The “Unpardonable Sin” (WIP)

Christ said, wherefore I say unto you all manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven on the man, but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven on the man. And whosoever speaketh a word against the son of man, it shall be forgiven him. But whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world neither in the world to come. By the way, this defines blasphemy as to speak against. So he’s talking about blasphemy in verse 31, and then he defines it for you in verse 32. Whosoever speaketh a word against, that’s what it means to blasphemy.

So, this is a very troubling passage to many because very few understand it in its dispensational context. Preachers who don’t rightly divide the word of truth, and there are many, sadly, they misuse these verses to scare people and try to get results. And they warn, you could be committing a sin that will never be forgiven. They use the fear factor. And I’ve heard messages where they misuse these verses, and it was all about trying to scare people and to, you know, responding to them or whatever. Of course, the charismatics, they try to use these verses against their critics because in the context they claim Jesus was casting out a devil by the devil and attributing the work of the Holy Spirit to Satan, and so the charismatic say, if you’re saying my ministry is not of God, you’re blaspheming the Holy Ghost, you know? And they try to use these verses to say, you can’t criticize me because then you’ll be in danger of blaspheming the Holy Ghost and that will not be forgiven.

But, you know, Christ said this before the cross. And who did he say it to? He said, “Wherefore I say unto you,” who’s the you? Context, unbelieving Pharisees. If you check the context, he’s talking about unbelieving Pharisees. That’s who he gave this warning to. Bottom line is there is not a sin that Christ did not die for and for which you cannot be forgiven if you trust him as your savior. Some people say, well, rejecting Christ is the unpardonable sin. No, because there’s a whole lot of people that have gotten saved that rejected the gospel the first time they heard it. So, if that was the unpardonable sin, as some preachers I think John MacArthur, for an example, tries to say, that’s what it is. When you reject the gospel, it’s an unpardonable sin, you won’t be forgiven. No, because there are people who, the first time they heard the gospel, didn’t believe it, but then they did believe it and they got saved and they were forgiven.

So, people try to get around this passage in various ways and the problem is they’re not looking at it dispensationally. That’s their problem. So by the way, blasphemy is to speak against the Lord and so this passage teaches us that the Holy Ghost is equal with the Father and equal with the Son. It’s possible to blasphemy the Father. It’s possible to blasphemy the Son. It’s possible to blasphemy the Spirit. Blasphemy is speaking against the Lord. So it shows that all three are God. Now, I don’t think the unbelieving Jews actually committed blasphemy against the Holy Ghost in this passage because on the cross, Jesus prayed for these people and he said, “Father, forgive them. They know not what they do.” So, if they had committed this sin, he’s warning them about, they wouldn’t have had an opportunity to be forgiven after the cross.

They had the opportunity to repent as a nation for killing their Messiah because of the intercessory prayer of Christ on the cross. So that prayer of him saying forgive them, they know not what they do, I think proves that they had not actually committed this sin. I think what he’s doing is he’s warning them of something. And I say that because in Mark 3:28, a parallel passage, he says, verily I say unto you, all sin shall be forgiven under the sons of men, and blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme, but he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation. Saying you’re in danger of something here. It’s a warning. And, also in John’s you don’t have to turn there, but in John 16, Christ said about the Spirit of God, John 16:8 he said, “When he has come, come with the Holy Ghost, he will reprove the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment.”

So, you know, the Holy Ghost had not yet been sent. Even though Christ was working, filled with the spirit in his ministry working by the power of the Spirit of God, the Holy Ghost had not been sent to reprove the world yet, when he said this. So, I don’t think the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, what I’m saying is I don’t think it’s something that they committed right here, but it’s something he’s warning them about that they’re in danger of doing. See, they were rebelling in ignorance. How do I know that? Because, Jesus said, on the cross, they know not what they do. Peter said in Acts 3:17, you did it in ignorance, okay? You’ve rejected Christ in ignorance. But after he rose from the dead and poured out the Holy Ghost, there was no more excuse, which by the way look in Matthew 12:38.

Then certain of the scribes and the Pharisees answered saying, master, we would see a sign from thee. And that was hypocrisy. They weren’t interested. They were just talking. He had been doing all kind of signs that they had rejected. But he answered and said to them, an evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign. There shall be no sign given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonah. What is that sign? For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth, you see that? He had to die, be buried, and rise again and that sign was given to Israel an opportunity for them to repent. The sign of the Prophet Jonah proves Israel could have repented in early Acts, and that they were given a renewed offer of their kingdom. They had rejected the Father. They had rejected the Son. That’s when they reject the Holy Ghost after he’s poured out, after the sign of the Prophet Jonah, after the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ.

