This is a Stillwater Revival Books audiobook selection. Please join us at PuritanDownloads.com to see all the new 99-cent digital downloads, Reformation in Puritan Books, Psalms Singing MP3s, and so on, the new SWRB Puritan hard drive, and much more. The new website is state-of-the-art and contains Puritan hard drive videos, Puritan quote videos, free samples of Psalms singing, MP3s, a powerful search engine, new material, Puritan books, MP3s and videos that you may follow through an RSS feed, and it is very easy to navigate. That's puritandownloads.com. Today on the Puritan and Reformed podcast, we are going to examine a very interesting subject. It is interesting, but very painful for those who are in the midst of it. That is, the delusion, the deception that somebody fears he's committed the unpardonable sin. This is one of Satan's greatest wiles, and there is an underlying presupposition to begin a study like this, and that is, if somebody fears he's committed the unpardonable sin, and we call it a delusion, we must have some kind of a basis for saying so. In My Mind is a book that has been republished by Sully Dale Gloria called Trouble of Mind and the Disease of Melancholy. About the close of the seventeenth century, Timothy Rogers, a pious and able minister of London, fell into a state of deep melancholy. Such was the distressing darkness of his mind that he gave up all hope of the mercy of God, and believed himself to be a vessel of wrath, designed for destruction for the praise of the glorious justice of the Almighty. His sad condition was known by many pious ministers, and people throughout the country, who it is believed were earnest and incessant in their supplications on his behalf. Thus it pleased God to grant a complete deliverance for his suffering servant. Having received comfort of the Lord, Rogers was exceedingly desirous to be instrumental in administering the same comfort to others. He therefore wrote several books with this object in view. One of these was entitled Recovery from Sickness, another Consolation for the Afflicted, and a third Trouble of Mind in the Disease of Melancholy. Here's just one paragraph from this interesting book by Timothy Rogers in the preface. The devil indeed is very busy working during the darkness of a soul. He throws in his bombs and fiery darts to amaze us more. When we are compassed with the terrors of a dismal night, he is bold and undaunted in his assaults and injects with a quick and sudden malice a thousand monstrous and abominable thoughts of God which at the same time seem to be the motions of our minds and so most terribly grieve and trouble us. And alas, we too often comply with the devil's designs. We are usually then under great unbelief, and too often think of God and of ourselves as he would have us think. Yet if you think that every action of a melancholy person is from this evil spirit, you will, as it is easy to fix any sort of dire impressions on such as are overcome with fear, persuade them at length that they are possessed, and that all they do is from the devil, when at the same time they are pained in every part, and then they find themselves unable to get out of their distress, and your discourses simply plunge them even lower in their misery. I would not have you bring a rallying accusation against the devil, so as to attribute to him a thousand things wherein he has no hand at all. Neither must you falsely accuse your friends by saying that they gratify him, when they do not do so. Consider how ill you would take it to be so used if you were in their case, or consider that to be without temptation is a greatest temptation. Do not much wonder at anything they may say or do. What will people not do who are in despair? What will they not say who think themselves lost forever? What strange extravagant actions do you see those do who are under the power of fear? And none are so afraid as these poor people are. They are afraid of God, of hell. and of their own sorrows. You need not much wonder at them when you know that even so great a man as Job cursed his day, and talked of God with much more freedom and boldness than he ought to have done. The Lord Himself said that Job darkened counsel by words without knowledge. Do not think it strange if they complain very much, for their grief causes them to speak. You know the tongue will always be speaking of the aching tooth. Their soul is sorely vexed, and though it is true that they get no good by complaining, yet they cannot but complain to find themselves in such a doleful case. And though they can say with David in Psalm 6 verse 6, I am weary with my groaning, all the night make I my bed to swim, I water my couch with my tears, yet they cannot forbear to groan and weep more till their very eyes are consumed with grief. Let no courage of theirs provoke you to passion. Let no sharp words of theirs make you talk sharply. Sick persons are generally peevish, and it will be a very great weakness in you not to bear with them when you see that a long and sore disease has deprived them of their former good temper. Many who are acquainted with this subject will remember the testimony of the famed poet William Cooper. Quoting John Piper's biography of Cooper, in 1786 Cooper entered his fourth deep depression and again tried unsuccessfully to commit suicide. In a letter to John Newton he wrote, January 13, 1784, Loaded as my life is with despair, I have no such comfort as would result from a supposed probability of better things to come, were it once ended. You will tell me that this cold gloom will be succeeded by a cheerful spring, an endeavor to encourage me to hope for a spiritual change resembling it, but it will be lost labor. Nature revives again, but a soul once slain lives no more. My friends, I now expect that I shall see yet again, they think it necessary to the existence of divine truth, that he who once had possession of it should never finally lose it. I admit the solidity of this reasoning in every case but my own. And why not in my own? I forestall the answer. God's ways are mysterious and he giveth no account of his manners. An answer that would serve my purpose as well as theirs that use it. There is a mystery in my destruction, and in time it shall be explained." In reading some of the books of the Puritans on this subject, it was inevitable that in dealing with the walls of Satan as a troubler, they would touch this subject. Listen to William Bernal in his Christian Incomplete