Shall we read, please, in the Epistle of Jude? Jude's Epistle, just before the Book of Revelation. And we'll read from the beginning. Jude, the servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James, to them that are sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ and called mercy unto you and peace and love be magnified be multiplied behold when I give all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation it was needful for me to write unto you and exhort you that you should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints. For there are certain men crept in unawares who were before of old ordained to this condemnation on godly men, turning the grace of God into lasciviousness and denying the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ. I will therefore put you in remembrance, though you once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved his people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not. And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he have preserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day. 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, as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. Likewise also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignity. Yep, Michael the Archangel, when contending with the devil, he disputed about the body of Moses, dare not bring before a reigning accusation but said the Lord rebuked thee. But these speak evil of the things which they know not, but what they know naturally as brute beasts, and these things they corrupt themselves. wow unto them, for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the heir of Balaam for reward, and perished in the vain saying of Cure. Now further down, please, at verse twenty. By the way, the passage that I have read is a very, very bleak, dark passage concerning apostasy. But I want to read the other side of the picture that we find at the end of this lovely epistle. Verse twenty. But ye beloved, building up yourselves in your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. And if some have compassion, making a difference and all the saved with fear pulling them out of the fire heating even the garment spotted by the flesh now unto him that is able to keep you from falling and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy to the only wise God our Savior be glory and majesty dominion and power Both now and forever. Amen. And we go that is blessing to the reading of its precious word. We have been looking at what the Bible has to say about the last days. And about the time immediately prior to the coming again of the Lord Jesus Christ. We have come to the end of another year. And I believe that when we come to the end of an epoch. and the things that have happened during the past year, it causes us to think very soberly of the coming again of the Lord Jesus. Even politicians, they tell us that we have come to a crisis of humanity. Some of them don't know what it is. They know perfectly well that the political situation in the world today, on every phase of life, that is a critical time that we have entered upon. Now we know what that critical time, what it indicates. It indicates the soon return of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. And so I have been thinking in looking at the different passages in the Word of God of the condition of the world immediately prior to the coming again of the Lord Jesus. And I don't know of any book in the Bible that gives such a graphic account of the apostasy that there is in the world at the present time concerning spiritual things than what we find here in the Epistle of Jude. I don't think I need to tell you that there were two men who were brothers of the Lord Jesus Christ according to the flesh and both of them wrote an epistle. One is the epistle of James and the other is the Epistle of Jude. And it would be very interesting to look at these two Epistles and what is said in them concerning the Lord Jesus Christ himself. There's tremendous exhortations in the Epistle of James, a tremendous body of truth that we find here. But here when we come to the final Epistle before the Book of Revelation, here we get one of the most graphic pictures of departure from God and what we call apostasy. Sometimes in looking at it, I dread getting up and speaking about it. But there are some things in it as well that are very helpful and encouraging. And I want to look tonight at both sides of the picture as you find it here. Now I went at the beginning, Jude in taking up his pen and writing, he speaks of the holy trinity at the beginning and he uses the term of the Lord Jesus Christ oh how he is giving honor to that one who was his brother according to the flesh but more than that he was the son of God and he calls him the Lord Jesus Christ and he tells us here that he wanted to write to the believers concerning the Common salvation. That is the salvation that we all rejoice in. But suddenly he realized that he should speak about something entirely different. You know, a good many preachers find that when they come to give a message to the people of God and when just immediately before the meeting you feel that is not the message tonight. And they changed the subject. And that is a very dangerous thing to do. Jude here, he wanted to write about the common salvation. But there was something happened at that time made him change his mind. It's a dangerous thing to do. I've done it sometimes. And sometimes it has worked. And other times it was a disaster. But I believe that Jude, as a thought of what was happening all around at this time, He starts and he gives a very vivid graphic picture of the apostasy of the last days. And it's this that I want to look at just for a few minutes here tonight. I'm not going to go into all the different details connected with it because that would be impossible in the space of half an hour. But I want to point out that here we get apostasy in all its blackness, in all its bleakness. this apostasy away from God. He speaks, first of all, of a collective