B, Pentecost 2 Proper 5 Mark 3:20-35 “The Unforgiveable Sin”

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The unforgiveable sin! The thought of this has terrified many a Christian needlessly over the years. Yet those who give away any thought of sin and repentance are perhaps nearer to blaspheming the Holy Spirit.

The thought of committing the unforgiveable sin is something the devil uses against God's children, so they inevitably despair of God's grace. Once Satan has our ear, he accuses and leads us to turn to sin away from God, deceived believers God's love is not for us. Then the evil one has got us where he wants us leading us to spiritually murder ourselves and opening the door to a plethora of shameful deeds.

When one hears of the sin against the Holy Spirit there is the temptation to quickly imagine some extraordinary sinful act, like suicide, paedophilia, or genocide. Although the sin against the Holy Spirit might lead a person into these acts, it might lead a person to just be apathetic towards what God is seeking to do in their day to day lives.

The sin against the Holy Spirit is the sin against the work of the Holy Spirit, and put most simply is the rejection what he seeks to give, which is faith! And where there is no faith, there can be no hope nor can there be any real love – for or from the self, for others, for God, or love received from others or from God.

While on holidays over summer, my family and I saw a sight I just had to go back and photograph. Let me paint this picture as an example of what happens to us when we sin against the Holy Spirit.

There was a windmill, built up strong and rugged. Next to it a tank was placed and a trough from which live stock could drink. This place was an oasis, a place where thirst was quenched, and life was restored. But the windmill had a mind of its own.

The windmill spun away pumping water quite happily with ease. After all the wind did all the work! But when the owner came to maintain the windmill he couldn't work the wind vane to turn the blades out of wind. And so there was no way to give it the much needed maintenance that every windmill needs.

After time the salt air from the ocean started to rust the blades of the mill! One worked free and came off in a storm. The mill still spun and pumped water but now it was out of balance. And without being fixed terrible stresses were placed on the windmill's structure and moving parts. The vibration was horrendous.

Rust and vibration continued for years and eventually all the blades came off and it couldn't pump water anymore. The wind still blew, the work was still being done, but there was now nothing to move the parts of the windmill and sitting motionless in the salt air the cogs and bearings soon became overrun by rust and the mill ceased up.

After time the whole site became run down, the tank fell to bits and the trough was broken. The paddock became dysfunctional and the animals broke free to find water elsewhere. The wind still blew and the well still had water, but what once supported life, had died.

One who sins against the Holy Spirit is like this dead windmill. The wind first blew on us in baptism, spinning us doing the work it needed to do on us, and making us produce a stream of living water. This water was not made by the windmill, rather the wind was sent to raise the water of life within us, in the spot where we were placed, right where our owner needed us.

Now unlike the earthly windmill that needs maintenance, we are maintained by the very act of working. The wind and the water lubricate us and make us function for the very purpose we were put here. Our function as windmills is pleasing to the owner and God the Father is our owner.

However Satan has taken the wind out of humanity's sails, so to speak! He disengaged Adam and Eve from facing into wind and he caused them to stop functioning as they should. Now the owner needed to send One to fix we who at best spin out of balance.

One who sins against the Holy Spirit is one who rejects the work of the Spirit, the wind on the blades! One who no longer has the waters of life moving within, and who rejects any maintenance from the owner. What a sad and sorry sight is a windmill that no longer pumps water. It's a picture of hopelessness and despair.

Unfortunately, many are tricked into believing it is all hopeless. And once there, despair and hopelessness become a self fulfilling prophecy of doom in one's life. We end up shedding the very thing that make us spin freely as Christians, receiving and pumping forgiveness, namely, faith from the winds of the Holy Spirit.

And the gift of faith that makes us work, wells up grace within to overflow from us. This grace is Jesus' life-giving death and resurrection for me, for you — for the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation. So we might continue being the pleasing person God has re-created, re-erected, or resurrected us to be in this life.

We have heard how Adam and Eve ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil and then hid from God behind other trees in the garden. They became like windmills spinning in the wind without pumping any water, they hid themselves, while still appearing to be properly functioning. Just like a mill that turns and looks like it's alright, further inspection by the owner soon discovers it's just spin and is dead even when it appears to be alive.

Adam and Eve chose to do the wrong thing and tried to spin God on who was really to blame. They threw away their means of life, and sought to hide behind a load of their own hot air and spin.

You and I do the same. For example, have you ever been walking down the street or doing something in a place when you see someone coming that you really don't wish to speak to at that moment? Have you every pretended not to see them, perhaps snob them, cross to the other side of the road to avoid contact? Adam and Eve sought to do the same with God. But God still sought them because he made us to have a relationship with us.

What happens when we do avoid contact with this person? We might get away without talking to them but often what is left is some bad blood between you, and if continued on, unresolved, the relationship breaks down. If you are lucky the person whom you seek to avoid will still bound up to you and say, "hi". And the lie continues as we say, "Oh, I didn't see you there!"

This person does what God does with Adam and Eve, and what he does with us. He comes to us seeking to restore the relationship with Jesus Christ's death and resurrection. He sends the Holy Spirit to blow on us and swing us back into wind so we once again are what he has created us to be, doing what he intended our being would naturally do.

The unforgivable sin is the sin of being, or rather not being what we were re-created to be. If I sin against the Holy Spirit I am like one who avoids a relationship with God, I cross to the other side of the road so I don't have to meet him. Or, I apathetically walk right past him without even acknowledging his presence. I reject faith from the Holy Spirit, which will severe me from grace, cut me from the cross and the forgiveness won by Jesus Christ, and a relationship with the Father. Remaining like that and I'm like the windmill still standing but dead to self and God. Not pleasing in any way!

The good news for us is when we are confronted by the Word of God and we sit up, provoked in conscience, that's the Holy Spirit spinning the bladed of the windmill. He is working in you turning you towards Christ so you willing receive the waters of forgives, that are pleasing to God.

Don't let the devil deceive you into believing that this is what you're not meant to be doing. It may appear you're not pumping life giving waters but rather sinful sludge. But this is good because God is preparing you to be his eternal well of life and he is removing the sluggish muck and welling up in you the waters of eternal life.

Just as Jesus was attacked for having an unclean spirit, you too will be attacked for the same thing since you are bound to Christ. But know if you're tempted to think you're of the devil why then would the devil be trying to deceive you? He will not fight himself? You're of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, so don't let Satan accuse you anymore, because he's the one who is blaspheming the Holy Spirit and he wants you to turn from God and bind yourself to him. Don't join him in the unforgiveable sin!

Finally listen to these wise words from the Word of God written in Hebrews chapter 6…

Therefore let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, and of instruction about washings, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. And this we will do if God permits. For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt.

For land that has drunk the rain that often falls on it, and produces a crop useful to those for whose sake it is cultivated, receives a blessing from God. But if it bears thorns and thistles, it is worthless and near to being cursed, and its end is to be burned.

Though we speak in this way, yet in your case, beloved, we feel sure of better things—things that belong to salvation. For God is not unjust so as to overlook your work and the love that you have shown for his name in serving the saints, as you still do. And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end, so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. (Hebrews 6:1–12 ESV)

Amen.