Matthew chapter 12, we're going
to start reading at verse 22, and we'll read through verse
37. I'll bring you up to speed on the context as we go through
our sermon. Matthew 12, verse 22. Then was
brought unto him, that is, Jesus, one possessed with a devil, blind
and dumb, he couldn't speak. And Jesus healed him insomuch
that the blind and dumb both spake and saw. And all the people
were amazed and said, Is not this the son of David? And when the Pharisees heard
it, they said, This fellow doth not cast out devils, but by Beelzebub
the prince of the devils. And Jesus knew their thoughts,
and said to them, Every kingdom divided against itself is brought
to desolation. And every city or house divided
against itself shall not stand. And if Satan cast out Satan,
he is divided against himself. How shall then his kingdom stand?
And if I by Beelzebub cast out devils, by whom do your children
cast them out? Therefore they shall be your
judges. But if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then the
kingdom of God is come unto you. Or else, how can one enter into
a strong man's house and spoil his goods, except he first bind
the strong man? And then he will spoil his house. He that is not with me is against
me, and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad. Wherefore
I say unto you, all manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven
unto men, but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven
unto men. And whosoever speaketh a word
against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him. But whosoever
speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him,
neither in this world, neither in the world to come. Either
make the tree good, and his fruit good, or else make the tree corrupt,
and his fruit corrupt. For the tree is known by his
fruit. Oh, generation of vipers, how can you, being evil, speak
good things? For out of the abundance of the
heart the mouth speaketh. A good man out of the good treasure
of the heart bringeth forth good things, and an evil man out of
the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things. But I say unto you
that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give
account thereof in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou
shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.
Now admittedly, there's a number of things in this text of scripture
that are difficult to understand. In fact, I probably wouldn't
have chosen to preach on this subject had it not been here
in the flow of the text. But nevertheless, that's the
process we follow when we go through a book like this, verse
at a time, section at a time. So I want to look today with
you at all of this section as the Lord would allow us to have
time, and it may be that I have to divide it up into two sermons. We'll see how it goes. First
thing I want you to see in this is the context. In this context,
we saw from chapter 11 up to the section we're reading now,
that the Lord Jesus Christ declares Himself to be the Son of God. Secondly, this was in verse 27,
He declares Himself to be the one mediator between God and
men. No man can know the Father but
by the Son. We cannot know God. We can't
come to God. We can't please God. There's
nothing we can know or have fellowship with God apart from Jesus Christ. The totality of what we know
about God, we know of Him in Jesus Christ. And so this is
what the Lord Jesus tells us in verse 27. So He's the Son
of God and He's the one mediator between God and men. We must
come to Him. So He tells us in verse 28, come
to Me. All you who labor and are heavy
laden, I will give you rest. And He shows Himself to be meek
and lowly of heart. And then in the first part of
chapter 12, He shows that He's the Lord of the Sabbath. the
Lord of God's rest. He's the one who finished creation.
He's the one who finished redemption. He's the one who fulfilled all
that was intended by the Sabbath instituted in the law. And He's
the one who gives rest to His people. He explains God's rest
and He gives God's rest. He's the Lord of the Sabbath.
And then we saw last week in verses 14 and following, that
the Lord Jesus is not only the Lord, the Son of God, the one
mediator and the Lord of the Sabbath, but He's the servant
of His Father. He's the servant of Jehovah God.
And so God draws our attention to Him and says, Behold My servant. my servant." Now in these verses
we see the next thing. Here, I think, in the unfolding
of the revelation of Christ and His work, we see our Almighty
Conquering Savior. And that's what I've entitled
this message. Our Almighty Conquering Savior. And you see that in a
number of ways in these verses. First we see in verse 22. Look
at this with me. "...then was brought unto Him,
the Lord Jesus, one possessed with the devil, blind and dumb."
Satan, by his demons, had captivated this man's body and soul. And
this is what the God of this world, Satan, does to men who
are unsaved. He keeps them in bondage. He
holds them in darkness until the glorious light of the gospel
comes and shines in their hearts. And so what happens is that this
man was brought to Jesus. It just said in the verse before
that, in his name shall the Gentiles trust. And we saw in the verses
that preceded this how as a servant of the Lord, fulfilling God's
will to save his people, he healed all that came to him. So by his
miracles and by his words, his teaching and his preaching, he
was showing his authority from God, doing the will of God. But
now when this man is brought to him, he's possessed with the
devil, he can't see, he can't speak. And He healed him, not
just gradually, but instantaneously He healed this man. He not only
healed him, but He cast out the demon so that he could speak
again and so that he could see. And all the people, it says in
verse 23, were amazed at this. And they couldn't help it. So
they said, is not this the Son of David? Now to you and me,
when we see the Son of David, we don't think much about that
title. But to the people then, Son of David was synonymous with
the Christ. And they asked the question almost
in a way that answered it. Is not this the son of David?
As if the answer must be drawn from it. Obviously. See what
he's doing. He cast the devil out of this
man and he healed him. But the people wondered, what
kind of a son of David was he? Was he a political son of David?
