“If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment …How much more severely do you think someone deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified them, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace?” (Hebrews 10:26-29)
The writer of Hebrews just convinced us in Hebrews 9 and 10 that the once-for-all sacrifice of Jesus puts away all the sins of humanity past, present, and future. But is he now telling us that there are types of sins that God will not forgive – deliberate and willful sins, as opposed to those sins committed in ignorance?
Actually, the writer has one specific sin in mind here in verse 26 – and it pertains to those Jews who keep refusing to accept their own Messiah. When Jesus finally came He confronted the Jewish people with a decision (Luke 2:34). They could either accept the claims of Jesus – that He is the divine Messiah (Mark 14:61-62), that He and the Father are One (John 10:30), and that all must honor the Son even as they honor the Father (John 5:18-23). Or, they could declare Jesus to be a false prophet and deceiver and that His miracles were performed by Satan’s power (Matthew 12:24; Mark 9:34).
Think about it. The foremost qualification of the Messiah (which means “Anointed One”) was that He was anointed with the Holy Spirit. “The Spirit of the LORD God is upon Me because He has anointed me to preach good news to the poor,” said the Messiah in Isaiah 61:1. “Behold My Servant, whom I uphold; My chosen One, in whom My soul delights. I have put My Spirit upon Him,” said God the Father about His Son, the Messiah in Isaiah 42:1. “I would not have recognized Him (the Messiah),” said John the Baptist in John 1:33, “But He who sent me to baptize in water, said to me, ‘He upon whom you see the Spirit descending and remaining upon Him, He is the One who baptizes in the Holy Spirit.’” In Acts 10:38 Peter declared that God anointed Jesus with the Holy Spirit and power and He went about doing good and healing all oppressed by the devil. So important was Jesus’ anointing with the Holy Spirit that it became part of His name – Jesus Christ, meaning “Jesus, the Anointed One.”
Therefore, to blaspheme the Holy Spirit by saying that Jesus performed His miracles by the power of Satan equates to a total rejection of Jesus Christ – God’s only sacrifice for sin. It is the same as the “deliberately sinning” that the writer mentions here in Hebrews 10. This sin refers to the repeated rejecting of Jesus Christ – God’s only sacrifice for sin. Rejecting Jesus is the only eternal and unforgiveable sin which anyone can commit.
REFLECTION
- If the Holy Spirit lives in your heart, hasn’t God already cleansed your sins?
- If your heart is concerned about offending God, doesn’t this show you’re born again and that the Holy Spirit is at work in your heart?
- Trust the sacrifice of Jesus to blot out every sin – no matter how bad it may be.
