“From Jude, servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James; to those who are called, to those who are dear to God the Father and kept safe for Jesus Christ, mercy, peace and love be yours in abundance. My dear friends, at a time when I was eagerly looking forward to writing to you about the salvation that we all share, I felt that I must write to you encouraging you to fight hard for the faith which has been once and for all entrusted to God’s holy people. Certain people have infiltrated among you, who were long ago marked down for condemnation on this account; without any reverence they pervert the grace of our God to debauchery and deny all religion, rejecting our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.
“I should like to remind you – though you have already learnt it once and for all – that the Lord rescued the nation from Egypt, but afterwards he still destroyed the people who refused to believe him; and the angels who did not keep to the authority they had, but left their appointed sphere, he has kept in darkness in eternal bonds until the judgment of the great Day. Sodom and Gomorrah, too, and the neighboring towns, who with the same sexual immorality pursued unnatural lusts, are put before us as an example since they are paying the penalty of eternal fire. Nevertheless, these people are doing the same: in their delusions they not only defile their bodies and disregard Authority, but abuse the Glories as well.
“Not even the archangel Michael, when he was engaged in argument with the devil about the corpse of Moses, dared to denounce him in the language of abuse; all he said was, ‘May the Lord rebuke you.’ But these people abuse anything they do not understand; and the only things they do understand – merely by nature like unreasoning animals – will turn out to be fatal to them. Alas for them, because they have followed Cain; they have thrown themselves into the same delusion as Balaam for a reward; they have been ruined by the same rebellion as Korah – and share the same fate. They are a dangerous hazard at your community meals, coming for the food and quite shamelessly only looking after themselves. They are like the clouds blown about by the winds and bringing no rain, or like autumn trees, barren and uprooted and so twice dead; like wild sea waves with their own shame for foam; or like wandering stars for whom the gloom of darkness is stored up for ever.
“It was with them in mind that Enoch, the seventh patriarch from Adam, made his prophecy when he said, ‘I tell you, the Lord will come with his holy ones in their tens of thousands, to pronounce judgment on all humanity and to sentence the godless for all the godless things they have done, and for all the defiant things said against him by godless sinners.’ They are mischief-makers, grumblers governed only by their own desires, with mouths full of boastful talk, ready to flatter others for gain. But remember, my dear friends, what the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ foretold. ‘At the final point of time’, they told you, ‘there will be mockers who follow nothing but their own godless desires.’ It is they who cause division, who live according to nature and do not possess the Spirit.
“But you, my dear friends, must build yourselves up on the foundation of your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit; keep yourselves within the love of God and wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to give you eternal life. To some you must be compassionate because they are wavering; others you must save by snatching them from the fire; to others again you must be compassionate but wary, hating even the tunic stained by their bodies. To him who can keep you from falling and bring you safe to his glorious presence, innocent and joyful, to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, authority and power, before all ages, now and for ever. Amen.” (Jude 1-25).
