The Faith - Our Faith

Jude 1:3 is possibly one of the most misunderstood and neglected verses today. The attitude of the many preachers and other professors of the word of God today is that they have no real desire to contend for anything. Many would rather have a large congregation and concentrate on growing that large congregation than to take the necessary steps defend the faith.

In the Bible God commands us to "...earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints." In Jude 1:3 it is written: "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."

To properly defend the faith, there are several key things we must do. Remember that the faith is the Word of God, we must contend for this faith. God does not mention to only contend for major things of faith and not the minor things. So many people today want to focus on the major things of the Word of God and they stop focusing on the minor issues. According to the verse above, all of the Words in the Scriptures are major issues to God for they are the faith. You can not ever determine which part of the Scriptures are minor and should not be defended. All the words of the Bible are worthy of being cherished and preserved in the Name of God.

Read this phrase, "...which was once delivered unto the saints." What you should always remember is that faith never changes, it is, it was and it shall forever be. We make the mistake of thinking that both sides need to compromise in order to get along. We need to understand if faith is compromised in the least; it no longer is considered the faith. Watered down faith is no longer a strength, it becomes weak and solvent. When you distort the faith, then what was the faith discontinues being the faith. Your belief in the Faith must continue to be strong and this belief must be taught to our children and also to their children and so on.

When God says to us “earnestly contend for the faith..." He is saying to us that we must earnestly, passionately and zealously, fight for the faith. We can not be passive about our defense of the faith; doing so is disobeying His Word and His Commandment.

God is utilizing the word "contend" to show us what we are to be impassioned about. God commands us to be passionate about contending for the faith. If you contend for something you are striving for it. By contending for something, you become spirited by it. By contending for something, you will lambaste those you are contending against. By contending for something you will vehemently defend others over the faith. This is what contending for the faith means.

Remember you are commanded to defend the faith. It is never to be supplanted or it is no longer is the faith. By protecting the faith there will come some instances whereby you will not get along with some, which is a condition of contention for something. The contention becomes worth it because the faith is at risk. Some people my feel hurt contending for the faith, but remember that God never tells us to stop contending for the faith just because someone’s feelings may get hurt. He tells us to defend it zealously.

Are you protecting the faith? Are you allowing the faith to be changed by your lack of involvement? Are you allowing others to weaken your resolve in the faith? As Christians we must zealously defend the faith. If we should lose the faith we have lost everything. God gave us the Faith; Let it not be destroyed!

This is my explosion of thought! This is a brief recap inspired by the Word of God and taken from words spoken by the evangelist Allen Domelle

Twas The Night Jesus Came

Now that the night before Christmas has arrived, I am reminded of a poem that I first heard of about a few years ago. It is a take on 'Twas the Night Before Christmas. The poem relates to the theology that says Jesus Christ will return for all true Believers one day in an event called the Rapture of the Church. Here is that poem and the credit to the Author, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ people and dust off those Bibles and read them -

'Twas the night Jesus came and all through the house
Not a person was praying, not one in the house.
The Bibles were left on the shelf without care,
For no one thought that Jesus would come there.
The children were dressing to crawl into bed,
Not once ever kneeling or bowing a head.
And mom in her rocker with baby in her lap
Was watching the Late Show while I took a nap.

When out of the east there rose such a clatter,
I sprang to my feet to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash
Tore open the shutters and lifted the sash!
When what to my wondering eyes should appear
But angels proclaiming that Jesus was here!
The light of His face made me cover my head--
It was Jesus returning, just as He said.

And though I possessed worldly wisdom and wealth,
I cried when I saw Him in spite of myself.
In the Book of Life which He held in His hand
Was written the name of every saved man.
He spoke not a word as He searched for my name;
When He said, "It's not here" my head hung in shame.
The people whose names had been written with love
He gathered to take to His Father above.

With those who were ready He rose without a sound
While all the rest were left standing around.
I fell to my knees, but it was too late;
I had waited too long and thus sealed my fate.
I stood and I cried as they rose out of sight;
Oh, if only I'd known that this was the night.
In the words of this poem the meaning is clear;
The coming of Jesus is now drawing near.
There's only one life and when comes the last call
We'll find that the Bible was true after all.

--AUDRY PATRICIA WOOLVERTON