There are times when we discover things in the Word of God that seem shocking. This is an instance when God uses a rather shocking term for these people. The Bible says in Jude 10-11, “But these speak evil of those things which they know not: but what they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves. Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core.”
God calls these people “brute beasts.” They are religious animals. When reading this particular passage, keep in mind that we are dealing with apostates. We are not dealing with people who are normally thought of by others as evil. We are not dealing with people who would be categorized as the lower types in the world, the criminal element, but God says these people are “brute beasts.”
There is the natural man, and there is the spiritual man. There are saved people, and there are unsaved people. A man who does not know the Lord Jesus Christ as his Saviour works entirely with the natural. He understands nothing about the spiritual. God says these people who talk about religious things and declare that they know almost everything about every subject are really operating entirely on the natural and know nothing of the spiritual. They are “brute beasts.”
The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 2:14, “But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” The Bible says that the natural man cannot know the things of God. It is impossible for a man who has never been born of the Spirit of God, no matter how religious he may appear to be or how much he may talk about God, to understand anything about the work of the Spirit of God. These are “brute beasts.” We live in a very religious world. While it is not popular to be a born-again Christian, it is popular to be religious because man is incurably religious.
The Bible says in Psalm 14:1, “The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God.” It makes no difference how much you know. What we preach and teach from the Word of God is divisive. Truth reveals. If the world really is divided between the lost and the saved, and we speak the message of God by the Spirit of God, do we realize that only those who have spiritual understanding are going to understand our message?
God tells us in verse 10 of Jude that these brute beasts not only speak what is natural, they also speak about “those things which they do not know.” Here the self-declared intelligent are told that they do not know anything about which they speak. People enjoy talking about God, but the Bible sys in verse 4, “For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men.”
Notice that brute beasts do not know God. To be “ungodly” means to refuse to submit to God’s authority. The Bible says in verse 10 that they speak about “those things which they know not.” They talk about God and about religion, but they do not even know God.
Another thing they like to talk about but do not know is salvation. The Bible says in verse 4, speaking of this same crowd, that they have turned “the grace of our God into lasciviousness.” They have turned “the grace of our God” into a license to sin. This means that they do not understand anything about salvation. The Bible says in Ephesians 2:8-9, “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.”
There is only one way to be saved. That one way is by the grace of God through faith. These people speak about God, but they do not know God because they will not submit to God. They speak about salvation and the things of God, but they are not saved. They have turned the grace of god into lasciviousness.
Additionally, brute beasts do not know the Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible says in the closing part of verse 4 that they are “denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.” They do not know the Lord Jesus Christ, but they will talk about Him. They know the historical figure, Jesus Christ, but they do not know the biblical Christ. Christ became man with ceasing to be God, yet without sin.
The longer we live, the more we are going to hear from this religious crowd who talks about God but does not know Him. They talk about salvation but know nothing about it. They discuss Jesus Christ, but they do not know Him because they are depending entirely upon the natural.
The point of the passage is very simple. God has a way, and man has a way. God’s way is the right way, the best way, and the only way. Remember that Proverbs 14:12 says that “there is a way which seemeth right unto a man.” He is willing to argue that his way is the right way.
God warns us. Remember that God has a way, and man has a way. We need to be absolutely sure that we are going God’s way. Notice verses 10 and 11, “But these speak evil of those things which they know not: but what they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves. Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core.”
“Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” — John 14:6