Armor. Another wall of Satan as a troubler is in aggravating the saint's sins against which he has a notable declamatory faculty. not that he hates a sin, but the saint. Now in this his chief subtlety is so to lay his charge, that it may seem to be the act of the Holy Spirit. He knows an arrow out of God's quiver wounds deep, and therefore when he accuses, he comes in God's name. As suppose a child were conscious to himself of displeasing his father, and one that owes him a spite to trouble him should counterfeit a letter from his father, and cunningly convey it into the son's hand, who receives it as from his father's, wherein he charges him with many heavy crimes, disowns him, and threatens he shall never come into his sight, or have a penny portion from him, the poor son conscious to himself of many undutiful carriages, and not knowing the plot, takes on heavily, and can neither eat nor sleep for grief. Here is a real trouble begotten by a false and imaginary ground." And later on William Gurnall says, Satan perplexes the tender consciences of doubting Christians with obscure scriptures whose sense lies too deep for their weak and distempered judgments, readily to find out, and with these he hampers poor souls exceedingly. Indeed, as melancholy men delight in melancholy walks, so doubting souls most frequent such places of Scripture in their musing thoughts has increased their doubts. How many have I known that have looked so long on those difficult places in Hebrews 6, 4-6? and in 10.26, which pass the understanding as a swift stream the eye, so that the sense is not perceived without great observation, till their heads have turned round, and they at last not able to untie the difficulties, have fallen down into despairing thoughts and words of their own condition, crying out, O they have sinned against the knowledge of the truth, and therefore no mercy remains for them. Who, if they would have refreshed their understandings by looking off these places, whose engraving is too curious to be long poured on by a weak eye, they might have found that in other scriptures plainly expressed, that which would enable them, as through a mirror, more safely to have viewed these. Therefore, Christian, keep the plains. Thou mayest be sure it is thine enemy that gives thee such stones to break thy teeth, when thy condition calls rather for bread and wine. Such scriptures I mean as are most apt to nourish thy faith and cheer thy drooping spirit." Now in our studies of people who fear they've committed the unpardonable sin, all one has to do is a search online to see how common it is that people entertain this delusion. Listen to this book called Religious Factors and Mental Illness by Wayne Edward Oates. One of the prevalent religious ideas among mental patients is the conviction that they have committed the unpardonable sin. A teaching fellow in the department of the author, Helen Armstrong Wright, analyzed the common factors in the histories of 12 patients who presented this idea during various types of hospitalization and psychiatric care. Six of them were men and six were women. Their ages ranged from 24 to 70. Nine of them had been exceptionally active religiously. They came from varying psychiatric diagnostic categories, obsessional neurosis, depressive reactions, paranoid schizophrenic reactions, and anxiety neurosis. Now obviously these people don't have a cure for this, but what did the Puritans say about the cure, besides William Gurnall? I will not limit myself to just what the Puritans said on this subject, because there's a number of excellent writings by other authors that are very helpful on this subject. For example, a pastor sketches or conversations with anxious inquirers by Ichabod Spencer, who writes, During the whole of one summer, a young woman of respectable family and of religious education was accustomed to send for me, from time to time, for religious conversation. She had no hope, and her mind was uniformly gloomy. She appeared peculiarly desponding. Time after time as I visited her, I endeavored as plainly as possible to unfold the divine promises and the fullness of Christ to meet all the possible wants of sinners who will believe in Him. Still she remained as sad and downcast as ever. Her most common topic was the magnitude of her sins. She was such a sinner that there was no mercy for her. Repeatedly I showed the error of this notion by the clear declarations of the Bible and by the nature of salvation procured by the great Savior. and most urgently pressed upon her the instant duty of hearing the gospel call to repent and trust in Jesus Christ while the Holy Spirit was driving with her. I assured her that no sinner need be lost because his sins are so great, since the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses from all sin. One day as I was urging this point and entreating her to be reconciled to God, yielding her heart to the persuasion of the Holy Spirit, she said to me, I believe I have committed the unpardonable sin. What makes you think so? I said. Why, I feel so, she said hesitatingly. What makes you feel so? The Lord would have forgiven me before this time if there was any forgiveness for me. He will forgive you now if you will repent of sin and trust in the redemption of Christ. No, she said, I have committed the unpardonable sin and there is no forgiveness for me. She wept and sobbed aloud. I said, how long have you been thinking that you've committed the unpardonable sin? I've known it for a long time. What is the unpardonable sin? The sin against the Holy Ghost which has never forgiven us in this world nor in the world to come. What is the sin against the Holy Ghost? After much hesitation she replied, it is the sin that Jesus Christ mentioned speaking against the Holy Ghost. Another famous in history who thought that he had committed the unpardonable sin records his experience and that is John Bunyan in his grace abounding to the chief of sinners where he says, then was I struck into a very great trembling in so much that it sometimes I could for whole days together feel my very body as well as my mind to shake and totter under the sense of the dreadful judgment of God that should fall on those that have sinned that most fearful and unpardonable sin. I felt also such a clogging and heat at my stomach, by reason of this my care, that I was, especially at some times, as if my breastbone would have split asunder. I feared also that this was the mark that the