We're turning our Bibles this morning to the little book of Jude. It only is one chapter, Jude, and we shall read verses 1 to 4. Another symptom of the false professed Christian is very plain. in the book of Jude. He's introduced in these verses, and from verse 5 onwards is a recap of biblical history showing that this type of professed godly person who's not real at all has happened all through biblical history. Jude, verse 1. 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 multiplied. 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 you should earnestly contend for the faith that was once delivered unto the saints. For there are certain men crept in unawares who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness and denying the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. We'll end in verse four, and God will bless the reading of his inspired word. We have been looking at some of the symptoms of the thing that should not be. The false Christian. The false professing Christian. And the symptoms in the Bible are very plain concerning the false professed Christian. They stick out of mind when you actually just read the thing. They stick out like chocolate stains on a white shirt. You can't miss it just by reading the Bible. That's why Jesus says, by their fruits you shall know them. There is definite knowledge of those who profess to be Christians and aren't. Not a hunch, knowledge, by their fruits, you know them. And once we look, and have looked, and once we come as believers to understand what the Bible says about Christians, thereafter it's pretty easy to see those that are not And I make no apology for saying things like that. The pity is that most modern pulpits in the Western world for years have been non-discerning, non-discriminatory. Pulpits and preachers in them that preach messages that are so bland, messages that even leave hypocrites firm still in their assurance of salvation. The hypocrite should never be left with assurance of salvation, because the hypocrite doesn't have salvation. It's as many as receive Christ, to them gives he the power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name. The Christian who believes is becoming a man and woman of God. In other words, there's a progressive change takes place in their lives as they grow more and more into a child of God. The hypocrite, the false professed Christian, simply remains the same and indeed deteriorates. They become more worldly. Their life goes in the opposite direction of the true Christian. The true Christian, let me just reverse all the points in the series I've given you so far. I've given you the sayings of the false professed Christian. The true Christian is the opposite of all that, as the Bible testifies. The true Christian is someone who loves holy living and wants that. That's their goal. The true Christian is someone who is governed by God's Spirit. The true Christian is someone who is ashamed of their sin. They're not like the false professed Christian who glory in their shame. No, the true Christian is actually ashamed when they sin. They constantly renew their mind by Scripture. The true Christian, their conversion can be described as entering through a narrow gate and proceeding along a narrow way. The true Christian is someone who is consistently obedient to God the Father's will. I didn't say constantly, but consistently. There's that consistency of wanting to obey God. When we find, learn something new from the Scriptures, we want to do that. The true Christian has a heart that is receptive to the Word of God. They believe deeply and thoughtfully and they keep believing every day. They love God more. The true Christian changes and flourishes and grows under the means of grace like the tree planted by the rivers of water that brings forth its fruit in its season. Psalm 1. The true Christian is someone who is led by the Spirit of God through the Word of God that the Spirit inspired. The true Christian is the complete opposite of the false professed Christian. Is that you, and is that me? If not, what possible grounds can anyone have for saying, I'm a Christian? And the answer is, no biblical grounds at all. But if those characteristics of true Christianity are in you and growing in you, then you can say you're a true Christian. But friends, how important it is to be assured from the Word of God that we are God's children. It brings great assurance to see your life resemble the presentation of a true Christian in the Bible. It brings no assurance at all and gives great doubts to see our lives matching the symptoms of the false professed Christian, and rightly so. I want to give you one more symptom of the false Christian from this wee book of Jude. There's only one point, but we're going to go through a few sub-points, obviously. The false Christian is someone who, number one, twists grace. That's it. They twist grace. Verse 3 of Jude. Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you and to exhort you that you should earnestly contend for the faith that was once delivered unto the saints. For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness. False professed Christians twist grace. They turn God's gospel of grace, salvation by grace, they turn it into an excuse to continue willfully sinning. That's what insidiousness means. And there are three things at least we see here in these verses three and four. We see there's an exhortation by Jude to fight, to contend, Jude says in verse 3 that he wanted to write to the Christians about the common salvation, the salvation they all shared. But he found, come the time of writing and under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, he found it needful, and the word means necessary, instead, to change what he was going to write about and to write instead