apostasy. And it's threefold. First of all, he speaks of Israel and what happened to them. What happened to the nation of Israel. And then secondly, he speaks about the angels that sinned, that left their own habitation. and he speaks about the angels, fallen angels. And then he speaks about Sodom and Gomorrah. And he goes into a little detail about them, but not going into all the details concerning it. But what we find here, it gives a revelation from God of what happened in the past. And it's a very, very dark picture. You know, it's a remarkable thing that the nation of Israel that had been redeemed by blood and by power that had been brought out of the land of Egypt and the Passover lamb and all connected with it and the teaching that was given by Moses at that time we find that they were brought out of Egypt and then brought into the land and then they were brought to Mount Sinai and the covenant was made with God at that time that was ratified by blood but immediately afterwards when they started on their journey across the wilderness we find that there was departure from God. The whole account of it is in the book of numbers and if we read the book of numbers and compares with the one hundred and six Psalm we'll find that the nation that came out of the land of Egypt it's characterized by rebellion and apostasy getting away from God murmuring and rebelling against God. And in the book of Numbers, the first part gives an outline of the tabernacle in the wilderness and how the different things that were revealed concerning it, a beautiful, beautiful pattern picture of what the nation should have been in the sight of God. But unfortunately, as I went along, it was just one thing after another, and finally rebellion of such a nature that God had to wipe the whole nation out except two individuals. You know, the very pleasant part that we find at the beginning, and the pattern that God had laid down for procedure in their worship in connection with the tabernacle, we find at the end that God had to wipe out a whole generation, thirty-eight years in the wilderness, and at the end there were only two survivors. And those two survivors were the two men that were faithful to God. Only two men after forty years. We get Caleb and we get Joshua. So here we find God's hand in judgment upon Israel. And as far as the doctrine of it is concerned, we would need to read the one hundred and six psalm. And it's a sad, sad bleak picture. So this is the first collective instance of departure and apostasy. And it happened to the nation of Israel. But the second one that he mentions here is the angels that sinned and how they are held in everlasting chains of darkness. until the judgment of the great day. The place where these angels are confined in the Epistle to Peter is called Tartarus. It was a special place. These angels that sin. Many a time in looking at the passage, my mind goes back to Genesis chapter six and the flood. You know, we find the same thing there. In Genesis chapter six, we find... that the people of Israel, the people of God, at that time, they had drifted away from God and believed that their world was full of violence and corruption. And as God looked at it, he decided that he would have to deal with it in judgment. I know perfectly well the different theories that there has been in connection with the flood. Some would deny that there was a general flood. But as far as the Word of God gives the account of what happened in the flood, a whole generation was completely wiped out except one family, a man and his wife and his three children. And all the rest of the world at that time was immersed in a flood and God acted in judgment in that way. and read that the world was filled with violence and also it was filled with corruption but there was something else and I believe that there was a satanic attempt on the world at that time or upon mankind I mentioned William Kelly this morning the Bible expositor on his book concerning the angels that sinned He states that in delicate language, we find here that there was a satanic invasion of the human race at that time. Now, I'm not going to go into detail about that because the Bible doesn't go into a lot of detail. But I'm quite convinced that the reason that a whole generation was completely wiped out by God was on account of an attack by Satan himself. And the result was that the race at that time had been completely polluted by a satanic invasion. I don't want to say anything more about it than that. And I believe that the angels that sinned that we find here in the book on this epistle of Jude is the angels that invaded the human race at that time and consorted with women. And the result was that there was a hybrid race. that was being propagated at that time. And God, in his judgment, he had to come in and wipe the whole generation out at that time on account of the sin that had been committed. So this is the second case of departure. The second case of apostasy. The second case of satanic action against the human race. And so we find here that God had to deal with it in very severe judgment. And I believe that the whole of mankind at the present time are the descendants of Noah and his wife and his three sons. You know, when we look at the Word of God and see these things, it makes us tremble. The third case was Sodom and Gomorrah. and when we turn to Genesis chapter eighteen and find what was happening there in Sodom and Gomorrah you know again it makes us tremble as I stand on the platform before an audience I tremble for to describe the condition of things in Sodom and Gomorrah it was sexual homosexual and the things that were happening at that time again God had to take Lot and send an angel to take Lot out of the city and the result was that it was destroyed by fire and blimps zone. God had a deal in a summary way with that city on account of the terrible sins that were taking place at that time. So these are the three different examples of apostasy and rebellion against Almighty God that Jude is speaking about. First of all, Israel in the wilderness. And