One of the roles of the Holy Spirit is to convict you of the nature of sin.

The Lord Jesus boiled sin down to one word:  unbelief—

John 16:9 (NKJV) — 9 of sin, because they do not believe in Me;

Unbelief is the parent of all other sins… all sin ultimately comes from unbelief.

The sin that doomed the human race in the garden of Eden was the sin of unbelief.

If Adam and Eve had simply believed what God told them to do and not to do, we would not be in the dire straits that we are in today.  (Well, that’s not completely true…I am sure that I would of messed it up for us all!)

Unbelief is the sin that reigns over all other sin.

 Unbelief is the unpardonable sin. I hope you fully understand that.

God can forgive a man of practically any sin; I do not care how horrible, hurtful, or heinous it might be.  What about Hitler?  Could Hitler have been saved?  Yes.  There is no sin (other than unbelief) that cannot be forgiven at the Cross.

But if a man dies refusing to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, there is no hope for him.

Dr. Rogers says that, “The sin of unbelief is actually a twofold sin.  It is a sin of commission and it is a sin of omission.  It is the sin of rejecting Jesus, and therefore the sin of refusing to receive the Lord Jesus.”

The only sin that has ever sent anyone to Hell is the sin of unbelief.

A man is not lost, without God–doomed because he gambles, gets drunk, cheats, lies, or steals.  Jesus died for every one of those sins, and He can forgive every one of those sins.

But the one sin that kills eternally is the sin of refusing to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus himself said in:

John 3:17–18 (NKJV) — 17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. 18 “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

A judge may convict you of a crime.

Your conscience can convict you of guilt.

But only the Holy Spirit can convict you of sin.

Many of you will remember the first sermon ever preached in the book of Acts on the day of Pentecost, when the Apostle Peter preached on repentance and faith in Christ, and 3,000 people were saved in one day. 

If Peter had preached that the day before, which is the day before the Holy Spirit had come, I don’t believe that the results would have been the same.

Those 3,000 people were not saved because of Peter’s delivery, style or passion.  It was not the witness of Peter that saved them, it was the work of the Holy Spirit.

The worst sin on planet earth today is the sin of unbelief. 

You show me a person who does not believe in Jesus Christ, and I do not care how morally he lives, or how much he gives to others or how well-intentioned he is…in the eyes of God he is just as guilty as the vilest sinner on earth.

Please understand this:  Show me a person who does not believe in sin, and I will show you a person who cannot believe in Jesus Christ, because the essence of sin is unbelief.

The Lord Jesus Christ died between two thieves hanging on two crosses. 

One died a saved thief, one died a lost thief; one is in hell today cursing God, one is in heaven today praising God. 

The only difference between those two thieves was unbelief. 

The greatest sin in the world is the sin of refusing to believe in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.  But only the Holy Spirit can convict you of that truth.

Has He done that in your life?