to them to exhort them. Exhort them to what? Exhort them, the verse says, that they should contend. The word means struggle, stand up for what? That they should struggle and stand up for the faith. that was once delivered to them, the faith. Jude's purpose in writing this letter to the Christians, the whole letter's purpose is to exhort them, to encourage them, to give them strength, to exhort them to stand up and struggle for the faith. Contend for it. Now note it says, the faith. not a faith, because that would defeat the entire purpose of the whole letter. It's common today to talk about a faith, different faiths, the Islamic faith, the Hindu faith. Prince Charles loves talking in this ethereal way. The Roman Catholic faith. the Mormon faith. They're not all faiths at all. They're all paganism under different guises. And the essence of them is all the same, man-made religion. They're not faiths, they're paganism. The Bible exhorts Christians to contend for the faith. This one faith, there is only one faith to contend for. The biblical faith, the only true faith that was once delivered to the saints. Delivered. See, it's not a matter of saying that's a faith and that's a faith. Only true faith was delivered. Man didn't come upon biblical faith by his own investigation, nor by his own reason, nor by human abilities. it was delivered unto him once. Like a parcel comes to your door in the post, it's completely delivered to you. That's how the faith, the only true faith came to believers, and that's the only faith that they're to contend for. Jude exhorts these Christians, because there is a fight ahead, A fight. A struggle. A struggle for the gospel. A struggle for the true faith. And surely that struggle is around us today. Indeed, you could certainly say the churches in the Western world have been utterly routed in that struggle. They've lost every major battle in the struggle for the faith. They've compromised on everything. Why is there a struggle ahead? Jude tells them in the first half of verse four, For there are certain men crept in on the words. That's why there's going to be a fight. Certain men. That's it. You can sum it all up. If there's trouble in a church, if there's trouble in Ballymena Congregational Church, if there's trouble in Ballymena Congregational Church, if there's trouble in any church, what's the cause? Certain men. It's always the same. Same answer. There are certain men, and the word men is the word for men and women. It's gender inclusive. There's going to be a fight. for the real faith, because certain men, certain people have crept in on the words. And the Greek word means, sneaked in, says Spurgeon. Lodged stealthily, stolen, slipped in, the Greek word means. And that's the reason why there's going to be a fight. The Puritan Thomas Manton says, their entrance into the church is under a colour and show of a profession. They profess to be saved. Certain people have crept in, and these people, says verse 4, are ordained to condemnation. didn't take God by surprise. They are ungodly people, which means irreverent or impious, professed Christians that are condemned by God already, irreverent and disrespectful, impervious and unholy, hostile to a holy life, and they are the cause of the church needing to strive and contend for the true faith. Because the false-professed Christian, you see, they have a big wide view of what a Christian is, don't they? That's why the gospel, the faith, must be contended for. And they must always, false professed Christians must always cause God's true people to stand up for the true faith which was once delivered to us. Because Jude's apostates, false professed Christians, pollute the faith with their human ideas. There's an exhortation that there's going to be trouble. The reason, because there are certain men who've crept in on a worse. Some points say, what does the false professed Christians that creep in on a worse, what do they do? These condemned ungodly who yet profess Christianity, what do they do? It says, certain men crept in on a word, who were before a whole their day into this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness. That's what they do. They turn God's grace into lasciviousness. That is their action. And deny the Lord Jesus. You see, after this verse, the whole rest of the book of Jude is illuminating this as happening before in different periods of history. This, where people come and twist grace into an excuse to continue in disobedience to God's law, sin. The Greek word turning, the heretics come and they turn, they are turning, the actual Greek word means change sides. And it's used of spinning a coin. To turn a coin right over to face the opposite direction of what it was facing before. And that's what these people do. They say, oh God's grace, He saved us by grace. We're forgiven. It's all grace alone. All by grace. We don't have to do anything. And they take that grace And they flip it right over into what? Lasciviousness. Licence to continue on sinning. Because after all, we're not forgiven by our works. All our sins are forgiven anyway, and it's all by grace. So they use grace as an excuse to say, you don't have to obey God's law, you don't have to stop, you can just continue on and live how you please. The only difference between a Christian is they're forgiven their sins. And that's it. They turn grace into a license for people to continue on sinning. They take God's lovely grace, where God forgives the repentant sinner from sin and empowers them to live a holy life all by grace. They take that grace and they turn it over like you turn over a 10p coin to the complete opposite direction. and they turn the idea of grace into an excuse to continue disobeying God. Continuancy? They twist God's grace, don't they? And I would say that God's grace