Lord did set on Cain, even continual fear and trembling, under the heavy load of guilt that he had charged on him for the blood of his brother Abel. Thus did I wind and twine and shrink under the burden that was upon me, which burden also did so oppress me that I could neither stand, nor go, nor lie, either at rest or quiet. Yet that saying would sometimes come to my mind, He has received gifts for the rebellious. The rebellious, thought I, why, surely they are such as were once under subjection to their prince, even those who, after they have sworn subjection to his government, have taken up arms against him, and so on. Thus sometimes I fought on, and should labor to take hold thereof, that some, though small refreshment, might have been conceived by me. But in this also I missed of my desire. I was driven with force beyond it. I was like a man that is going to execution, even by that place where he would feign creep in and hide himself, but may not. Now I should find my mind to flee from God as from the face of a dreadful judge. Yet this was my torment, I could not escape his hand. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. But blessed be his grace that scripture and those flying sins would call as running after me. I have blotted out as a thick cloud thy transgressions, and as a cloud thy sins. Return unto me, for I have redeemed thee." In a magazine that is called the Gospel Magazine and Theological Review, From the 1st of July, 1874, there is an obituary, and in the obituary it says, She was a stranger to the trials which many of the Lord's children have to wade through. Her time was devoted to benevolent purposes and to the visitation of the sick and encouragement of young converts, her moral character without blemish. Had she then no trials? Yes, for their needs must be a crook in every lot. For many years our dear sister was harassed with the thought of having committed the unpardonable sin, and seemed never to have entirely got rid of the dread and fear on that account, and often in great darkness would flee to the word and cry out, Yes, Lord, I do believe. Her consolation was in the unfailing promise of Christ, Whosoever believeth in me, though he die, yet shall he live. In John Owen's famous treatise on the mortification of sin, he gives a comment on the life and vigor and comfort of our spiritual life depend much on our mortification of sin. However, he does say that a man may be carried on in a constant course of mortification all his days, and yet perhaps never enjoy a good day of peace and consolation. So it was with Heman in Psalm 88. His life was a life of perpetual mortification and walking with God, yet tears and wounds were his portion all his days. But God singled out Heman, a choice friend, to make him an example to them that afterwards should be in distress. Can you complain if it be no otherwise with you than it was with Haman, that imminent servant of God? And this shall be his praise to the end of the world. God makes it his prerogative to speak peace and consolation. There is a sermon by the Scottish preacher Thomas Chalmers, which I have already narrated for Sermon Audio, and this is called, On the Nature of the Sin Unto Death. And in this he says, if we assume that the sin unto death is the same with the sin against the Holy Ghost, then from what has been said in a previous discourse, it will follow that we regard those people to be on a wrong track of inquiry, who with a view to ascertain whether they have committed this sin, look back to their bygone history and rummage the depositories of their past remembrance. and try to find among all the deeds they have ever committed that one deed of particular enormity to which the forgiveness of the gospel will not and cannot be extended. There is in truth no such deed within the reach of human performance. The blood of Christ can wash away the guilt of all the sins of all the individuals in the assemblage before us. And in the hearing of every one of you, do we make this free and open announcement of the gospel remedy and all the power and preciousness which belong to it. So here Thomas Chalmers is saying that if you think that there is that one sin that you have committed that puts you out of the reach of mercy, you're misunderstanding what the sin unto death is. It is a matter of rare occurrence, but it does occur, that the imagination of this sin fills the heart of some melancholy patients with the agitations of despair. and spreads a dark and mournful complexion over the secret history of him who is a victim of it, and keeps the comfort of the gospel far away from him, and fixes in his mind the obstinate delusion that there is something about him which renders him an exception to those wide and universal calls which are made to circulate at large among all the other sons and daughters of the species, Now this is a misapprehension. The offer is still unto all and upon all who believe, and he is not excluded from the offer. And there is not a single iniquity of his past life that so excludes him. And if he will only come to Christ in his appointed way, and do honor to the power of his sacrifice by resting on it, and show respect to his authority by putting forth all the energy that is in him, to act up to its requirements, and evidence his humble submission to the doctrine of the Spirit by praying for him in faith, and give proof to the general honesty which runs through all his principles on the subject of the Christian religion, by his diligent use of every revealed expedient, in the way of reading, enacting, and devoutly observing the appointed ordinances, then do we say to him what we say to you all, that you have taken such a step, and entered upon such a career, and committed yourselves to such an infallible guidance, as in spite of all the manifold deformities of your past life, And under all that guilt of rebelliousness which now lies upon you, will translate you into acceptance with a God whom you have so deeply offended, and carry you forward by the ascending march of a progressive and ever-advancing sanctification to all the glories and all the perfections of a blissful eternity." Thomas Chalmers, quoted from his Miscellaneous, Volume 3, The Select Works of Thomas Chalmers, on the nature of the sin unto death. Now at this time I want to move forward to examine some of the proofs that if you think that you have committed the unpardonable sin, it is proof that you have not. But I am not just speaking in