Was he going to come now and set up his kingdom in the nation
of Israel and overthrow the Roman rule and establish Jerusalem
again as a place where the Jews worship and all these things?
Is that the kind of son of David he was going to be, the Christ?
Is that what Christ would do? And what they're seeing unfolding
here in the New Testament through the Gospels is that Christ came
to save his people from something that is at the root of their
problem. Not just their physical bodies,
and not even just the temporary possession of their souls by
Satan, but the permanent uprooting of sin, which was the problem
of all their ills. And so the Lord Jesus came to
do this. They didn't understand it. They
asked the question. It draws an immediate response
from the Pharisees. Verse 24, when the Pharisees
heard it, they immediately come to their own defense. They feel
that their empire is about to crumble. They couldn't deny what
Jesus had done. This man, who couldn't see, was
unable to speak. was clearly possessed with the
devil, and I don't know how they would know that, but Jesus immediately
heals him and casts the devil out. And the Pharisees are scrambling.
They're looking for a way to defend themselves, and they can
find nothing. And so they come up with this
pathetic attack on the Lord Jesus Christ. I have no other way to
describe it but pathetic, because it's an attempt on their part
to grasp in a way to bring Christ down before the people. In order
to discredit Him. In order to assault what He's
doing and what He's saying. To try to make Him look like
what He is not. And that's their ploy. Now, who
are these men, these scribes and the Pharisees? Well, they're
the ones who had arrogated themselves to the position of authority
in the things of God. They claimed to be able to understand
spiritual things far better than the people. Ordinary people?
They have to come to the scribes and the Pharisees for the interpretation
of God's Word. But remember what it says throughout
Scripture. For example, in 1 Peter 5.5,
he says, Remember what Jesus said in verse 25 and 26 of Matthew
11. He says, Those who in their own
eyes are wise and prudent, And you've revealed them to babes,
those who in their own eyes are nothing, are unprofitable in
the kingdom of God, can bring nothing that would do God any
good, have no spiritual value, but need only. And they come
to God in Christ. He says, humble yourselves. And
these Pharisees and these scribes had done the opposite. They had
put themselves on the podium. They had made themselves the
oracle to which men must come to find the answers. But pride
goeth before a fall." And that's what we're going to see here.
They were the men who in their hearts were the servants of Satan. In fact, Jesus in John chapter
8, He tells them, you are of your father the devil. And the works of your father
you do. And so they were the sons of the wicked one. They were the children of evil. They were the sons of the devil.
And so it's no wonder that they attacked Jesus, is it? It's no
wonder that they're trying to grasp back for the glory that
they were feeling they were losing by what he was doing. And so
they come and they attack Him in this way. And you can see
a number of things by this. First of all, you see the desperation
that they have. Satan's kingdom is crumbling. The kingdom of Christ is coming. It's being established. It's
taking over in the hearts of men. Jesus says in Matthew 16,
16-18, He says, I will build my church, and the
gates of hell shall not prevail against it." There's no possibility
that success is coming. And these men know that, and
yet they do the opposite of what they do. Instead of humbling
themselves, instead of thinking, what are we doing? Fighting against
God? Which is about what they're about
to do. They harden themselves in their attempt, in their purpose,
to overthrow Christ and His people. And so they throw out this ridiculous
statement here. It says here in verse 24, "...when
the Pharisees heard what Jesus had done, they claimed this,
This fellow doth not cast out devils, but by Beelzebub, the
prince of the devils." Now, this is an absurd claim. This is absolutely
stupid. There's no better way to describe
it than to use a term that we don't want to call people, but
we have to call stupid what these men did here. Because Jesus shows
this through His His answer to them reveals their ludicrousness,
the ridiculousness of what they said. But they didn't say it
out loud, yet Jesus knew their thoughts. Look in verse 25, "...and
Jesus knew their thoughts." It's just a casual throwing it in
there that the Lord Jesus Christ knows their thoughts. He's the
one who searches the hearts and tries the reins. He knows the
inmost thoughts of men. And He searched their thoughts.
And think about this. Would you go before the Lord
Jesus Christ in an argument? especially a public argument,
when your own face is at stake, your own reputation and all you
stand for is at stake, would you dare to do that? Remember,
these men are desperate. They have thrown rationality
to the wind. And so they make this bold and
audacious, absurd claim. They say, He cast out devils
because He works for the prince of the devils. Beelzebub. And
so Jesus answered. Listen to His answer. Such wisdom. He says, "...Every kingdom divided
against itself is brought to desolation, and every city or
house divided against itself shall not stand. And if Satan
cast out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then shall
his kingdom stand?" That's the first thing Jesus says. He refutes
their claim. Now, listen carefully to what
he said. He's saying, do you hear what
you're saying? What you claim is that Satan
sends his demons, his servants, his ministers into the hearts
of men to overthrow their hearts, to take control of them. And
then you're saying that I am serving Satan, I come along also
as his minister, his servant, and I undo what he just did.
