I just want to say firstly, we should not rely on our own feelings or understanding to tell us what God is doing. We know, sin is not of, from or a part of God, and is lawlessness, resulting in judgement and death, so we cannot excuse any sin. It cost the Lord His precious life. Yet we must also be quick minded to remember that God has an arch enemy, satan, who literally is doing everything he can to destroy your soul, attack your faith (make you choose to unbelieve without consciously knowing, thereby doubting the sure promises of God and insulting His honor and character). Satan will use scripture to condemn you and curse you, that will try press you to believe the lies. You need not.
I've been struggling with the unforgivable Sin for months on end now, it is torturous. Some days I feel some of God's grace and truly believe He is working through it all to bring me To Him, other days I am sunk into fear and despair, because I remind myself that I've not felt conviction from the Holy Spirit for a very long time. My heart feels hardened and its all my fault, its been my choices.
After I was regenerated, I was so messy and careless, I did not sit down and grow any faith. Whenever I read the Bible I believed I believed it.. Only 3 years later I now know I did not. I would have the Holy Spirit convict me of sin or when I was about to sin, and would be in so much despair (through wrestling with thoughts of God not hearing me, me not being able to get close to Him, Him being far off etc).. And would give in to the sin. It just happened more frequently, the joy of the new birth slowly went away and I became more anxious and fearful, living in habitual sin. I was always sharing memes, clips, watching sermons etc but never truly believed (but was deceived into believing I did). If only I had believed I'd of seen my foolishness. Somewhere in 1 or 2 John we are told that In Him is no darkness and if we live in darkness and say we have fellowship with Him we are liars. I read this and thought I believed it, yet I was living in darkness. That is contradictive.. Now I see it and realise God's word was showing me that I was lying, and had to truly place my faith in Him, that was my ticket out the darkness I was in.. I was living in unbelief (which is a really serious sin that was at the root of all my habitual sinning). If anyone died in a state of unbelief, they cannot be forgiven for they do not believe in the only One who can forgive then of that which condemns them to hell. This is what happened to Adam and eve, they were unbelieving, satan done it by placing doubts in their mind about the word of God. They ended up believing a lie. This is still what he is doing today.
Forsake listening to yourself, stop trusting your own thoughts and feelings. Examine yourself biblically and believe what you read to be true without a shadow of doubt.
If we fall away from faith, then it's impossible to be brought back. If you have faith, it is from God, not from ourselves. If we leave God then we lose faith for He is faithful, not us. When He is with us, we experience faith and can grow it.. Its a beautiful harmonious synchronisation of God sharing His faith with us, and us almost feeling like its ours.. Yet He is the author and finisher of our faith.. Notice the words here.. He is the "author".. And "finisher" of "our" faith. It seems contradictive doesn't it.. We know better with God that it's not. The author of a book, like scripture, is God, yet who did He allow to write it? The faithful... The same way the faith is His, but He allows us to apply it in ourselves to grow closer to Him. Like a mother who is baking cakes, and her little 4 year old wants to help. She knows her child will slow her down, make a mess, but allows her to help, when her husband gets home, she allows the child to present the cakes to him and tells him that it was her who made them..
There is nothing I desire more than to live in faith to the Lord. Yet I have let Him down tremendously, I rejected His tender and loving Spirit through unbelief and self righteousness. I am unworthy, and cannot do or offer anything to Him to help me.
Yet I must also note that it's not 100% despair, thank God for it. The enemy wants me to despair without pause and to finally die and join him. Yet there is grace and hope that peers through me, giving me some sort of hope that God is working even in such a horrible wretched man such as me.
I wish that nobody would have to experience the grace of God in this way, to seek and clutch at the very same Spirit that I was driving away from me, while being overcome with emotive waves of feeling abandoned by God etc, is just foolish. God id was working right there in those precious moments where I unbelieved and rejected His work. It is sad that I cannot recall just how deeply I grieved Him, I just know it was horrible, terrible enough for me to believe I was lost, after having grace dawn inside of me. I can't think of a worse person than me.
