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 ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints. ~ Jude 1:3b -KJV
My previous Jude 1:3a comments focused on our “common salvation” and contending for the faith. Today I am focusing on the word “saint”.
The Greek word for saint: “hagios” means holy and therefore people generally expect holy conduct out of us if we claim to be Christians. Even the church-avoiding neighbor is somewhat familiar with the demands of our book and can point out some of our common violations and infractions if we display them too openly.
Saints are generally dead people. So it is with the common saints peopling the church. It really takes the power of self-crucification to begin to truly walk forward in a saintly manner.
It is rather amazing that the Greek “Hagios” comes from the Greek “Hagos” which means ‘an awful thing‘! Sin does not want to run into the Hagos holiness of God in a dark alley. Sin and Hagos don’t get on too well together and guess who always triumphs in the end?
Oddly enough, we are finding some newer ‘Christian’ sects (so-called) which seem to outpace each-other in expressing their holiness in wanton acts of unholiness. This – to their way of thinking – is the epitome of truly humble sainthood. Hmmmmm. To me that’s sounding more like heresy. We must “contend” for the real message of salvation that was once and for all “delivered” to the early church and was then passed down to us from there. It hasn’t changed because it is sufficient in its purest and original form.