theory here. This is something that I passed through personally for eight months of my life back in 1983, in which I was finally cured by reading John Bunyan's Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners. But I want to quote from some of the sources that helped me out during those times. I know how difficult it is to work through such fears because you suppose to yourself, well, what if this author is finally wrong? I've still had it in the end. It's over for me. I'm quoting from the systematic theology of Augustine Hopkins Strong, and I remember the page number by memory. and that is on page 650 he talks about the sin of final obduracy and this is what he says the sin against the Holy Spirit is not to be regarded simply as an isolated act but also is the external symptom of a heart so radically and finally set against God that no power which God can consistently use will ever save it This sin, therefore, can only be the culmination of a long source of self-hardening and self-depraving. He who has committed it must be either profoundly indifferent to his own condition, or actively and bitterly hostile to God. And here is the key. So that anxiety or fear, on account of one's condition, is evidence that it has not been committed. The sin against the Holy Spirit cannot be forgiven simply because the soul that has committed it has ceased to be receptive of divine influences, even when those influences are exerted in the utmost strength which God has seen fit to employ in His spiritual administration. Then he quotes Van Oosterzee, The commission of the sin is marked by a loss of spiritual sight. It is marked by a loss of religious sensibility. It is marked by a loss of power to will the good. The lava hardens after it has been broken from the crater, and in that state cannot return to its source. The same writer also remarks in his Dogmatics, Herod Antipas, after earlier doubt and slavishness, reached such deadness as to be able to mock the Savior, a dimension of whose name he had not long before trembled. Julius Muller in his Doctrine of Sin says, It is not that divine grace is absolutely refused to anyone who in true penitence asks forgiveness of this sin, but he who commits it never fulfills the subjective conditions upon which forgiveness is possible, because the aggravation of sin to this ultimatum destroys in him all susceptibility of repentance. The way of return to God is closed against no one who does not close it against himself. I can anticipate an objection at this point that fear that you've committed the unpardonable sin is proof that you haven't because that anxiety, that fear is the opposite of obduracy and final hardness of heart. Well, what about the case of Judas? I mean, wasn't Judas afraid? But what put Judas out of the reach of mercy? Simply despair of it. There's nothing in his case that talks about his sin being pardonable or unpardonable, but simply that he despaired of mercy. Now this is a hypothetical case, but there's an interesting paraphrase of Psalm 130 in John Owen's work on the forgiveness of sin that I want you to listen to. John Owen writes, O Lord, through my manifold sins and provocations I have brought myself into great distresses. My iniquities are always before me, and I am ready to be overwhelmed with them as with a flood of waters, for they have brought me into depths wherein I am ready to be swallowed up. But yet, although my distress be great and perplexing, I do not, I dare not utterly despond and cast away all hopes of relief or recovery. Nor do I seek unto any other remedy, way, or means of relief, but I apply myself to Thee, Jehovah, to Thee alone." Now it is interesting that Owen says, should he utterly despond and cast away all hope of relief or recovery which Judas did in a hypothetical case there certainly is no faith where there is no hope now the warning passages of Hebrews torment people exceedingly but there is one part of the Hebrews warnings that I think that needs to be kept in mind and that is that phrase they trample underfoot the Son of God Here it is in Hebrews 10 verse 29, of how much sorer punishment suppose ye shall he be thought worthy who has trodden underfoot the Son of God, and has counted the blood of the covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing, and has done despite unto the Spirit of grace. Now, it argues a great deal of contempt a great deal of abduracy of heart for somebody to trample or trodden under the foot the Son of God. It's contempt against this person, it's a contempt against his claims, and it's a contempt against his gospel. I'm looking at this book called The Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit by William Ormey in which he says, Ormy writes, that offense, it seems evident, involves some degree of knowledge and conviction of the truth. This was clearly the case with the Pharisees who were guilty of reviling our Lord. He told them this most plainly. If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin, but now they have no cloak for their sin. He that hateth me, hateth my Father also. If I had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin. But now have they both seen and hated both me and my father. They profess that they did know him, that they were capable of judging him, and that they rejected him after weighing his claims. Now the people that I've spoken to, and on numerous cases I have spoken to them, refer to some sin that they have done in the past, like maybe fornication or maybe something else that they have done. But it wasn't a rejection of Jesus Christ and his claims upon them, as if they're trampling his gospel claims under their feet. Now, it is impossible, writes Orme, to conceive that men who saw what they did and heard what they heard and witnessed the display of moral goodness and benevolence which they frequently beheld, should have been without some conviction that Jesus was no imposter. They must have had secret and perhaps very powerful feelings that he was indeed sent of God, and that in opposing him they were opposing the designs of heaven. When the same class of persons were afterwards addressed by the apostles, it is evident that they knew a great deal, they took time to consider, they had great reasonings among themselves, and with the full splendor of the apostolic ministry shining upon them, they deliberately and violently rejected the gospel, thus judging themselves unworthy of the eternal life which was offered them. The difference