Okay, turn with me once again to the book of Jude, where our study will focus on a single verse, verse 4. Having just exhorted his readers to earnestly contend for the faith that was once for all handed down to the saints. Jude now begins to explain why he felt such an exhortation was necessary. He says in verse four, that it was for, or because certain persons have crept in unnoticed. Those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation. ungodly persons who turn the grace of God into licentiousness and deny our only master and Lord, Jesus Christ. As we discussed last week, the reason we're to contend so earnestly for the faith, which is simply another way of saying that we are to defend at every turn the precious doctrines found in God's word, The reason we do this is because there will always be those who will attempt to subvert the teaching of the Word of God. Those who seek to malign, those who seek to twist, distort, whatever adjective you want to describe or whatever activity you want to describe, there will be those who attempt that with the Word of God. We see this all the time. This should not come as any surprise. It is disheartening when it goes on in the local church. And I think it's disheartening mainly because a lot of the times we find ourselves in a situation where there are relatively few in the church who are adequately equipped to handle every error that springs up. I think that's really the emphasis on this particular exhortation, to be those ready to defend the Word of God from all who would seek to do it harm. Now, again, this implies, as Paul exhorted Timothy in 2 Timothy 2.15, this implies that we study to show ourselves what? approved as workmen who need not be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. Knowing the word of God as accurately and thoroughly as possible is the only way that we'll be able to recognize that the truth is coming under attack. I've used the example of how they train people who work in banks to spot counterfeit money. They don't show them all kinds of examples of counterfeit bills. They actually seek to make the person working in the bank so familiar with the actual currency that they can spot a fake or a forgery from a mile off. The same thing is true about the Word of God. If you want to be able to recognize error from truth, you have to become so familiar with the truth that you can spot error from a mile away. I know a great number of people who have made it their life's mission to study this heresy and that heresy, and they're very adept at identifying this error and that error because they've studied these errors. But what I find most of the time in those cases is that these same individuals tend to be rather anemic when it comes to being able to rightly divide the word of truth. They're very good at their knowledge of certain errors. But what they lack is really a solid basis upon which to determine error from truth to begin with. You might yourself have experienced this. You go to chat rooms, you go to debate websites, and you can see people talking about this sort of thing all the time, right? We need to know the truth. so that we can discern truth from error. Now, before we go on to talk about what we read here in our text this evening, I want to linger just a little bit longer on verse three, just a couple of minutes, to share with you something that's been on my mind over the last several weeks concerning Jude's pastoral approach to his readers. This is something that, as I said, it's been on my mind for a few weeks now. It's recently been brought into sharper focus. I started praying in earnest that God would help me in this particular area, and He has. He's moved in some rather remarkable ways to begin to grow me in this particular area. Not only have I had to deal with a situation similar to what Jude is describing here in our text tonight, which has been a learning experience all its own, But I was also reminded only a few days ago, very lovingly I might add, of a particular blind spot that I might have that with the Lord's help I'll be doing my best to address. I want you to notice once again something that Jude says in verse three. We find Jude making an apology here of sorts. It's not the kind of apology that you might expect. It's not the apology in the sense that he had done anything wrong. It's just he wants to make an apology actually for not being able to do what he wanted to do. Do you get that from there? He says, he reminds me of the guy that comes on TV. who says, we interrupt your regularly scheduled programming to bring you this important public service announcement, right? In other words, what we had intended to put on the screen at this time has been supplanted or replaced by something more important, something I have to say to you. Jude does the same thing here. He says, look, I wanted to tell you about this common salvation that we have. I wanted to speak about our common salvation, Now I have to go somewhere that I really hadn't intended to go. And it was this verse in conjunction with God's subtle reminders of late that actually convinced me or convicted me that the better part of wisdom for anyone who expounds the word of God, who stands in the pulpit week after week, the better part of wisdom is to understand that preaching is much more effective when biblical truth is emphasized as opposed to actually becoming fixated on error. I think this is a trap we can all fall into, right? We tend to want to scream so loudly against the error that we see taking place in the church at large that very often we can become fixated on that and speak much more about the error than actual