Does that make any sense at all? That is crazy. That's ridiculous
to make that claim. And so you can see the futility
of this feeble accusation that they bring against him. It's
pathetic, isn't it? What you're saying here is that
Satan, who is evilly wise, doesn't have the reason to think this
through, that he hires one person to come along and undo what the
other one has done already. He's at cross purposes in His
kingdom. His kingdom cannot stand. So that's the first thing the
Lord Jesus says. Now what you see in this, and
you're going to see this over and over in this section of scripture,
is that... When Satan's servants, these
Pharisees and these scribes, feel their grasp crumbling away
from them and they attack, you see the pathetic position that
Satan himself is in. Because he is being bound by
the Lord Jesus Christ. And yet he's squirming, he's
trying to get out from under this. He's grasping for everything
he can. And so he throws this out. But
know this, this is a fundamental truth. that every time that the
wicked one or his servants attack the Lord Jesus Christ, he always
is made to appear more glorious. And that's what you see here.
His wisdom comes out in such a way that we stand back almost
in awe and we think, wow how did he answer so cleverly, so
wisely. I myself sometimes have someone
say something to me and I think later, man I wish I would have
thought of this and that to say. Have you ever done that? I do
it all the time. But the Lord never hesitated. He knew their
thoughts. He knew their wicked intentions. And He had something
that they didn't have besides His wisdom. He had the truth.
And there's nothing you can do to assault the truth. There's
nothing you can do. Even men know that. Facts are
stubborn things. You've probably heard that quotation.
You can't get rid of them. And the Lord Jesus Christ came
with the truth. He had the truth. All he had
to do is lay the facts on the table. The evidences speak for
themselves. He was sent of God, and it was
clear that this was the case. And so he throws their accusation
to the ground by showing how ridiculous it was that Satan
would fight against his own kingdom. And then, in verse 27, he does
something else. He reveals not only how ridiculous
their claim is, but He shows their hypocrisy and their inconsistency. Because in their contradiction
against Him, they're actually condemning themselves. Listen
to what He says here in verse 27. And if I, by Beelzebub, cast
out devils, by whom do your children cast them out? Therefore they
shall be your judges." Now here the word children, it means that
the Pharisees and the scribes had disciples. And they would
like people to call them rabbi and father. Remember Jesus said,
don't call no man father on earth, don't be called rabbi. But that's
what they like to do, because they considered those that they
taught to be their sons and their children in their teachings.
Now the Lord Jesus calls them, He puts this question to them
that forces them into a corner. It shuts them up in two ways. Listen to what he says again.
He says, "...if I, by Beelzebub, cast out devils, by whom do your
children cast them out?" The Pharisees claimed to have the
ability to cast out Satan or his demons. Whether they could
or they couldn't isn't the point. But the Lord attacks them on
their own principles. Let's take your claim. Your claim
that you and your disciples can cast out devils. They go about
doing their work. They take credit for casting
out Satan. You, of course, bask in their
reflected glory and you say, yes, see they're my sons, my
children. They're just doing what I've
taught them to do. And so the Lord asks this question of them.
He says, If I, if what you claim is true about me, if I cast out
Satan by Satan, if I cast out his demons by the prince of demons,
Satan himself, then let me ask you this question. By whom do
your children cast them out? Because you see, if you draw
the conclusion that the Lord Jesus is casting out demons only
because he works for the prince of the demons, Satan himself,
then you have to also draw the conclusion that those that you
teach also cast out demons by the prince of devils. Now, let
your sons, your disciples, be your judges. What would they
say in response to that? Would they say, yes, we are working
for Satan. We are casting out demons by
Satan. If you do, if you take that path, then what you're saying
is you're exposing yourself as a total fraud. A total enemy
of all that is good and an enemy of God. On the other hand, If
you say, well the Lord Jesus Christ must cast out Satan by
the Spirit of God, then what does that say? Your sons, those
that you've taught and led in your path, they have to admit
that Christ is who he says he is. He's sent of God and he does
these works by the Spirit of God. So he shut them up. There
was no wiggle room here. He put them into the corner.
Which way are you going to take it? You can't have it both ways.
And the fact of the matter is, is they condemned themselves.
Because they took this claim and they were making this accusation
after they made that claim that they could cast out Satan and
their disciples could. And yet the Lord Jesus Christ
says, well then, you've just condemned yourselves as ministers
of Satan. You see, our Lord Jesus Christ,
He didn't leave them unexposed. He exposed them for what they
were. They were frauds. They were the
servants and the children of the wicked one, and He exposed
them as such. And He made Himself appear more
glorious because He didn't waver. He simply spoke the truth of
God, and He spoke it in wisdom. Because the other thing you see
here is that in their attempt to discredit, this pathetic attempt
to discredit and contradict Christ, what they did was, it's like
Satan does, he can't win so he just throws dust in the air,
as it were, of deception and lies. Remember in the garden
when the devil came in the form of a serpent to Eve and he says, Yea, hath God said you shall
not eat of every tree of the garden?" And she goes on and
says, the Lord said this and that, and He says, God knows
that in the day you eat thereof your eyes will be opened. You
shall not surely die. He directly contradicted God's
Word. At first it was a subtle thing,
and then He directly attacked the Word of God, the truth of
God. And that's what they're doing here. They directly assault
the very purpose and reason for Jesus' coming. And by doing that,
they throw this whole cloud of this cloak of obscurity over
what he's doing in order to confuse the people. That's what deception
does. It throws us into a state of confusion. Well, I don't know
what's true. I don't know what's going on. You can't see. And
then the Word of God strikes through the darkness and clarifies
things. The Lord Jesus Christ actually
did. Look at verse 28. He says, He
raises it as a question. But it's not a question of if
whether He actually did do this. It's a question of if and this
is the fact. He says, "...but if I cast out
devils by the Spirit of God..." then the Kingdom of God is coming
to you. This is what they didn't want men to see. The cloud of
confusion is there, and the Lord Jesus Christ strikes through
that cloud of confusion and deception on their part, false accusations
and feeble attempts to overthrow the King of Glory. And he says,
and this is the conclusion of his question to them, "...if
I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then know this, the kingdom
of God is come unto you." The Lord Jesus Christ's kingdom.
