Prayer Works Morning Devotion: May 28, 2025

"Waiting On The Holy Spirit - Getting Our Hearts Ready for Pentecost"

"Matthew 12:28-32 - Blasphemy Against The Holy Spirit Will Not Be Forgiven"

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Bless the Lord, oh, my soul and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Thank you for joining us for this morning's devotion.

It is such a blessing to be able to work for the Lord. And it's such a blessing to be able to know that our family, our Kingdom, family is with us and our Kingdom family is present and not only here on this call, but all around the world.  

It's such a blessing to remember that even those who we may not know personally, we are joined with and connected with through the Holy Spirit.

And we have been looking at the Holy Spirit. Pastor Zee has been walking us through scriptures that teach us about who the Holy Spirit is. 

What the Holy Spirit equips us to do, what Jesus meant when he said to his disciples on resurrect and that he would send the Holy Spirit to them. And we we've been studying how the Holy Spirit has been present since the Old Testament since the beginning of time.  

The Holy Spirit has always been present with God. And this week we started going through scriptures in the New Testament that talked about the Holy Spirit.

And today our focus Scripture is Matthew 12:28-32 and maybe I'm going to actually back up a little bit and start with verse 22 to give a little bit more background as to what's happening.  

But before we begin, let me just pray. Heavenly Father, thank you so much again for this day.

Thank you that we have breath in our lungs that we have life in our bodies, that we have the ability to hear you and see you and every day presents a new opportunity to witness for you to share your love from the smallest to the greatest of ways Heavenly Father.  

So we thank you Heavenly Father for this fellowship of faith that you have joined all these lives together Heavenly Father to seek you in unity as one on this prayer call. So we thank you, Heavenly Father, for what you have joined together Heavenly Father.  

And we pray that you will be with us on this call and that your word may go forth and feed us as manner for this day. And I pray, heavenly Father that you will let the words of my mouth be acceptable to you.  

So thank you Heavenly Father once again for this opportunity. I praise you, I love you, I give you all glory and honor in Jesus name. So I'm going to start reading Matthew 12 and I'm going to start at verse 22 and I'm going to read through to verse 32.  

Then one was brought to him, who was demon possessed, blind and mute, and he healed him so that the blind and mute man both spoke, and saw. And all the multitudes were amazed and said could this be the son of David?  

Now, when the Pharisees heard it, they said this fellow does not cast out demons except by deals above the ruler of the demons. But Jesus knew their thoughts and said to them every Kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and every city or house divided against itself will not stand.  

If Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then will his Kingdom stand? And if I cast out demons by Beelzebub by whom do your sons cast out. Therefore, they shall be your judges.  

But if I cast out demons by the spirit of God, surely the Kingdom of God has come upon you. Or how can one enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods unless he first binds the strong man and then he will plunder his house. 

He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters abroad. Therefore, I say to you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the spirit will not be forgiven men.  

Anyone who speaks a word against the son of man, it will be forgiven him. But whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him either in this age or in the age to come.  

So you look at this word blasphemy. Blasphemy in a biblical sense means to talk against, to slander God and the Holy Spirit, so Jesus is saying anyone that slanders with his mouth, with her or her mouth, the works of the Holy Spirit.  

And gives credit to the evil one to Satan for casting out demons and healing. They what it what it takes to be in the heart of a person that is able to do that means that they are just on the brink of absolute unforgiveness, and here Jesus is giving a warning to the Pharisees saying you can't.  

You see the good works that Jesus is doing in casting out demons and stealing this demon possessed man who was also blind and mute. They saw this, and yet their hearts were so hardened that they attributed to the work of Satan.  

Can you imagine what it took to get to that point where you can see the goodness of the Lord and attributed to the power of Satan, and before this, I'm not going to read the verses, but before this.  

There's a lot going on, the Pharisees had it against Jesus because for many, many reasons, one was jealousy. One was they thought that he and his disciples were disobeying the Sabbath or not observing the Sabbath because Jesus prior to this had healed a man with who had a withered hand.  

And the varieties have told them, well, is it lawful for you to heal a man with a withered hand? And Jesus, like you all are totally not getting the point of what the Sabbath is. You have piled on to a commandment of God's commandments of men because you wanted to create the Sabbath in your image.  

But Jesus had told them. He is Lord of the Sabbath and as Lord of the Sabbath he has every right and authority to help them understand what it means to observe the Sabbath in spirit and in truth, and not with all these extra laws and rules and regulations that have that they had piled on prior to this conversation. 

Talking with them, they had criticized Jesus for allowing his disciples as they were going through the fields to pluck off the heads of grain and eat them because they were hungry and they said, oh, that was to follow the Sabbath.  