truth. Now, I think my preaching is somewhat well balanced in that regard, but I have caught myself and others have caught me, uh, tending to get fixated on certain things. It wasn't that long ago. John Williams called me out. Well, I guess it's been a few years. Yeah. But he called me out once and he said, look, enough of the Joel Osteen stuff. We get it. We understand. I was like. Wow, do I really mention him that much? And John, being the very sweet individual he says, his response was, you know, I expected him to say, well, you know, not that much, but you know, you could lay off it a little bit. But how did John respond? All the time. I was like, wow, I didn't know I did that, right? And so we can all fall into these traps where we get fixated on one thing or another. And especially as a pastor, I don't want to be one who focuses more on the errors, more on name calling, more on innuendo, because again, as I was reminded this past week, those things can come across as cynical, sarcastic, even hurtful in some areas. So with your help and accountability, my intention is to focus more on delivering the truth and let you guys figure out anything that should stem off of that. Will you help me in that? Don't beat up on me please, but I'm a work in progress just like you are. Jesus prayed to the Father in John 17 that we would be sanctified by what? the truth. And then he qualified that by saying the truth is what? The word of God. Right. So again, I would ask that you begin to pray with me that we would all, not just myself, but we would all be more inclined to focus more on the word and more on the truth than we are on pointing out the faults in others and so on and so forth. I think we'll find a lot more people will be attracted to our teaching, our counsel, if we don't stand on that high horse and pontificate as if we're in a position of superiority. Because at the end of the day, we're really not, are we? I mean, the person who doesn't understand the doctrines of grace might actually be infinitely more holy than we are in many regards. And so, I know I'm not just speaking to myself, I've spoken to some of you who share these same concerns. when you go out onto the internet and you get, especially Facebook, when people bait you into these discussions and before long, what are you doing? You're what? Yeah, yeah, you're kind of right where they are. So now having said all that, while Jude would have rather written about this common salvation, right? He says it's necessary for him to take a detour in his plans. He wants them to know that they should be even more insistent on defending the faith because certain persons had crept in unnoticed. I've entitled this evening's message, Beware the Creepers. Because that's exactly how Jude himself is describing them. These are the stealth, Spreaders of error. These are the ones who creep in, they sneak in unnoticed to do what it is they have come to do. Two things stand out in this sentence. First of all, I want you to notice that Jude doesn't feel any need to personally identify these individuals. He could have. Paul's done this, right? Paul mentions a few times. He mentions the departure of Demas. He mentions Hymenaeus and Philetus. He mentions Alexander the coppersmith. Paul was not afraid, I think under apostolic authority and with the wisdom God had given him, he was not afraid to mention people by name when their warning was called for. Jude doesn't do that. This might be because he really didn't know their names. He had just heard reports that this was going on in some churches. But it might be for another reason, maybe, Maybe he's calling them certain persons because he feels comfortable and had confidence that those within the church who understood the truth and had grown accustomed to contending earnestly for the truth would know who these individuals were. Again, if you're well-trained biblically, if you understand the word of God and truth from error, you'll be able to spot these certain persons. And so it might be that Jude felt that they were adequately equipped to do that. This is certainly hoped because what would happen otherwise? You'd have a church where everybody's saying, is it him? Is it him? Is it her? Is it her, right? And that's not healthy either. So the key here is to be so adept at contending earnestly for the faith that we're able to recognize if someone came to this church and said certain persons have crept in unnoticed and they're spreading error, you should know who those are, right? Hopefully, that's the goal. Now notice also the last part of the sentence. Jude says that these certain persons crept in unnoticed. This is the modus operandi of almost every false teacher. False teachers don't walk into a congregation and say, hi, my name's Bob and I'm a false teacher, right? I mean, if they did that, hopefully someone would show them the door, right? Instead, they creep in. The word translated here as crept is actually a word that refers to one who slithers in as a snake does, right? You don't want to think about a snake that makes him so insidious. You never hear him coming. They don't have footsteps. They slither in. And that's the word that's kind of being used here to describe how false teachers enter in unnoticed into the congregation. They slither into the congregation. And once there, they give the appearance of being Christians. And they use their claims of being Christians as a means of staying hidden. all the while they're spreading their false teaching. They might appear to be very eager at first, even very helpful, but before long their colors will begin to show. The Apostle Peter wrote a word of warning