He's the king. And what is this kingdom? It's
the establishing of Christ's rule in the hearts of men. on
the basis of His victorious accomplishments at the cross. That's the Kingdom
of God. It's God ruling in our hearts
by faith, pointing us to Christ, because of what Christ has done
at the cross. And so he makes this clarifying
statement. They were trying to obscure it.
He clears the cloud of fog and filth away. And he says, Ah,
the kingdom of God is coming to you because I do this by the
Spirit of God. And then verse 29 he says, Or else, because he's going to
go on and amplify his coming into the world, he says, Or else,
how can one enter into a strong man's house and spoil his goods,
except he first bind the strong man, and then he will spoil his
house? What is this saying here? It's saying that at this time,
when the Lord Jesus Christ was coming and overthrowing Satan
out of men's hearts, delivering them from His rule and from the
effects of His rule in their lives, that He was actually first
binding this strong man. And this is what's spoken of
in Revelation 20. Satan would be bound. When Christ came into
the world, and He announced the presence of the Kingdom of God,
and He fulfilled the coming of that Kingdom when He went to
the cross and overcame Satan and death and put away our sins. When He did that, He actually
bound Satan. And so you see this in Luke chapter
11. He says, I saw Satan as lightning
fall from heaven. This is the Lord Jesus Christ
casting Satan out of heaven. The accuser of the brethren is
cast out. And so you see this in this illustration
he gives. He says, you don't go into a
man's house and rob him of his goods willingly on his part. He's not going to stand by and
take that. What do you do? You first break in. You tie him
up. And then you go, okay, now what do I want? And then you
take it. You spoil him after you tie him up. Otherwise, you
can't take anything from Him. So the Lord Jesus is saying,
first I bind the strong man, then I take his goods. And what
is He talking about here? He's talking again about the
rule of His kingdom in the hearts of men. And think about this
now. I want you to consider this.
When we read this passage of Scripture, And you see the absolute
power of the Lord Jesus Christ over Satan. What does that do
to you? What does it cause you to think?
I don't know about you, but it causes me to think, there's yet
hope for me. Because if the Lord Jesus Christ
can overthrow the wicked one, and uproot his kingdom in the
hearts of men, then he can overthrow His rule in my heart. He can
take out my root problem. He can cleanse me from the guilt
of my sin. He can free me from the condemnation
of it, and deliver me from its power, and bring me to glory
and save me from its presence. He can deliver me and save me
from my sin. This is what is intended by these
scriptures, is to cause our hearts to run out to Him. The Lord Jesus
Christ, He is the Son of God. He's the one mediator, the Lord
of the Sabbath, the Lord's servant. And you see Him here as the one
who is stronger than this strong man, binding Him and delivering
men's souls. from the consequences of sin. It was by one man that sin entered
into the world, and yet we see here by the one man, the Lord
Jesus Christ, that sin is uprooted and removed, and Satan is bound
and overthrown. And I've written several things
in the bulletin, if you were to look at this later. I'll just
go through them quickly here, and giving you several references.
But Christ overcame Satan in several ways, and I've given
nine here. Perhaps there's more. Perhaps I should have condensed
it a little bit here. But I think about this. In his
incarnation, when the Lord Jesus came into the world, what happened? Herod and his men wanted to kill
him. They sought him out to kill him.
And yet he escaped. He overcame his intentions in
his incarnation. When he came into the world and
took on a body, that body by which he would fulfill the will
of God. And he says, a body thou hast prepared me. And he comes
into the world, and by his coming into the world, Satan couldn't
fulfill his wicked desires in destroying the Christ. The one
who God promised in Genesis 3.15 would bruise the head of the
serpent. And he knew that, and he wanted to kill him, but he
couldn't. And even in his temptations. Remember everything that Satan
brought against him. Turn these stones to bread. The
Lord Jesus Christ answers. He says, man shall not live by
bread alone. He quotes scripture, but he identifies
himself with his people. He doesn't say, look, I don't
need you to tell me what to do. I'm the son of God and I'll prove
it. And he turned some stones to
bread. No, he says, man shall not live by bread alone. He subjected
himself to the law of God. And so he relied on God's word.
And as man, as the second Adam, he fulfilled what was required
to deliver us from Satan's kingdom. He stood for us, and he stood
in opposition to our enemy, and he overthrew him in his temptations.