secondly, the angels that sin that are being confined in a place at the present time in chains until the judgment of the great day. Those that were responsible for the invasion of the human race at that time, they're being held for judgment until the great day when God will deal with them. And then finally, what we find in Sodom and Gomorrah. My beloved friends here this morning, this evening, as we look at the world in which we live today, we find some things that it's difficult to speak about. And one has to be very careful in our language. But as we look, even here in the United States of America, and the sexual sins and the things that's happening at the present time in the pollution of the human body by mankind, I believe that the time has come when God will have to deal with it in judgment. And this is what Jude is speaking about. He doesn't mince his words speaking about it here. And he shows us that in every case where there was that sin, it had to be dealt with in judgment and it was and it makes us tremble to think what's going to happen to this country on account of what is taking place we take cities like New York and San Francisco and some of the other great cities here in this country and the sins that are being committed and people they don't seem to have any conscience about it at all and they talk about the gay generation and homosexuality and the pollution of mankind that's going on at the present time and the disease that God and judgment has brought upon the country on account of it. There's a disease called AIDS and it's only in comparatively recent years that this thing has happened and it's spreading right around the world just like a bushfire. I understand that one country that's absolutely polluted by it is Africa. And they say that in every three seconds another person is being contaminated with this terrible, terrible disease. And every strata of society at the present time they're suffering on account of it. And they're trying to find a remedy for it. But some time ago the Surgeon General of the United States. He stood up and declared that there was no such thing as a remedy for this terrible disease. I believe it's the judgment of God on this country. We have a brother in the Assembly where we are in New Jersey and he's employed by the United States government to go to different countries to find out what is happening in connection with sexual sin. He's been in China, he's been over in Europe, and he's going over to Africa and in other countries and making an investigation of what is happening in the population of these different countries and then coming back and reporting to the United States government. and some of the things he has told us, it's really frightening. Now this is a sad story and it's something that one feels very, very difficult to speak about publicly. But I believe we have to speak out and point out that in the past, whenever there was sin against God, especially along sex lines in connection with the human body, God had to come in in judgment and deal with it in a very, very drastic way. So I believe that that is the crisis that we've come to not only here in the United States but in practically every other part of the world as well. So first of all there was three great examples of collective departure and apostasy. and rebellion against God. And then further down in the chapter there's a threefold individual. Individuals who again had to be dealt with by God on account of their sin. First of all there was Cain and then there was Balaam and then there was Kor. And we read woe unto them. Jude says and then he mentions Cain the man that wanted to worship without shedding blood a man that was a murderer the first murder that took place recorded in the Bible it was committed by Cain when he murdered his brother it's a remarkable thing that the first family right at the beginning of the human race a murder was committed by Cain and a man who deliberately unknowingly turned against God And instead of offering a sacrifice for a sin, he determined that he was going to murder his brother. So here we find Cain and all that he represents. And then secondly, Balaam. As we think of Balaam in Numbers chapter twenty-two to twenty-four, we find statements here concerning this man. He was a man that wanted to be known as a prophet. but at the same time he was out for gain. Money was the motive and all that he did and God had to deal with that man too. And then the final one was Korah and he committed the sin of rebellion against God by wanting to be a priest instead of just an ordinary member of the congregation. So these three men are examples of individual rebellion against Almighty God. And in each case, God had to deal with them in a very summary way. As far as Korah and his company were concerned, the ground opened and swallowed him, and we read that they were down alive into the pit. So here, the first part of the Epistle of Jude, he gives these three collective examples of rebellion and apostasy and then three individual examples of the same. It's a sad, sad story and I don't want to say any more about it here tonight because what I have in mind, my beloved friends here tonight, we're living in a world that are duplicating these things but thank God there is a remedy and there's another side of the picture. And at the end of this beautiful epistle, we find the remedy for those that are real, true believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, those that want to follow the truth, those that want to be absolutely sincere and genuine in the presence of God. And we get a beautiful, beautiful five-fold picture here at the end of the epistle of Jude. And it's this that I want to emphasize here tonight. It's a building in the city of Washington. And it is a very important building in the country. It's called the Pentagon. I took the trouble some little time ago to find out a little bit about it. It was built quite a long time ago. Millions of dollars were spent in building it. It's five-sided and it is the center of defense for the United States. It's the headquarters of the