"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.
II. 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.
III. 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. Nine tenths 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.
Verse-Reference
Square — [Jhn 1:1 KJV]
Abbreviate Books
Use SBL Abbrev.
