XI.

THE UNPARDONABLE SIN.

[Sunday Evening, April 12, 1893.]

"And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him; but whosoever shall speak against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, nor in that which is to come."-MATT. 12:32.

The subject of the unpardonable sin keeps coming up ever and anon, sometimes in one shape and sometimes in another; now in the fervid appeal of a revivalist, again in the solemn title of a tract, or the sober heading of a review; anon in the triumphant shout of a preacher who fancies that here at least he has an argument against the final salvation of all, that here is a mountain-peak over which the ocean of infinite love shall never prevail. This is the last refuge of those who cling to the old theology on the subject of destiny. In this fortress they make their final stand.

I have a reason for this present discussion. This subject is sometimes pressed upon our attention by the unhinging of an intellect or the settled melancholy of a sensitive heart. A note was handed up in this pulpit, not long ago, from some one evidently sincere and evidently in great

trouble, asking for light upon the theme before us. When I say that the paper upon which that note was written was heavily bordered with black, you will understand that the request was probably born of a personal bereavement; that the writer may have been trembling for the fate of some one who had passed to the other world under the supposed shadow of this awful imprecation. I trust, therefore, that those who do not need my words will kindly believe that they are not superfluous. While this discourse may seem to some like applying the flail anew to chaff that has been already well threshed, there are others who will be glad of any grains of comfort the process may reveal.

Let it be conceded at once that the subject has its difficulties. It is not an easy one. If I fail in my explanation, I shall fail in good company. I shall not stand a solitary monument of exegetical disaster. Let me premise, however, that what is told us of this sin, which stands apparently exceptional in the realm of transgression, ought to be interpreted in the light of the universal promises and world-wide hope of the gospel. Whatever may be meant, however desperate the depravity described, however severe the penalty threatened, let us be sure that it does not mean to map out a small territory which the divine compassion can never conquer, for "all things shall be subdued unto Him." It cannot mean that there shall be

some subjects so rebellious that they will never yield; for "every knee shall bow of things in heaven and things on earth, and things under the earth." It cannot mean that some voices will be finally silent in the grand ascription of praise; for "every created thing which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth, and in the sea, heard I saying, Unto him that sitteth upon the throne, be the blessing and the honor and the glory and the dominion."

If you walk out into the woods in the early spring, you will often find upon the north side of the trees and in secluded places little patches of snow and ice. Everywhere else the traces of winter are melting away and running in tiny streams to the brooks and from the brooks into the Mississippi. You say, "Well, the sun's work is not all done yet; he will have a hard task to get around all these trees and into all these crevices, and he may not be able to shine upon some of this snow and ice powerfully enough to affect it." But do not fear for the sun. Come out again in a week or two. Where are now your stubborn and incorrigible relics of December? The sun has found them and the great stream is bearing their little tribute on its mighty tide to the gulf. You must learn to interpret nature in the light of summer. You must interpret the vestiges of winter that you see in the early spring by the undisputed

power of the sun. So must we interpret the exceptionally persistent cases of iniquity that we find mentioned in Scripture, in the light of its reiterated, emphatic and sweeping assertions of the omnipotence of divine love. That sun will at last melt the most frozen heart.

I. There are three versions of the incident from which the phrase "unpardonable sin" is drawn. These differ widely in detail. The account in Luke is wholly different from that in Matthew and Mark.

While these failures to agree upon circumstances of time and place discredit the infallibility of the memories of those who wrote, the accounts give evidence that some such words as those which stand at the head of this discourse were spoken by Jesus, and made a terribly distinct impression.

In two instances, however, the threatened withholding of forgiveness is represented as being occasioned by a slanderous assault of the Pharisees upon the character of the work of Jesus. We may, therefore, assume that this was its actual origin, although the tradition which Luke followed locates it in another connection.

The controversy arose over a case of exorcism. We are familiar with the demonology of that day, and know how every disease was attributed to an evil spirit, and how insanity, in particular, was regarded as demoniacal possession. Jesus, in per

forming his cures, did not correct the popular belief, but proceeded upon it in restoring disordered intellects. We do not believe to-day nor is it necessary to suppose that he believed, in the existence of a huge arch-fiend who had legions of inferior demons under his command, sending them hither and thither on missions malign. The casting out of a devil would be, in modern phrase, the restoration of a lunatic to sanity. Whatever the malady, whatever the cure, it matters not. The Pharisees attributed his work to one whom they believed to be the source of all evil. They called light darkness. They confounded moral distinctions. They stigmatized holiness as iniquity. They attributed the good which Jesus accomplished through the power of God to deception and fraud, corruption and villiany. They believed that there was a monstrous personality of fiendishness, cruelty and depravity in the universe, and they were willing to taint and discredit with his unhallowed and polluting touch that which had been wrought and sanctified by the hand of Jehovah. Surely the brazen impudence of their folly and wickedness could go no further. Is it any wonder that Jesus set his blistering condemnation upon their shameless foreheads? The sin itself, therefore, was a sin against light, "falsity, willing sophistry, perversity of judgment about moral distinctions, the confounding of right and wrong, deeming good evil and evil good."