In the next three verses (Jude 1:5-7) Jude mentions three examples of the Lord’s judgment upon the wicked, and they are supposed to stand as warnings to folks like the wicked teachers who sought to defame and destroy the Gospel efforts in the first century AD. Most scholars make the wicked out to be sexual deviates. While this might be a literal rendering of the texts involved, how would sexual immorality point to the false teachers who arose against the Gospel of Christ in the first century AD? In Jude 1:5 the author of this epistle points to a time under the Old Covenant when the Lord saved a people for himself out of the land of Egypt. Jude tells his readers that they already know about this, therefore, he is only going to recall the event itself for the purpose of illustration. In other words, he doesn’t have to explain the details, because they already know about the event; they know the details. What Jude recalls to his readers’ memory is that although the Lord saved a people for himself once for all, he acted a second time to destroy those who weren’t faithful. So, what’s Jude’s point and what exactly is he referring to by saying: “them who believed not” (Jude 1:5)?
First of all, I need to explain a few things about this verse. The word translated once (G530) means one single time, a moment that isn’t repeated, it was done once for all. Most translations put this adverb to modify know or knew. So, Jude’s readers’ knowledge of this event was once for all (time). Perhaps that could be true, but a few translations put the adverb with the Lord saving a people out of Egypt once and for all for himself. I prefer this understanding, because, at least for me, it makes more sense. The Lord doesn’t save “a people” for himself every day or even once every thousand years etc. Rather, he saved “a” people, Israel out of Egypt once and for all (time). They and only they were God’s people among the nations. But, “afterward” or a “second time” i.e. God acted again to destroy those among that people who didn’t believe (Jude 1:5).
The picture that Jude is painting by referring to this event under the Old Covenant is that the Lord, Jesus, saved a people for himself, once and for all (time). That generation was a chosen generation, chosen for a specific purpose. The first century AD believers were a chosen generation (1Peter 2:9), which were placed in contrast against the generation of unbelievers during Moses’ lifetime (Hebrews 3:10). Ten times they rebelled against the Lord (Numbers 14:22), although they had seen works that no man had ever seen done. When the Lord was about to bring them into the Promised Land, they believed the evil report of ten of the twelve sent in to spy out the land (Numbers 13:25-33), and they wanted to kill Joshua and Caleb (Numbers 14:1-10), because they brought back a good report, saying they had nothing to fear, because the Lord had delivered their enemies into their hands.
We need to keep in mind that Jude is using something physical to refer to something spiritual. That generation under Moses had to literally make war against the inhabitants of the land, and in doing so the faithful (under Joshua) would claim the land as theirs. The context into which Jude puts this is the spread of the Gospel that would conquer the world. It is called spiritual warfare (2Corinthians 10:3). The disciples of Christ don’t wage war in the physical sense. Rather, we fight against the spiritual powers of darkness, against the rulers of this world (Ephesians 6:12), casting down the strongholds of evil imaginations and bringing every thought into the captivity of Christ (2Corinthians 10:4-5), and our only offensive weapon is the word of God (Ephesians 6:17).
It was this idea that was being attacked by the false teachers (cp. 2Peter 2:1), known as antichrists in John’s letters (1John 2:18, 22; 4:3; 2John 1:7). Just as the Israel under the Old Covenant was influenced by the bad report of the 10 spies to reject the salvation of the Lord and return to Egypt (bondage), believers under the New Covenant were being influenced by false teachers to believe the task of bringing the world under the influence of Christ was too great a work, and they were considering returning to the bondage of Judaism for their salvation through Law (Galatians 4:21-31). So, Jude, in pointing to this event under the Old Covenant, was reminding the backsliders that the Lord wouldn’t protect them when he came a second time to reward everyone according to their works. They, the backsliders, would die in the war (i.e. the Jews war with Rome (66-70 AD), or through famine or fall in the wilderness of people (Ezekiel 20:35) as slaves, but they would not receive the promises.
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