Trinity Baptist Church

The Book of Mark

The Unforgivable Sin

Mark 3:20-35

 

Our test for this evening is Mark 3:20-35.  We did Part 1 last time which deals with Jesus being accused of being a lunatic and liar and I mentioned to you there is a story within the story so we’ll look at that tonight. 

 

The theme of this particular section is the unforgivable or unpardonable sin. 

 

Notice verse 28

 

By the way, just as an aside, I discovered something about that verse this week I’d never seen or realized before.  That little phrase, “Truly I say to you,” or “Assuredly I say to you” never appears outside the Gospels and it is only heard from Jesus. It’s not in the book of Acts or any of the Epistles and only Jesus says it. 

 

It seems to have been a phrase that He used to identify something that had very significant meaning and was, in fact, a representation of divine truth that needed to be heard.

 

In this case, notice what it is: 

 

Verses 28-29

 

Now it might strike you as strange that there is a sin that is unforgivable. That seems to go contrary to all we teach and preach.  Don't we say that God offers forgiveness to sinners?

Doesn't the gospel promise that the Lord will forgive all our sins? That He'll pass by all our iniquities? Isn't He a pardoning God who overlooks sin? Doesn't He bury it in the depths of the sea, remove it as far as the east is from the west and remember it no more?

 

When we preach the gospel, don't we say that God will forgive all your trespasses, all your sins? Doesn't this sort of contradict that?

 

It may appear to, but in fact, it doesn’t and we’ll learn why tonight.  But just at the outset, what we have here is an extremely serious passage of Scripture and it is important that we correctly interpret and understand it. 

 

There are a lot of things you can be wrong about and they won’t make much difference, but when we move into the arena of unforgivable sin, we want to make sure we’ve got it right. 

 

Now at the very first, we need to make sure we are clear on Who Jesus is.  Remember, the first verse of the book identifies Him as the Son of God.  We’ve been watching the evidence as it piles up that the claim is true. 

 

He’s healed diseases and cast out demons and confronted the devil and forgiven sins and done things that only God can do.  He is God in human flesh. He is the Messiah of Israel. He's the Savior of the world but all that comes from the reality that He is the Lord God. He is God the Son.

 

Now that is critical because believing that and committing your life to Christ is the only way to escape hell and enter heaven.

There's only one way to escape eternal hell and eternal heaven and that is by believing in Jesus Christ. There's no other way to be saved, the Bible makes that absolutely clear.

 

So it's pretty important that you get that nailed down. And yet those closest to Him thought He was crazy.  He was a lunatic in their estimation and their intention was to take control of Him and get Him out of the public view. 

 

Others thought He was a liar who is just deceiving His followers.  If that is true, He was the best there’s every been because we still have Christianity two thousand years later still flourishing and still having people willing to give their lives for it. 

 

So, was He a liar?

 

verse 22

 

Now we've got the big boys coming down from Jerusalem. These are the theological brains of the day and now they're after Jesus. They don't like His message. They don't like what He says. They don't like what He does and they want Him dead.

 

In the meantime the ministry and popularity of Jesus continues to spread.  He’s going everywhere and more and more are coming to Him and something has to be done. 

 

So finally the word gets to Jerusalem and Jerusalem sends the big dogs and they come to the conclusion that Jesus is a liar, and not just a liar, but a liar energized by the devil himself. 

 

Why do they make that accusation?  They have to explain the supernatural things that are going on.  

Simple insanity and human lies don’t explain he things He is able to do. 

 

They knew He was bossing demons around and healing disease and they had to explain the supernatural power.  It was either God or Satan because those are the only two supernatural persons who have that kind of power and they sure aren’t going to admit that He’s of God. 

 

So they accuse Him of being empowered by Beelzebub, which is a name for Satan among the Jews used to designate him as the ruler of demons. 

Most likely it roots back to Baal.  The word “Beelzebul” is used five times in the Old Testament, so it had been around a long time. The Jews were familiar with it and used it.

 

In fact, the ancient Jews intentionally changed Beelzebub to Beelzebul because when you change the “B” to “L”, the meaning of the name goes from being “lord of the high place” to “lord of the manure”.

 

So through the years, this Beelzebul, lord of the dung, or lord of the flies that collect on the dung, had become the name for Satan.

 

So the elite religious leadership of Israel choose to use the vilest possible slander and blasphemy available to them and say the Son of God is nothing but a servant of Beelzebul.

 

Most people wouldn't say that. I don't think most people in Israel would say that. I don’t think most people today would say that.  You find quite a few who acknowledge that Jesus was a good man who takes his place among others who’ve live.  In fact, there are atheists who reject Christianity who don't go that far.

 

But they did!  They concluded He's a very bad man who’s a great liar trying to convince people He’s God when He is actually satanic. 

 

And I love the way Jesus deals with their accusation. 

 

verse 23

 

“He calls them to Himself” and spoke in parables they could understand.  The word means to lay alongside. You've got something you don't understand so you lay something alongside it that you do understand and it makes it clear.  And it’s as if He says, “Guys, come in real close and don’t miss this.”

 

He starts with a logical absurdity and then goes to a logical reality.  Here's

 

 

“How can Satan cast out Satan?”

 

Good teachers ask questions that create a dilemma and reveal the ignorance of the student. 

 

How can Satan cast out Satan? How can he do that? Better said, “Why would he do that?”  That is an absurdity.

