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The context of the saying cannot be appreciated from reading Luke alone and can be found in Mark 3:22-30 and Matthew 12:22-33, serving as a good example of how the Gospels complement one another. The scribes accused Jesus of using demonic authority to drive out demons, and he replied with several metaphors to show that it made no sense to think Satan would use his own power to cast himself out of someone he had possessed. Only God’s Holy Spirit was strong enough to overcome the satanic, and the scribe’s accusation revealed that they could not distinguish between what was from God and what was from Satan.
The Greek word “blasphaemeo” means to blaspheme and also to slander. Confusing the Holy Spirit with Beelzebub was slander against the Spirit. Anyone who could so slander the Spirit would be unable to repent and seek forgiveness, for he could not tell evil from good.
Our sins would remain unforgiven if we had to rely on distinguishing good from evil, because our hearts deceive us as the scribes’ hearts deceived them. Only the grace given as an undeserved gift by Christ is capable of working the impossible, convicting us and making us able to repent.
There are also implications of this saying for the church. If the church calls what is evil good or what is good evil, then it cannot carry out its function as an instrument of salvation. This is why reliance on a careful reading of the Scriptures is necessary when the church acts on questions of what is sinful and what is good. Placing our trust in only the political processes of the church or in such criteria as personal experience rather than upon the Scriptures means we are depending on the very sinful hearts which have betrayed us, and the church then begins to become indistinguishable from the world around it.
The irony of Jesus having to tell the scribes – the very persons responsible for the faithful transmission of God’s written word – that they could not distinguish good from evil, should not be lost on the church.
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