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As a Christian there is one question that has returned again and again, and which the answer seems to have continually changed. It is this: What did Jesus mean when he said ‘every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven people, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven’ (Matthew 12:31)?

Context

The biggest problem I’ve found in interpreting Scripture is me. Namely my desire to extract as much possible information from every word. This is a good thing, but can sometimes lead to dead ends – nothing happens as an isolated event, everything happens within a context. No-one just says a sentence without it being part of a conversation, a longer monologue, or at least something bigger. And this sentence of Jesus is no different. Matthew 12 is Jesus’ logical self-defence, explaining to the Pharisees that he’s not a servant of Satan. He says that a ‘kingdom divided against itself is laid waste’ (Matthew 12:25), and then goes on to explain that the fact that he casts out demons is evidence that he is not allied with the demons. He says: ‘Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.’ (Matthew 12:30) Jesus’ underlying message in this passage is that Jesus is on God’s side, and that you are then either on his team, or on Satan’s team.

We then come to verse 31. ‘Therefore I tell you’ – notice the ‘therefore’! Jesus has drawn the conclusion we just saw in verse 30, and as a result is going to go on to say: ‘Therefore I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven people, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven.’

Conclusion

So here we go. ‘…every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven people…’ – Jesus seems to be inferring here that every sin is forgiven, not just those of Christians. In other words, Christians do not receive forgiveness of sin at conversion, because the fate of all people is to have their sin forgiven, presumably ‘in the age to come’ which Jesus refers to in Matthew 12:32. What blasphemy against the Holy Spirit means is allying yourself, not to Jesus, but to Satan. You may not do this actively because I’m sure many atheists today would deny even the existence of Satan, and certainly Jews, Muslims, etc would not claim to…but Jesus tells us that ‘whoever is not with me is against me’.

Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is a complex title, but the concept is not complex. The John 3:16 offer is made: ‘God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.’ Do you believe? Will you ally yourself with Jesus? Will you become part of his body, the church? Will you acknowledge that your hope is in Christ alone? If the answer is yes, then praise God! You have been adopted into God’s family by his grace. But if the answer is no, then fear. By denying ‘the free gift of God [which] is eternal life through Christ Jesus’ (Romans 3:26) you are committing blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.

Pressing forward

I hope that made some sense. The question now, however, ought to be: ‘What’s the application?’ As a Christian reading this post all we’ve achieved is learning what we already knew. But there are some good practical applications in these words.

Firstly, we need to be careful to ensure that we know whose side we are on, because we do not want to be inadvertently committing blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. If you look at your life, and I mean every aspect of it, are you on Jesus’ side? Because quite bluntly, if there is even one aspect of your life that would suggest you are not, I would suggest that Jesus says you’re against him, and are therefore allied with Satan. ‘But that’s not very fair,’ you may say, and to be honest that’s what I’d say too. I feel convicted by this as much as anyone, but I feel the comment is fair, because I’d far rather be safe than sorry. I want to be radical for Jesus in every area, and I want you to be too.

Secondly, we ought to be challenged by Jesus’ words in verse 30: ‘whoever does not gather with me scatters.’ You see, our perception of the world is that there are several camps, and that we sit in one of them. There’s a Christian camp, a Muslim camp, a Scientology camp, etc. But that’s not Jesus’ view. There is one camp, and you’re either in it with Jesus, or out of it. As a result, we need to gather and be united to him. Don’t ally yourself so forcefully with one denomination or movement that divisions appear in the body of Christ – Jesus’ love is more powerful than heresy and false teaching, so embrace your brothers and sisters of other traditions, denominations, and expressions of Christianity.

"Today's Little Lift" from Jim Bullington

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