Do You Have a Godly Conscience?

Well, brethren, you no doubt have heard the expression, Let your conscience be your guide. Is that always a good policy? To let your conscience be your guide? What about the recent Boston Marathon terrorists? You know, we've heard so much about those terrorists. What type of conscience did they have when they decided to plant those bombs, which killed an eight-year-old boy? You all remember, I know there was a 29-year-old girl named Crystal Campbell that was killed.

I think there was another young lady that was killed with these bombs. So, what type of conscience did they have? Were they listening to their conscience when they set the bombs that maimed several others and wounded well over a hundred people? Were they listening to their conscience when they assassinated Sean Collier? You remember the 26-year-old police officer at MIT? How could someone set off bombs to kill people they don't even know?

How could someone kill innocent children? What allows people to do such heinous acts? What type of conscience could allow for such mayhem and destruction? What type of conscience do you have? Today, we're going to talk about our conscience. Do you have a godly conscience? Now, that's the title of the sermon. Do you have a godly conscience? Because, brethren, our conscience must be a godly one. It needs to be one that is yielded to God's Holy Spirit. So, do you have a godly conscience? Your conscience must accept the true God of creation as your primary authority in your life.

Your conscience must be convicted of God's laws, of God's commandments, of God's statutes. And your conscience must be committed to living by every word of God. Only then may your conscience be your guide. Otherwise, don't listen to your conscience, because it'll get you into trouble. So, today, we're going to talk about developing and maintaining a godly conscience.

We're going to talk about four principles that will help us to develop and also to maintain a godly conscience. So, we'll go through four principles. The first one is by far the longest, so don't be too alarmed when I'm only halfway through when I finish the first point. Because, in my notes, I've got about nine pages of notes, and the first five pages cover point number one.

So, this is the longest point. And that is, you must accept the true God as the one primary source of authority in your life. If you're going to have a godly conscience, it only stands to reason that it must be the true God that you've accepted as the primary source of authority in your life. Anything short of that will get you into big trouble. We all need to surrender to God and strive to please Him in all that our hands find to do. We know that God is love, and we know that we are told we are to become love.

So, we have to accept the true God as the one primary source of authority in our lives. Now, I know that we all believe we've done that, but have we done it perfectly? Are we behaving in such a way that shows that we are doing it perfectly? That's not the case for any of us, because we're all still human. We all fall short. We're not like Jesus Christ yet. Christ was perfect. Christ was without sin.

Christ was totally yielded to that one primary source of authority, the Father, God the Father. You see, the problem with the terrorists, and I'll just refer to them as Suspect 1 and 2, because I guess it's Zarnayev or something like that, Tamilin, and hard names to pronounce. But when we first heard about them, it was Suspect 1 and 2. We probably all saw on the TV set these men that had perpetrated these crimes, and they had pictures of them.

The older brother was Suspect 1 and the younger brother was Suspect 2. So the problems with these men, the big problem is that they did not have a godly conscience. If they'd had a godly conscience, they could have never done what they did. They no doubt killed people thinking they were doing Allah a great service.

I have no doubt that they were, at least in certain ways, dedicated, thinking that they were doing Allah a service by killing the infidel. Isn't that what Allah wants? To have the infidel killed? But, you know, Allah is not the true God of creation. So we might ask the question, who is behind this god Allah who endorses such terrorist behavior? Because if you read the Qur'an, it's hard to get around what is said there, even though some people claim that that's not the way Allah is.

But if you really read the Qur'an and see what it says in there, you would no doubt think differently. There's something very twisted in their thinking. So who is behind the terrorists? Well, the god of this world is behind the terrorists. Satan has deceived the whole world in this matter of conscience, so their conscience didn't bother them a whole lot, evidently, because they were able to do it.

Again, they thought they were doing God a service, but the problem was it was the wrong god. The true god was not their primary source of authority. They were following another god. They were under the sway of Satan the devil. They were deceived, very clearly deceived, believing many lies regarding God and religion. And that's the world we live in. The world is confused about God. It's confused about religion. So many people believe many lies, and it's not just the Muslims.

It's a lot of Christians, too, that believe a lot of lies. And the Bible is very clear on that. Christ said, how be it in vain do they worship me teaching for doctrine the commandments of men? They were worshipping God in vain, or Christ in vain, because they were serving the wrong god. They placed their faith in a false god. They placed their faith in the father of lies.

People like these terrorists are defiled by Satan's lies, and so they do his bidding. They don't believe in the true god of creation, the omnipotent, the almighty, the perfect, the loving god, the god of mercy. Their hearts and minds are twisted and defiled by lies and by treachery. Now, let's go to Titus 1, and the Bible speaks to this very fact here, Titus chapter 1, verses 15 and 16. Titus 1, Titus 1, verses 15 and 16. To the pure, all things are pure, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure, but even their mind and their conscience are defiled.

They profess to know God, but in works they deny Him. Being abominable, what those men did was an abomination. You know, what they did to innocent people was abominable. Being abominable, disobedient, and disqualified for every good work. One of the commandments says, thou shall not murder. And God is talking about this type of murder, this type of thing that they did. So they were abominable, they were disobedient, they were disqualified for every good work. Both the mind and the conscience can become so defiled that they cease making distinctions between what is pure and what is right and what is wrong.

