Satan would like nothing more than to keep people laboring under that misconception. Many people fear they have committed some sin that God cannot or will not forgive, and they feel there is no hope for them, no matter what they do. To reject the only Savior is to be left with no means of salvation to reject the only pardon is, obviously, unpardonable. Forgiveness is found exclusively in Jesus (John 14:6). God has provided for our salvation in His Son (John 3:16). There is no forgiveness for someone who dies without faith in Christ. “Without faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6), and the object of faith is Jesus (Acts 16:31). If a person resists that conviction and remains unrepentant, then he is choosing hell over heaven. The Holy Spirit is at work in the world, convicting the unsaved of sin, righteousness, and judgment (John 16:8). There is no pardon for a person who dies in his rejection of Christ. The only unpardonable sin today is that of continued unbelief. Jesus Christ is not on earth, and no one can personally see Jesus perform a miracle and then attribute that power to Satan instead of the Spirit. The blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, specific as it was to the Pharisees’ situation, cannot be duplicated today. Jesus pronounced that sin to be unforgivable. Standing before the Light of the World, bathed in His glory, they defiantly closed their eyes and became willfully blind. Yet they deliberately chose to deny the truth and slander the Holy Spirit. They saw Jesus’ wonderful works, and they heard His clear presentation of truth. They knew the prophecies were being fulfilled.
The Pharisees knew that Jesus was the Messiah sent by God to save Israel. They were not speaking out of ignorance or misunderstanding. The Jewish leaders of Jesus’ day committed the unpardonable sin by accusing Jesus Christ (in person, on earth) of being demon-possessed. The guilty party, a group of Pharisees, had witnessed irrefutable evidence that Jesus was working miracles in the power of the Holy Spirit, yet they claimed that He was possessed by the prince of demons, Beelzebul (Matthew 12:24 Mark 3:30). In other words, the particular case of blasphemy seen in Matthew 12 and Mark 3 is unique. The unforgivable sin is blasphemy (“defiant irreverence”) of the Holy Spirit in the context of the Spirit’s work in the world through Christ. It is the one iniquity that will never be forgiven (“never” is the meaning of “either in this age or in the age to come” in Matthew 12:32). According to Jesus, the unpardonable or unforgivable sin is unique.
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