If you don’t follow Jesus, of course you misunderstand him.

John 8.21-29.

As you know, those who imagine Jesus is only a great moral teacher, and figure “I’m the world’s light” means that and no more, tend to ignore the radical statements Jesus made about who he is, what he can do, and who sent him and why. They refuse to recognize him for who he is. When he made roundabout statements about it, they deliberately chose to misinterpret him; when he made blunt statements about it, they wanted to kill him. John 8 contains both such things.

So let’s get to those things. Back to temple, Jn 8.20 where Jesus was teaching yet another lesson to skeptical people.

John 8.21-29 KWL

21 So Jesus told them again: “I’m going away.

You’ll seek me, and you’ll be destroyed by your sins: You can’t go where I go.”

22 So the Judeans said, “He won’t kill himself, will he?”

—because Jesus said, “You can’t go where I go.”

23 Jesus told them, “You’re from below. I’m from above.

You’re from this world. I’m not from this world.

24 So I told you you’ll be destroyed by your sins,

for when you won’t believe who I am, you’ll be destroyed by your sins.”

25 So the Judeans told him, “Who are you?”

Jesus told them, “I’ve been telling you who, since the beginning.

26 I have much to say and judge about you—but my Sender is truth.

And what things I heard from him, I speak to the world.”

27 The Judeans didn’t understand he spoke to them of the Father,

28 so Jesus told them, “When you exalt the Son of Man, you’ll then know who I am.

I do nothing on my own, but I speak these things just as my Father teaches me.

29 My Sender is with me; he’s not left me alone, so I can always do what pleases him.”

As the world’s light, those who follow Jesus get our eternal life from him. Jn 8.12 And those who don’t, who have no intention of following him, can’t possibly go where he does. Don’t wanna go where he’s going. He’s leading us to his kingdom. They might imagine they want God’s kingdom, but they want something radically different than what he’s creating, so they’re not going in. So their sins will destroy them.

Listening to our God, not our gut.

Jude 1.19-25.

Years ago, I had to deal with an unteachable co-worker. We’ll call him Ulises. Nice guy, but nobody could tell him a thing: He knew what he already knew, and figured he already knew best. This attitude eventually got him fired. Our boss discovered repeated warnings just weren’t working, and sent him home.

Ulises followed his gut. Most people do. They encourage us to. We’re supposed to listen to that deep inner voice which tells us what we really oughta do. What we really want, what’s really best for us, what’s the right thing to do: The inner voice knows all. Don’t starve it.

Sometimes we call it following your instincts, following your hunches, following your gut; following the core of our being which knows the difference between wise and dumb, true and false, right and wrong, good and evil. Christians imagine it was put there by God. And it’s not a new idea, believe it or don’t; it’s always been around. Every generation dusts it off and repackages it.

The ancient Greeks called it the πνεῦμα ψυχικόν/néfma syhikón, “psychic spirit,” the essence of life. First God creates the life-giving air, we breathe it, and in our lungs it’s turned into the πνεῦμα ζωτικόν/néfma zotikón, “vital spirit,” and then it works our way into our minds and becomes psychic spirit. This psychic spirit travels down our nerves, moves our limbs, and makes us alive. Oh, and as a handy side effect it also imparts divine wisdom.

Your average person who follows their inner voice, has never heard of this and may even think it’s rubbish. But Plato, Erasistratus, Galen, and plenty of ancient Greeks sure did. And of course these beliefs trickled into the church, and warped a few teachers. And that’s where we get to Jude.

Jude 1.19-20 KWL

19 They’re the ones making distinctions based on a “psychic spirit” they don’t have.

20 You, beloved: Build each other up in your most holy faith. Pray by the Holy Spirit.

We Christians aren’t to follow any “psychic spirit,” inner voice, id, instinct, inner child, or whatever you wanna call it. Because the scriptures actually call this our flesh. It’s our carnal human impulses, our self-preservation instinct gone wrong, our sin nature. I often joke my inner child is really an inner brat: He’s whiny and selfish, and needs to be “put in time out” forever. Brats need discipline.

