"Ye shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost is come upon
you."
God is love, and the Holy Spirit is ceaselessly striving to make
this love known in our hearts, work out God's purposes of love in
our lives, and transform and transfigure our character by love.
And so we are solemnly warned against resisting the Spirit, and
almost tearfully and always tenderly exhorted to "quench not the
Spirit," and to "grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby,"
says the Apostle, "ye are sealed unto the day of redemption."
There is one great sin against which Jesus warned the Jews, as a
sin never to be forgiven in this world nor in that which is to
come. That was blasphemy against the Holy Ghost.
That there is such a sin, Jesus teaches in Matthew xii. 31, 32,
Mark iii. 28-30, and Luke xii. 10. And it may be that this is the
sin referred to in Hebrews vi. 4-6; x. 29.
Since many of God's dear children have fallen into dreadful
distress through fear that they had committed this sin, it may be
helpful for us to study carefully as to what constitutes it.
Jesus was casting out devils, and Mark tells us that "the scribes
which came down from Jerusalem said, He hath Beelzebub, and by
the prince of the devils casteth He out devils." To this Jesus
replied with gracious kindness and searching logic: "How can
Satan cast out Satan? And if a kingdom be divided against itself,
that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house be divided against
itself, it cannot stand. And if Satan rise up against himself and
be divided, he cannot stand, but hath an end. No man can enter
into a strong man's house and spoil his goods, except he will
first bind the strong man; and then he will spoil his house."
In this quiet reply we see that Jesus does not rail against them,
nor flatly deny their base assertion that He does His miracles by
the power of the Devil, but shows how logically false must be
their statement. And then, with grave authority, and, I think,
with solemn tenderness in His voice and in His eyes, He adds,
"Verily I say unto you, All sins shall be forgiven unto 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"; or, as the
Revised Version puts it, "is guilty of an eternal sin"; and then
Mark adds, "because they said, He hath an unclean spirit" (Mark
iii. 22-30).
Jesus came into the world to reveal God's truth and love to men,
and to save them, and men are saved by believing in Him. But how
could the men of His day, who saw Him working at the carpenter's
bench, and living the life of an ordinary man of humble toil and
daily temptation and trial, believe His stupendous claim to be
the only-begotten Son of God, the Saviour of the world, and the
final Judge of all men? Any wilful and proud impostor could make
such a claim. But men _could_ not and _ought_ not to believe
such an assertion unless the claim were supported by ungainsayable
evidence. This evidence Jesus began to give, not only in the holy
life which He lived and the pure Gospel He preached, but in the
miracles He wrought, the blind eyes He opened, the sick He healed,
the hungry thousands He fed, the seas He stilled, the dead He
raised to life again, and the devils He cast out of bound and
harassed souls.
The Scribes and Pharisees witnessed these miracles, and were
compelled to admit these signs and wonders. Nicodemus, one of
their number, said to Jesus, "Rabbi, we know that Thou art a
teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that Thou
doest, except God be with him" (John iii. 2). Would they now
admit His claim to be the Son of God, their promised and
long-looked-for Messiah? They were thoughtful men and very religious,
but not spiritual. The Gospel He preached was Spirit and life; it
appealed to their conscience and revealed their sin, and to
acknowledge Him was to admit that they themselves were wrong. It
meant submission to His authority, the surrender of their wills,
and a change of front in their whole inner and outer life. This
meant moral and spiritual revolution in each man's heart and
life, and to this they would not submit. And so to avoid such
plain inconsistency, they must discredit His miracles; and since
they could not deny them, they declared that He wrought them by
the power of the Devil.
Jesus worked these signs and wonders by the power of the Holy
Spirit, that he might win their confidence, and that they might
reasonably believe and be saved. But they refused to believe, and
in their malignant obstinacy heaped scorn upon Him, accusing Him
of being in league with the Devil; and how could they be saved?
This was the sin against the Holy Spirit against which Jesus
warned them. It was not so much one act of sin, as a deep-seated,
stubborn rebellion against God that led them to choose darkness
rather than light, and so to blaspheme against the Spirit of
truth and light. It was sin full and ripe and ready for the
harvest.
