Jude 1:3 Beloved, while I was making every effort to write you about our common salvation…
Beloved… This is the noun form of the word αγαπαο/agapao or “love”. In this case, it is the Greek word Ἀγαπητοί/agapetoi. Per Strong’s Concordance, it can be translated as: beloved, esteemed, dear, favorite, worthy of love. Simply put, loved ones.
Jude is addressing “loved ones” in Jesus Christ. Believers in Jesus are loved.
…while I was making every effort to write you… Jude wants his audience to know he is focused. As a mindset, Jude has been continually intent to make it known to fellow believers. Jude also wants to communicate with σπουδή/spoude. The word can be translated as: haste, earnestness, diligence; earnestness in accomplishing, promoting, or striving after anything; to give all diligence, interest one’s self most earnestly. σπουδή/spoude is where we get the English word “speed”.
Jude is in a hurry to give it all he has to write and write and write to fellow believers.
Write about what??? This is the original, urgent intent of Jude’s letter …our common salvation…
Salvation or σωτηρία/soteria in the original Greek… Soteriology is the field of study of our “salvation”. Defined by Strong’s as: deliverance, preservation, safety; deliverance from the molestation of enemies in an ethical sense, that which concludes to the soul’s safety or salvation.
Messianic salvation as the present possession of all true Christians.
Future salvation is the sum of benefits and blessings which Christians, redeemed from all earthly ills, will enjoy after the visible return of Christ from heaven in the consummated and eternal kingdom of God.
A.W. Pink stated this is a fourfold salvation: saved from the penalty, power, presence and most importantly the pleasure of sin.
Romans 1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
The gospel of Jesus Christ is our salvation. The Apostle Paul offers what many believe to be the definitive statement on the gospel. This is of the utmost importance as stated by the Apostle Paul. This is the priority. As believers in Jesus Christ we should draw a line in the sand and stick a flag in the ground over this issue. If a person does not get the issue of the gospel of Jesus Christ right, big time eternal problems.
1 Corinthians 15:1-4 Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures…
Jesus Christ died. He was buried. And He was raised.
This is the gospel message of Jesus Christ. The gospel is the ευαγγελιον/euaggelion. This is really “good news”.
Here is how Strong’s Concordance defines “gospel”. It is the glad tidings of salvation through Christ. This is the proclamation of the grace of God manifest and pledged in Christ. As the messianic rank of Jesus was proved by his words, his deeds, and his death, the narrative of the sayings, deeds, and death of Jesus Christ came to be called the gospel or glad tidings.
The resume of Christ is sequentially ordered in Strong’s definition of the gospel. The glad tidings of the kingdom of God soon to be set up, subsequently also of Jesus the Messiah, the founder of this kingdom. After the death of Christ, the term comprises also the preaching of (concerning) Jesus Christ as having suffered death on the cross to procure eternal salvation for the men in the kingdom of God, but as restored to life and exalted to the right hand of God in heaven, thence to return in majesty to consummate the kingdom of God.
The issue of the gospel is not an intellectual decision. The gospel is a moral issue. Does God exist and does He take the issue of sin seriously? If so, then there is accountability. The issue needs serious attention. Eternal life and eternal death are on the line. The destination of your eternal soul is at stake. This is about getting your heart, soul, and mind right with the Creator.
This good news is for everybody! God does not discriminate. The most brutal, unsavory character can be saved from eternal hell if they believe the gospel message. One can think up the vilest person in their mind and that person too can be saved with their belief in Jesus Christ. We are all equal at the foot of the cross. Even a barbaric Scythian can be saved by the cross work of Jesus…
Colossians 3:11 a renewal in which there is no distinction between Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and freeman, but Christ is all, and in all.
1 Thessalonians 5:9 For God has not destined us for wrath, but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ…