Then in his ministry, by his miracles, he set men free in
body and soul. And we just read about that in
this case of the dumb man. He overthrew the wicked one by
his truth, and he frees us from the bondage of the law and our
own sin by the same truth, by his cross. And this is the central
point of Scripture. It was in the cross the Lord
Jesus Christ overthrew Satan, and in our conversion. It says
in Acts 5.31, it says, Him, the Lord Jesus Christ, God has exalted
to His right hand for to give repentance and remission of sins
to Israel, to His people. And so in all these ways you
see Satan overcome. Look at one scripture, I'll just
turn with you to one. Look at 1 Peter chapter 5. How
do we overcome Satan? Well, we get in the closet and
we pull out our guns and we start shooting and we find a way to
subdue our sin. We just do everything we can,
right? No. He says here in 1 Peter chapter
5, casting, verse 5, verse 7. Chapter 5, verse 7, "...casting
all your cares upon him, for he careth for you." Be sober!
Be vigilant! "...because your adversary the
devil, as a roaring lion, walks about seeking whom he may devour,
whom resist steadfast in the faith." How do we overcome Satan? You can't. But Christ has. And faith looks to Christ and
says, He has answered God for me. And in His answer to God,
in His answer to God, He's satisfied God's law. He's taken away all
the accusations Satan might bring. Because He's fulfilled the law,
taken away our sins, and now He's toothless. There's nothing
to condemn us. Who can condemn those for whom
Christ died, and is risen again, and intercedes? None can. So
we resist Him steadfast in the faith. And it says the same thing
in Revelation 12 verse 11. But you can look at that later
if you want to follow up these references. In our walk of faith,
Christ overcomes Satan. He overcomes him in gathering
his people from out of the world. He overcomes him in our preservation. Remember what it says in Romans
6.14, Sin shall not have dominion over you. Why? Because you're
not under the law, you're under grace. What does that mean? It means that everything that
is required for your deliverance has been answered by the Lord
Jesus Christ. He's done what was necessary
to save you from your sins. It's all God's work. It all hangs
on Him. And God tells us to look to Him.
And so, in verse 17 of Romans 6, he says, But God be thanked
that you were the servants of sin, but you have obeyed from
the heart in believing Him and believing Christ. So you see
that. And then, of course, in the final
judgment, God is going to cast, the Lord Jesus Christ is going
to cast Satan into the lake of fire. And that's where he will
be forever and ever with his servants. But back to Matthew
chapter 12. Let's go on there. The Lord Jesus
Christ bound Satan at the cross. He was being bound here because
the Lord Jesus Christ on the basis of what he would accomplish,
speaks with the authority of our mediator, and he commands
Satan, and he frees men from his bondage. And this is the
truth of the gospel, the glorious truth that Christ has overcome
our great enemy. And then he says in verse 30,
He that is not with me is against me. and he that gathereth not
with me scattereth abroad." There's no neutral ground in the world. You know, there are only two
kingdoms. Well, we think, no, there's the
kingdom in China, the one in Russia, and the United States,
and Israel, and all these different places. And then there's also
presidents, and there's senators, and there's princes, and all
these different things. No, there's only two kingdoms.
God only recognizes two kingdoms. There's only two kinds of people.
There's only two cultures. There's only two doctrines. These two things are the Kingdom
of God and His Christ, and the Kingdom of Satan. It's the servants
of God, the sons of God, believers, the elect of God, those redeemed
by the Lamb, those regenerated by His blood, by His Spirit,
because of His blood. Or, there are those who are the
servants of Satan. There's only two kingdoms. Everyone
can be lumped into these two categories. And Jesus says, if
you don't gather with me, you're scattering abroad. And the Pharisees
were doing what? They were trying to scatter abroad. And He says to these people hearing
Him, you can't have it both ways. You can't have some of what the
Pharisees say and some of what I say. It's either one or the
other. It's either all Christ or it's everything else. You're
either saved by Christ alone, or you're saved by someone else. And you're not saved by anyone
but Him, because it says in Acts 4.12, there is salvation in no
other than the Lord Jesus Christ. God hasn't given any other name
under heaven whereby we must be saved but His. And so you
cannot have it both ways. You're either in His kingdom
or not. In verse 31, Wherefore, the Lord says, I say unto you,
all manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men. But
blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men.
And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of Man, it shall
be forgiven him. But whosoever speaketh against
the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this
world, neither in the world to come. Now, this is a troubling
text of scripture, is it not? Jesus says here, everything will
be forgiven. And He doesn't mean that everybody
in the world will have all their sins forgiven except this one.
That's not what He means. He means that in the things that
God forgives, Everything will be forgiven, the sons of men.
