Contend for the Faith – Jude 1:3

Is it your responsibility to contend for the faith?  Jude thinks so.  He writes all his letter recipients and appeals to them to contend for the faith.  That requires us to know what the faith is that we are contending for, and to recognize and reject false versions of it.  This is not just the responsibility of elders and teachers, but the responsibility of all of us.

Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints. (Jude 1:3, ESV)

What sets the saints, the holy ones chosen by God, apart, is our common salvation couched in terms once for all delivered to us through the apostles of our Lord Jesus.  We have this salvation in common.  It is not a common salvation in the sense of lowly, except insofar as it is for any and every person, high or low.  This salvation can have no additions to it, nor subtractions, because it is a tradition that is authoritative and any alteration of it results in the loss of salvation’s way and knowledge.

Jude says this is what he wanted to write about, but the gospel is being threatened among them by false teaching and there was a need for this group of believers to contend for the faith.  It is as if this amazing gift of the message of salvation is the flag and Satan is doing everything he can to capture the flag.  His most creative tool is false teachers, people who often have part of the message but distort or deny the actual gospel.  We have to fight to keep our flag.  

False teachers aren’t the only threat.  There is our own inward yearning for self-rule that leads us to want to alter the gospel to fit our expectations and desires to contribute to our own salvation.  There can be laziness that keeps us from faithfully teaching the message to the next generation.  There are the cares of the world that could distract us from this crucial handing on of the tradition.  There is wealth that makes us feel we don’t need salvation.  But Jude will deal with the specific threat of false teachers.