He is certainly not by design going around tearing up his own kingdom. He's not going around exposing people with demons who are sitting comfortably in synagogues. Why would he remove the very means he has of destroying lives? 

 

He wants them there resident and at work. Follow the ministry of Jesus and you’ll discover every time Jesus gets around a demon that start screaming and wanting Him to leave them alone.  If He’s of Satan, He’s sure not going to destroy himself and his enterprise.

 

verses 24-26

 

Satan is not going to do that. Satan wants to destroy the work of God, not his own work.” From that logical absurdity Then He moves to

 

 

verse 27

 

That’s obvious, isn’t it? If you want to go in and get the property of someone, you have to overpower the guy. You've got to be stronger than he is to get his property. So Jesus is saying the only logical conclusion here is that I am stronger than Satan and there is only one who is stronger than Satan and who is that? It's God. You can't enter the strong man's house. The strong man is Satan.

 

What about his property? What property does Satan have? Well Satan is a spirit.  He  doesn't wear a red suit and a pitchfork and a pointed tail and horns and all of that. Satan is a spirit. So he doesn't possess anything material.

He doesn't have a warehouse with a lot of Halloween costumes. Satan doesn't possess anything material. His whole world is spiritual.   All his demons are called spirits, unclean, but spirits. So you have a spirit world with nothing material.

 

So when Jesus goes into Satan's domain and plunders his property, what's his property? His property would be the demons and the people that they have commandeered. If you're going to go in and take power over the demons and scatter the demons and deliver the people that they have possessed, then you have to bind the strong man to pull it off, right?

 

And that's exactly what Jesus did. He exposed the demons. He dismissed the demons. And He rescued the people who had been possessed by the demons. He plundered the strong man's house. You have to bind the strong man to do that.  Therefore, whoever Jesus is, He's stronger than Satan.

 

They've set themselves up for this one because they said He did what He did by the power of Satan. The problem with that is that's a logical absurdity for Satan to cast out Satan. And if He's not Satan casting out Satan, then He's greater than Satan and the only One greater than Satan is God.

 

He’s definitely not a lunatic. That doesn't work. And Jesus is not a satanic, deceptive liar who represents hell and wants everybody to think he represents heaven.

 

Who is He? Well you're left with one final option and that is He is God.  He's Lord.

 

And we see that addressed

 

Verses 28-30

 

The eternal sin for them was saying Jesus is demonic. They went to hell for that.

 

Is that always the case?  Every time someone thinks or says Jesus is the devil, they seal their doom and die and go to hell? 

 

Not necessarily.  It is blasphemy, no doubt.  Nut blasphemy is forgivable.  The key here is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. 

 

What is the responsibility of the Holy Spirit?  He is to reveal Christ.  He is the way we come to understand Who Jesus is. 

 

See, it’s possible to blaspheme Jesus and not have full revelation and that is forgivable.  But if you come to the conclusion that Jesus is of the devil and that's your final conclusion with full revelation, if that's your response to the full understanding of the gospel, the full revelation of Christ contained on the pages of Scripture, if that's your final conclusion, you could never be forgiven because you've had full revelation and that is an eternal sin. 

 

To boil it down to a simple statement, the unforgivable sin is refusing to acknowledge and accept Jesus as Savior and Lord. 

 

We looked at in detail in our study of Hebrews. 

Hebrews was written to Jews in the first century who were well aware of the ministry and miracles and teaching and resurrection of Jesus.

But they hadn't come to Christ. They weren't believing. They knew the truth. They knew the gospel. And they were holding back. So in Hebrews 2:3 comes the first of several warnings to them in this book where the author says, “How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation?”

 

If you come all the way to the full understanding of the greatness of this salvation and you walk away, how are you going to escape judgment?

 

You knew about Christ's life and ministry. You knew about it from the eyewitnesses, namely the Apostles who had the signs and wonders and gifts of an Apostle and affirmation of all that they said. If you neglect after that kind of evidence, how you going to escape judgment?”

 

Then in chapter 6 there is another warning to the same people. 

 

Verse 4

 

You are enlightened, you had information, revelation, you tasted the heavenly gift.  Maybe you got healed. Maybe somebody you know got healed. You were there when the miracles were poured out by the power of the Holy Spirit and you tasted the good word of God when Jesus taught it and you tasted the power of the age to come miracles.

 

In other words, you were exposed to all of it and now you’ve chosen to walk away and refuse what Christ did, it is impossible for you to be saved. 

 

Then it is repeated again in chapter 10.

 

verse 26

 

If you just go on living your life of sin after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there's nothing else. There's no other sacrifice. If you reject Christ and His sacrifice, there's nothing waiting for you except judgment. 

 

verse 27, 29

 

If your final decision is with full knowledge to reject Who Christ is and what He has done, hell couldn’t be any hotter for you. 

 

We’re all blasphemers to one degree or another. Hardly anyone accepts Christ at their first opportunity. 

 

The Apostle Paul said to Timothy in 1 Timothy 1:12, “I thank Christ Jesus our Lord who strengthened me because He considered me faithful, putting me into ministry even though I was formerly a .blasphemer.”

 

All kinds of blasphemy can be forgiven except that final blasphemy that says with full revelation, “I reject Christ.”

 

Let me close with Matthew 12:31-32

 

We're all blasphemers of a sort who have been forgiven if we've come to faith in Christ. But we better warn our friends, “Don't turn away!  Get the full revelation and respond in full trust.”

 

Let’s pray.