In yesterday's passage we found Jude making a mysterious statement about a group of angels who are imprisoned in chains until the day of judgment. We discussed what is the most prevalent theory about this, which is that these angels are the ones from Genesis 6:1-2: "When human beings began to increase in number on the earth, the sons of God saw that the daughters of humans were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose." In was in those days that the wickedness of humans became so great that the Lord could not tolerate it, so He sent the flood to rid the earth of those whose thoughts were "only evil all the time". (Genesis 6:5b) Yesterday we talked about a possible reason why the sin of these angels who mixed with humans was so bad that they had to be arrested and kept in custody until the judgment---it could be that they were turning the human race into beings who were incapable of seeking or accepting redemption.
The reason so many Bible scholars and theologians think Jude may be referring to the sexual sins of the angels of Genesis 6 is because the placement of his comment regarding these angels comes in the middle of a passage that has to do with sexual sins. He has been talking about people of his day who have perverted the grace of God by using it as a license for immorality. (Jude 1:4) Then he mentions the angels who did not stay in their place and who are in prison. (Jude 1:6) And today he compares the sin of these angels to the sins of the citizens of Sodom and Gomorrah.
"In a similar way, Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion." (Jude 1:7a) The citizens of these towns were wicked in matters other than sex, according to the prophet Ezekiel, who says that the people of Sodom were "arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things." (Ezekiel 16:49b-50a) So we see that these people were prideful about themselves. We also see that they had no compassion on their fellow man, for they had plenty and refused to share it with the needy. The "detestable things" they did in the sight of God may refer to their sexual sins, but Ezekiel says it was for all their sins combined that the Lord "did away with them". (Ezekiel 16:50b)
However, it is their sexual sins that Jude speaks about in our passage today, and he compares their sexual sins to those of the angels who are currently in chains. In what ways can these things be compared?
Well, for one thing, neither these wicked angels nor the people of the area of Sodom and Gomorrah reverenced the Lord. The angels left their proper positions, given to them by God, as "ministering spirits" to human beings. The Apostle Paul says in his letter to the Hebrews that the job of the angels is to be ministering spirits "sent to serve those who will inherit salvation". (Hebrews 1:14) So when the angels decided to harm human beings instead of helping them, they were saying to God, "We will not obey You. We will not fulfill the purpose for which You created us." In this same way, the people of Sodom and Gomorrah turned their backs on God in their pride and in their plenty and said, "We will not obey You. You created us to obey You, but we refuse. We will do as we wish."
What happens when a person decides not to obey the laws of God? Very often he decides not to obey the laws of the land either, or the laws of common decency. On the night before God rained down fire and brimstone on the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, we see that all semblance of law and order had broken down. The men of the city were trying to beat down Lot's door so they could drag the angels out of his house in order to sexually assault them. It wasn't just a few men of the city who regarded no laws of God, no laws of the land, and no laws of human decency. The Bible tells us that it was every man of the city, both young and old, who came and demanded that they be allowed to have their way with Lot's guests. (Genesis 1:4-5) Did these men know Lot's guests were angels? Were they trying to mate with beings they were never meant to mate with, just as the angels of Genesis 6 were trying to mate with beings they were never meant to mate with? We don't know who these men thought the angels were. It could be they were in the habit of assaulting all strangers who came into town. It could be that the angels (who appeared in the form of human males) were more attractive than most human males. It's hard to say, but the behavior of the men of the city proves to us how utterly lawless they were and how far their society had broken down. When people feel it's alright to break down a man's door in order to drag his guests out of the house and rape them, they have lowered themselves to a level below any creature on earth. They have become depraved beyond belief.
Lot begged the men of the city not to do such a thing. We don't know whether he realized yet that his guests were angels, but we do know that he felt responsible for protecting them while they were "under the protection of my roof". (Genesis 19:8b) It's at that point he offered his two virgin daughters to the men outside his door. Some critics of the Bible accuse Lot of cruelty for doing this, but I tend to agree with the scholars who think he was trying to buy some time to think what to do, knowing the men had no interest in his daughters. He knew they would refuse his offer because by this point in time the men of the city had experimented with every sexual act they have been able to think of. Regular relations with a woman no longer held much interest for them. Relations with each other had become boring to them too. They want these strangers, even if they have to take them by force, because they have never been with these strangers before. There's something about the strangers that they find different and compelling. They will do anything it takes to get to them, have their way with them, and probably (if the strangers had been humans) kill them in the process.
Just as God never intended for the angels to mate with humans, He never intended for humans to engage in sexual activities except with the person to whom they are married. In the Bible we won't find God's blessing on any sexual union except on that between a husband and wife. As the Apostle Paul said in Hebrews 13:4, "Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and the sexually immoral." Marriage has God's blessing. There is nothing sinful about a husband and wife having marital relations with each other. When we have any type of sexual relations other than in a union which has the blessing of God on it, we are abandoning God's best plan for our lives, just as some of the angels abandoned God's best plan for them.
What is the outcome when humans refuse to acknowledge God's authority over their lives? What happens when humans turn their backs on God and decide to serve only themselves? Jude says what happened to the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah serves as an example to us of the judgment that awaits those who don't allow God to be Lord of their lives. "They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire." (Jude 1:7b) The wickedness of the people in Genesis 6, the wickedness of the people of Lot's day, and the wickedness of the people of Jude's day was the outward symptom of what was wrong in their hearts. They did not honor God as Lord. They did not think they had to obey the Lord's commands. In their hearts, they were gods, and the only laws they wanted to obey were the laws of the carnal mind and of the flesh. It was the continual unrepentant condition of their hearts that put them in danger of eternal condemnation, for we've all sinned. Jude isn't saying that if we have sexual sins (or other sins) in our past that we are destined for destruction. We disobeyed the Lord before we came to Christ and we still sometimes make mistakes. But Jude warns that the person who continues living in unrepentant sin, and who has no regard for the Lord, and who does not fear the consequences of the breaking of the Lord's laws, is endangering his eternal soul. What's in the heart comes out through the actions, so he cautions his readers that if their actions don't reflect who they are supposed to be in Christ, perhaps they are not serving Christ but themselves. This is how they are to recognize their own problems of the heart and the problems in the hearts of the false teachers who are trying to take advantage of the grace of God by telling the saved that they can live any way they please.
We can't live any way we please, not if our hearts are right with the Lord. "Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body." (1 Corinthians 6:19-20) Christ paid a great price to redeem us. We belong to Him, not to ourselves, so we must live in a way that honors our Redeemer.
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