How dare you pluck off heads of grain that was work and then they also were condemning Jesus because he healed someone, he healed this man who was suffering on the Sabbath and they.

After this, they determined in their hearts and they began to kill him so as at this time as he heals, this demon possessed blind and mute man.  

These Pharisees had already determined in their heart that they were going to get it. They were going to kill him. So just imagine all this is going on in their hearts as they say, Jesus was only able to heal this demon possessed, blind and mute men by the spirit of Beelzebub above.  

This is when Jesus says you can slander me. You can talk bad against God. You can do any sin, any sin in the world and that actually is as a comfort for us, because if you imagine no matter what sin we've done.  

It can be forgiven if we ask for forgiveness and repent, but what it takes the depth of sin, the depths of denial and the depth of hardness of heart that it takes to attribute the works of the spirit to Satan.  

Means that you are just beyond forgiveness because what it takes to do that means a total and absolute and complete rejection of the Holy Spirit, which in turn means a complete and absolute rejection of Jesus Christ and God, Father ultimately.  

So the unpardonable sin is the blasphemy or surrender of the Holy Spirit. But yet we can take hope in this in that if you think that you have committed any sin in your life that makes you unworthy.  

We see in these in this scripture passage right here Jesus says any sin can be forgiven any sin. So we can take comfort in that in knowing that any sin we have committed can be forgiven, any sin.  

So if you're holding in your heart remembrances and still beating yourself up about things you may have done in your past or even about things you may be still harboring or holding in your heart today, all that can be forgiven. 

If you ask for forgiveness and you repent. The only sin that cannot be forgiven is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. And if you look throughout the old and New Testament, this word bless blasphemy and when it's used it's always used in general use in the context of Satan. 

And what Satan did and what Satan will do, as revealed and prophesied in revelation, what the beast will do in the final days, the beast will be someone who will be filled with blasphemous words and blasphemous speaking against God and the Holy Spirit.  

So let that be a sign to us as we're all looking for the Antichrist, and all of this and saying, well, who's the next Antichrist or this? There are people, yes, who behave in incredibly ungodly ways and who commit all kinds of heinous acts, but even they can be forgiven.  

However, there will come a time when a beast will come forward and his mouth will be full of blaspheming the Holy Spirit and as it says in the Book of Revelation, multitudes will follow him.  

So let's beware, anyone blaspheming against the Holy Spirit run, be warned. So these verses not only provide a warning to us, they also provide hope to us in the sense that Jesus is telling us, hey, you want to talk bad about me.  

I can forgive you that can be forgiving you but don't attribute to Satan the holy works of the Almighty God, through his Holy Spirit. So as we begin to prepare our hearts for the Holy Spirit, let's not take the Holy Spirit lightly.  

Let's not minimize this great power that Jesus has gifted to us so that we can stand in this day. Let's not minimize that, let's not think that it means nothing.

It means everything. Let's hold fast to that truth and let's not be like the Pharisees thinking that it is the following of the laws that will make us holy.  

That will make us pleasing in the sight of God, no, you can follow every law there is on the books. How many laws are there in this nation? How many laws are there in the world and that following those laws don't make you holy?  

What makes you holy is your obedience, our obedience. Our giving honor to God. Our giving honor to Jesus, our letting the Holy Spirit work through us and in us. That's what makes us holy. It's not following every letter of the law.  

It's love, you don't need a law for love. But if you don't have love in your heart, then of course you're going to need all kinds of laws to tell you what is right, what is wrong. Don't do this.  

Don't do that, and you're going to be looking for a formula, a prescription for faith and there is no prescription for faith, there's no formula for faith. There's no rule book for faith and love. 

It's in your heart. It starts in your heart and the more as we learn and lean into understanding where the Holy Spirit is and who we are. Let us not take this for granted. Let us really go into this season as we prepare to remember Pentecost and what it means.  

Let us prepare for something special and even today, we can prepare our hearts for something special, we can prepare our hearts that in some way, God will use us, even if it seems small, because we never know, just smiling and making eye contact with someone in the grocery store at your office, at some stranger. 

You just never know how that one act may be an answer to someone's prayer. Some of whom may have been saying I feel invisible. Or God, I'll know you exist if someone smiles at me today and gives me a kind word.  

I know you exist if someone does something helps me in some way. So I urge all of us today listen to the promptings of the Holy Spirit today, because the Holy Spirit is always prompting us, that insistent still calm voice that urges you to do a good deed to do something good for someone.  

And it's not going to be a you're not going to be able to hear that voice when you're stressed out. You know you have to be able to hear their voice when you're confused, when you're angry, when you're upset.  