between these classes must, I think, be apparent to all. So long as men will listen, however carelessly, and attend, though under the influence of the most corrupt motives to the word of God, some hope may be cherished that the light of truth will yet penetrate their darkness, and that the power of God may yet subdue their enmity. But when there is considerable knowledge of the subject, with a perception of its evidence, and a professed examination of its claims, combined with high indignation at its spiritual glory and violent opposition to its propagation, what can be expected? If any man inclined to do the will of God, he shall know whether the doctrine be of God. But if men deliberately prefer falsehood to truth, and unrighteousness to holiness, it is a righteous thing with God to leave them to the natural consequences of their sin and folly. blindness of mind and hardness of heart, so that they cannot be converted or saved. Many of those who reject Christianity from ignorance give themselves no concern to oppose or to calumniate it, whereas the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is a direct and open reviling of the Gospel from malevolence against its author and a desire to obstruct the progress of His glory. I was speaking to a friend who feared that he had committed the unpardonable sin, and I gave him an illustration, that of Dan Barker, who for some years was a professed Christian, and I believe even a pastor for a number of years, knowledgeable of some Greek and Hebrew, who now has turned his back on that and spends his time in debating theists and he takes an open opposition against the gospel. But if you listen to his words in these debates, this man is very vitriolic. The one thing that marks him is his enmity against the gospel. He blasphemes every time that he attacks it. Now, if the gospel were a fiction, why does it work up such a malevolence in his heart? I've even written to him on an occasion and I said, the best way to sum up your belief is, there is no God and I really hate Him. I said, for there not being a God, why does it agitate your passions the way that it does? And that's what we're talking about when we're talking about somebody who is blaspheming the Holy Spirit. He's trampling the Son of God. He's trotting the message underfoot. Now I want to mention the title of the book that I have just been quoting because you may want to look it up for yourself. These books I quote I'm finding on books.google.com by William Ormey called Discourses on the Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit the Divine Influence and its Connection with Instituted Means with Notes and Illustrations written in 1828. I want to spend a moment dealing with the last warning passage in Hebrews and the reason why is because this particular verse is the one that frightened me so much and the one that frightened John Bunyan that he talks about in Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners. The one problem with that book I think is that a lot of it is too subjective. What I mean by that is it is interesting that John Bunyan continually talks about verses being spoken to them as if they came out of heaven. Now that's not going to be really helpful for us as we ascertain what is the warning passage in Hebrews about Esau selling his birthright for a morsel of meat and how can I know if that's what I have committed. And so let me read the verse in its context. Looking diligently, lest any man fail of the grace of God, lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled. Lest there be any fornicator or profane person as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright. For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected. For he found no place for repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears. What a stumbling block is this? He says, any fornicator. And maybe somebody has fallen and fallen seriously into sins against the seventh commandment. And now you send your day of grace away. And here you are. You're seeking repentance. You're crying for it like Esau did. Carefully, even with tears. And yet you are rejected. Well, I'm going to state that the most helpful commentary that I had personally found upon this was the one by John Brown, which was released in the Geneva series by the Banner of Truth. So let's read the whole thing because the more light that we have, the more it helps us. As a further means of preventing apostasy, the Apostle exhorts the Christian Hebrews to watch over each other with a holy jealousy. verses 15 to 17, looking diligently, lest any man fail of the grace of God, lest any root of bitterness bring enough trouble you, and thereby many be defiled, lest there be any fornicator or profane person as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright. For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected, for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears. The natural order in explaining such a passage as that now before us is to attend first to the evils against which the Apostle exhorts the Hebrew Christians to guard, and then to the manner in which they are to guard against them. The evils to be guarded against are any man's failing of the grace of God, any root of bitterness which should trouble and defile them, any profane or sensual person rising up among them, Who should for present enjoyment sacrifice future happiness? The Hebrew Christians are exhorted to guard against any man's failing of the grace of God. Here two questions meet us. What is the grace of God and what is it to fail of the grace of God? The grace of God in the language of systematic theology is either divine influence or the effect of divine influence. In the scriptures the grace of God is the divine kindness or some effect of the divine kindness. And the passage before us, I apprehend, the grace of God, or this grace of God, refers to that effect of divine favor or kindness mentioned in the preceding verse, seeing the Lord obtaining a celestial blessedness which consists in the knowledge of, conformity to, and fellowship with Christ. And to fail of this grace of God is just to come short of heaven. Now the Hebrew Christians were to watch over each other, lest any of them should, by not following holiness. by not cultivating devotedness to God, fail of attaining that state of perfect holy happiness in the immediate presence of the Lord, which is a prize of our high calling. They were to watch particularly, lest