The Truth War

by John MacArthur

  We will examine the gnostic error in more detail in chapter 4, but simply notice for now that the whole point of Jude’s epistle is to confront this type of error and encourage believers to fight for the true faith. Notice also that Jude does not waste any subtlety or employ any understatements in his evaluation of the apostates of his day. Friendly dialogue with them was not part of his plan for dealing with their error (see also 2 John 7–11).

  Apostasy is the technical name for serious, soul-destroying error that arises from within the church. It comes from the Greek word apostasia, which occurs in 2 Thessalonians 2:3 and is translated “falling away.” The word is closely related to the Greek word for “divorce.” It speaks of abandonment, a separation, a defection—the abdication of truth altogether.

  Can a genuine Christian fall away from the faith and become an apostate? No. Scripture is quite clear about that. Those who do depart from the faith, like Judas, simply demonstrate that they never had true faith to begin with. “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out that they might be made manifest, that none of them were of us” (1 John 2:19, emphasis added). Jesus said of his true sheep, “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand” (John 10:28–29).

  Nonetheless, there are lots of apostate people. Ever since the time of Judas, there have been people who profess faith in Christ and identify themselves as disciples but who never genuinely embrace the truth. They may understand the truth. They may even seem to follow it enthusiastically for a while. They might identify with a church and therefore become an active and integral part of the earthly Christian community. Sometimes they even become leaders in a church. But they never really believe the truth with an undivided heart. Like tares among wheat, they have an appearance of authenticity for a while, but they are incapable of producing any useful fruit (Matthew 13:24–30).

  An apostate is therefore a defector from the truth—someone who has known the truth, given some show of affirmation to it, perhaps even proclaimed it for a while—but then rejected it in the end. The typical apostate may still purport to believe the truth and proclaim the truth; but in reality he opposes the truth and undermines it. He is a traitor to the faith and secretly an enemy in the Truth War. But he wants everyone to think otherwise. Most apostates seek to remain within the church and actively seek acceptance among the people of God. Because everything they do undermines faith and corrupts the truth, such people pose a grave danger to the health of the flock—even though they usually bend over backward to appear friendly, likable, and pious. That is why Jesus compares them to ravenous wolves in sheep’s clothing (Matthew 7:15).

  A few apostates are outspoken and aggressive in their opposition to the truth, but most are subtler. Regardless of how friendly, benign, or self-effacing they may appear, these wolves in sheep’s clothing are invariably driven by evil and self-aggrandizing motives—such as pride, rebellion, greed, lust, or whatever (2 Peter 2:10–19). That is not to suggest they always know full well that they are apostates. Many of them are so blinded by their evil desires that they really imagine they are serving Christ when in fact they are opposing Him (John 16:2).

  Others may start out actually meaning well, but they never get past being double-minded. They are like seeds sprouting in shallow or weedy soil. They often show prodigious signs of life for a time. But ultimately their own shallowness or worldliness make it impossible for God’s Word to take root (Matthew 13:20–22). Despite whatever temporary appearance of spiritual life they might display, they are incapable of producing real fruit, and they eventually fall away. Don’t let the temporary appearance of spiritual health and vigor at the start fool you. When such a person abandons the faith, it proves he or she was always unregenerate and unbelieving—still dead in trespasses and sins.

  Apostasy can have far-reaching and disastrous effects on an entire congregation’s spiritual health. When false teaching goes unchallenged, it breeds more confusion and draws still more shallow and insincere people into the fold. If not vigorously resisted, apostasy will spread like leaven through seminaries, denominations, missions agencies, and other Christian institutions. False teaching thus attacks the church like a parasite, affecting our corporate testimony, inoculating people against the real truth of the gospel, proliferating false and halfhearted “disciples,” and filling the church with people who are actually unbelievers. By such means, entire churches and denominations have been taken over by apostasy.

  WHEN FALSE TEACHING

  GOES UNCHALLENGED,

  IT BREEDS MORE CONFUSION

  AND DRAWS STILL MORE

  SHALLOW AND INSINCERE

  PEOPLE INTO THE FOLD.

  In fact, that has happened countless times throughout church history. It has especially happened on a wide scale over the past century and a half, wherever modernism, theological liberalism, neoorthodoxy, “process theology,” and a host of similar ideas have spread. Whole denominations (even many where the gospel was once proclaimed clearly) have been left spiritually bankrupt because error and unbelief were tolerated rather than being opposed.

  Obviously, the cause of truth is hurt when this happens. People who embrace apostasy are destroyed by it. Churches wither and die because of it. Consider the fact that by the end of the first century, when the apostle John wrote Revelation 2–3, five out of the seven churches in Asia Minor were either beginning to defect from the faith or were already apostate bodies. (Sardis was already apostate; Laodicea was teetering on the precipice of final rejection.) Christ’s central message to all but two of the churches included a mandate to deal with apostates in their midst. The battle for truth in the church has always been a very, very difficult but necessary conflict.