Some one has said that "this sin cannot be forgiven, not because
God is unwilling to forgive, but because one who thus sins
against the Holy Spirit has put himself where no power can soften
his heart or change his nature. A man may misuse his eyes and yet
see; but whosoever puts them out can never see again. One may
misdirect his compass, and turn it aside from the North Pole by a
magnet or piece of iron, and it may recover and point right
again; but whosoever destroys the compass itself has lost his
guide at sea."
Many of God's dear children, honest souls, have been persuaded
that they have committed this awful sin. Indeed, I once thought
that I myself had done so, and for twenty-eight days I felt that,
like Jonah, I was "in the belly of hell." But God, in love and
tender mercy, drew me out of the horrible pit of doubt and fear,
and showed me that this is a sin committed only by those who, in
spite of all evidence, harden their hearts in unbelief, and to
shield themselves in their sins deny and blaspheme the Lord.
Dr. Daniel Steele tells of a Jew who was asked, "Is it that you
_cannot_, or that you _will not_ believe?" The Jew passionately
replied, "We _will_ not, we _will_ not believe."
This was wilful refusal and rejection of light, and in that
direction lies hardness of heart beyond recovery, fullness of
sin, and final impenitence, which are unpardonable.
Doubtless many through resistance to the Holy Spirit come to this
awful state of heart; but those troubled, anxious souls who think
they have committed this sin are not usually among the number.
An Army Officer in Canada was in the midst of a glorious revival,
when one night a gentleman arose and with deep emotion urged the
young people present to yield themselves to God, accept Jesus as
their Saviour, and receive the Holy Spirit. He told them that he
had once been a Christian, but that he had not walked in the
light, and, consequently, had sinned against the Holy Spirit, and
could never more be pardoned. Then, with all earnest tenderness,
he exhorted them to be warned by his sad state, and not to harden
their hearts against the gracious influences, and entreated them
to yield to the Saviour. Suddenly the scales of doubt dropped
from his eyes, and he saw that he had not in his inmost heart
rejected Jesus; that he had not committed the unpardonable sin;
that
"The love of God is broader
Than the measure of man's mind:
And the heart of the Eternal
Is most wonderfully kind."
And in an instant his heart was filled with light and love and
peace, and sweet assurance that Christ Jesus was his Saviour,
even his.
In one meeting, I have known three people who thought they had
committed this sin, and were bowed with grief and fear, to come
to the penitent-form and find deliverance.
The poet Cowper was plunged into unutterable gloom by the
conviction that he had committed this awful sin; but God tenderly
brought him into the light and sweet comforts of the Holy Spirit
again, and doubtless it was in the sense of such lovingkindness
that he wrote:
"There is a fountain filled with blood,
Drawn from Emanuel's veins;
And sinners plunged beneath that flood
Lose all their guilty stains."
John Bunyan was also afflicted with horrible fears that he had
committed the unpardonable sin, and in his little book entitled,
"Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners" (a book which I would
earnestly recommend to all soul-winners), he tells how he was
delivered from his doubts and fears and was filled once more with
the joy of the Lord. There are portions of his "Pilgrim's
Progress" which are to be interpreted in the light of this
grievous experience.
Those who think they have committed this sin may generally be
assured that they have not.
1. Their hearts are usually very tender, while this sin must
harden the heart past all feeling.
2. They are full of sorrow and shame for having neglected God's
grace and trifled with the Saviour's dying words, but such sorrow
could not exist in a heart so fully given over to sin that pardon
was impossible.
3. God says, "Whosoever will may come"; and if they find it in
their hearts to come, they will not be cast out, but freely
pardoned and received with loving kindness through the merits of
Jesus' blood. God's promise will not fail, His faithfulness is
established in the heavens. Bless His holy name! Those who have
committed this sin are full of evil, and do not care to come, and
will not, and, therefore, are never pardoned. Their sin is
eternal.
"HAVE YE RECEIVED THE HOLY GHOST SINCE YE BELIEVED?"