I may be wrong, but the desire I have to be restored to the Lord, to obey Him through faith, to understand His word and to share it with the world. The desire to change and to forsake myself, I cannot see how these things can originate from me, I am death and failure. It gives me a hope that I can obey the Lord in the faith I could of grown in 3 years ago.. And truly get to know Him, and to mourn properly in His presence for the pain and sickness I forced on Him.
The Lord is willing.. He has done immeasurably miraculous things for us all. Some thing's just so great and so loving that by itself, hardens us by seeing just how disgusting we are to be blind or impartial, or indifferent to it. Like me with the magical work of His Spirit.
All I know I can do, is see myself more and more as the depraved soul I am.. How helpless I am.. How evil and incapable I am. It makes me desire Him more. Confess my sins to Him, there are so many over such a long time it is difficult to have such a deep godly repentance over then, as I just feel so far from God, but at the same time, shouldn't I? Nobody should expect that God should be waiting at the door after living the way I had.. Unbelief... Dishonoring His very character, His essence and will.
If you pray, and because are far from the Lord. Don't sit in the dark and sulk with your sins. Truly expose them, see then as they are.. Try ponder and then scrutanize what they have cost you.. Think what it's done to God.. Place them beside His will and His character.. You want to confront yourself (if your heart is hardened) with more and more of your frequent sins.. But not only if them alone.. This is the enemies goal. But to then think about the Lord, His word, His grace and His sacrifice for you. Make a frequent of it.. Slowly it will begin to make you truly see yourself for what you are apart from the Lord, and will over time make you seek and appreciate Him, and to
forsake yourself.
If you are seeking forgiveness, might it just be the Lord who is seeking to forgive you, even after all you've done? Think about that for a moment.. meditate on it. Let it sink in. Who are you or I, to forgive, or desire to forgive? are we wretched sinners, asides from the forgiveness in us, that is a strong point? I say not.. I say we are wretched sinners with nothing good in us, that the Lord is good.
Did we love Christ? In fact we hated Him. Yet we love Him because He first loved us.
If we desire to know Him. Is it not His desire for us to know Him?
Just because we fail to define or imagine what work the Lord could be doing, does not mean work is not underway, in fact He never stops or rests unlike us.
If you can begin to see the deeper work of God behind the veil of unbelief, hardness of heart.. You will see His glory in a new perspective. A glory that works even for the lowest of the low, for those who are so blinded by unbelief that they sobbed for Him while He was holding their hand. Its hard to imagine a greater blindness. If the Lord does not give up in us... WHO could He? Could it be believed anymore that the Lord could ever give up on anyone?
If we live in habitual sin, its dangerous. Wilful sin, its dangerous. I, maybe you and many others know this. God is love but is a Holy judge. The scripture shows us both sides of Him and His justice and mercy. How many more days would I of went, before I had completely given over to my unbelief? How am I actually able to Not completely give over to it? If I was living in it for so long then why have I remained to this day, seeking/ desiring the Lord? Is it because whilst living at enmity with Him, while rejecting Him.. Being blind to Him, I somehow had strength of will, or of faith to hold onto Him blindly? Or is it more likely that through all of that, the Lord did not let go of me? Scripture speaks of us falling away, it speaks of the unforgivable Sin. Being unable to be renewed to repentance. If we get to the stage where we are completely taken over by our old ways, then we can get so far from the Lord that His hold on us, is treated as something else.. We notice not the hold He has in us, even if He is hanging on to us by the unforgivable Sin.
This is a deep thing to think about. I began to truly fear when I pondered commiting the unforgivable sin, losing the Lord (who I'd already thought I'd lost and never been able to get close to) this almost awoken something in me, a little bit of faith that the Lord has so graciously kept with me, for this moment. This is the battle I am in, and it will require faith to be won. It exposed me for the last 3 years, I then knew that the faith u thought I had was false, I knew the Lord had been with me, I knew He would of heard my prayers had I believed and had faith.. All these things that had hindered me since regeneration, suddenly were seen as the lies and darkness they had always been. How did this happen? I have only my own interpretation, that the Lord.. Having no other way that I can think of, to reveal His grace, His presence to me, remained with me, and through the fear of losing Him, the faith that remained because of Him, awoken to see the darkness and depravity of myself and the lies and unbelief I had been living in.