  WHY THE EVANGELICAL MOVEMENT

  IS IN TROUBLE TODAY

  Apostasy poses real and present dangers today as always. Actually, the threat may be more imminent and more dangerous than ever, because most Christians nowadays simply don’t care about the prevalence of false doctrine, nor do they take seriously their duty to fight against apostasy. Instead, they want a friendly atmosphere of open acceptance for everyone, tolerance of opposing ideas, and charitable dialogue with the apostates.

  Evangelicalism as a movement has historically stood against handling important Bible doctrine in such an indifferent way—as if truth itself were pliable. Evangelicals’ primary distinctive used to be their commitment to the purity of the gospel. That commitment is reflected in the word evangelical itself (which is derived from the Greek word for “gospel”). William Tyndale was one of the first to use the expression, speaking of “evangelical truth” as a synonym for the gospel. And the evangelical movement has always treated the gospel as the core and foundation of all truth.

  Since the Protestant Reformation, the term has historically been used to signify a particular strain of conservative Protestantism in which a handful of key gospel doctrines are regard ed as absolutely essential to authentic Christianity. These nonnegotiable evangelical distinctives include the doctrine of justification by faith, the principle of substitutionary atonement, and the absolute authority and perfect sufficiency of Scripture. (Of course, necessarily implied and included in that short list are a number of other vital doctrines, including Christ’s deity, His virgin birth, and His bodily resurrection.)

  THE EVANGELICAL

  MOVEMENT ISN’T REALLY

  VERY EVANGELICAL

  ANYMORE. THE TYPICAL

  EVANGELICAL LEADER TODAY

  IS FAR MORE LIKELY TO

  EXPRESS INDIGNATION AT

  SOMEONE WHO CALLS FOR

  DOCTRINAL CLARITY AND

  ACCURACY THAN TO FIRMLY

  OPPOSE ANOTHER SELF-

  STYLED EVANGELICAL WHO IS

  ACTIVELY ATTACKING SOME

  VITAL BIBLIC
AL TRUTH.

  Evangelicalism has furthermore always expressly denied that any good works or sacraments have any merit before God or any instrumental efficacy for justification. So the stress in historic evangelicalism is properly placed on the primacy of faith over works. Evangelicals have always resisted the pressure to elevate good works over sound doctrine, insisting that truly good works are the fruit of faith, never a valid substitute for it.

  But the evangelical movement isn’t really very evangelical anymore. The typical evangelical leader today is far more likely to express indignation at someone who calls for doctrinal clarity and accuracy than to firmly oppose another self-styled evangelical who is actively attacking some vital biblical truth.

  Meanwhile, much of the evangelical movement has been acting for a long time as if our main duty is just to keep in step with the fads of worldly culture in order to gain the approval of each succeeding generation. That strategy will never fail to find enthusiastic support among those who are immature, weak, ignorant, or cowardly, but it can never be truly effective. Without the truth, no spiritual transformation is possible (1 Peter 1:22–25; John 17:17).

  Evangelicals who are so desperate to follow the culture invariably lag several years behind anyway, somehow managing to look awkward and clumsy by always failing to keep in step, no matter how hard they try. But, then, the church is not supposed to ape the world’s fads or court the world’s favor anyway. Jesus said, “If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:18–19).

  The campaign to make Christianity seem “contemporary” and sophisticated in the world’s eyes is proving especially disastrous right now. As postmodern culture becomes more and more hostile to authority, clarity, and authoritative proclamations of truth, evangelicalism is blithely drifting more and more into postmodern ways of thinking about truth, imagining that this is the way to “reach” the culture. Consequently, Christians are less and less willing to fight for the truth.

  HOW CHRISTIANS ARE KEPT SECURE

  Something similar was apparently happening in the apostolic church. That is why the central point of Jude’s brief but powerful epistle was a challenge designed to motivate Christians to become soldiers in the Truth War.

  But Jude’s starting point, interestingly enough, was to stress the security of the true believer. He addresses his epistle “To those who are called, sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ” (v. 1). All the urgings, warnings, and encouragements in the verses to come do not apply to anyone who is halfhearted or double-minded. He is addressing those with true faith.

  Jude recognizes that all war is ugly, dangerous, distasteful, and something every sane person would prefer to avoid altogether. Warfare in the spiritual realm is no different in that respect from carnal warfare; if anything, it is even more menacing. If conventional warfare is (as General Sherman said) the closest thing to hell on earth, spiritual warfare is actually more horrifying still—because it is literally a hostile engagement with the forces of hell in the spiritual realm, where the enemy is never even fully visible.

  Remember: our real enemies are not mere flesh and blood. This is cosmic warfare, engaging the armies of hell, which are arrayed against Christ. Their weapons consist of lies of all kinds—elaborate lies, massive philosophical lies, evil lies that appeal to humanity’s fallen sinfulness, lies that inflate human pride, and lies that closely resemble the truth. Our one weapon is the simple truth of Christ as revealed in His Word.

