The Ultimate Faith Challenge

The Ultimate Faith Challenge

Contending For the Faith August 16/17

Jude 3-4; old testament reference

Exodus 34:12-16

Contend--- You are either moving forward increasing your faith or you are regressing, backsliding, becoming more worldly. No one ever stays static although it may feel that way at times. Time is a stream that either will carry a floater downstream or, if he struggles, he may proceed up stream, to his place of destination!

3. 
   3 ¶ 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.
   
4. 
   4 For there are certain men crept in unawares,
   who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men,
   turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness,
   and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.
   
5. 
   5 I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not.
   
6. 
   6 And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day.
   
7. 
   7 Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.
   
8. 
   8 ¶ Likewise also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities.
   
9. 
   9 Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee.
   
10. 
    10 But these speak evil of those things which they know not: but what they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves.
    
11. 
    11 Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core.
    

So what do we have? The Logos i.e. The "Word " of God was written to all people everywhere, at all times, in all places, in short to everyone. All can get life out of these words by only reading the thoughts contained there in. Now what I am saying or as it happens writing, is specific to time place and person. If you receive any life from the words it is because you are able to relate them in some way to your specific time place and situation.
In short they may be to a new believer, a person working in the ministry, an evangelist, a prayer person,
a young person, a an old person in the lord with much experience and so on.

Much also could be made of the context The Old Testament reading of this same idea is found in Exodus 34:12-16. In short destroy, Idolatry.(Creating A god made of human hands or mind!) Permit no fortification. (worship of a false God.) It seams that the writer thought that to permit a sin would be to think of it and in time to embrace it and in the process of time to commit the same! Also the sins accepted by the Fathers are embraced by the sons, and those same sins are taught and propagated by the grand sons!

New Believer

A new believer is like a clump of clay that may be molded into any shape the artist desires. He is actually being molded into the believer he will become by every reading of scripture.Also every act of fellowship where he "Learns" the way of Salvation forms the picture that he will later compare everything else. Like a young child he is greatly impresses by every experience, and as such will grow or be warped by all that he encounters. As Jesus said it is especially important not to cause one of these little ones to stumble.

Believer

As a believer begins to identify him self as a Person of faith, he often will call himself a "Baptist" or a "Methodist" or whatever as his affiliation is called. At this point the admonition will be especially important; for by this time he will have become active in the flow of the fellowship. He often takes on as many "jobs" as his time allows. Others may look at him as being a very important person, however he has not actually "solidified" in his faith. Because the sermons and teachings are necessarily limited by "seat time" (how long the congregation can stay seated,) what he thinks that he knows while it may be accurate, may also contains gaps. It is in these gaps that he is especially vulnerable to deception and many a believer has been led astray by "winds of doctrine!" As difficult as it is, he must stay diligent to contend for the faith! In this manner he will "present himself faithful before the father,"A workman to be honored!

Minister

Our minister especially needs to contend for the faith. It is his passion that people are seeking. All the world to them is nonchalant, lukewarm. The human spirit seeks someone to believe in. There is to them so much that is phony, so much that is a sham! Yet every man wants someone to prove their faith; someone who will really live it out. The only way a minister can experience this reality of faith is to really live it on a minute to minute basis. He must really believe the things that he says every time that he opens his mouth! He must live it in the morning, in the evening at the times that he is alone, where no one is looking. Yes at all times. No one can do this in his own strength, he must get this fire from the throne of the Lord. He must get this life giving mana in the secret place in his own private life! Because so many are depending upon him, he must contend for the faith!

Evangelist

The evangelist does that which is his nature. Every encounter is a opportunity to speak a word in season to comfort the one in need.
Every eye met in passing could be a person who does not know the Lord as their personal Savior.
They might not know the one who would speak a word of forgiveness to a lifetime of sin!.
They might not know the friend who sticks closer than a brother.
They might not have experienced an end to so many questions.
Every person is waiting if not to get that first day of new birth,
then for that life giving hope that comes to one who remembers the name of Jesus at a time like that!
Ever vigilant always thinking of the eternity to gain and guilt to shed, by simply turning to Jesus.
By simply allowing him to come into the sin sick heart.
What he has been is not working,
lets turn it all over to the son who wrote the light of the dawn.
The one who authored the world could not do badly with my world, he would think!
Daily thought like this is what contending for the faith is all about for the evangelist!