In contrast, Jude told his readers to pray by the Holy Spirit. We’re not to follow our own spirits, but our Lord. The inner voice is the wrong voice—and the devil does a mighty good job of hijacking it, making evil look good or pragmatic, and getting us to do evil instead. So listen for God. The Spirit knows the right way to go.

And confirm him. One of the ways we do that is with our “most holy faith”—the religion taught by Jesus, confirmed by his prophets and apostles in the bible, handed down and encouraged in by the Christians of our churches. You know who you believe in; keep believing in him. Join hands with his fellow servants and follow him together. Not on our own, where we can go horribly wrong: Together.

When Christians have no respect for leadership.

Jude 1.14-18.

I previously explained when Jude referred to the mythology of his day, it doesn’t mean Jude considered these books historical or authoritative. I bring this up again ’cause Jude quoted a bit from 1 Enoch, a fictional firsthand account of heaven as shown to Noah’s great-grandfather Enoch. (Who went there y’know. Ge 5.24)

Jude 1.14-15 KWL

14 Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about them,

saying “Look, the Lord comes with myriads of his saints, 15 making judgment upon all,

examining every life against all their irreverent work, irreverently done;

concerning every harsh thing the irreverent sinners said against him.”

No, 1 Enoch wasn’t actually written by Enoch. It was written in Aramaic, a language which didn’t even exist in whatever century Enoch lived in. It claims to be by him, so we call it pseudepigrapha, which means “fake writings.” But it’s fanfiction. Well-known fanfiction; Paul even took the idea of the “third heaven” from it, 2Co 12.2 ’cause that’s where paradise is figured to be. There’s even a copy of it among the Dead Sea scrolls.

The bit Jude quoted comes from this passage—I’m quoting a Greek translation found in the Codex Panopolitanus.

…that he comes with his myriads and his saints, making judgment upon all. He will destroy all the irreverent, and examine all flesh against all their irreverent work, irreverently done; and harsh words which the irreverent said, and everything which the irreverent sinners said together about him. 1 Enoch 1.9 KWL

Obviously Jude wasn’t making an exact quote; he may have been quoting it from memory.

Think of it this way. Say I’m talking about Jesus’s second coming. Say, in order to make a point, I quote Larry Norman’s “I Wish We’d All Been Ready”:

There’s no time to change your mind;

The Son has come and you’ve been left behind.

Norman was hardly an infallible prophet. But hey, he rhymes; and as we learned from The Lego Movie, that ain’t nothing. Some people will believe anything put to poetry.

Why do people quote other people? Usually it’s to criticize, but often it’s to prove we’re hardly the only people who believe as we do. Jude was far from the only apostle to teach Jesus is returning and’ll judge the wicked. But when Jude wrote his letter, he didn’t have their writings to quote from. So he quoted what he did have, off the top of his head: 1 Enoch. It’s not bible, but it’s something. Something his audience knew.

Still true, too. Jesus is returning and’ll judge the wicked. And go-it-alone Christians who presume they’re righteous when they reject Jesus’s church, who slam church leaders and presume their rebellion is righteousness, are gonna find themselves on the wrong side of salvation history.

Rebellion against God’s authorities. 𝘕𝘰𝘵 his angels.

Jude 1.8-13.

Previously I brought up the people with whom Jude disputed in his letter: The folks who were going their own way, embracing their favorite myths instead of Christianity, going astray, and leading others with them.

And I suspect the reason Jude kept referring to Pharisee mythology throughout his letter, was because these ancient Christianists were likely also referring to Pharisee myths. Christians still do it too, y’know. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve heard non-biblical stories about Satan, used as proof how it behaves or what it’s up to. Preachers like to claim these stories give us insight into devilish behavior. More like insight into how little homework people do before they get behind the pulpit and claim to teach God’s word.