any root of bitterness springing up should trouble them, and thereby many be defiled. The apostles' language is figurative, and borrowed from a passage in Deuteronomy. Lest there should be among you man, or woman, or family, or tribe, whose heart turneth away this day from the Lord our God, to go and serve the gods of these nations, lest there should be among you a root that beareth gull and wormwood. A root that beareth gull and wormwood is just another name for a secret apostate, a false-hearted professor of the true religion, or, as Moses expresses it, a man or woman whose heart turneth away from the Lord our God. For such a root to spring up is for such individuals to manifest their apostatizing tendencies by their words or their conduct. When circumstances call these forth, as when persecution for the word's sake arises, and such persons trouble the Church, their false doctrines and their irregular conduct trouble their brethren, not only by producing grief and regret, but also in many cases by introducing strife and debate and all the innumerable evils that rise out of them, and by this means many are defiled. The root of bitterness has, as it were, a power of contaminating the plants in the neighborhood of which it puts forth its bitter leaves and brings forth its poisonous fruits. A false-hearted professor introducing false doctrines or sinful practices is very apt to find followers. Isn't that interesting? It's not talking about an individual professing Christian falling into individual sins, but it is talking about a lifestyle that's being introduced into the assembly of the saints as eleven to corrupt the whole lump. Evil communications corrupt good manners, and a little leaven, when allowed to ferment, will go far to leaven the whole lump. Profane and vain babblings increase unto more ungodliness." I'm still quoting John Brown. But they were to guard not only against speculative irreligion and error, to which I apprehend there is a direct reference in the words just explained, but also against practical ungodliness and immorality, there to look diligently lest there be among them any fornicator or profane person like Esau, who for a morsel of meat sold his birthright. Esau is not in the Old Testament represented as a fornicator, but the Jewish interpreters with one consent accuse him of incontinence. and his marrying two Canaanite wives against the will of his pious parents certainly does not speak favorably either of his continence or piety. It is strange that fornicators and profane persons should be in any way connected with the Christian church. They certainly have no business there. In a Christian church, where anything approximating to primitive discipline prevails, they will not be allowed to remain when they appear in their true colors. But it would appear that at a very early period such persons did find their way into the Christian church. And it is deeply to be regretted that such persons are still to be found in her communion, persons who, while they make a profession of Christianity, are secretly the slaves of impurity, lightly regard the promises and threatenings of religion, and where they think themselves saved, can speak contemptuously of its doctrines and laws. Esau was such a person, and he manifested his character by relinquishing all claims and title to the privileges connected with primogeniture. for a trifling and temporary enjoyment. You have an account of the facts referred to in the 25th chapter of Genesis verses 29 and so on. The case of Esau is introduced not only for the purpose of the awfully impressive warning which follows, but also to suggest this thought to the Christian Hebrews. Beware of permitting sensual and profane men to find their way into or to retain their place in your society. For whenever the temptation occurs, they will act like Esau. They will openly apostatize. To avoid present suffering, or to obtain present enjoyment, they will make shipwreck of faith and a good conscience. Such are the evils against which the Apostle exhorts the Hebrew Christians to guard. The means which he recommends them to use for this purpose is to look diligently. Now I want to get to the heart of the mantra, and I realize that people who fear they've committed the unpardonable sin It's very difficult for them to listen, but you need to gird up the loins of your mind. You need to think this thing through. You need to be sober-minded and think about what is really being said in this so that you can rightly conclude that you are not the persons that are being spoken of. So let me continue to quote John Brown. In like manner, the profane and sensual professor of Christianity, who for present enjoyment gives up the promised inheritance in heaven, will one day regret and vainly regret his choice. He will find no room for repentance, in other words, no means of altering the divine determination, that the man who prefers earth to heaven while here, must when he leaves earth go to hell and not to heaven. This passage rightly interpreted throws no obstacles in the way of a sinner who has made and long persisted in a foolish choice, making a wise one now. Now is the accepted time. Now is the day of salvation. If you wish to inherit the blessing, you may, but there is only one way in which you can, the way of faith, repentance, and obedience. Eternal life is yours if you choose it, not otherwise. Eternal life is a gift of God through Jesus Christ our Lord, and nothing but an obstinate refusal to receive it shall exclude any man who hears the gospel from its enjoyment. The words which follow, verses 18-28, form the concluding paragraph of the general exhortation to hold fast to faith and profession of Christianity in opposition to all temptations to return to Judaism grounded on the demonstration of the immeasurable superiority of the former to the latter, which had been presented to them in the doctrinal part of the epistle." Now the summing block that is usually found in this scripture is that Esau sought repentance and was denied it. But was he seeking repentance from God? Was he praying to God for repentance? Or was he in the context getting his father to change his mind? Was that his goal? Albert Barnes rightly says in his commentary that it is No place for repentance in the mind of Isaac, or no way to change his mind. It does not mean that Esau earnestly sought to repent, and could not, but that when once the blessing had passed the lips of his father, he found it impossible