I couldn't do it without faith. I couldn't have faith without the Lord.
If we are fallen away, there is no chance of faith, for it comes from the Lord, His Spirit. That means there is no chance of forgiveness for forgiveness cones from the Lord and we only know Him by His Spirit. There can be no repentance for the divine knowledge and guidance required for repentance comes from the Holy Spirit. This is another thing I've struggled with.. So in some ways I know the Lord has not gone.. Yet I feel I cannot repent properly as I've not been convicted, and dint feel sorry enough, I rarely cry. Yet the Lord makes it clear and makes sense of it. How can someone living so far from God, in habitual wilful sin, after so long without being in communion with the Spirit.. Receive the grief of the Spirit? We used to feel grieved because He was right with us, right by us.. But we pushed Him away, and surrounded ourselves in darkness, He cannot dwell in darkness, for He is light, beautiful life giving light. Tender light, merciful light, Holy light. We cannot weep or grieve as He does, but as we can without Him, this again should only show us how sick and depraved we are that such abominable living barely budges our hearts. This is truly our natural ways toward God. Anything moving, anything that brought that beautiful heartfelt repentance came from the Lord, His Spirit, it as Him sharing the heavenly effects of sin to the disobedient children. Do not be sunk in despair if you feel you cannot repent. It will come, it has to. If you truly seek the Lord, want to be forgiven and forsake all your own ways, repentance will happen, just don't expect the heavenly version. Expect the depraved human kind.
An example in my case, is this. I no longer drink alcohol which I was drinking every day almost. I was smoking cigarettes, watching porn and occasionally having sex. These were part of my habitual life of sin. This didn't include all the pointless movies, TV shows, selfish purchases etc that filled up the rest of my time. However when this fear arose about the unforgivable Sin, and this little bit of faith arose, I instantly forsook all these things. Why? These were things that truly I thought I was in bondage again to. But it was all false, built in unbelief and lies, as soon as I had. A little bit of true faith, even though it came from a deep fear, that fear caused me to think I might of lost the Lord forever and I believed what it said... Then faith arose. True faith works repentance they are inseoersbke thus is evident by my unbelief.. If I ever repented after regeneration, why did I sink into deeper darkness and sin? Because it was not repentance through faith. The faith was missing. I was deceived thinking I believed but if I had, I wouldn't of fell gradually into a lifestyle of sin. So it's testimony of God's word again that the moment I had true faith, I forsook the lifestyle. The Lord had given me understanding about my unbelief.. I am blind, and the Lord is the teacher. I am the student, I teach myself nothing but the ways of death and destruction. The Lord however knows all things that can lead us back to the narrow path so although I was not experiencing the Holy Spirit in the way I thought I should if He hadn't left me, He was very much still at work from further away.
I was given knowledge of my sin (unbelief, fornication, drunkenness, idolatry - placing myself in God's position, etc)... This knowledge received in faith, along with the word of God, made me forsake them, and to seek the Lord.
But I cannot say that its smooth or final. I still battle with it even today, I wish nobody had to experience these things and the truth is they don't need to.
Do not give up. Treat Him faithfully, don't doubt Him, doubt yourself and use that doubt as motivation to seek Him. Pray, pray, pray and keep praying even when you don't feel like you are heard. Keep praying, read the word. Don't sink in despair for the Lord is in the light not the darkness. And He can see in the darkness but we cannot. Go to a good church, if your heart is hardened then it may be a little more difficukt, you may be anxious etc but trust me. Its better to go, and get familiar with God's people be honest with then don't try deceive them. Ask questions, make friends, listen intently to sermons, keep going don't give up after one or two night through fear, instead persevere, the Lord can use that but He can't do much if we give up! Reach out to chat if you want
