Q: What is the “sin against the
Holy Spirit,” found in Matthew 12:31-32, that God will not forgive?
In Matthew 12:31-32, Jesus says, ”Therefore
I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven people, but the blasphemy
against the Spirit will not be forgiven.
And whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but
whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age
or in the age to come.” (ESV)
These words of Jesus have been the
source of a great deal of speculation on the part of Bible teachers as well as
a source of fear and guilt for many Christians over the years since they were
spoken. Many people fear that they may
have committed this “unforgivable sin,” and therefore are eternally lost. Other people live their lives in fear of
committing this sin, and Bible teachers throughout the ages have either tried
to explain it away or magnify its importance.
However, a closer look at these words of Jesus, as well as the context
in which they were spoken reveals the true nature of Jesus’ warning.
In the Bible, the words “blaspheme”
and “blasphemy” are a reference to the act of speaking evil about God. This occurs elsewhere in Scripture when
people portray God falsely, either by their words or their actions. In the context of these verses, Jesus is
responding to an accusation from the Pharisees that when He casts out demons,
He is not casting them out by the power of the Holy Spirit, but instead by satanic
power.
It does seem unusual that Jesus does
not address their accusations against Him, but instead responds by criticizing
their treatment of the Holy Spirit. In
the Scriptures, though, the work of Jesus and the Holy Spirit always go
together. When Jesus was Baptized by
John, the Bible tells us that the Holy Spirit descended upon Him and remained
there (Matthew 3). All of the work that
Jesus did in the Gospels was done along with the Holy Spirit. Likewise, Jesus instructs His disciples (John
14-16) that after He ascends into heaven, the Holy Spirit’s work will focus on
reminding people of Jesus’ words and actions during His earthly life.
Since the work of Jesus and the Holy
Spirit are so closely tied together, to blaspheme one is to blaspheme the
other. Especially in this case, when
they accuse Jesus of working miracles by powers that are spiritually evil, to
speak evil about Jesus is also a direct accusation against the Holy Spirit who
works with Him.
While in Matthew, we see the chain of
events during which Jesus said these words, Luke includes these words in a list
of other sayings of Jesus rather than within the story during which they were
originally spoken. The preceding sayings
in Luke 12 deal with unbelief and rejecting Jesus, giving us a clue that this
saying is likely to be dealing with the same theme.
The rest of the Bible continually
speaks of the fact that every sin can be forgiven by those who trust in
Jesus. In fact, the only sin that the
remainder of the New Testament ever mentions as the cause of a person being
condemned to eternal punishment is that of rejecting Jesus death as the payment
for sin.
When we take all of this evidence
into account, it appears that the sin against the Holy Spirit that is
unforgivable is that of being confronted with the truth about Jesus and rejecting
Him in spite of the evidence. This
unforgivable sin is not simple unbelief by one who is uninformed or unfamiliar
with the truth about Jesus. Instead, it
is the willful rejection of Jesus when one has been confronted with the truth
of who He is and what He claims about Himself.
In commenting on these verses, Martin
Luther summarizes their meaning by saying, “This is the great and unforgivable
sin, when someone resists God’s Word and work.
Other sins are easily recognized and have a form, but this one, with
which one dashes against God, is not recognized and is therefore
unforgivable.” “There is no grater sin
than not to believe this article of ‘the forgiveness of sins’ which we pray
daily in the Creed. And this sin is
called the sin against the Holy Spirit.
It strengthens all other sins and makes them forever unforgivable.”
The consistent testimony of the Bible
is that for those who trust in Jesus all sins are forgiven, but for those who
reject Him, no sin is forgiven.
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