EVENING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 6/18/2025 9:50 PM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-6“The Enemy”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference:
Jude 3-4
Message of the verses: “3 Beloved, while I
was making every effort to write you about our common salvation, I felt the
necessity to write to you appealing that you contend earnestly for the faith
which was once for all handed down to the saints. 4 For certain persons have
crept in unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this
condemnation, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into licentiousness
and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.”
“They Were Ordained to Judgment” (Jude
4a): I
want to continue where I left off in yesterday’s Spiritual Diary as I begin
this topic and now will continue looking at it by quoting what Dr. Warren
Wiersbe has to say about it along with giving my comments too.
“This
body of truth was delivered (Jude-3)
to the saints. The word means ‘to be
entrusted with.’ The church
collectively, and each Christian personally, has a stewardship to fulfill. ‘But as we were allowed of God to be put in
trust with the Gospel, even so we speak’ (1 Thes. 2:4). God committed the truth to Paul (1 Tim.
1:11), and he shared it with others, such as Timothy (1 Tim. 6:20). He exhorted Timothy to entrust the Word to
other faithful men (2 Tim. 2:2). You and
I would not have the Word today were it not for faithful believers down through
the ages who guarded this precious deposit and invested it in others.” Perhaps when we get to heaven we may see what
I will call our “Christian genealogy” as to how we all become believers. Now when I became a believer I was listening
to some cassette tapes of sermons by a man named Hal Lindsey that a high school
friend of mine had in his home in Florida.
He shared them with me, and said that he was a believer, but later on
told me that they were not into that anymore, so I don’t believe they were true
believers. I guess that my thread would
then have to go through Hal Lindsey, and then I passed it onto my wife who
passed it onto our two children who passed it onto their children.
Dr.
Wiersbe goes on: “The church is always
one generation short of extinction. If our generation fails to guard the truth
and entrust it to our children, then that will be the end! When you think of the saints and martyrs who
suffered and died so that we might have God’s truth, it makes you want to take
your place in God’s army and be faithful unto death.
“What
does it mean to ‘contend for the faith’?
The Greek word is an athletic term that gives us our English word agonize.
It is the picture of a devoted athlete, competing in the Greek games and
stretching his nerves and muscles to do his very best to win. You never fight the Lord’s battles from a
rocking chair or a soft bed! Both the
soldier and the athlete must concentrate on doing their best and giving their
all. There must also be teamwork,
believers working together to attack and defeat the enemy.
“Sometimes
you hear well-meaning people say, ‘Well, it’s fine to contend for the faith,
but don’t be so contentious!’ While it
is true that some of God’s soldiers have been the cause of quarrels and
divisions, it is also true that some of them have paid a great price to defend
the faith. As Christian soldiers, we
must not fight each other or go around looking for trouble. But when the banner of Christ is in danger of
being taken by the enemy, we cannot sit idly by, nor can we ever hope to win
the victory by wearing kid gloves.
“Charles
Spurgeon once said that ‘the new views are not the old truth in a better dress,
but deadly errors with which we can have no fellowship.’ False doctrine is a deadly poison that must
be identified, labeled, and avoided. Spurgeon also said, ‘I cannot endure false
doctrine, however neatly it may be put before me. Would you have me eat poisoned meat because
the dish is of the choicest ware?’
“We
must always speak the truth in love, and the weapons we use must be
spiritual. At the same time, we must
dare to take our stand for ‘the faith’ even if our stand offends some and
upsets others. We are not fighting
personal enemies, but the enemies of the Lord.
It is the honor and glory of Jesus Christ that is at stake. ‘Fight the good fight of faith’ (1 Tim.
6:12).”
Dr.
Wiersbe’s wisdom can be seen in this section as it is said of him that “he puts
the cookies on the shelf where we can reach them.” His commentaries are pretty easy to
understand, and that is why I like to read and share his wisdom in my Spiritual
Diaries.
6/18/2025 10:17 PM
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