Keeping Ourselves in the Love of God

But you, dear friends, building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, expecting the mercy of our Lord Jesus for eternal life.

Jude 20–21

The New Testament world was not warm and cuddly. Normally it was quite the opposite: a world hardened by political and personal conflict, intense competition in business, rife with biases, prejudices, and injustices. Yet in this world the gospel came and flourished. The different nature of the gospel, that contrasted with the hardness of the First Century world, was attractive in and of itself, but if that was all the gospel had to offer — just a different emphasis, just a new idea that was better than the old ideas — it would have ultimately failed to grow and spread for very long, and been assigned to the category of another failed ideology or movement.

In the gospel, however, we have not just another idea, not just a contrasting value or popular fad, but a new reality that meets the central need of every generation. It was the life and love of Christ that flowed through the hearts of the new believers that made the difference. Men like Jude, the half-brother of Jesus who authored this little epistle, preached this gospel of love and life. Among the faithful they stood like giants wherever they were placed. Not everyone noticed their spiritual stature, to be sure, but those who did held them up as models, as little examples of the character of Christ. Men and women such as these existed and they existed specifically because God had gotten His way in their hearts and lives. They had abandoned themselves to the will of God and in so doing experienced the depth of peace and of transformation of heart that only God can bring.

Jude’s encouragement and command to believers is that we continue to keep ourselves, as individuals and as a divine community, in the love and mercy of Christ, that we be not discouraged by the hardness of the world, nor be disheartened by all that is not yet perfect in the church. He encouraged us to press on toward love and mercy, and in so doing we will raise up a generation who longs to go deeper into the heart of God and higher in the expression of obedience and praise.

Submit yourself to the love of God in Christ, abandon yourself there, until the love of Christ becomes the chief reality in your life and in your relationships with others.

Prayer:

Lord, we thank You that You relate to us in mercy and love. Lead us to grow in our thirst of You and Your love, and the desire to share it with others. Amen.