All kinds of sins, even speaking against the Son of Man, the Lord
Jesus Christ. But, he says, there is one sin
that is not forgivable, that cannot be forgiven. There's no
such thing as a purgatory, but if there was some thought that
in the future world there would be forgiveness, it's not even
going to be forgiven in that world to come. this sin? And immediately what does it
do? It makes us suddenly pay attention, doesn't it? What is
this sin? Have I committed this sin? Am
I liable to commit this sin? Maybe I know someone who's committed
this sin. What am I to do? How can I avoid committing this
sin? All these questions begin to
bubble up, don't they? I hope they do, because that's
why God gives warnings in Scripture. Now, He speaks these words in
the context of what the Pharisees had just said. And when you look
at this, what does it mean to blaspheme against the Holy Ghost,
the Holy Spirit of God? It's a lot easier I think, to
say, as I read Don Fortner's commentary on this, he says it's
actually easier to say what it isn't than it is to say what
it is. So I considered a number of things
that it might be. So, for example, when I looked
at scripture, I wondered, is blasphemy against the Holy Ghost,
is that... Something that we do if we're
maybe continuing in sin a long time. Maybe because we continue
in sin. Is that blasphemy against the
Holy Spirit? Because I've gone on and I've heard the gospel
and I've just, I've not believed it all my life. Is that blasphemy
against the Holy Spirit? Well, for every one of these
things I found a counterexample that says, no, that's not it.
So for example, let's take that one. Someone, let's say someone
is given the truth of God, and yet they serve idols. Let's say
someone not only serves idols, but they're the worst idolater
you've ever known. They set up idols in the place
of God's worship. And they even pass their own
children through the fire. In service, in sacrifice to these
idols. And they teach, as the king,
they teach people to serve idols. Would that man have committed
this sin? Well, this man is King Manasseh. In 2 Chronicles chapter
33, if you read it, you see he did all these things. He was
the worst king and he ruled over Judah and Jerusalem for 55 years. A horrible man. And God says
he's a horrible man in scripture. And yet, and yet, the Lord brings
him into affliction at the hands of his enemies. And he draws,
he humbles this man. And he draws out of this man,
crying and pleading to God. And God saves him. And he comes
back and he destroys all the idols he set up. And he undoes
what he had done. God saved this man and he was
hardened in his sin and yet God saved him. So it's not that.
It's not that. Or what about if a man commits
adultery and then murders the husband of this woman with which
he commits adultery and then covers it up and acts hypocritically
before the whole kingdom? That's David. King David. Is
that that sin of blasphemy? No, it's not. Or how about Peter? Remember? Jesus says, in fact,
turn to Luke chapter 22. I want you to see, this is important
to see this. Luke chapter 22. I don't say all these things.
I'm not saying all these things to excuse these wrongs. It doesn't
mean, oh great, now I can do everything that King Manasseh
and David and Peter and Paul and all these guys did together
and everything will be alright with me. No. No, no. We never take God's Word. If
God, in His mercy, deals with us in grace, it never causes
us to think, oh good, now I'm free from all these shackles
that kept me from doing what I wanted to do. Now I can sin
without restraint. No, that's not the response of
the heart. Remember what Paul said in Romans 7? The good that
I would, I do not. He wasn't saying, golly, there's
a lot of bad I want to do and I'm finally getting to do it.
No, he says, the good that I would, I do not. And when I would do
good, evil is present with me. There's this struggle. But in
Luke chapter 22, you see Peter's case. Look at verse 31. I love this passage of scripture.
The Lord said in verse 31 of Luke 22, "...Simon, behold, Satan
has desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat." How
did Jesus know that Satan wanted Him? Well, because He's the King. You've got to go to the King
to get permission for everything. Satan had gone into heaven and
asked permission to sift Peter like wheat. But the Lord had
anticipated his attack, and he had already entered his counter-plea.
Verse 32, "...but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail
not." I prayed for your faith. But yet you know what happened.
And Jesus says here, he anticipates it. But when thou art converted,
strengthen thy brethren. He knew that Peter was going
to deny him. In fact, it was according to
his word. Three times you're going to deny
me before the cock crows. By morning. Peter says, it's
not going to happen. I will not do that. There's no
possibility. Everyone else can do this, but
not me. And Peter did exactly what Jesus said. And yet he did
not commit the sin of blasphemy against the Lord. What did he
do when he denied Him? Well, he said three times, I do not
know Him. And the last time he cursed and
swore, No, I don't know Him. He used the worst language he
could think of in order to convince those, this little maid. You
know, he's this great, big, strong leader of a man, becomes weak
and helpless before this maid because it was God's will that
he would do so. But look at also, consider Paul. Remember what Paul was? He persecuted
the people of God. He says, look at 1 Timothy. I
want you to see this. 1 Timothy. What did Paul say
about himself? These are the things that are
not blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. He says, verse 12 of
1 Timothy chapter 1. I thank Christ Jesus our Lord,
who hath enabled me, for that he counted me faithful, putting
me into the ministry, who was before, he's speaking of himself,
before I was a blasphemer. and a persecutor, and injurious. I didn't just think about doing
wrong, I actually did wrong against people. But I obtained mercy
because I did it ignorantly in unbelief." And sometimes you
look at that and you think, well, Paul, he was excused for it because
he just didn't know what he was doing. He was out of his mind.
