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Book: Matthew
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Matthew 12:31,32 The Unpardonable Sin
Intro. Satan many times likes to torment people with the thought that
they are guilty of committing the unpardonable sin. Many times
people have come to me with a tortured soul thinking that they
had committed that sin. If you are worried that you might have
committed the unpardonable sin I can assure you that you have
not. If you had you would not be the least bit worried or
concerned. The fact that you are concerned indicates that the
Spirit is still striving with you.
I. There is a sin for which there is no forgiveness, neither in this world
or the world to come. Jesus speaks of it here in the text.
A. God said to Jeremiah, "Therefore pray not for this people
neither lift up cry or prayer for them, neither make
intercession to Me for them, for I will not hear thee."
B. God said to the prophet Hosea, Ephraim is joined to idols, let
him alone.
C. Paul speaks in Romans 1 of a group that God had given up.
D. How terrible when God says let them alone, don't pray for them
any more, I will not hear you, I have given them up.
I. What the unpardonable sin is not. Many times when we hear or read
about some horrible atrocity, such as sexual abuse of a child, or some
cruel form of torture of another human being, and we are prone to say
that is unforgivable, yet the scripture tells us that if we will
confess our sins He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to
cleanse us from all unrighteousness. John declared that the blood of
Jesus Christ God's Son cleanses a man from all sin.
A. It is not adultery.
1. David was guilty of adultery, yet the prophet said to
him upon his confession, "Your sin is forgiven."
2. Jesus said to the woman taken in the act of adultery
whom they desired to stone, "Neither do I condemn thee.
B. It is not murder.
1. David was also a murderer.
2. Paul's hands were red with the blood of the saints. He
voted for Stephens death and helped to accomplish it.
II. Looking at the scriptures.
A. Back in the first book of the Bible we get a hint of the sin.
God said, to Noah, "My Spirit will not always strive with man."
1. One of the most glorious truths is that God's Spirit
does strive with man.
a. He speaks to us of sin, righteousness, and of
judgment to come.
b. The warning is that He will not always strive
with man.
c. There comes a time when the Spirit of God will
cease striving with a person.
d. No more seeking to draw them to the love of
Jesus Christ no more conviction of sin.
2. If God's Spirit is striving with your heart this
morning, be thankful, there could come a time when He
will no longer strive with you.
B. In John 12:39 it speaks concerning the Pharisee's, "Therefore
they could not believe." It was no longer they would not
believe but the could not believe.
1. What had happened that they could not believe?
2. The first time they met Jesus and saw the miracles that
He did, they were faced with the issue of whether or
not He was the promised Messiah.
a. After some questioning and argument they
decided that He was not.
b. Each time they saw another miracle the question
would rise again, "Could He possibly be the
Messiah?" and each time they would answer,
"No."
c. They had said no so many times, that they now
could not say yes. "Therefore they could not
believe."
C. When this man in our text was brought to Jesus possessed with a
devil, blind, and mute, and Jesus healed him so that he could
see and speak. Here was indisputable evidence that He was the
Messiah. The people were amazed and began to say, "Is this not
the Son of David?" which was one of the titles of the Messiah.
1. The Pharisees were forced to acknowledge the evidence,
however, because they could not believe, they had to
attribute the acknowledged miracle to another source
than God, thus they said, He is doing this by the power
of the devil.
2. The actual attributing of the works of the Holy Spirit
to the devil was evidence that they were approaching or
had arrived at that place of no return. The place where
the Spirit would no longer strive with them. The place
where God would say, "Let them alone, pray no more for
them, I have given them up."
D. When Jesus spoke of the Holy Spirit testifying of sin, He said,
"Of sin because they do not believe in Me."
1. The rejection of the Spirit's witness to your heart
that Jesus is the Messiah, He died for your sins. Is
the starting on the path that will lead to the
unpardonable sin.
2. The continued rejection of Jesus Christ as your Savior
will ultimately bring you to the place where God's
Spirit will cease to strive with you.
3. If you die rejecting Jesus Christ, there is no
forgiveness, not in this world or in the world to come.
E. Jesus declared that God did not send Him into the world to
condemn the world but that the world through Him might be
saved, He went on to say, "He that believeth in Me is not
condemned, but he that that believeth not in Me is condemned
already seeing he has not believed in the only begotten of the
Father.
1. This is the condemnation, light has come into the
world, but they will not come to the light.
2. Their reason for not coming to the light is their love
for darkness. Men love darkness rather than light for
their deeds are evil.
3. Don't give me that junk about intellectual difficulties
concerning accepting Jesus. Your problem is your love
of evil. You love darkness rather than light.
F. If you should be among those that stand before the judgment of
the great white throne of God, there will be only one charge
against you. God will not go into the details of all of the
evil things you have done, the lies you have told, the people
you cheated. The only charge will by your refusal to accept
Jesus Christ as your Savior.
III. From a physical standpoint there is the phenomena known as atrophy.
The loss of the use of a muscle or organ of the body through
non-use.
A. If you bind your arm to your side and do not use it, over a
period of time your muscles will atrophy, and you will lose the
use of that arm.
B. They say that if you were in total darkness for a long enough
period of time, where no light could stimulate the nerve cells
in your eye, you would become blind.
C. Refuse to allow a part of your body to function in its God
ordained fashion for a long enough period of time and that
organ of the body will lose its capacity to function.
D. Refuse your heart to yield to Jesus Christ a sufficient number
of times, and you will lose the capacity to do so. You will be
as the Pharisees who could not believe.
IV. From a meta-physical standpoint. Every action or decision makes a
pattern of connections in your brain. An oft repeated action begins to
make such a pattern that the function can be done almost
automatically. Such as knitting. You watch some ladies knit while
carrying on a conversation. You hear it said, "He can do it with his
eyes closed."
A. The first time you heard the gospel of Jesus Christ, and you
felt the tug of the Spirit on your heart, there was a real
battle going on in your mind, for some reason you decided Jesus
wasn't for you, and you said no.
1. The next time you were asked to accept Jesus it was a
little easier to say no, for you had already
established a pattern in your brain.
2. You have said "no" so many times now, that it is almost
an automatic response.
3. When someone asks you to believe in Jesus now, your
whole body rises in rebellion to the thought, you have
become vehemently opposed to the thought.
4. You are close to having committed the unpardonable sin,
you are close to where the Pharisees were when John
declared, "Therefore they could not believe."
B. 9/10ths of the decisions to accept Jesus Christ are made in the
teen years. This is when the heart is still pliable, it has not
yet become hardened by continual refusal.
1. The average length of life is 70 years.
2. If you are 25 years old, and have not accepted Jesus
your chances of being saved are only one in 5,000.
3. If you are 35 years old and not saved, your chances are
only one in 125,000.
4. The odds continue to increase so that if you are 65
years old and have been rejecting Jesus Christ all
these years the chances that you will be saved are so
slim that you defy the odds, and your salvation is
nothing short of a miracle of grace.
5. This is why the prophet Isaiah said, "Seek ye the Lord,
while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near."
6. God's word says, "Today if you will hear His voice,
harden not your heart."
C. Today as you leave this place, you will be on the road to
heaven, or one giant step closer to hell.
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