In my experience, when a person’s quoting myths instead of bible, not only do they take bible out of context, but usually take the myths out of context too. So what I believe Jude did here (and yeah, I admit I’m biased in favor of this interpretation ’cause it’s what I’d do—isn’t that how bias usually works?) was find out what the myths really taught, then turn ’em around on the heretics. Like so.

Jude 1.8-10 KWL

8 Of course these people who dream of flesh stain themselves.

They reject authority. They slander the well-thought-of.

9 When the head angel Michael was debating with the devil over Moses’s body,

it didn’t dare bring a charge of slander, but said, “Lord rebuke you.”

10 These people don’t understand such things, and slander them.

Nope, we don’t have a copy of where the Michael-debating-Satan story comes from. The early church father Origen believed it’s from a book called The Ascension of Moses. De Principiis 3.2.1 We think we have a copy of that book, but our copy doesn’t include that story. Maybe Origen was wrong; maybe we have the wrong book; maybe our copy of the book is missing a chapter; doesn’t matter. Plenty of Pharisee myths include heavenly courtroom cases, with Satan as adversary and other popular angels as defenders. Some of our own, too: Stephen Vincent Benét’s 1936 short story “The Devil and Daniel Webster” has a lot of parodies in popular culture.

So when these ancient misbehaving Christians claimed, “It’s okay to tear Christian leaders a new one when they’re wrong… after all, Michael ripped Satan a new one in The Ascension of Moses,” Jude came right back at ’em with, “Nope; you read that story wrong. Michael didn’t ‘rip Satan a new one.’ Satan fought dirty, but Michael behaved itself, and resisted the temptation to act like an ass. Not so much you.”

A lesson plenty of Christians nowadays have definitely not followed.

Lessons from Jewish (and Christian) mythology.

Jude 1.5-8.

Jude 1.5-6 KWL

5 I want to remind you—though you knew all this already:

First the Lord rescued his people out of Egypt. Second, he destroyed those who didn’t trust him.

6 Including the angels!—who didn’t keep their original authority, but abandoned their own dwelling.

For their judgment on the Great Day: Kept in indestructible chains, in the dark.

Jude isn’t the only apostle who finds it fascinating that God judges angels. (And apparently we Christians judge ’em too. 1Co 6.3) Simon Peter brought ’em up, 2Pe 2.4 and Christ Jesus himself taught the everlasting fire was constructed for them. Mt 24.41 The apostles liked to point out God doesn’t spare angels when they sin, and he’s mighty close to them… so why do we presume he’ll spare us humans when we sin? Grace is awesome, but it’s still not a free pass.

Irritatingly, popular Christian theology has made the apostles’ idea meaningless. How? Because we teach angels don’t get judged the same way as humans. Different species, different rules.

We point out the bible says nothing about atonement for angels. ’Cause it doesn’t. Jesus died to make humanity right with God. Not angels. Jesus became human to die for us. He didn’t become angel. He came to save the world, Jn 3.17 not the heavens. Angels can go take a flying leap.

“Jesus didn’t die for angels” gets repeated in pulpits, in seminaries, everywhere. Humans get grace; angels don’t. Humans sin and get forgiven; angels sin and never, ever do. Because, it’s explained (and this explanation doesn’t come from bible), angels see God. Up close. So when they sin it’s a billion times worse: They of all people should know better than sin. Consequently when they sin, it’s one strike and you’re out: They fall from grace and go to hell. Do not pass the cross; do not collect atonement.

This strikes me as entirely inconsistent with God. He’s love, remember? 1Jn 4.8, 16 So how would his love evaporate when an angel sins? Why are humans of such value he gave us his Son, but angels are as disposable as a ripped ketchup packet? Even if God loves us humans way more than he does angels, it’s still really contrary to grace to imagine God has none for them.

And inconsistent with what the apostles taught. They were trying to make a logical comparison between angels and us: If angels get in trouble, so do we.