A couple of times a year someone will ask me about the “unforgivable sin” that Jesus names as blasphemy
of the Holy Spirit. (Mark 3:20-30) Reading these words of Jesus often scares people because they fear they may have
committed it and are the walking condemned.  For this reason we need to understand what this “unforgivable sin”
entails. In Mark 3, blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is what the “teachers of the law” were doing during Jesus’ life time as
they were witnessing the miracles he was performing and claiming that it was from the devil.  Mark 3:30 explicitly
states that they were claiming that Jesus had an evil spirit after seeing him drive out demons. I have a hard time
understanding how someone could commit this sin today.

I found something that illustrates quite well why blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is the unforgivable sin and
why people who fear they have committed this sin have not.  To blaspheme the Holy Spirit you have to continue to
insist that God’s gracious miracles are from Satan.  If a person does this, then there is no other way that God can reach
them.  It is not that they have done something that they can’t then be forgiven for, they have rejected the very power
of God’s love.

Since this is a topic that may come up again in your studies please take note. The following is from an unknown author:

The question then becomes, “Suppose you see the power of God rescuing people from utter hopelessness,
yet you call that action demonic or evil, and therefore reject it; if you do that, then how will you be rescued from your
hopelessness? If you refuse to see the difference between the Spirit of Holiness and the spirit of evil, if you reject the
Holy Spirit who comes to transform you, then how will you be transformed? If you spurn the power of the Spirit to set
you free, then how will you be set free?” Here is the rope to pull you out of the quicksand; the rope holds no grudge if
you reject it, but you cannot be rescued without it. Here are the paramedics to extricate you from the wreck in which
you are trapped; if you shout curses and slap their hands away, you will be unable to escape on your own. They will
not be offended, but will think you must be in shock and will go on trying to rescue you. Here is the Spirit of God,
who comes to redeem people in all their hopelessness; it is not that the Spirit retreats at your rejection and refuses to
have any more to do with you. It nevertheless remains true that your life can only be transformed by the power of the
transforming Spirit. The point of the saying, then, is not to indicate that there is no longer any hope for people who
have failed in this one never-quite-specified way. Rather, it indicates that for us all there has never been any other
hope than the transforming power of the Spirit.
 
used by permission/Matthew Dabbs

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