No, he's saying that ignorance was a fault. of His. It wasn't an excuse for sin. It was sin. Ignorance is sin. He says in Ephesians chapter
4 that we were like, don't be like the Gentiles who are darkened
in their minds and ignorant. They serve, we'll read that in
a minute, but this notion of being ignorant didn't give Paul
an excuse to do this. It just means that he was in
unbelief. He didn't understand He didn't
know the Lord Jesus Christ. God hadn't shown grace on him
and revealed to him yet his Son. And so he acted this way. But
look at the next verse. And the grace of our Lord was
exceeding abundant With what? With faith and love
which is in Christ Jesus. What did God's grace do for Paul
while he was in this condition of blaspheming? God's grace came
and gave him faith in Christ. and caused him to love Him, and
to love His people. That was the operation of the
Spirit of God in Paul while he was a blasphemer. Speaking against
Christ, and hailing men and women, and throwing them into prison,
and consenting to Stephen's stoning, all these things that Paul did.
You would think, if anyone, but notice what Paul was. He was
the apostle to the Gentiles. Look at Ephesians chapter 4.
He says in Ephesians 4 verse 17, "...this I say therefore
and testify in the Lord, that you henceforth walk not as other
Gentiles walk in the vanity of their mind, having the understanding
darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance
that is in them because of the blindness of their heart." Is
the Lord saying here, well, see, there's nothing wrong with this.
They just happen to be in the dark. I mean, they're totally
innocent. They're just in the dark. We've got to overlook that.
No, He's blaming them for this. Because this blindness of heart
is the result of God's judicial judgment because of our sin.
And God Himself has to remove that blindness. Look at verse
31, the same chapter. Paul says, "...let all bitterness
and wrath and anger and clamor and evil speaking," which is
the same word as blasphemy, "...be put away from you with all malice."
Malice means evil intent, an intent to do harm. And be ye
kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as
God, for Christ's sake, hath forgiven you." And then in verse
8 of the next chapter, see what he says there? He says, you were
sometimes darkness, but now are you light in the Lord. So we
were in the dark, our hearts were hardened, We were in the
ignorance of our mind because of the foolishness of our hearts,
and the wickedness, just like Paul, and God had mercy on us,
and now you're light in the Lord. So these things are not the blasphemy
against the Spirit of God. All manner of sin and blasphemy,
Jesus says, is going to be forgiven. Look at Mark chapter 3. This
is where I think it's most clearly revealed what this sin is. Mark
chapter 3. He says in Mark 3, verse 28, Verily, the same account is recorded
by Mark. He says, "...Verily I say unto
you, all sins shall be forgiven to the sons of men, and blasphemies
wherewithsoever they shall blaspheme. But he that shall blaspheme against
the Holy Ghost hath never forgiven us, but is in danger of eternal
damnation, because they said he hath an unclean spirit." Do
you see that? That's the clearest explanation
of what it means. These men, these scribes and
these Pharisees said, they said what? He cast out Satan by Beelzebub,
the prince of the devils. They claimed that the work Jesus
did, He did as a servant of Satan. But Jesus said, I cast out Satan
by the Holy Spirit. And they said, no, no, he does
it by Satan, by the wicked one, the evil spirit. In other words,
they equated the work of the spirit of God with the work of
the devil. They said the spirit of God is
doing the work of the devil at the command of Christ. Christ
himself is his servant, controlled by the wicked one. That's blasphemy
against the Spirit of God. It's to claim that the work of
the Spirit of God in saving men's souls and freeing them from the
bondage of sin and Satan is the work of Satan himself. And they
did this, they did this not only with a hardened heart, but they
did it in full light and full evidence of the truth. Their
claim that Jesus cast out Satan by the prince of the devils,
they knew that was a bogus claim. They knew it was stupid and ridiculous
and absurd. They knew they were just trying
to throw dust in the air to cloud the issue that Christ had come
and his kingdom was being set up in the hearts of men. That
he was the king of glory. They knew this. They knew he
was the Christ. The people had said, is not this
a son of David? They knew this. They knew it
better than the people. These ordinary people understood
that he was the Christ, and yet the Pharisees who claimed to
have a corner on the spiritual market, they were blind, I can't
see, I don't know what's happening, he must be a servant of Satan.
And they accused him of these things. They were deliberately,
willfully, knowingly, In malice, with thoughts of doing bodily
harm and even death, destroying the Lord Jesus Christ, they were
doing all these things because they were afraid of losing their
own glory. Everything to them was unimportant
except their own status amongst the people. Just like Satan,
the only thing he cares about is his own glory. I will be like
the Most High. I will ascend into the... I will
make my place where God is. That's what Satan said in his
heart and he was cast down. And so these men are the same
thing. And they claimed that the work of the Spirit of God
was the work of Satan himself. That's how evil this is. Now, this particular crime, this
sin, in many ways was especially present in that time. It doesn't
mean that it's not present now. It doesn't mean it's not a warning
for us. But I think it's especially present in that day and age.