has been twisted in most of the evangelical churches in the Western world. Twisted to mean forgiveness without repentance. Twisted to mean not forgiveness from sin. He shall call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sin. No, no, no. They've twisted that to mean forgiveness not from your sin, but forgiveness in your sin. Haven't they? They've twisted grace. They've twisted grace to mean you actually have power. after you're saved now, and it's okay to continue on the way you were before. Continue in sin, which simply means continue in disobeying the law of God. Because sin is, the definition of what sin is, is transgression of the law. So you have power to continue on disobeying what God wants and still be a Christian still. Once you're a Christian, you can continue as you like. That is to twist grace. And that's what false Christians do. Because grace is never described in the Bible as an excuse to continue on sinning. Thomas Monkton says, so here grace aboundeth. Let us be much in duty, saith the spiritual man. God has saved us by grace. Grace abounds here. Let us do what God wants. Let sin abound, saith the carnal man, says Thomas Monkton. Oh, God has saved us by grace. Let's just continue in sin. The total opposite. The real Christian sees God's forgiveness by grace through faith alone and says, that's marvellous, let's be holy. We're no longer slaves to sin. We're free to be righteous. The false Christian sees salvation by grace, forgiveness of sins and says, I'm forgiven for my sins. Let me sin and disobey God some more. I'm free from the law of God to do whatever I want, the complete opposite. Whereas the freedom that the gospel brings is freedom from the bondage to sin, the bondage to disobedience of the law. But the false Christian uses that phrase and says, it's freedom to do what I want, and freedom from God's law, to twist grace, and they turn that grace right over on an excuse to continue living the way they want. They make grace, lasciviousness, their excuse, their license, the Greek word means, to continue in willful sin. When anyone says, you really shouldn't be doing that as a Christian, God will say, oh no, out they get their license. By grace alone, we're not saved by works. So you see what these false Christians who infiltrate churches do, and you see what Jude says true Christians are to fight against and contend with. The true Christian is to struggle and fight against those that reverse God's grace to mean we're forgiven, therefore we don't have to obey God, we can continue in sin. Grace equals continue to sin. They've turned it over, they've twisted it to the opposite of what grace really means. It's plain from the Word of God. It says in Romans 5 and 20, Moreover the law entered, that the offence might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. That as sin hath so reigned unto death, even so might grace reign unto righteousness through eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? God forbid! How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein? God forbid! says Romans more than once. that grace should be used in this way. God forbid the absolute negation. Grace does not lead to let's continue to disobey God, sin. God forbid. What does grace teach a Christian? Listen to this. Titus 2, verses 11-15. All of what it says, it says of what grace teaches. It says, For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared unto all men, teaching us. Grace has appeared, grace brings salvation, and grace teaches us something. Here's how a true Christian is taught of grace. Grace has appeared to all men, brings salvation, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts We should live soberly, righteously and godly in this present world, looking on to the glorious appearing of the great God, our Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us. What does grace teach? The grace that brings salvation teaches that Christians are to deny. They're to say no to worldly lusts. and no to ungodliness. And it teaches us how we should live, what we should say yes to. We should live soberly, which means self-controlled. Righteously, which means obeying God's righteous law. It's not talking about justification by faith, that's the salvation. We live soberly, We live righteously and we live godly in this present world. Grace, in other words, brethren, does not teach us to be worldly. It doesn't teach us to be selfish and disobedient towards God. That's not grace. That's not the grace that brings salvation. Grace teaches just the opposite to what the false Christian believes. The verse goes on that Christ came to redeem us from all iniquity, in Titus 2. Grace teaches us He came to redeem us from all iniquity, not in iniquity, but from it. So the attitude, I'm forgiven, I'm a Christian, I am saved by grace, so I'll just continue on to do what I want. I can disobey God if I want, because it's all under the blood." That is what a false Christian who reverses grace says. And that person is to be fought against by the true church, says And why would the true church not want to fight against such a person? Because that person has actually perverted the actual gospel and grace to mean something that it doesn't. The passage in Jude of course goes on, doing more things. The false Christian in the same verse, denying the Lord our God and our Saviour Jesus Christ, verse 4, you can take that as meaning they deny the deity of Christ. I think that's not really what it means. Denying means contradicting. Contradicting are God and Jesus Christ. The false Christian contradicts God and Christ when Christ tells his disciples, obey me. When he says in his great commission to the church, teaching them to obey all things whatsoever I have commanded you, Matthew 28, the false Christian contradicts that