Jude 1
1
Greeting
1 Jude, a servant wholly devoted to Jesus Christ and a brother of James.
To those whom God has called—loved in God the Father and are kept safe for Jesus Christ.
2 May mercy, peace, and love overflow more and more in your lives.
A Call to Defend the Faith
3 Beloved, although I had hoped to write to you about the salvation we all share, I found it necessary to write instead with an urgent appeal: You must earnestly and actively contend for the faith that God entrusted once for all to the saints.
4 The reason is this—certain individuals have quietly slipped in among you. Long ago their judgment was already announced. They live without reverence for God, twisting His grace into an excuse for moral corruption, and in doing so they deny Jesus Christ, who alone is our rightful Master and Lord.
Examples of Divine Judgment
5 Though you already know these things, I want to remind you: After Jesus delivered His people out of the land of Egypt, He later brought destruction upon those who refused to trust Him.
6 Likewise, the angels who did not remain within the authority assigned to them, but abandoned the place God had given them, He has kept under restraint in darkness, bound until the judgment of the great Day.
7 In the same way, Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns surrendered themselves to sexual corruption and unnatural desire. They now stand as a warning, having undergone the punishment of eternal fire.
The Character of the False Teachers
8 These people follow the same pattern. Guided by their delusions, they corrupt their own bodies, reject rightful authority, and insult glorious ones.
9 Yet even Michael the archangel, when he contended with the devil over the body of Moses, did not dare to pronounce a slanderous judgment. Instead, he said, “The Lord rebuke you.”
10 But these individuals pour contempt on things they do not understand at all. The limited knowledge they possess derives solely from natural impulse, as with irrational beasts—and precisely this instinctual understanding serves as the instrument of their destruction.
11 How terrible their end will be. They have chosen the way of Cain, thrown themselves into Balaam’s error for the sake of profit, and destroyed themselves in rebellion like Korah.
12 These constitute concealed reefs in your love feasts, banqueting alongside you shamelessly. They are shepherds who look after only themselves. They are like clouds that promise rain but deliver nothing, like fruitless autumn trees—pulled up by the roots and twice dead.
13 They are violent waves of the sea, churning up the shame of their own lives. They are wandering stars, for whom the deepest darkness has been permanently reserved.
Prophetic Condemnation
14 Long ago Enoch, the seventh from Adam, spoke prophetically about such people, saying, “Look—the Lord is coming with countless holy ones,
15 to carry out judgment against everyone and to expose every godless person for all the ungodly acts they have committed in defiance of Him, and for all the harsh words that rebellious sinners have spoken against Him.”*
16 These people are chronic grumblers, constantly dissatisfied, advancing according to their own inordinate desires. They speak with inflated arrogance and use flattery when it serves their own advantage.
Final Exhortations
17 But you, beloved, must remember what was foretold by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ.
18 They warned you that “In the last time there would be scoffers who live according to their own godless cravings.”
19 These are the people who cause divisions. They operate on natural impulse alone and do not possess the Spirit.
20 But you, beloved, by continuing to build yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying under the direction of the Holy Spirit,
21 remain firmly anchored in God’s love as you await the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life.
22 Show compassion to those who are unsure and wavering.
23 Rescue others by pulling them back from the brink of destruction. And toward others, show mercy with caution—hating even the traces of sin that cling to them.
Doxology
24 Now to the One who is able to protect you from stumbling and to bring you into His glorious presence without fault and with overwhelming joy,
25 to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord—to Him belong glory, majesty, power, and authority before all time, now, and for all eternity. Amen.
Notes
14-15 The quotation originates in 1 Enoch 1:9, a Jewish apocalyptic text commonly dated to the first century B.C
Currently Selected:
Jude 1: AFINTEXP
Highlight
Copy
Compare
Share
Want to have your highlights saved across all your devices? Sign up or sign in
Copyright © 2026 Michael Adeyemi Adegbola. This Scripture text is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License (CC BY-SA 4.0).