But that's still voice will cut through when you're still and when you ask. So as today ask for the Holy Spirit to speak to us, let's ask for better eyes to see and better ears to hear what God is saying to us through his Holy Spirit. 

Whatever nudges, holy nudges, and I'm not talking about impulses. The holy nudges of the Holy Spirit are not to be confused with our impulses. Even sometimes when we have the impulse to do good it’s not necessarily a Holy Spirit.  

The Holy Spirit and nudges will often require some form of sacrifice. Something that will be so extraordinary and exceptional but it will be for the good of someone else and you'll be a blessing.  

You'll be a blessing, and it's not something that we're going to get something out of but it's something that we're doing just solely for the good of the person and solely because we want to be obedient to what God is leading us to.  

So let's not be like the Pharisees looking at the rules and the laws and thinking that it's the rules and the laws that make us holy. No, it's the love of God. The first Two commandments, the first greatest commandments.  

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, all your strength and love your neighbor as yourself. If the Pharisees who prided themselves on being the keepers of the law.  

Who really believe that if we're really following that, there's no way that they could have said to someone who was hungry. Oh, you can't pluck heads of grain because you're hungry.  

You're working, you're breaking the Sabbath. Or you can't kill someone who has a withered hand on the Sabbath. Or you can't free a demon possessed man who's deaf and mute on the Sabbath.

If they truly believe in the first two and greatest commandments, there's no way that they could have said those things.  

There's no way that they could have plotted in their hearts to kill Jesus. There's no way they could have done it. So my brothers and sisters in Christ do not be deceived, know that the Holy Spirit is all powerful.  

The Holy Spirit is the spirit of God. The Holy Spirit is our gift that Jesus sent to us to sustain us especially for a time such as this. And we're here right now as believers in the faith because God knew he knew us and formed us, and the wounds of our mothers.  

He knew that for this time we will be here. We will be now, we will be trusting and believing and seeking the Lord. We'll be trusting and waiting for the power and presence of the Holy Spirit.  

So that we would be the ones who will be found faithful when Jesus returns. And we don't know when he's returning, but like to live, as you know, he could return at any moment. Let’s pray.  

Heavenly Father we thank you for your great mercy. We thank you for your great grace. We thank you that even though Jesus is not with us here in body, he is with you in heaven and he is with us in spirit.

And he is advocating for us and he is praying for us. And he did not leave us alone, but he left us your Holy Spirit.  

And it's only through your Holy Spirit that we were able to stand. That we were able to discern that we were able to have the wisdom that we need, especially for a time such as this.  

It is only through your Holy Spirit that we can remain calm and at peace when all around us is chaos and all around us, our lives and deception and distractions, we can remain at peace because we have your Holy Spirit. And we are looking forward eager anticipation to commemorate the day of Pentecost.

That great day when you showed out your Holy Spirit and you showered the Holy Spirit, upon the early church and they needed that Holy Spirit Father, and it was because they had your Holy Spirit that they were able to stand against the Roman Empire.  

The Roman Empire is no more no one who would have thought the Great Roman Empire would come to nothing. Would be just a memory buried under layers of history. Who would have thought that the Christian faith would still be standing. And the Christian faith is still standing. 

And we are picking up the torch we are picking up the baton of faith that the early church has passed on to us over the many, many centuries and we still here at this time are picking up the torch are passing on the baton to the next generation help us Heavenly Father to be effective witnesses for you. 

Help us to keep holy the things that are holy. Help us to walk in your spirit today and help us to not miss opportunities where we can share love and where when people see us and hear us they can say, surely, surely God exists because they see the work of your Holy Spirit in us.  

I pray your blessing. I pray your covering upon these, your children. That you would sustain us this day. That you will help us to climb every mountain, overcome every obstacle that we may face.  

I pray Heavenly Father that you will encourage us and keep us strong. I pray that we will act on the nudging of the Holy Spirit promptly and not delay.  

I know Heavenly Father that as we approach this day of Pentecost and as we seek to gather to praise you and wait with expectation on what it is that you have in store for us as you wait in expectation for a fresh filling of the Holy Spirit, we know the enemy will try to come against us.  

But we also know Heavenly Father that it is by your Holy Spirit that demons are cast out. That demons are sent fleeing. So we pray Heavenly Father, to walk in this knowledge, this day and every day.  

I ask you're covering your protection over all of your children. Help us Heavenly Father to fight the good fight of faith, to stand, strengthen our armor, Heavenly Father and let our steps be guided by you today.  

And I pray all this in Jesus precious name, Amen. Amen family God bless you. Know that we love you. We truly love you and have a blessed and mighty day in the Lord, Goodbye.