In these verses, Jesus gave a very alarming warning. He said, “Truly I say to you, all sins shall be forgiven
the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they utter; but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never
has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin….”
Jesus made it quite clear that all manner of
blasphemies against Him, vile as they might be, could be forgiven. But not the
blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. Why did Jesus say the scribes were committing
the unpardonable sin by what they said about Him earlier? It’s because they
were saying that the Lord had an unclean spirit and attributed the work of God through
Him as the work of the evil one. Jesus calls it the eternal sin. The point here
is that they did not just say it once, but they kept on continually repeating
it.
The religious leaders, the scribes, failed to realize how very close
they were to committing this unpardonable sin. They were skirting on the borders
of blasphemy. For they kept denying the work of the Holy Spirit and kept saying
that the Lord’s deliverance ministry and miracles were the works of evil
spirits. By persisting in this attitude, they were hanging precariously at the
brink of crossing that line.
The unpardonable sin is one of those often misunderstood
teachings of the church. What exactly is the unpardonable sin? It is the continual and persistent rejection of the witness of the Holy
Spirit concerning our Savior’s divinity and His saving grace. It’s the incessant,
deliberate and defiant attribution of the work of light to that of darkness. It
is the persistent and repetitive rejection of the witness of the Holy Spirit, be
it in the form of His quiet witness in the conscience, or through the logical
reasoning of the Word of God, or by signs, wonders and miracles.
What’s terrifying is the fact that the scribes were not people who were
not acquainted with the Word. They were people who dealt with the Word of God
daily and were familiar with it. Being
acquainted with the Word should have helped them to recognize Jesus and His
works. Yet they were plotting to terminate Him and kept attributing His compassion,
love and deliverance ministry to that of Satan and evil spirits. Unwittingly,
they were hardening their hearts against the wooing of God’s love. If they
persist in that way it would bring them to a point where they could not accept
the only remedy to their sin and the forgiveness of God became illusive.
As we handle the Scripture, we must stop pointing our accusing finger of
condemnation at others. Instead let’s seek God for the spirit of discernment to
enable us to identify and glorify God for His grace at work in our life.
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