Jude 1:4 (LSB)

Passage

For certain persons have crept in unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.

Nearby Context

Jude 1:2 May mercy and peace and love be multiplied to you.

Jude 1:3 Beloved, while I was making every effort to write you about our common salvation, I felt the necessity to write to you exhorting that you contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints.

Jude 1:4 For certain persons have crept in unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.

Jude 1:5 Now I want to remind you, though you know all things, that Jesus, having once saved a people out of the land of Egypt, subsequently destroyed those who did not believe.

Jude 1:6 And angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day,

Study Lenses

The verse centers on "condemn", "grace", "certain", "persons", "crept", "unnoticed", "long", and "beforehand". It is saying that the verse draws attention to "condemn" and "grace", so its meaning should be read from those terms before moving to application.

The nearby context moves from verse 3's "Beloved while I was making every effort..." into verse 5's "Now I want to remind you though...", so "condemn" and "grace" belong inside that flow. In Jude context, the local focus is Christ, faith, and discipleship.

A plain takeaway is to answer the verse's own emphasis on "condemn" and "grace" with trust shaped by these words, not by a vague optimism outside the passage.