to change it. Isaac firmly declared that he had pronounced the blessing, and though it had been obtained by fraud, yet, as it was of the nature of a divine prediction, it could not now be changed. He had not indeed intended that it should be thus. He had pronounced a blessing on another which had been designed for him, but still the benediction had been given. I'm looking at another witness to this fact from something that is called the Gospel Advocate, where it says, I find nowhere that Esau repented, as one of your readers has intimated, He found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears. He did not repent, but sought repentance. Of whom did he seek it? Not of himself, but of his father. Bless me, even me also, O my father. And Esau lift up his voice and wept. Isaac said to him, I have blessed him. yea, and he shall be blessed, I cannot revoke it. Thus Esau did not repent, but sought repentance in his father's breast, but could not find it. His father could not revoke the blessing given to Jacob. So there's no indication here that he wanted to repent of his sin to God the Father and God would not hear him. It's a different kind of repentance. He was trying to get his father Jacob to change his mind. Now I want at this point to quote from an old Puritan book by Richard Gilpin called The Temptations of Satan. The anguish of a distressed conscience is unspeakably great and so much that many are, as Haman in Psalm 88, 15, even distracted while they suffer the terrors of the Almighty. These, though they look round about them for help and invite all that pass by to pity them, Because of the hand of the Lord has touched them, Job 19.21, yet Satan laughs at their calamity and mocks at them under their fears and does all he can to augment the flame. He suggests dreadful thoughts of an incensed majesty, begets terrible apprehensions of infinite wrath and damnation. He aggravates all their sins to make them seem unpardonable. Every action He calls a sin, and every sin He represents is a willful forsaking of God, and every deliberate transgression He tells them is a sin against the Holy Ghost. He baffles them in their prayers and services, and then accuses their duties for intolerable profanations of God's name. And if they be at last affrighted from them, he then clamors that they are forsaken of God because they have forsaken him. Let me continue to quote Richard Gilpin by moving forward to page 299. He belies God further, by representing Him as designing the ruin and misery of the tempted person in particular. He would make him believe that God had a particular spleen, as it were, against him, above other men, and that in all his dealings with or concerning him, he is but as a bear lying in wait, and as a lion in secret places, Lamentation 3.10, ready to take any advantage to cut him off. And accordingly he gives no other interpretation of all the ways of God, but such as make them look like tokens of final rejection of those that are concerned in them. If there be upon them outward afflictions, he tells them these are but the forerunners of hell. If they lie under inward sense of wrath, he calls that the firstfruits of everlasting vengeance. If any particular threatening be impressed upon their consciences by the Spirit of God, in order to their humiliation and repentance, He represents it as God's final sentence and absolute determination against them. If precaution God see it fit to set before them the examples of His wrath, as it is very frequent for Him to do, lest we should fall after the same example of unbelief, 1 Peter 2, 6, 1 Corinthians 10, 6, Satan perverts this to that which God never intended, for he boldly asserts that these examples prognosticate their misery, and that God signifies by them a prediction of certain unavoidable unhappiness. This must be observed here, that these misrepresentations of God are none of Satan's primary arguments. He uses them only as fresh reserves to second others. For where he finds any wing of his battalions ready to be beaten, he comes up with these supplies to relieve them. For indeed, these considerations of God's severity in general, or of his special resolve against any in particular, are not a force sufficient to attack a soul that is within the trenches of present peace. They are not of themselves proper mediums to produce such a conclusion. Though we suppose God severe, except we should imagine Him to be a hater of mankind universally, we cannot thence infer the final ruin of this or that individual person. And besides that these are unjustifiable falsehoods, they cannot make the final damnation of any one so much as probable till the heart be first weakened in its hopes by fears or doubtings raised up in it upon other grounds. Then indeed men are staggered, either by the deep sense of their unworthiness, or some sad continuing calamity, and a seeming neglect of their prayers. If Satan then tell them of God's severity, or that, all his providence considered, he has set them up as a mark for the arrows of his indignation, they are ready to believe his report, it being so suitable to their present sense and feeling. Satan also fetches arguments from the sins of God's children, but his great art in this is by unjust aggravations to make them look like those offenses which, by special exception in Scripture, are excluded from pardon. The Apostle in 1 John 5.16 tells us of a sin that is unto death, that is, a sin which, if a man commits, he cannot escape eternal death, and therefore he would not have such a sinner prayed for. What he means by that sin he does not tell us, it being a thing known sufficiently from other scriptures. The note of unpardonableness is indeed affixed to sins under several denominations. The sin against the Holy Ghost Christ pronounces unpardonable. Matthew 12 31 Total apostasy from the truth of the gospel has no less said of it by the apostle when he calls it a drawing back to perdition. Whether these be all one, or whether there is any other species of sin irremissible besides that against the Holy Ghost, it is not to our purpose to make inquiry. Whatever they are in themselves, Satan in this matter makes use of the text to speak of them distinctly, as we shall presently see. But besides these, the Scriptures speak of some that were given up to vile affections and to a reprobate mind, Romans 1, 26 and 28, and of others that they were given up to hardness of heart, Matthew 13, 14, Acts 28, 26. Now whosoever they