about this to the church in 2 Peter 2. Turn to 2 Peter 2 and read with me verses 1 through 3. What is Peter right here? He says, but false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. Many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned. And in their greed, they will exploit you with false words. Their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep." You know, just as an aside, if you keep reading what Peter has written here and compare it to what Jude has written, the parallels are astounding, right? What Peter warned his readers about here was finally fulfilled by the time Jude was writing his letter. In fact, many scholars believe, and I would certainly agree with this as well, many scholars believe that Jude had actually been in receipt of Peter's letters. Remember, these were letters that went out far and wide. They were disseminated to most of the churches in that area. So it's not unreasonable to suspect that Jude is writing on the basis of that which Peter had foretold being fulfilled. And that's why the language is very similar. Now, this is not to suggest, as some scholars have suggested, that there's some sort of literary dependence between the two letters. There are some scholars who say that all Jude is doing is just borrowing Peter's letter and writing about it as if it's now in the past tense. He's depending on Peter's letter to write his own. That's not true at all. It's not true at all. Those people who think that way are usually liberal theologians who deny the work of the Holy Spirit in inspiration. They deny the possibility that Jude could actually be writing under inspiration in the same way Peter was and that's how they came up with the same things to say, right? I remember in one of my seminary classes, My New Testament professor, who was a liberal theologian, was suggesting that a lot of the Gospels borrowed from each other. And I asked him, why do you think that a lot of the Gospel writers actually borrowed material from each other? He said, well, look how similar they are. And I'm like, well, do you believe in the doctrine of the inspiration of the Word of God? Well, absolutely I do. Well, could not the Holy Spirit have caused each gospel writer to write the same truths?" Yeah, he was like, well, I just don't think that happened. So be that as it may, I don't believe this is a situation where there's some sort of literary dependence going on. Besides that, Peter wasn't the only one. to have warned of this type of impending danger, right? Jesus himself warned his disciples of the dangers of false prophets in their own midst. In Matthew 7 15, he was giving his famous sermon on the mountain. He said to them, beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. He's saying the same thing Peter's saying. He's saying the same thing that actually happened in Jude's letter. He's saying that these people have crept in and they've been so successful at creeping in unnoticed that they blend in with the sheep. They're wolves in sheep's clothing. In Acts chapter 20. Paul warned the Ephesian elders saying this in verses 29 and 30. He says, for I know this, that after my departure, savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. Also from among yourselves, men will rise up speaking perverse things to draw away the disciples after themselves. So all we have in this case, is Jude writing to his readers that, as predicted, these false teachers had, in fact, slipped in among them unnoticed. And make no mistake about it, this is something that can happen even to the most prepared churches, even to the most vigilant, most determined to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints. This can happen in any church. This is how good Satan is, right? Satan can have his minions infiltrate a church of any level of maturity. It will happen. And I think more often than not, it happens in churches that are more mature. Because churches that are weak and vapid in terms of doctrine, what interest does Satan have in messing up that which is already messed up, right? So anyway, he's the master of deception. And he will infiltrate even the strongest of churches. I think Judas is a perfect example of this. If there was any group of individuals who should have been inoculated against the possibility of infiltration, it would have been the 12 apostles. those who had ministered with Jesus from the very beginning of his earthly ministry. Judas himself, think about this, Judas himself lived with and ministered among those same men for nearly three years, or the better part of three years, unnoticed, unsuspected. That's how effective some of these false teachers can be. Now I say this only because One of the most dangerous things a church can do is to think that they are so vigilant, so effective at contending earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints, so doctrinally astute or scripturally savvy that a false teacher wouldn't stand a chance in their midst. Actually, nothing can be further from the truth. Again, false teachers don't come into the church and announce that the virgin birth is a lie. They don't come in and infiltrate the congregation and begin teaching that Jesus is not God. Their introduction of error is just as subtle as their creeping into the church was to begin with. They start by sowing the littlest seeds of doubt. They start by introducing the smallest, most seemingly insignificant variation of the doctrine that the church holds to be true. And then from there it just spreads like gangrene as it gains a foothold. If I can, especially, if I can go into a church and get to the weakest members, the newest members, the most