Prayer Person

The person of Prayer, placed in the secret places of the body of Christ must always guard the balance of seeing the wounded and hurting world and the joy that Christ has over come the world. Sometimes it is a little hard to remember these things. For him to contend for the faith he must always remember Revelation 5:12 that promises the prayers of the faithful arise in the heavenly spiraling up before the throne of the Most High. This eternal place will always remember his prayer and its parallel answer. Particularly does he remember the prayer at a time when he sits between the spoken petition and the manifested answer. What goes on in that intermediate period between the prayer and the answer.
That is when contending for the faith takes place.
Once he has prayed: not to answer or even speak contrary to the prayer of faith; that is the problem.
When everything looks like all is lost, Contend!.
When hope is bleak,Contend!.
yet the prayer person has another field in which to contend. To the rest of the fellowship, he is like the root system. Out of sight and out of mind, he can see so many things that it does not seem like the rest of the world sees. He must guard against trying to take over, trying to control things. The last thing the minister needs is for some one to start criticizing and undermining the vision and the work that this minister has received from the Lord. Many times it isn't that there is something wrong but simply that his way is different. To Contend he must remember that is place is to help, not to lead. In humility he must remember that his is to see which way that the lord is leading and go get in the path. His life and work is magnified when he carries to the throne the thoughts and the concerns of those who do not know personally the miracle of answered prayer. It is in these places that his efforts are best felt!

Old

An old believer will look at things differently.
He will have earned at least one of two types of discerning of spirits.



• The first type could easily be understood by the phrase "once bit twice shy!" If a person experiences any thing and especially if there is joy or pain connected , he will be a little more careful the next time. This is a natural discernment that derives itself from the promise that Jesus made "In this world you will have tribulation." Also the fact is if you live long enough you will learn something.
  
• There is a spiritual gift listed in I Corinthians 14. It is a gift given to the church (usually for meetings or assemblies) that permits the gift holder to assess the spirit (and by inference often the motives of those that he encounters. This gift also developers in accuracy and clarity with use (trial and error.) After a time he might be able to exercise this gift in any given situation with the qualifier that it is as the Spirit wills.
  

The point is that this person will follow this scripture much differently than our new or adolescent believer. Being old in the faith implies but not necessarily insures that he will have been grounded in the faith. The phrase "you can't teach an old dog new..." A mature believer should be grounded in the faith. Sadly I have seen some "old" believers that were as "silly" or as gullible as any young one. For this reason the old believer must always contend for the faith once delivered and Strive for the best. He must guard his mind so as not to grow lazy in the exercise of the commandment of Jesus "Go Ye into the world and teach."




Context


As the letter by Jude was written to a specific group, the body of believers circa 80 A.D. These were encountering a "new" theology. (understanding of God and his nature.) This theology was called Gnosticism. It's basic precepts described the Spiritual nature and being GOOD, and the body was BAD. Paul responded to this concept as saying I beseech you therefore brethren to keep your whole spirit soul and body sanctified. But Jude simply says contend! The doctrine that began to developer as the result of this Theology permitted any kind of bodily expression as being permissible, as the body could never be redeemed. This understanding contravened the Hebrew scripture as the Hebrews described a righteous person as only a person who "lived" out the "Torah" in everyday life! Describing the person in only two parts the Greek thought of Gnosticism basically equated the spirit with the soul (thought life.) In actuality they ignored what Paul was calling the Spirit in I Thess. The Hebrews thought of the mind as the "battle ground" of the was to do right or not follow Torah. This is a partial picture of my understanding of this concept. The Soul; has a vote, the "flesh" has a vote. And The mind can follow a "will" fashioned after the teaching of Scripture, to vote with God's Spirit, or Follow the carnal desires of the flesh which includes the body and Its passions. Jesus taught that the thought life was a precipitate of the acts of the body in Matt 6, (If a person would look on a woman with "lust in his heart" he has committed Adultery already! By so doing, He imputed guilt at the thought life level as compared to the physical level as had been the rule of the Hebrew Scriptures.) Jude simply commanded "Contend." I think of the Proverb that noted "a corner of a roof top was preferable to life in a big house with a contentious Woman." A woman like this might be a woman who had been spurned of fancied so! Maybe a person who had wanted a child, yet so far left barren. In any event this picture of a person whose first thought was to breathe, the second was to "contend" for the thing that her very self identity needed to have resolved.





The Old Testament

Exodus 34:12-16





• 12 Take heed to thyself, lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land whither thou goest, lest it be for a snare in the midst of thee:
  
• 13 But ye shall destroy their altars, break their images, and cut down their groves:
  
• 14 For thou shalt worship no other god: for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God:
  
• 15 Lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and they go a whoring after their gods, and do sacrifice unto their gods, and one call thee, and thou eat of his sacrifice;
  
• 16 And thou take of their daughters unto thy sons, and their daughters go a whoring after their gods, and make thy sons go a whoring after their gods.
  
• 17 Thou shalt make thee no molten gods.
  
• 18 ¶ The feast of unleavened bread shalt thou keep. Seven days thou shalt eat unleavened bread, as I commanded thee, in the time of the month Abib: for in the month Abib thou camest out from Egypt.