are of whom these things may be justly affirmed, they are certainly miserable, hopeless wretches. Here then is Satan's cunning. If he can make any child of God believe that he has done any such act or acts of sin, as may bring him within the compass of these Scriptures, then he insults over them and tells them over and over again that they are cut off forever. To this purpose he aggravates all their sins. First, he finds them guilty of any great iniquity. He fixes upon that, and labors all he can to make it look most desperately that he may call it the sin against the Holy Ghost. And in this he has a mighty advantage, that most men are in the dark about that sin, all men being not yet agreed whether it be a distinct species of sin or a higher degree of willfulness relating to any particular sin. Upon this score, Satan can lay the charge of this sin upon those that apostatize from the truth, and through weakness have recanted it. Thus he dealt with Spira, with Bilney, with Bainham, and several others. There is so near a resemblance in these sins of denying truth to what is said of the unpardonable sin, that these men, though they were scholars and men of good abilities, yet they were not able to answer the argument that the devil urged upon them, but it prevailed to distress them. Upon others also has Satan the advantage to fix this accusation. For let the species of the sin be what it will, if they have anything of that notion, that the sin against the Holy Ghost is a presumptuous act of sin under temptation, they will call any notorious crime the sin against the Holy Ghost, because of the more remarkable aggravating circumstances that have accompanied such a fact. Next, he aggravates the sins of God's children from the willfulness of their sinning. It is a thing often too true that a child of God may be carried by a violent impetus or strong inclination of affection to some particular iniquity, where the forwardness of desires that way, by a sudden haste, do stifle those reluctancies of mind which may be expected from one endowed with the Spirit of God. whose power upon them does ordinarily sway them to lust against the flesh. But it is more ordinary to find a temptation to prevail, notwithstanding that an enlightened mind does make some resistance, which, because it is too feeble, is easily borne down by the strong importunities of Satan, working upon the inclinations of the flesh. Both these cases are improved against them over whom Satan has got any advantage of doubting of their estate. If they have resisted but ineffectually, or not resisted at all, He charges them with the highest willfulness, and will so aggravate the manner that they shall be put in fear. Not only that there can be no grace, where sin has so much power, is either to control so much light and endeavors, or has so subjected the heart to its dominion, that it can command without a contradiction, but that they can have no hope. that they that sin with so high a hand should ever enter into God's rest. And to this purpose he commonly sets before them that text of Hebrews 10.26. If we sin willfully, after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins. Or that of Hebrews 6.4. It is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and so on, if they shall fall away, to renew them again, to repentance. Both which places speak indeed at least such a difficulty as, in common use of speech, is called an impossibility, if not an utter absolute impossibility of repentance and pardon. But then the sinning willfully or falling away there mentioned is only that of total apostasy, when men that have embraced the gospel, and by it have met with such impressions of power and delight upon their hearts, which we usually call common grace, or the Puritans call common influences of the Holy Spirit, do notwithstanding reject the gospel as false and fabulous, and so rise up against it with scorn and utmost contempt, as Julian the apostate did. If now the true intendment of those scriptures were considered by those that are distressed with them, they might presently see that they were put into fear where no such cause of fear was. But all men have not this knowledge, nor do they so duly attend to the manner of the apostles' discourse as to be able to put a right interpretation upon it. Upon such, Satan imposes his deceitful gloss and tells them, Willful sinners cannot be restored to repentance, but you have sinned willfully. When sin was before you, you rushed into it without any consideration as a horse into the battle. or when God stood in your way with commands and advice to the contrary, when your conscience warned you not to do so great wickedness, yet you would do it. You were as those that break the yoke and burst the bonds. Upon this supposition, that these texts speak of willful sinning and the general, how little can be said against Satan's argument. How many have I known that have been tortured with these texts, judging their estate fearful because of their willfulness and sinning? who upon the breaking of the snare of Satan's misrepresentation have escaped as a bird unto the hill. Third, when either of the two former ways will not serve the turn, that is, when he meets with such against whom he has nothing of notorious wickedness to object, or such as have a better discerning of Scripture than to be so imposed upon, he labors to make a charge against them from the number of their miscarriages. Here he takes up all the filth he can and lays it upon one heap at their door. That was a reading from the book of Traitus on Satan's Temptations by Richard Gilpin, who lived from 1625 to 1700. Now reprinted by Sully Dale Gloria Ministries, in part two of this podcast we're going to look at some of the things that William Gurnall talked about. And since it's a mighty difficult thing to help people who are under the fear that they've committed the unpardonable sin, we're going to try to give more specific counsels. We will also look at the character in Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress called the Man in the Iron Cage. because I think that there's something that is misunderstood about that man in the iron cage and the counsels that were given to him. Still Waters Revival Books is now located at PuritanDownloads.com It's your worldwide online Reformation home for the very best in free and discounted classic and contemporary Puritan and Reformed books, mp3s and videos. 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