vulnerable, very good, the most vulnerable members, and I can sow seeds of doubt in their minds, then who do they take that to? They take it to the next person, and the next person, and the next person. And by the time someone who's able to defend all of that actually hears it, it could be wildly out of control already. And now you're not just blowing out a match, you're trying to put out a forest fire in the church. And again, it happens, and it happens just like this. Now notice how Jude characterizes these individuals. He says that these are, quote, those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation. If you read the commentators, you'll see that there's been a great deal of speculation concerning what that means. And again, I think this is, the speculation is driven by the fact that a lot of people don't want to consider what this actually does mean. What does this mean? Well, I think the meaning's quite clear. In spite of the fact that some are uncomfortable with the idea that God raises up individuals for the sole purpose of using them to demonstrate his wrath upon sin, this is exactly what Jude is saying here. And no, this does not in any way make God the author of sin. It simply means to borrow an illustration from Paul in Romans nine. It simply means that the potter has the same right over the same lump of clay to make some vessels for honorable use and some for dishonorable use. Right. That's what Paul's talking about there. Those made for honorable use, Paul writes in Romans 9.23, are marked out beforehand for glory. Those vessels made for honorable use, that's simply a term to describe the elect of God, right? Those marked or made for dishonorable use, Paul writes in the previous verse, Romans 9.22, are what? vessels of wrath prepared for destruction. Even earlier, Paul makes specific mention of Pharaoh, doesn't he? Remember what he says about Pharaoh? He says, for the scripture says to Pharaoh, for this very purpose, I raised you up. Why? Why did he raise Pharaoh up? So that Pharaoh might be saved? so that Pharaoh might be an example of God's mercy and loving kindness? No, he says, for this very purpose, I raised you up to demonstrate my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth. How did God demonstrate his power in Pharaoh? He relieved him of everything he possessed and ultimately killed him, crushed him. For what purpose? For His glory. For His glory. In John 17, Jesus refers to Judas as what? The son of perdition. Now, that's really a phrase that we don't use very often today, right? What does son of perdition mean? What would that have meant to a Greek-speaking audience? Son of perdition is John Gill says that this phrase identifies or marks Judas as, quote, the one that was appointed to eternal ruin and destruction, of which he was justly deserving. In other words, God had marked out from before the foundation of the world that this Judas would be the instrument that he would use to commit the greatest act of treason known to mankind. the greatest act of treachery known to man would come because God had ordained it from before the foundation of the world. We read this in the prophets, don't we? You realize that the Old Testament prophets prophesied that Judas would sell the Messiah for 30 pieces of silver, right? Now notice also the reason Jesus gives for Judas's having betrayed him. He says in John 17, that Judas betrayed him that the scripture might be fulfilled. So again, what was Judas's purpose in this world? To be the one who betrayed Christ. Otherwise, I mean, what's the other alternative? Oh, it just happened. Judas, poor Judas, he was just a victim of circumstances. You know, he had a pretty rough upbringing as a child. He was just predisposed to do this sort of thing because his mother mistreated him or his father dropped him on his head when he was a baby, whatever the case might be, right? But that's not the case at all. Judas behaved in the way he did because he could not have done otherwise. He was the one marked out beforehand to do this. Remember what Peter said about the crucifixion of Christ. In Acts chapter two, remember he says, Jesus was put to death by the predetermined counsel of God. And he says, and he was put to death by your lawless deeds. by the hands of sinful men, who had been what? For ordained to that purpose. You think Pilate could have done anything other than what Pilate did? No, Jesus tells him as much. He's silent before Pilate. Pilate says, why are you silent? Do you not believe that I have the power to let you live or put you to death? And what'd Jesus say? You would have no power over me. unless it had been granted to you by the Father. The point that Jude is making in his use of this language is that those who creep into the church to spread false teaching are to be distinguished from the true saints in the church who are doing their best to earnestly contend for the faith. He wants his readers to understand that these false teachers who worm their way into the church, and this is important. He wants them to understand that these deceivers, these false teachers are not people who were once Christians who decided that they would take a bad road and become deceivers. He wants them to understand this by way of assurance and comfort. This is not going to happen to you. If you're earnestly contending for the truth, you don't have to worry about one day being one of these false teachers. He's saying the people I'm talking about, these certain persons are those who creep in unnoticed because they've been marked out from beforehand to do exactly what they're doing in the church. And their condemnation is