”Jesus knew their thoughts and replied, “Any kingdom divided by civil war is doomed. A town or family splintered by feuding will fall apart. And if Satan is casting out Satan, he is divided and fighting against himself. His own kingdom will not survive. And if I am empowered by Satan, what about your own exorcists? They cast out demons, too, so they will condemn you for what you have said. But if I am casting out demons by the Spirit of God, then the Kingdom of God has arrived among you. For who is powerful enough to enter the house of a strong man and plunder his goods? Only someone even stronger—someone who could tie him up and then plunder his house. “Anyone who isn’t with me opposes me, and anyone who isn’t working with me is actually working against me. “So I tell you, every sin and blasphemy can be forgiven—except blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which will never be forgiven. Anyone who speaks against the Son of Man can be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven, either in this world or in the world to come. “A tree is identified by its fruit. If a tree is good, its fruit will be good. If a tree is bad, its fruit will be bad. You brood of snakes! How could evil men like you speak what is good and right? For whatever is in your heart determines what you say. A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart, and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. And I tell you this, you must give an account on judgment day for every idle word you speak. The words you say will either acquit you or condemn you.”“
Matthew 12:25-37 NLT
The passage about the unforgivable sin, blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, should always be approached in its context. We must remember that the direction of the conversation is not anthropocentric. Jesus shows God’s perspective on actions. He does this because he is speaking to Pharisees who claim to know the mind of God. If he was speaking to the common man, he might have chosen something different or not at all. Due to the accusation that it was Satan’s power that was committing healings and miracles, Jesus makes this statement about levels of sin. But as Jesus often did, it seems that he was reducing multiple sins into one. That is to say that he was drawing the philosophical line of salvation at the work of the Holy Spirit. He challenged the Pharisees to stop classifying sin but instead to see sin as a quality of behavior. Its main characteristic is to deny that God is at work when he is. This characteristic of thought is more egregious than any one sin and it is the root of eternal damnation. The common man need not fear sinning in this way because the common man is not an authority on God’s mind. It is a place reserved for the academic who thinks he might judge and discern the acts of God. It’s a warning to judge carefullly, knowing that one can easily change behavior, but one can’t easily change thoughts. When we encounter Christians who might be worried about committing the unforgivable sin, we should remember that it has a specific context of denial and ascription that no believer could rightly perform.
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