The Grievous Sin of Unbelief

“To whom sware he that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that believed not?  So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief” (Hebrews 3:18-19).

After Jesus repeatedly demonstrated his Messiahship with many signs, wonders and proofs, he rebuffed the Pharisees craven appetite for more proof.  It is very telling that Jesus scathingly rebuked the Pharisees, saying, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign” (Matthew 16:4).  As Bob Dylan put it, “Ya either got faith or ya got unbelief, and there ain’t no neutral ground.”  More proof—even another sign—is therefore fruitless; an evil and adulterous heart of unbelief cannot be persuaded.

Moreover, when God asked—“IS THERE NO BALM IN GILEAD?” (Jeremiah 8:22)—what did he mean?  Well, Gilead is a city in Israel known for its medicinal balm.  And “Gilead” means “Heap of testimony or evidence.”  So, in other words, “Is there no balm or healing virtue in a heap of testimony or evidence?  Haven’t I abundantly proven myself?  Even to the point where unbelief is outrageous?  Do you recall how the Lord chided with his disciples about unbelief?  I have long maintained that—IF the Son of man were ever to have sinned (an impossibility, I know)—it would have been over the disciples’ unbelief.  Nothing made Jesus more incredulous or angry than unbelief—especially in the presence of HEAPS OF EVIDENCE proving that faith in Jesus Christ is the only correct conclusion.

Enough evidence is supplied to know Jesus Christ, therefore the Lord demands obedience and perseverance with or without further enlightenment.  We place our faith in him because we have enough evidence to do so.  Increasing enlightenment is for enrichment and fellowship, not to provide further proof of what is already proven beyond a shadow of doubt.  When the disciples asked Jesus, “Increase our faith,” he replied, “if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed” you can say thus and thus, and it will obey you.  No more faith or evidence is needed to convince a convinced soul.  In fact, Jesus indicts those who continually ask for more proof by calling them “evil and adulterous”—evil because they refuse the light of truth and adulterous because they are unfaithful to God.

After the spies—excepting Caleb and Joshua—gave a bad (faithless) report concerning the Promised Land, the Lord asked Moses, “How long will this people despise me?  And how long will they not believe in me, in spite of all the signs which I have wrought among them?” (Numbers 14:11).  Oh, THE GRIEVOUS SIN OF UNBELIEF!!  To remain faithless in the face of a demonstration of the Spirit’s power is both disturbing and incredulous.  Can you hear the Lord’s heart break over the callousness of unbelief?  Can you feel his pain when he asks, “How long will they not believe in me, in spite of all the signs which I have wrought among them?”  These faithless Israelites (who died in the wilderness) were so grievous, Paul used them as an object lesson.  He said, “Let us therefore be zealous and exert ourselves and strive diligently to enter that rest [of God, to know and experience it for ourselves], that no one may fall or perish by the same kind of unbelief and disobedience [into which those in the wilderness fell]” (Hebrews 4:11).

The verse of scripture immediately following Hebrews 4:11 seems out of place, but actually it fits like a glove!  “For the Word that God speaks is alive and full of power [making it active, operative, energizing, and effective]; it is sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating to the dividing line of the breath of life (soul) and [the immortal] spirit, and of joints and marrow [of the deepest parts of our nature], exposing and sifting and analyzing and judging the very thoughts and purposes of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12).  Herein this description of “the Word of God speaks” is the key to why unbelief is a lie.  Because it is “active and full of power,” dynamic and penetrating to the depths of human nature, unbelief in the face of such overwhelming proof of God’s efficacy, is not only grievous, but stupid beyond belief.

The cynic, agnostic and/or atheist has no ground for skepticism.  God and His word demand our attention and belief, and no one is excused because the proof is clear and irrefutable.  “But I say, did they not hear?  Indeed they have; their voice [that of creation bearing God’s message] has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the [farthest] ends of the world” (Romans 10:18).  Also, “that which is known about God is evident within them [in their inner consciousness], for God made it evident to them.  For ever since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through His workmanship [all His creation, the wonderful things that He has made], so that they [who fail to believe and trust in Him] are without excuse and without defense” (Romans 1:19-20).

THE GRIEVOUS SIN OF UNBELIEF is ultimately the unpardonable sin.  In the end, it is naked and fully-convinced unbelief that proves unpardonable.  G. K. Chesterton—on a path to his conversion from agnosticism/atheistic leanings—came to see the unpardonable sin as “sincere pessimism.”  Though it took some time and meditation to wrap my mind around what Chesterton said, I came to agree with him.  To hold stubbornly fast to unbelief in light of the irrefutable proof of God and His love is sincere pessimism and ultimately the unpardonable sin.  Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit—defined in scripture as “the unpardonable sin”—is to disparage the character of God by calling Him evil in light of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.  The word “blasphemy,” according to James Strong, means “vilification (espec. against God)...evil speaking; to attack the reputation of (a person or thing) with strong or abusive criticism.”  Jude succinctly captured what blasphemy looks like by quoting Enoch’s strong indictment against ungodly men: “Behold, the Lord came with many thousands of His holy ones, to execute judgment upon all, and to convict all the ungodly of all their ungodly deeds which they have done in an ungodly way, and of ALL THE HARSH THINGS WHICH UNGODLY SINNERS HAVE SPOKEN AGAINST HIM” (Jude 1:14-15).

Blasphemy is therefore calling evil good and good evil to the extent that it becomes an entrenched belief; since from the heart the mouth speaks, words spoken from such a person originates from a condemned heart.  And Jesus called them “condemned already”; those who did not believe Him or His works.  No matter how you look at it, “Whatsoever is not of faith is sin” (Romans 14:23).  “If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin” (John 15:22).  Because they refuse to believe that God loves them and desires to save them, they forsake their own mercy.  Ultimately, their strident sin of unbelief kills them because they refuse to believe in God’s only way to life, Jesus Christ. 

“Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God” (Hebrews 3:12). 

   

                                                            

In the Futility of their Minds

“Now this I affirm and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, IN THE FUTILITY OF THEIR MINDS; they are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart” (Ephesians 4:17-18).

Note how darkened understanding and futile thinking are “due to...hardness of heart.” The chain of causation linking hardness of heart to ignorance and darkened understanding to futile thinking is a revelation of the highest order. Ignorance is more than mental (soulish); it is also spiritual (involving the conscience). Many think man’s spirit and heart are synonymous, but Watchmen Nee defined the heart as, “The conscience in man’s spirit plus the mind in his soul.” Thus the spirit of man—comprised of conscience, intuition and communion—is not wholly represented by the heart. Likewise, the soul of man—comprised of mind, will and emotion—is also not wholly represented by the heart. The spirit is conscience, intuition and communion, whereas the heart is one-third spirit (conscience) and one-third soul (mind).

Nonetheless, the interrelationship between human aspects of mind and heart makes them all dark, hard and futile whenever the life of God is missing from them. As an example, Friedrich Nietzsche, a staunch atheist (undoubtedly “alienated from the life of God), died in a lunatic asylum with a hard and unrepentant heart still clinging to the futility of his darkened mind. As G. K. Chesterton observed, “The softening of the brain which ultimately overtook him [Nietzsche] was not a physical accident. If Nietzsche had not ended in imbecility, Nietzscheism would end in imbecility. Thinking in isolation and with pride ends in being an idiot. Every man who will not have softening of the heart must at last have softening of the brain.”

Scripture outlines the declension of those who refuse to honor and thank God. And this fundamental lack of honoring God as God and being unthankful are the root causes of their willful ignorance. But atheists such as Nietzsche are simply and undeniably liars, having been informed of God’s benevolent existence. “For since the creation of the world his invisible attributes, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, THEY DID NOT HONOR HIM AS GOD OR GIVE THANKS, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened” (Romans 1:20-21).

Remember, “Every men who will not have softening of the heart must at last have softening of the brain.”

The Nature of Deception

“Now it happened, as we went to prayer, that a certain slave girl possessed with a spirit of divination met us, who brought her masters much profit by fortune-telling. This girl followed Paul and us, and cried out, saying, ‘These men are the servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to us the way of salvation.’ And this she did for many days. But Paul, greatly annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, ‘I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.’ And he came out that very hour” (Acts 16:16-18 NKJV).

Note the exact words this slave girl cried out: “These men are the servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to us the way of salvation.” What’s wrong with that? Wasn’t that the truth? No! It was ONLY factually correct. A lie is deeper than what mere factual data or mental misinformation or mistakes can tell us; if we fail to strike to the core of the essential nature from which a lie occurs, we cannot sufficiently define what it is. James Strong (in the New Testament Greek section of his “Exhaustive Concordance”) defined “lie/liar” as “a falsifier,” or more broadly, as one who utters “an untruth or attempt[s] to deceive by falsehood.” The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines “falsifier” as “to make (something) false: to change (something) in order to make people believe something that is not true.” To “make” or to “change” implies intent, and here in this definition of a falsifier, it is expressly done to deceive. Intent matters, no matter how accurate a statement is.

How many times have you understood and agreed with every word a person said technically, yet you knew intuitively that something was wrong, something off-center? Though the words spoken—taken at face-value—were correct, somehow you knew they spoke lies. Something just didn’t ring true!

Jesus made it clear that a liar is someone who speaks from his own nature. In one place Jesus said that those who speak from themselves seek their own glory; but in another place Jesus told the Pharisees that they spoke from the lying nature of their father the devil. “You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. WHENEVER HE SPEAKS A LIE, HE SPEAKS FROM HIS OWN NATURE, for he is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44).

We must discern deeper than words or wonders, even deeper than humanly perceptible. A liar is not a liar because he occasionally misspeaks or gets facts wrong. Anyone can and does that. No, a liar is someone off-center from his created purpose, someone expressing himself in both word and deed from that false premise. He is dispositionally off-kilter; he speaks from his fallen nature. Fallen man before redemption is a liar, “off-center from his created purpose.” Thus scripture describes man thusly, “Men of low degree are emptiness and men of high degree are A LIE AND A DELUSION. In the balances they go up; they are together lighter than a breath" (Psalm 62:9). Additionally, because a liar hates truth, DECEPTION is inevitable.

As T. Austin Sparks observed, “The great apostasy of the last days will have as its ground an absence of genuine love for the truth for its own sake. A craving for the demonstrations, sensations, manifestations, and then the satanic production of an imitation apostolicalism with power, and signs and lying wonders will create such a strong delusion that ‘if it were possible even the elect would be deceived’ (Matthew 24:24).”

THE NATURE OF DECEPTION is darkness disguised as light. As THE prime example, Satan—the father of lies and prince of darkness—masquerades as an angel of light. Also, the “imitation apostolicalism” Sparks spoke of is “in accord with the activity of Satan” (2 Thessalonians 2:9)—but what came first, the activity of Satan or unprovoked unbelief? To not believe the truth concerning Jesus Christ is no small matter, satanically influenced or not. In fact, God, who knows the hearts of all men, judges those who fail to love and believe truth harshly. He unleashes Satan and “All the DECEPTION of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason God will send upon them a DELUDING influence so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth” (2 Thessalonians 2:10-11).