Because over the course of time... The whole nation of Israel had
been given such light and revelation, and these men epitomized the
darkest part of that idolatry and hardness of heart." And when
the Lord Jesus came onto the scene, as Isaiah prophesied that
God would... He says... How does it say it? I'm trying to remember exactly
how the words go. Let me just turn to a scripture and see if
I can refresh my memory. He says, I'll probably not be able to
put my finger on it. But remember, Isaiah said, he said, I'm sorry. He has blinded their eyes. He
has hardened their heart, that they should not see with their
eyes, nor understand with their heart, and be converted, and
I should heal them." That's what Isaiah said when he saw Christ
in His glory. It was God's will that these
men be left to their own destruction and actually fall into the hardness
of this sin to so oppose Christ. to claim that He was led and
controlled and the Spirit of God Himself were under the control
of Satan. In other words, as Satan's servants,
they were claiming, our Master is the Lord, not Christ, not
God. And He rules in the hearts of
men. So the Spirit of God is the one
who alone can save. One of the big lessons you get
out of this section of Scripture in Matthew 12 is that men are
only delivered from sin and from Satan at the command of Christ
by the Spirit of God. Do you see that in these verses
that we've gone through? Do you see that there's only
one way that you and I can be delivered from our sin? Is that
if the Lord Jesus Christ comes to us and commands us commands
us to be saved by His Spirit, He delivers us from the bondage
of sin and from Satan. That's the big truth that comes
out of this. And so you see here, in Matthew
chapter 12, the conquering of our Almighty Savior over His
enemy, Satan, Satan's followers and his servants, his children,
And He exposes them, He shows them for what they are, and also
in the process, He delivers His people and He gives this huge
promise that all sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven, the sons of
men. What a testimony to the grace of God. What a testimony
to Christ's power, His authority, His wisdom, His glory, His truth. All these things are seen here.
And so you see in the latter part here, Jesus tells them in
verse 33, "...either make the tree good, and his fruit good,
or make the tree corrupt, and his fruit corrupt, for the tree
is known by his fruit." He says, "...a good man out of the good
treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things." You've seen
what I've done. You've seen what I've said. What
conclusion should you draw? That it came out of the good
treasure of my heart. But he says, an evil man, out
of the evil treasure of his heart, bringeth forth evil things. So
he calls them a generation of vipers. He says, how, verse 34,
O generation of vipers, how can you, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the
heart the mouth speaketh. Now, we don't have much time
left, but I just want to close with this thought. What will
you say? What do you say now about your
salvation? Your standing before God? What
do you say in your thoughts? What do you say in your prayers?
What do you say to other men? To the believers? To unbelievers? And what will you say in the
day of judgment? What will you say? How do you
know what you're going to say? The Lord gives the answer here.
Whatever you speak with your mouth is going to reflect what's
in your heart. What you say before God, in your
conscience, in your prayers, to men now, and in judgment,
is what is in your heart. Now when you think about that,
you think, oh man. It's really not good and I need
to fix things." And so you start putting, you know, a lid on things
and try to not say that and not say that because you don't want
to reveal what's really in your heart. But the answer is not
trying to clamp your tongue so much as to have in your heart
the very truth of the gospel. You see, because when you stand
before God in judgment and you answer, you're going to say what's
in your heart. Even though you think you're
going to say, well I want to say the right thing. Well, the
only way you're going to say the right thing is if that right
thing is in your heart now. And so Jesus says, out of the
abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. What do you say when
God says, how can you stand before God now? How can you stand here?
How can you be accepted before God? What do you have? How do
you know you're a Christian? How do you know that you love
the Lord Jesus Christ? All these questions that come
into our conscience, we'd like to answer them. Remember this truth. Who is he
that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather,
that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who
also maketh intercession for us." You see, in the heart of
every believer is this unmovable, unshakable truth that mostly
comes out under affliction. When they answer to God in their
conscience, they say, Everything I look to in my life to find
an evidence whereby I might have confidence before you has dissolved. It seems like it's absent. I
find few words, if any, in my prayers to be able to hang on.
I don't even know if I know the Lord. But I only know this one
thing, that if Christ died for me, then all is well. And I come
to you, Lord, and I look to Him, and I ask you to receive me for
His sake, and He is all my hope. He's my hope to have faith. He's
my hope to love you. He's my hope for everything.
You see, that's the heart that's a true heart. A heart that confesses
its sin and comes to God and says, Lord, I'm nothing but a
sinner. Save me by your grace. And if I'm not saved by your
grace through Christ alone, then I'm lost and deservingly so.
That's the abundance of your heart. It has to speak that way.
May God give us grace to so own Christ. according to the gospel
and deliver us from this unpardonable sin that we would deny and even
state that the Lord Jesus Christ is actually under the control
of the devil in Christ's name. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you
for your word, we thank you for your mercy and your grace that
you would so deliver those who are blind, can't see spiritual
things, and dumb, can't speak the right things, and controlled
in the darkness of their heart by the kingdom of Satan, and
by your mighty power, and by your the foundation of your saving
work on the cross. You've commanded, and Satan is
cast out of our hearts, and your kingdom is set up, and we now
love and believe the Lord Jesus Christ. Help us, dear Lord, to
see Him in all of His glory, and to call upon Him, knowing
that we're only delivered by the Spirit of God. Help us to
be thankful. Help us not to take life with
indifference, in some kind of a neutral state of uncertainty,
but to come to the Lord Jesus Christ and abandon all other
hopes and to lay hold on Him and cling to Him with our whole
heart. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.