and says, no, I don't have to obey God. That's legalism, I can continue on in sin. The false professed Christian contradicts God and Jesus Christ. More characteristics often, the whole book of Jude will give you the characteristics, mercy if they define the flesh. They damage their own bodies, it means. Verse 8 says, they despise dominion. There's another symptom of a false professed Christian. They despise authority. Dominion means authority. They hate any kind of authority. No one's going to tell them what to do. They don't like authority. Verses 8 and 10, they speak bad or evil about things they don't understand. In other words, that simply means they're actually stupid and don't have a clue about things, yet they're always speaking about it. Bad things about it. Talking about things and giving their opinion, their bad opinions, about things they don't even understand. Like the Bible. Verse 12. They're at the Love Feast. The Love Feast was a feast in the early church that was connected with the Lord's Supper. And at the love feast they feed themselves without fear, it says in verse 12. They have no fear. They have no shame. They're so hardened in sin. They're clouds without water, verse 12. Deceptive. They don't bring any refreshment. There's the promise of it, but it never comes. Verse 13, they foam out their own shame. They open their mouth and out it comes. Things that a true Christian would be ashamed of. And what's their destiny? Their destiny is, in verse 13, their destiny of these people that crept into the church under the profession of being a Christian, their destiny, it says, is the blackness of darkness forever. Total separation from God forever. for professed Christians. It's very important to know whether you're a true Christian or a false one. So I draw to a conclusion. The church is exhorted that false Christians are to be fought against because they twist the gospel. Our job is to preserve the true gospel that was once delivered to the saints. The church is the pillar and ground of the truth. And if you are a true Christian, you will be pained by some who turn God's grace into lasciviousness. Of course you will be. I've led before you over these number of weeks, probably quite painstakingly, some of the biblical symptoms of a deadly disease. A deadly and common disease in Northern Ireland churches. False professed Christianity. Here's the symptoms. Take it as you're looking at a sickness You're looking at a disease. You're looking at these symptoms. They're the symptoms of a false professed Christian. Hostile to a holy life. You don't believe in doing that, do you? They're very extreme. That's fundamentalism. Hostile to holy life. Governed by self-will. Proud in their sin. worldly in their thinking mind. Shallow conversion, broad way, disobedient to God the Father's will. Well, I know the Bible says that, but I'm not going to do it. Their heart is hardened to the Word of God, impervious like the hardened path in the field in the parable of the sower. They love the world more than God. It's another symptom of a false Christian. Unchanged by the means of grace that cause other Christians to grow. And they turn God's grace right around. as an excuse to continue in sin. And they contradict what Christ commands as well. The question I'd like to ask all the professed Christians in Northern Ireland is this, are you a real Christian according to the Bible? If so, you will be showing the symptoms of a real Christian Are you showing the symptoms of a real Christian or a false one? Imagine a man went to the doctor and he's showing the symptoms in his body of a terrible disease. He's been losing weight for a few months. He's lost his appetite. He's got inward pain. He's got weakness and no energy. There's been a change in his blood count. So the doctor puts him through a scan and says to him, you know, all these things, and then the scan results come in. They're pointing to the fact that you've got a deadly cancer. And the specialist says to that man, Sir, you're showing the symptoms and the scan confirms you've got cancer. We can do what we can. Here's the treatment program we recommend. Imagine if the patient says, Yeah, you're wrong. I don't have cancer. Well, I know I'm showing those symptoms. I know I'm losing weight and I'm not hungry and all that. I can see the scan results. But I'm all right. All that. all those symptoms are not true. I don't need the treatment, no thanks. If that was a real circumstance, there is nothing more that specialists can do. If the patient denies the very symptoms and their meaning, denies the facts and refuses the treatment, the patient will die. The Word comes to us and teaches us and tells us and warns us. if you're showing these biblical symptoms of false professed Christianity, you've got a terrible disease. But if you flatly reject the symptoms, all those symptoms, for the six or eight weeks we've been looking at them and say, I know I'm showing these symptoms, Maybe I'm worldly or proud of my sin and disobedient. I know I'm showing those symptoms, but I don't have the disease. I'm all right. Well, then there's nothing more that I can do or the Bible can do. If you're showing the symptoms, yet denying what the symptoms prove and still refusing treatment, which is repentance from sin, trusting in Jesus Christ and obeying him as Lord. You'll go into eternity, but it'll be a lost eternity, because the symptoms prove the reality of the thing. The biblical symptoms of a false Christian. That's what they are. And what are you? What are you and I? Let us search our hearts, read the symptoms of our life, as we would do if we had a physical disease. Diseases are fatal. Some false professed Christianity is fatal. It will kill the soul in hell if left untreated. Okay? Amen. Thank you for your attention.