itself.
And so this judgment, this wrath of God that is coming, it is a wrath that will be brought by Christ, the judge who will sit on the great white throne of judgment and all the nations gathered before him.
And he will separate them out as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And as he talks about this in Matthew 25, the goats will be on his left and the sheep will be on his right. Those who are on his left will go away into eternal punishment.
But those on his right into eternal life. This is Jesus Christ who will do this. And so we must know the judgment of God is in his hand so that just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire.
Just as we see that in the example of Sodom and Gomorrah, so we can know that those who taught falsely against the truth of God who did not do the works of Christ, but instead did the works of Satan. They likewise will be judged in eternal fire as Sodom and Gomorrah were by the hand of Christ himself.
So turn from sin and walk in his righteousness. Christ's death on the cross, the blood that was shed for our sins will forgive you of any sin that you have committed against God. And we all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
It is because we have taken the things that God has given to us, life and breath and everything, as Paul talks about in Acts 17, all things that have been given to us by God. We've taken those things and we've blasphemed him and glorified ourselves instead.
And that's why we are, as Jonathan Edwards described, like spiders, loathsome insects being held over the pit of hell, because we've made ourselves worthless, according to Romans chapter three. But it is Christ who makes us worthy, his sacrifice on the cross that cleanses us from sin and makes us righteous before God.
So repent of your sin. Worship Christ the Lord as holy. Ask for his forgiveness and it will be given to you, cleansed from all unrighteousness and then continue to walk in the ways of Christ all the days of your life.
And you will be saved on the day of judgment and have nothing to fear of the promises of wrath that we see here in chapters five, six and seven. Let us pray. Chapters five, verses five, six and seven in the book of Jude.
Our Lord, we thank you for these warnings that have been given to us. And I pray that we would heed them, that we would not be like the world, that we would not listen to the teachers of darkness, but that we would instead walk in the light as he is in the light.
Christ, the light of the world that had come for us to die on the cross for our sins and rise again from the grave so that in him we might be cleansed of our sins and have eternal life. Keep us faithful to the commands of Christ to our dying day so that on that day we know we will be with him in glory.
And we pray this in Jesus name. Amen.
You've been listening to When We Understand the Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, Gabe will be going through a New Testament study. Then on Thursday, we look at an Old Testament book.
On Friday, we take questions from the listeners and viewers. Tomorrow, we'll pick up on an Old Testament study, When We Understand the Text.