sure. This is actually something that can be seen very clearly in the next adjective that Jude uses. What does he say about these certain persons? What adjective does he use to describe them? He says that they are ungodly. Ungodly. We often use that same word to describe those whose conduct is less than desirable, right? We might even use that same word to describe our fellow believers who are behaving in a certain way. It's ungodly behavior, right? The writers of scripture used this word in an entirely different way. To say that something was ungodly was the most serious accusation that could be made against someone. Ungodly in this sense means completely devoid of anything concerning an acknowledgement of God. totally devoid of anything pertaining to God at all. This refers to someone who has neither the intention nor the ability to worship God in spirit and in truth. Someone who's just devoid of any fear of God, devoid of any respect for the things of God. They have one mission and one mission only, and that is to disrupt. And this is evident in the rest of what Jude says about these false teachers. He says that they do what? What do they do? They do two things. They turn the grace of God into licentiousness and deny our only master and Lord Jesus Christ. What does it mean to turn the grace of God into licentiousness? Absolutely. These are the same people that Paul's addressing in Romans six, verse one. You know, he's just taught about this overcoming grace, this grace that God uses to save us in spite of ourselves. It's a wonderful, glorious grace. And Paul says, you know, some of you might say, should we send the more that grace may abound? And how does he respond? God forbid, don't even let that thought enter your mind. That's not even possible. That's a thought that should be repelled by every true believer. We don't use grace as license for anything. Now the word licentiousness here refers to that which is shockingly lewd. There were those, the Corinthian church was full of them. There were those who use the grace of God as a coverall. They believed that having been saved by the grace of God, they were thus free to do whatever they wanted to do whenever they wanted to do it. They were the once saved, always saved individuals that give Christians today such a bad name. They were these carnal Christians that so many people tout as a real thing. That is oxymoronic, you know. When Paul uses that phrase, he says, I'm speaking to some of you as carnal. What he's meaning by that is you're not saved at all, or at least you're not showing evidence of being saved. That's not a blanket statement saying that we accept the belief of carnal Christianity. There's no such thing, right? But these are people who use grace as an excuse to live a life of indifference against sin. They do exactly what the Apostle Paul warned again in Romans 6.1. What else do they do? In addition to turning the grace of God into licentiousness, what else do they do? They deny our only master and Lord, Jesus Christ. Actually, the second error builds on the first, doesn't it? In the insistence that God's grace allows for one to continue in sin, the false teacher's denying what? The Lordship of Christ. This is where the anti-lordship, so-called free grace theologians err so brazenly. This is at the heart of their error. They insist that just because I can point to a day and time when I walked an aisle and said a prayer that I'm good to go no matter how I choose to live my life, That's where that idea comes from. They're committing the fallacy of anti-lordship thought. That's why Jude uses these two words, these two designations for Christ himself. He says, they deny our only master and Lord. And Jude's warning his readers and even us tonight to be on the lookout for such individuals and not fall for their ungodly and their ultimately destructive tactics. Are we on the lookout? Are we earnestly contending for the faith to the level that we're able to spot those people who creep in unnoticed and seek to undermine subvert, confuse, twist, malign the Scriptures, and lead astray the unsuspecting. Again, the only way we can effectively do that is to have a command of the Scriptures. What's the old saying? If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything? This is where we stand. on the word of God, rightly divided, rightly understood. Well, let me just, as I close, let me just leave you with some practical application that I think will be helpful as we continue to earnestly contend for the faith in this place. Let me begin by saying that we don't know who the reprobate are. Right? We don't. We don't know who the reprobate are. In other words, we have no way of knowing whether someone in our midst is simply misguided, untaught, poorly taught, or whether they are actually to be numbered among those who have been marked out from beforehand for destruction, for condemnation. What this means is that we need to be very careful how we approach those who differ. Would you agree with that? We don't know who these individuals are. Remember when we were going through Hebrews chapter six, verses four through six, that fearful chapter where we're told that there are some who taste the heavenly gifts and experience this, that, and the other thing in the church. And if they fall away, it's impossible ever to gain them back repentance. The beauty of that passage too is we don't know who those people are. Far be it from me to ever be able to say, yep, you've stepped over that line. So there's no possibility that you'll ever be saved. The same thing applies here. We need not be so quick to judge others with regard to where they are theologically. How many of you here can acknowledge right now that where you are today theologically, you weren't when it first began? And how many of you are very thankful for the love and compassion and concern that brothers and sisters in Christ showed you as they ministered the truth to you, right? And that gets back to what I was saying earlier about what we should really focus on. Just focus on the truth. Just give the truth. Don't resort to name calling and sarcasm and cynicism and, you know, the world's full of that kind of thing. But we need to be serious minded and just lovingly give the truth to people. Right? Listen to Paul. Turn to 1 Timothy 1. 