Army and the Navy and the Air Force. It's the largest office building in the world and thirty-two thousand people are employed in it and there are five stories in it and there's a concourse right in the center of the Pentagon the size of two ball fields. It's the largest office building in the world, and it's made of steel and concrete, and it is the headquarters of defense of the United States. And for that reason, all the men that are responsible for the security of the United States have their headquarters in the Pentagon. But it's only an illustration of what I want to talk about tonight for a few minutes. because we get another Pentagon right here in the epistle of Jude and there are five different things that are said here in connection with true believers and Jude after going into detail about these sordid sordid things and terrible things that happened in the past in connection with rebellion and apostasy against Almighty God at the end he turns around and says beloved and I use that word And I think he does it with relief, beloved. And I want to read that portion down again, because it is delightful. And I want to point out that there are five things here of defense that the believer has against all that's going on in the world in which we live today. Verse twenty, it says this, but ye, beloved, Building up yourselves in your most holy faith. First of all, it's building. Building. Praying in the Holy Spirit. Here we get prayer in connection with building. And then after that, keep yourselves in the love of God. Here it's keeping ourselves abiding in the love of the Lord Jesus Christ. looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ. And here it's looking forward to the coming again of the Lord Jesus Christ. Looking. And then the next thing we find is witnessing. And speaking of all that was going on around, he says, and of some have compassion making a difference. And others say with fear, pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garment spotted by the flesh, nor unto Him that is able to keep you from falling and to present your body, to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy to the only wise God our Father, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever. Amen. So here are the fivefold fortress for the believer. And the first one is building up yourself in your most holy faith. You know, this word building is a very important word. After a person has been saved, the next thing is to build themselves up in the faith. We find both in the Old Testament and the New Testament that building is a very important part of the life of any believer. In the Old Testament we read about them building, first of all, a tabernacle. And after that they built a temple and after that you remember Nehemiah he built a wall. And the men that were building, they had a trial, a trowel and a sword. And they were building, building, building. The things that were concerning the worship of God. In the New Testament, we find exactly the same thing. We find that the Lord Himself, in Matthew chapter sixteen, He told Simon Peter, He said, On this rock I will build my church. Oh, thank God for that building that's going up the day. And the builder is the Lord Himself. And the Apostle Paul, he too is a man that again and again uses the term edifying. Edification, and that means building. Oh, it's so easy to take a hammer and a crowbar and knock a building down. But I tell you, it takes some skill and some hard labor. to do some building and to build up. Building up yourselves in your most holy faith. The only way that that can be done is to get down to the Word of God and find out the great truths that we find in Scripture, the fundamental truths that are being denied today on every hand and building ourselves up with that. I remember when I was a young Christian, I was given some advice. There's a brother came to me and he said, I want to tell you two things that you should do. He said, the first thing you should do is buy a good Bible. Buy a good Bible. And he said, buy an alarm clock. At that time I was working. Had to start work at six o'clock in the morning. It was the First World War. And from six o'clock in the morning to... half past five at night. But then three days in the week we had to work till half past eight. And on Saturday we worked from six in the morning until four o'clock, went home and came back at half past five and worked right through the night until six o'clock on Sunday morning. I was sixteen years of age at the time and I was told to get a good Bible and buy an alarm clock. And I can well remember in those days getting up very early in the morning with the alarm clock and opening my Bible and trying to get something from God. You know, if we only got a grip, that the only way that we can be built up in our most holy faith is the careful study of the Word of God. Later on, there was a brother, again gave me some advice. I had spent seven years in Central Africa and came home on my first furlough and I was walking down the street with a brother coming from a meeting and he put his arm inside mine and he said, I want to give you again some advice. He said, when you go back to Africa, make up your mind that the matter of what happens in your life, every day you're going to devote time to the careful study of the Word of God. And he said, if you do that, never neglect it. Get down to the study of the words of God. And he said, with prayer, he said, God can bless you and you can be of some help to God's people. Now, the brother who told me that, if I were to tell you his name, you would recognize it right here at Park of the Pounds. His wife is still here. But that dear brother, George McAllen. He's with the Lord. And I thank God for the advice that he gave me at that time. And during the years since that, we have tried in a simple way, every single day to devote time, not only to get into the presence of God, but also to get down to the book, to the Word of God, and to study it carefully. And I think if we only took that advice, It would completely revolutionize our lives. I