  It is a frightening scenario, especially when we fully realize our own utter frailty, our own tendency to self-deception, and our own proclivity to sin. Very little would seem to qualify us to be soldiers in the Truth War. But for one thing: we follow a Commander who has been given all authority—absolute lordship—in heaven and on earth (Matthew 28:18). As Paul said, Christ is “far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come. And [God] put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church” (Ephesians 1:21–22). He is truth incarnate. And if you are a true believer, you are called, sanctified, and preserved in Him.

  In the ultimate and eternal sense, no true Christian has ever been or ever will be a casualty in the Truth War. We are loved, called, blessed, made holy, and kept secure—even in the midst of escalating apostasy. Despite all the dangers posed by hellish lies and cosmic warfare, we are preserved in Christ and guaranteed to triumph in the end.

  That is the starting point of Jude’s epistle. That is also precisely where Jude ends his epistle, commending his readers to “Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy” (v. 24).

  So this is the context in which Scripture calls us to wage war on behalf of the truth: The task is intimidating. The enemy is fearsome. The dangers are daunting. The spectacle of such a battle is appalling. And the price of involvement is total self-sacrifice—which is just what every true Christian renders to Christ at salvation (Luke 9:23–25). But we are promised that such a sacrifice will always be worthwhile, and our final triumph is likewise guaranteed—because we are “preserved in Jesus Christ.”

  That is surely something to keep in mind as you think about your part in the Truth War. It is perfectly natural to feel inadequate. We are completely inadequate in and of ourselves (2 Corinthians 3:5-6). But Christ is perfectly sufficient, and we are united with Him by faith. There is no reason for dread or apprehension. Our triumph is certain in the end, because Christ has already won the ultimate victory on our behalf. True believers are always ultimately secure in the faith, “kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Peter 1:5). Remember Jesus’ own words: “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand” (John 10:27–29). And damning lies collapse under the power of the truth (2 Corinthians 10:4–5).

  So if you are a believer, get into the battle. Fight for the truth. Contend earnestly for the faith. Apostasy is present in the church, and it is probably going to get worse. But we who believe in Jesus Christ have nothing to fear. We are called and loved and kept secure in Him, so we can be supremely confident, even in this era of doubt and uncertainty. Because the One who is truth incarnate—the One whose honor and glory are therefore on the line—is both our Commander and our Protector. And His Word is a formidable weapon.

  3

  CONSTRAINED INTO CONFLICT: WHY WE MUST FIGHT FOR THE FAITH

  Beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you concerning our

  common salvation, I found it necessary to write to you exhorting

  you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all

  delivered to the saints.

  —Jude 3

  Since the catalyst for this book is Jude’s challenge to people under his pastoral care, I want you to meet him.

  Jude was the younger half brother of Christ.

  How do we know that? Well, first of all, Scripture says that after the birth of Jesus, Joseph and Mary had at least four other sons. (Mark 6:3 indicates that they had daughters too—although the girls’ names are not given and we don’t even know how many there were.) The household in which Jesus grew up seems to have been a fairly large family by today’s standards. In Matthew 13:55, Jesus’ four half brothers are expressly mentioned by name.

  In that context, Matthew is describing how people in Jesus’ hometown of Nazareth responded to his authoritative teaching by questioning His credentials. They expressed disbelief and amazement that a teacher like Jesus could come from the family of a low
ly carpenter in their own unremarkable village. In the process, they mentioned Jesus’ parents and His siblings. As Matthew records the names of the four younger sons in the family, notice the last person on the list: “Is this not the carpenter’s son? Is not His mother called Mary? And His brothers James, Joses, Simon, and Judas?” (emphasis added).

  “Judas” is a simple transliteration of Jude’s Greek name. In the original biblical manuscripts, it is exactly the same name used to signify Judas Iscariot. But to distinguish Jesus’ brother from the traitor, the author of the epistle is always known in English as Jude. Incidentally, the only place in the English Bible where Jude’s name actually appears in that familiar shortened form is the first word of the first verse of his short epistle. Even there, the name given in the Greek manuscripts is Ioudas.

  Judas (meaning “praise YHWH”) is an Anglicized Greek variant of Judah, one of the twelve tribes of Israel. This was quite a common name in first-century Israel. The New Testament introduces us to at least seven different men named Judas, including two of the original twelve disciples.

  There was, of course, the notorious false disciple named Iscariot. But there was also a faithful member of the Twelve named Judas. John 14:22 has parentheses with the note “not Iscariot” following his name. Acts 1:13 refers to that lesser-known disciple named Judas as “Judas the son of James.” He is normally called Lebbaeus and Thaddaeus rather than Judas (Matthew 10:3). That disciple is not the author of the epistle. (Although such a connection has sometimes erroneously been made, we shall shortly see why it is a mistake.)

  Other Judases in the New Testament include an insurgent named Judas of Galilee (Acts 5:37); Judas Barsabas, a church leader who delivered news about the Jerusalem Council’s ruling to believers in Antioch (Acts 15:22); and a man named Judas who lived in Damascus on Straight Street, in whose home the apostle Paul stayed immediately after his conversion (Acts 9:11).