Sermon.964
“Is There A Sin God Will Not Forgive?”
From the pulpit of Bayview Baptist Church.
Matthew 12:31,32
One of the most difficult truths to come to grips with is that God’s Amazing Grace is big enough to extend to every single person.
The Bible teaches that all who receive Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior in true repentance will have their sins forgiven.
Jesus came to our earth to bring forgiveness.
We deserve God’s wrath in His justice, but He gives us mercy bathed in grace.
Through His death burial and resurrection, Jesus has made it possible for all who place their trust in Him to experience free and full forgiveness, no matter who they are, no matter what they have done.
That’s the great news of the Gospel we proclaim and teach week after week at Bayview Baptist Church.
That’s why our text in Matthew chapter 12 seems so strange.
Listen to the words of Jesus in Matthew 12:31,32.
Matthew 12:31,32
Wow!
Every sin will be forgiven, except the sin of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, that will not be forgiven.
This is often called the unforgivable or unpardonable sin!
Many people may try to ignore these verses because we know that the Bible teaches us that God will forgive our sins through the saving blood and atonement of Christ.
So, we try not to think about what seems like a glitch in scripture.
It’s very important for us to understand what Jesus means when he says blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is the unforgivable sin; so our goal is to avoid any misunderstandings these verses may cause.
Let’s pause and pray that God would give us understanding as we look at this very difficult, but important text.
You may want to tighten your thinking caps as we look closely at this very complex text.
I couldn’t come up with any jokes that go along with the unforgivable sin, for this is serious business.
So let’s read Jesus’ words again and dive right into the text.
Matthew 12:31,32
The word “blasphemy” is described in the Thorndike dictionary as “abuse of or contempt for God or sacred things.”
The Jews of Jesus’ day believed that blasphemy against God was a sin which deserved death.
I think that an important question is in order here.
Why would blasphemy against Jesus be forgivable, but blasphemy against the Holy Spirit be unforgivable?
If anything, it would seem that it should be the other way around.
And how can there be an unforgivable sin, when both the Old Testament and the New Testament places a great emphasis upon God’s Amazing Grace and His forgiveness?
One explanation is that blasphemy against Jesus is rejection of Jesus by nonbelievers, but blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is always committed by a Christian.
In other words, when a person becomes a Christian, any sin he or she has committed in the past is forgiven.
But if a Christian chooses to turn against the Christian faith, there can be no forgiveness.
I would choose not to hold to this view, since in this text, Jesus is warning the Pharisees, who were the Jewish religious leaders.
The Pharisees were clearly not Christian believers, so to say that the unforgivable sin is something that only a Christian can commit is really twisting and misusing the words of Jesus.
A second view says that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is attributing miracles the Holy Spirit has done to Satan.
This view ignores the fact that Jesus teaches in Matthew 7:21-23 that miracles do not necessarily reveal the Holy Spirit’s presence and power.
There can, and are, miracles where the Spirit of God is not present.
The Bible says, for many will drive out demons and perform many miracles in the name of the Lord, but never know the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal savior.
A third view is that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is rejecting Christ as Savior.
This answer almost hits the nail on the head, but not quiet!
So, what is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit?
I think that deep inside, the Pharisees knew that Jesus was the Messiah, but they refused to admit it.
So, my definition of the unforgivable sin is that it’s a deliberate rejection of Christianity when you know that Christianity is true!
It is exactly what the Bible says.
Blasphemy is "speaking against the Holy Spirit."
Jesus is talking about those people who reject the Gospel when they know in their hearts that the Gospel is true.
The Apostle Paul is a crystal clear example of someone who had heard the Gospel, but refused to believe the truth about the Gospel, then completely changed his way of thinking.
He came very close to committing the unforgivable sin, but he did not commit it because he repented of his crimes against God and embraced Jesus as his Lord and Savior.
So, blasphemy against the Holy Spirit involves rejection of the Truth of the Gospel of Christ when that person is fully aware of what they are doing; but it also carries with it the connotation that he or she is speaking in a negative way against the Holy Spirit.
Paul didn’t blasphemy against the Holy Spirit because before he became a Christian he persecuted the church out of ignorance, and after he became a Christian God forgave him.
The Pharisees deliberately rejected the work of the Holy Spirit, and spoke in a negative way against the Holy Spirit, even though they knew in their hearts that Jesus was the Messiah!
That is the unforgivable sin.
You may ask, “Are there people today who have committed the unforgivable sin?”
I’m afraid there are.
There are people who are familiar with Christianity and the Gospel, but who have never truly received Jesus Christ as their Savior, and who want nothing to do with Christianity.
They are familiar with Christianity because they have attended church, perhaps they have read the Bible to some degree, or listened to Billy Graham or some other evangelist on TV, but even though they know the facts of the Gospel are true, for whatever reason, they choose to reject that message.
Those who commit the unforgivable sin have never truly received Christ as their Savior.
This concept is a first cousin to the doctrine of Once Saved Always Saved!
If they had once been truly saved, their past, present and future sins would have been forgiven, and as a result, Jesus would have marked a perfect score beside their names.
For the Christian, the promise of First John 1:9 has no exceptions: “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”
Those who are guilty of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit want nothing to do with Christianity because they have totally and finally rejected the truth.
Oh, you cannot straddle the fence!
The blasphemy against the Holy Spirit involves a total rejection of Christ’s work and a deliberate speaking out against the Spirit.
Jesus said about those people, “they went out from us, but they did not really belong to us for if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us.”
That perfectly describes those who participate in the church and apparently claim to be Christians, but are really not true believers.
The label applied to them is actually the term anit-Christs, which is not a nice label.
Listen to these words from Hebrews 6:4-6
“It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the Word of God and the powers of the coming age, if they fall away, to be brought back to repentance, because to their loss they are crucifying the son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace.”
Once people have seen the Light of Christ and gotten a taste of heaven, once they have experienced the sheer goodness of God’s Word, if they turn their backs on it, washing their hands of the whole thing, they cannot start all over again as if nothing happened.
Folks, that’s talking about people like the Pharisees, who knew Christianity to be true, but instead of receiving Jesus as Lord and Savior, they deliberately rejected Him forever.
That’s about as important of a New Testament teaching that I can ever remember; that not all who claim to be Christians really are.
A person can talk and act like a Christian for awhile and still not be a genuine believer.
Someone can even make a public profession of faith, walking down the isle of the church in a flood of tears, and still not be a Christian.
Many people desire spiritual encouragement, but don’t really place their faith in Jesus.
If you’re trusting Jesus as your Savior today, then clearly you have not committed the unforgivable sin.
If you are worried that you may have committed the unforgivable sin, then you probably have not.
Just the sheer fact that you are worried about it would almost 100% eliminate the problem from your life.
But if your are not certain that your sins have been forgiven, then what you need to do is turn to Jesus Christ, for He will enable you to stop depending upon yourself, stop thinking that you are good enough the way you are, and put your trust in Jesus.
If you do that, I assure you that every sin you have ever committed will be forgiven because Jesus’ death on the cross in our place and God’s Amazing Grace confirms you will be forever free and have full forgiveness.
May God bless you in your continued and steadfast efforts to serve Him.
Heavenly Father, if there is one here today reading this sermon who has not yet entered into a personal saving relationship with You, I pray this miracle of salvation be present in his or her heart, and You, Dear God, will take up residence in the Holy Temple of his or her heart. Amen.
Rev. Jimmy Davis
Bayview Baptist Church
5300 Two Notch Road
Columbia, SC 29204
Email: BayviewBaptist@aol.com
Telephone: 803-754-8690
