Luke 12:10, commentary and pictures

Luke 12:10 belongs to a call given to those favored with great light to leave tame, listless striving and give the whole heart to the service of Christ through daily prayer and watchfulness. The sin against the Holy Spirit is not mysterious and indefinable, but persistent refusal to respond to the invitations to repent. Most commonly it appears in persistently slighting heaven's invitation to repent, and every step in rejecting Christ is a step toward rejecting salvation and toward committing it.

It is wilfully attributing to Satan the work of the Holy Spirit, and when people wilfully reject the Spirit and declare it to be from Satan they cut off the channel by which God can communicate with them. Rejecting the Holy Spirit surpasses all other sins, because the Holy Spirit is the power by which the forces of evil are conquered, and to reject Him cuts a person off from the source of power, from Christ and communion with Him. Whatever the sin, if the soul repents and believes the guilt is washed away in the blood of Christ, but blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven because the one who rejects the work of the Holy Spirit places himself where repentance and faith cannot come to him; it is by the Spirit that God works upon the heart, so when the Spirit is finally rejected there is nothing more that God can do for the soul.

Charging the work of God to undue excitement and calling it fanaticism is sinning against the Spirit and standing on dangerous ground. Light must be intelligently cherished and faith constantly exercised rather than being controlled by feeling, for unless that course is reversed conscience becomes less sensitive, appreciation of the Spirit lessens, and understanding God's message becomes harder, because the person places himself where he cannot recognize the Spirit and sets himself against every means God might use to save him from ruin. There is grave guilt in knowingly speaking against or denying the Holy Spirit after witnessing evidence of the Spirit, and those who then reject it because its message reproves them are not in the same position as people who lack that experience, so their knowing indifference and continued rejection leaves them without excuse.

Knowingly resisting the Holy Spirit is the sin against the Spirit, and this is the case when reports and accusations are not made in ignorance but by one who has seen the fruits of the work, involving false accusations and rejection of truth given through the Spirit. Calling Spirit-inspired messages from God a human invention is an example of this unpardonable blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, as in claiming that Dr. Kellogg himself gave their speaker her inspiration. The verse means there is an unpardonable sin, yet God never gives any mortal a message to tell another mortal that he has committed it or that he is lost and too far gone to be saved. God sends warnings to correct errors, not to destroy people, for all are on earth to form characters fit to inherit eternal life, and if they heed the word of the Lord He will correct and guide them.