love building. I served an apprenticeship in shipbuilding. And I went there to the shipyard when I was sixteen years of age and I was there for five years. And I loved to build ships. Some of the great ships that were floating today. I saw the keel being laid. and every part of the structure going up. It was a joy when the ship was built to see it go out on its maiden voyage. And I served my apprenticeship of the men that built the Titanic. I know there was a terrible disaster there, but it's a beautiful thing to see a nice piece of work, work well done, and to see the result of building. I still have my tools. I look at them today, the different tools that I use in those days, they're sacred to me and I look at them and I thank God for those early days that made a tremendous impact on my life in building up in the most holy faith. That is the first one and this is very important. Building on the second one is praying in the Holy Ghost. You know, prayer always goes along with the building. I often think of that passage in Luke chapter eleven, where the Lord Jesus, when he was praying, and after he had finished praying, the disciples came to him and said, Lord, teach us to pray. Teach us to pray. They didn't say, Lord, teach us to preach. That came later. But teach us to pray. And you know, it's only the Lord himself can do that. And many, many times when we see someone that really can't pray, get up and speak to God in such a way that you know they're right in the presence of God and God is listening to them and to hear them pray, say, oh, I wish I could pray like that. You know, to hear the Lord pray, that was the reaction on the minds of the disciples when they said, Lord, teach us to pray. And then the Lord gives them an instruction in that. I'm not going to continue there. But these are the two vital fundamentals in this Pentagon. First of all, building, and then secondly, praying. And then keeping yourself in the love of God. This is so important. Keep yourself in the love of God. And oh, what a delight it is to look in the... Holy Scriptures, the men that Jesus loved, and not only that God Himself and His love. I believe that love, as it has often been said, is the most important thing in the world. And what a joy it is to see love and affection and the love of Christ in the life of any individual believer. Keep yourself in the love of God. I would love to illustrate here, but just pass on. And then not only Keep yourself in the love of God, but looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ onto eternal life. This is looking forward to the coming again of Christ when we will be with him. This is what we have been speaking about. here at this conference, the coming of Christ. In spite of all that's going on around, oh, thank God He's coming back again. And then finally, the witnessing that we have to engage in. And we read, first of all, we have to make a difference in the people that we contact from day to day and make a difference and have compassion on those that have been led astray. You know, as far as the people that are propagating these heretical teachings, the things that are being done contrary to the Word of God, there are some that are innocent and that are being laid astray. And we have to make a difference and have compassion on them. But as far as the others that are propagating the doctrine and the things that we find to take people away from God, we have to deal with them in a different way. So here we find first of all compassion on those that have been led astray. Compassion. But the next thing is saving those that are in danger of the fire. I know two evangelists at the present time and they're outstanding men. They're well known around the world but before they were saved they were just right on the verge of dropping into hell. If I were to tell you some of the things that these two men did before they were saved, you would be surprised. But God in His mercy, just before they dropped into hell, God laid His hand upon them and brought them to Himself. And thank God today that God can do that. We have to witness to people like that that are living a life in such a way that if they died they would drop into hell and certainly these two brethren God in a marvelous way saved them and has used them and they're both alive today and I thank God for it but the last one is hitting even the garments spotted by the flesh you know at the present time as we look at some of the things that we see on television everything is done to try to seduce seductive dress that we find and I think we have to be awfully careful even the dress or the garment that's spotted by the flesh and we have to avoid anything of that kind now these are the different areas that we find here that I would call the Pentagon and thank God We can be saved from all that's going on in this world that's away from God by following the example that we find here in this lovely passage. I don't want to go on down to the end of the passage here in connection with a wonderful, wonderful doxology that we find at the end. But thank God Christ is coming and He's coming soon. And then all our difficulties and problems will be over. We'll be in His presence. and enjoying the presence of the Lord in heaven itself. Now may God bless his word to our hearts for his name's sake. A little word of prayer. Our blessed God and Father, we come to thee in the name of the Lord Jesus and thank thee for thy word. We know that there's some parts of it that we have difficulty even speaking about, but we know as we look around us today, that what we find in this wonderful epistle is happening under our very eyes. But we thank thee for the remedy. We thank thee, our Father, for thy word. We thank thee for prayer. We thank thee for the hope of the coming again of the Lord Jesus. And we thank thee for the love of God. And our Father, we pray that these things may garrison us and that we may be able to have a testimony for thyself to the guilty world all around. These are our desires. We commend them to thee with thanksgiving in the name of the Lord Jesus. Amen.