1 Timothy 1. Read with me as I read verses one through four. Here we read Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by command of God our Savior and of Christ Jesus our hope. To Timothy, my true child in the faith, grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord, as I urged you when I was going to Macedonia, remain at Ephesus. Why? So that you may charge certain persons. Notice the similarity here between his language and Jude's language, right? so that you may charge certain persons not to teach any different doctrine, nor to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies, which promote speculations rather than the stewardship from God that is by faith." Now I want you to be very observant here and note carefully what Paul tells Timothy in verse five, because it illustrates precisely how we're to go about this process of identifying, exposing, and warning others about false teachers. Paul says, the aim of our charge is love. that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. In other words, we're to approach those who are in error with a pure heart, a good conscience and a sincere faith. And again, that goes back to what I said earlier. We have the tendency, I even said this on Sunday, I believe, but we have the tendency a lot of times to use the flamethrower approach. with people who differ from us doctrinally. We can rip up the flamethrower and we just scorch them from the top of their head to the bottoms of their feet. And then we pat ourselves on the back and say, man, I defended the truth. Right? That's not really how we're to do it. With love. Love is all you need. As tempting as it might be to launch headlong into someone with guns a blazing, We need to do everything from a position of humility. And Paul exhibits that a little later on in this passage. He says, I thank him who has given me strength, Christ Jesus our Lord, because he judged me faithful, appointing me to his service. And Paul's especially amazed at this. Listen to what he says. Though formerly I was a blasphemer, persecutor, and insolent opponent. But I received mercy because I had acted ignorantly in unbelief, and the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. This saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am foremost." I think he's telling Timothy there, Timothy, don't get above your raisin. Don't think so highly of yourself. Don't act as though you were this super saint the whole time you've been alive. He says, I wasn't. I was just sharing with Mike and Ginger earlier, you know, when I was, I went through some dark years as a young man, young kid. I shared a little bit with you guys on Sunday about what that was all about, but it's a wonder I'm not in prison today. Because that's probably where I would have gone from reform school, probably back out on the street at 18 and probably back into prison. I mean, it was a horrible time until the Lord saved me at age 14 and started to grow me. I could be hyperjudgmental and look back on those early days when I was worthless, as Paul says, of himself. And I could be hypercritical of that particular time in my life, but looking at where I'm at now and how the Lord has been so good to me and so gracious to me, why would I not want to extend that to other people? Why do I not want to extend that possibility even to the people who are the most detestable? At one time, you and I, we were all the most unlovable people on earth. And yet while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Not when we became savable, not when we became good enough, not when we became smart enough, not when we had all of our doctrine together. Christ died for us while we were yet sinners. We should at least extend love and compassion and understanding to those with whom we might disagree. You don't have to agree with them, but guess what you do have to do? You have to love them. And you have to be humble when approaching them. Timothy's responsibility was to instruct those whom the apostle Paul identifies as certain men, urging them to cease and desist in their strange doctrines. And he was to do it from a position of humility, recognizing where he himself had come from. I pray that we will recognize and apply two things from what we see here in this third and fourth verse of what Jude writes here. Number one, that false teachers will always be a problem for the local church and the alarm should be sounded whenever they appear. Don't get me wrong. Whenever a false teacher appears in our midst, we should do what? Sound the alarm. That's not gossip, folks. You know, people can often say, well, you know, I don't want to say anything because I don't want to gossip. If there's false teaching going on here, we need to sound the alarm. It's for the protection of everyone, right? And two, I pray that our reaction to the false teachers in our midst would be a reaction of firmness and humility in hopes that God might be pleased to save them. Right? Turn them away from their ungodly ways.