What Jesus' Brother Jude Wanted Us To Know | VV. 14-16, Part 1 | Enoch
We are reaching a point in Jude’s letter where he makes one final appeal to a preeminent saint who seemed to be the forerunner of prophetic preaching in Scripture. While we typically think of Noah as the first type of prophet who announced the coming judgment on the world through the Flood, Enoch was actually the first preacher in Scripture and we know this because of Jude.
Interestingly enough, the Holy Spirit uses Jude to corroborate information that is found in a book called 1 Enoch, which is a non-canonical, pseudepigraphal source, that is, a book that is written by someone different than what the title indicates. Enoch did not write this book, but this particular information about Enoch is true as Jude indicates. This was also the case regarding the detail about the struggle between Michael the archangel and the devil over the body of Moses in verse nine—a fact found in the Assumption of Moses. Since the Holy Spirit is the source of truth, we can trust these particular details to be just as much the Word of God as the rest of the Bible is. One cannot forget that the Apostle Paul had done the same thing on three different occasions (Acts 17:28; 1 Cor 15:33; Tit 1:12). That said, we do not then assume the entirety of these extra-biblical sources are accurate and trustworthy. As is often the case with pseudepigraphal books, a cursory reading shows how much of what is written is inconsistent with the Word of God. Thus, we remain content with what the Holy Spirit has revealed through Jude.
Jude 14–16 reads as follows: “It was also about these that Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied, saying, ‘Behold, the Lord comes with ten-thousands of his holy ones, to execute judgment on all and to convict all the ungodly of all their deeds of ungodliness that they have committed in such an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things that ungodly sinners have spoken against him.’ These are grumblers, malcontents, following their own sinful desires; they are loud-mouthed boasters, showing favoritism to gain advantage.”
“These” in Jude’s letter continue to be the false teachers operating within the circles of the true church and Jude tells us here that Enoch has condemned them from the beginning. Enoch was unique in that he never suffered a physical death, rather he was taken right into heaven like Elijah later was in 2 Kings 2. In a time when people were living well over 900 years, Enoch’s departure was relatively early, happening in his 365th year of life.
The text of Genesis 5 says on more than one occasion that Enoch “walked with God” (vv. 22, 24), following up with “and he was not, for God took him” (vs. 24)—standing out in stark contrast to every other name in the genealogy that ended with “and he died.” In the genealogies of Genesis 5 and 6, only Enoch and Noah are identified as righteous men. “Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation” (6:9) who “found favor in the eyes of the LORD” (vs. 8).
Doing the math in Genesis 5 gives us some fascinating historical perspective: Noah’s father, Lamech, was born while Adam was still alive, so naturally, by the time Noah was born, Adam’s son Seth was still alive. It was in Seth’s day that “people began to call upon the name of the LORD” (Gen 4:26), so there was clearly not a point in history when mankind did not have a ready knowledge of who their Creator was. Indeed, the eye-witness(es) to the inside of the Garden of Eden were literally among the living, nearly up to Noah’s birth.
What is happening simultaneously, though, is an increased desire in the culture for immorality. They are, by and large, in constant rebellion against God to where we are told that by the time Noah is on the scene, “the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart were only evil continually” (6:5).
Many credit Noah as being the first preacher or prophet in the Bible probably because of the Apostle Peter’s comment in 2 Peter 2:5 that he was a “herald of righteousness.” Indeed, his reverent faith “condemned the world” (Heb 11:7) in his obedient endeavor to build the Ark to prepare for the world-wide flood—an event that has become one of the most monumental acts of God in human history. Yet, Jude has given us even more information on Enoch’s utterances than we have of Noah’s, pre-Flood.
Well before Noah was even born, Enoch was preaching against the wicked culture. Enoch’s statement, according to Jude, was:
“Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of his holy ones, to execute judgment on all and to convict all the ungodly of all their deeds of ungodliness that they have committed in such an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things that ungodly sinners have spoken against him.”
This was the prophetic message of Enoch in the days just before Noah.
The immediate takeaway here is in his repetitive use of the word ungodly—four times in a single verse. It echoes Jude’s earlier statement in verse 4: “Certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ” (emphasis mine).
The Greek word for “ungodly” is interesting because it is a word that has to do with a lack of God-fearing worship. The third most commonly used word for worship in the New Testament is sebomai, which means “to revere”, or “to worship.” It is from this word that the understanding of “ungodly” is brought about as the opposite of reverent, God-fearing worship would then be communicated as asebes. The negative particle “a” at the beginning of the word denotes a lack of that thing indicated, similar to the term atheism—the belief that there is no (a—) God (theos).
The overall takeaway is this: Enoch preached long ago that the judgment of ungodly people was coming and now Jude is preaching that the false teachers in the church are the ungodly people who will be included in that very judgment long ago preached about.
We cannot miss that there is no separation between unbelieving pagans, atheists, or agnostics and the false teachers who operate within Christian circles and under Christian cover. The unbelievers of Enoch’s day are just as unregenerate as the religious pretenders in our own day. In other words, the call for discernment is magnified as we understand that we must “watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught; avoid them. For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the naïve” (Rom 16:17–18) (emphasis mine).
Too many in the church today do not believe false teachers exist. They may be willing to admit that some are edgy, or not always doctrinally sound, but they would be uncomfortable in asserting they are unsaved and thus still under the wrath of God. Even in the most obvious cases where the Gospel itself is continually perverted to be inclusive of other false religions, people do not “avoid them,” rather they "find the positive" aspects of their ministry and use that to excuse the heresy, or they point out how many people have "benefited" from their wide influence.
The emotionally difficult thing for any of us to do is to remain biblically objective when discerning teachers and their ministries. Global influence does not imply biblical fidelity. We must be willing to mark and avoid those who do not faithfully teach the whole counsel of the Word of God.
We will pick this section of Jude back up next week as we continue to unpack the significance of Enoch's message.
In Christ Alone,