So my point is, I think the leaders in Israel committed this so called, I say so called because that’s not what it’s called in the text, but the sin that’s not going to be forgiven, they call it the unpardonable sin. I believe they committed that in Acts 7 when they murdered a man, Stephen that was filled with the Holy Ghost. They were pricked in their heart. They could not argue with him. His face shown as an angel. And they knew about Moses and his face shining with glory. They knew this man was filled with the Holy Ghost. There’s no doubt about it, and they still killed him. Instead of repenting of killing their Messiah, they kill the messenger. They reject the witness of the Holy Ghost. And that’s why when Stephen is stoned, you know, what does he say? “I see the Son of Man standing, because at that moment judgment was coming, wrath was coming,” you know, they had rejected the Father. They had rejected the Son, they reject the Holy Ghost, they fall as a nation.

In Acts 7, wrath could have been poured out, but instead, of course, God poured out grace saving the leader of the rebellion, Saul of Tarsus, making the Apostle Paul, revealing the mystery of this age through him, and ushering in this wonderful dispensation of the Grace of God. But what I’m saying is that that evil generation that Christ kept – he kept talking about a certain generation, an evil generation, a wicked generation, a generation of vipers, and so on. They lost their opportunity to repent, receive their king and his kingdom. When they blasphemed the Holy Ghost, they sealed their doom, those that had done that. Now, that goes along with another troubling passage and I will take a couple more minutes and hit this in, Hebrews 6. And of course, Hebrews is written to the Hebrews and it’s not written to the body of Christ. It’s very easy to prove that from the book of Hebrews. It’s for us as is all scripture. It’s not written directly to us where we’re living in the age of grace.

There is a passage here that has troubled many people in Hebrews 6:3-4, for it is impossible for those who are once enlightened have tasted the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come. That’s not about the kingdom. The powers of the world to come were being tasted in early Acts because the signs and wonders of the kingdom were being worked because the kingdom was being offered. If they shall fall away, to renew them again to repentance, seeing they crucify themselves, the Son of God afresh, and put them to open shame. That generation that blasphemed the Holy Ghost and fell, they fell away. They didn’t have another opportunity to receive their kingdom. They sealed their doom, okay?

This is something that happened to Israel. This is not something that happens to people today. And so, you know what? There is a sin on the death. That’s another passage people misuse. First John 5:16, he said, don’t even pray for it, don’t even pray for it. There’s a sin on the death. Look, they sealed their doom, they fell. This is something Israel committed, okay? And then, in the seventieth week of Daniel, there is a particular sin that if a person commits, they can’t be saved, and that’s taken the mark of the beast. But, in both scenarios, in the early Acts with Israel in the seventieth week, this is not something that has to do with us. There is no sin that you can commit in the age of grace that can’t be forgiven. There is no sin in this age of grace that if you commit, people shouldn’t even pray about it because you’re doomed. Those passages are not written to us in this age.

Now, I finished with this thought. Isn’t it an amazing thing? Saul of Tarsus was leading in that stoning of Stephen because they laid their garments at his feet signifying his authority. He blasphemed the Holy Ghost. Jesus said it shall not be forgiven. Did he get forgiven? Well, obviously, he became the Apostle Paul. How did he get forgiven? With a new message. He was not saved by the gospel of the kingdom. He was saved by the revelation of the gospel of the grace of God. When Christ revealed the gospel of the grace of God to Saul of Tarsus, he was saved by a new message. And Israel, during the Acts period, those Jews that had blasphemed the Holy Ghost and Israel fell as a nation, those Jews could have got saved under Paul’s gospel, but many of them still rejected that. But they could after Act 7, the kingdom was not offered.

Now that brings up a whole another question about Peter’s ministry after Acts 7, but what happens with Peter in the little flock is he begins a maintenance ministry, not an expansion ministry, and he comes to see that Paul was given a new ministry and message and that the kingdom was postponed, so they maintain their calling, but he knows the kingdom is not coming. He gets that knowledge. You can see that in 2 Peter because he explains why the kingdom was postponed in 2 Peter. But this thing of not, the unpardonable sin or the sin on the death, that has to do with Israel. We’re not in the context of those passages. Isn’t it wonderful to know there’s not a sin that you can commit that God will not forgive if you trust Christ as savior. When he died for all of your sins and the moment you believe the gospel, the grace of God, you are instantly and forever forgiven all trespasses.

Don’t let anybody scare you with the unpardonable sin or the sin of the death, you know. I’ve always heard people talk about J. Harold Smith’s famous message, God’s Three Deadlines. So, one day I decided I was going to check it out, listen to it because I’d always heard about it, but never – and I could not believe my ears when the guy got up in his introduction and explained the importance of context. And then he proceeded to preach his whole message out of context because he used Matthew 12, the unpardonable sin. He used 1 John 5, the sin on the death. He used those passages to try to scare everybody to death, to get them to come forward, you know. If you don’t respond tonight, God will probably kill you, you know? You’ll go to, you know, you won’t have another chance, you know, just that whole – now look, you ought to take things serious and not to procrastinate and not, you know, because you’re not promised another day. It’s not true that a person could commit a sin in this age of grace that can’t be forgiven. That’s not something Christ said to us.