The Letter He Meant

Jude sat down to write one letter and ended up sending a different one.

He tells us so in the same sentence where he names his subject: "Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints." He had wanted to write about the salvation all believers share. Something happened before he could, and he names it in the next verse: "certain men crept in unawares." He calls them "ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness," which means shameless living. The trouble had come inside the church, because these men had slipped in quietly and were sitting among the believers.

"Earnestly contend" is an athlete's word in Greek. It comes from the word for a contest in the games, the same word that gives us "agony." Then comes the phrase that tells us what the struggle is for: "the faith which was once delivered unto the saints." Once here means once for all. The faith was handed over one time, complete, with no second edition promised. Delivered is the ordinary word for handing something to someone to keep safe. Paul writes the same idea to Timothy from prison: "That good thing which was committed unto thee keep by the Holy Ghost which dwelleth in us."

So the faith you have been asked to hold was there before you were. It did not come from you, and nobody is asking you to make it up or improve it. It can be defended at all only because it arrived finished. Whatever this week asks you to stand up for, you are standing on what God has already given. And you are not holding it on your own, because Jude writes to people who are "preserved in Jesus Christ."

Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year one reading for day 90 is Merciful and Faithful (Deuteronomy 4:31).

All 365 readings in Daily Manna, Year Two