So we might ask ourselves, just what is the conscience? The Bible uses that word in the New King James anyway. It uses the word conscience. And the English word conscience is a combination of the Latin words, sire, I don't know how to pronounce it, s-c-i-r-e, which means to know, and con, which means together. So the Greek word for conscience is found more than 30 times in the New Testament. It is the word, again, I don't know how to pronounce this either, but it's sounidasis, s-u-n-e-i-d-e-s-i-s.

It literally means the self that knows with or observes itself. It's talking about an inner, something going on inside, an inner voice that we should listen to if it's yielded primarily and first and foremost to the true God. So it means the self that knows with itself. So that really doesn't tell us much about the conscience, does it? I mean, you can only get so much out of that. We'll learn more by looking at how the word is used in the Bible.

So in this verse that we just used here in Titus, it talks about, But even their mind and their conscience are defiled, so we can defile our conscience. So we can't always listen to our conscience because our conscience may be defiled. So we have to be careful that our conscience is pure and that our conscience is tuned in with God and that we are on the same wavelength with God. Let's go to Romans 2, where this word is used again.

Romans 2. Romans 2. We'll read just two verses here. Romans 2, verses 14 and 15. Romans 2, verses 14 and 15. We're going to break into a lengthy sentence that Paul has... He often does this. Long, long sentences drawn out. So we'll just come into the middle here in verse 14. He says, For when the Gentiles who do not have the law, by nature do the things in the law, So by nature they were keeping certain aspects of the law. Not every aspect by any means, but they were keeping certain aspects of the law.

Although not having the law are a law to themselves who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, And between themselves and their thoughts accusing or else excusing them. In the day when God will judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ, according to my gospel. Of course, this is Paul that wrote this. Notice the conscience bears witness. So what is a witness? Well, a witness is one who testifies, one who gives evidence as to the facts or events. As in a courtroom, the attorney calls certain witnesses to prove whatever it is he's trying to prove.

So the conscience is a witness. Your individual conscience witnesses or testifies or bears witness either against you or for you. It witnesses or it testifies in the court of your human mind that you did this or that or you're about to do this or that. You're considering that you're going to do a certain act or a certain thing. It is a kind of inner voice that witnesses or testifies concerning our actions and our thoughts.

Richard Armour said, the conscience is a built-in feature that haunts the sinner, helps the preacher. I guess it helps the preacher because hopefully the members are haunted by a guilty conscience and so they don't get themselves into trouble, which helps the preacher. Because he doesn't have to get weighed into a big problem. I guess that's what he means. He goes on to say, some sins it makes us turn and run from, but most it simply takes the fun from.

So he's saying that a guilty conscience. You know, you've heard that expression and no doubt you've had a guilty conscience at times. You knew you did something you shouldn't have done and you felt badly about it. You felt guilty because you had done something wrong. Well, instead of doing it, we should listen to our conscience that's being inspired by the true God and not do it. Back off and not go that route. We don't have to listen to the temptation. That's different from the conscience. I mean, it's hard to separate exactly how all this works, obviously, but Satan tries to tempt us. And then there is a conscience that God has placed in us. And, you know, I don't know that I can explain it fully, but we're going to give it a try anyway by looking at the various scriptures here. And that inner voice often convicts us that we shouldn't do something, but sometimes we override our conscience, don't we? Sometimes we choose to do it anyway.

And how we... choices that we make will perhaps defile our conscience or will help our conscience be pure. So it is important the choices that we make. So it doesn't stop here. Our conscience is not just a witness. You might say it's also a judge in some respects. As Paul said, their thoughts alternating, accusing, or defending them. In other words, your conscience not only testifies as to what you did, but then acts as a judge. It either accuses or defends what you did and then pronounces you innocent or guilty. So according to Romans 2 that we just read, all men have a law written in their hearts. They have a moral awareness, a personal sense of right and wrong. Now that only goes so far. The conscience is, again, that inner voice that witnesses, judges, and convicts us. That is, it approves or condemns our actions and our thoughts. Romans 9, verse 1. Let's go take a look at what Paul says here in Romans 9, verse 1. Paul says, I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying. My conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit. He says that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart. So he says, the conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit does act upon our conscience. Our Christian conscience, if we are led by the Spirit of God, if we indeed have God's Spirit dwelling in us or God's Spirit is working with us, then our conscience is led by the Holy Spirit. Our conscience will become more and more like the kind of conscience that Jesus Christ had. Jesus Christ made all the right decisions. His conscience was always pure. He never sinned. He never had a guilty conscience because he never sinned. In John chapter 8, let's go there and consider this account. It also uses this word, conscience, here.

John chapter 8, verse 9. Now, the story, and I'm not going to read all the verses here, but remember that the scribes and Pharisees brought a woman to Christ, a woman who had been caught in the very act of adultery. Now, for some reason, they didn't bring the man. Now, that's a little fishy because it takes two to commit adultery. So, the woman was brought to Christ. And in verse 4, it says, Now, Moses and the law commanded us that you should be stoned, or that such a person should be stoned. But what do you say? So, they were testing Christ to see what Christ would do. They wanted to see if he would accuse her and if he would say she should be stoned. They were trying to trap him. Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with his finger as though he didn't hear what they said. So, when they continued asking him, he raised himself up and said, And again, he stooped down and he wrote on the ground. Now, we don't know what he wrote on the ground, do we? I mean, you've all heard speculation, perhaps, that he was writing on the ground certain dates, certain acts that maybe some of these Pharisees had committed themselves. Sins that they had committed. Now, that's pure speculation because the Scripture doesn't tell us what Christ wrote. But it does go on to say, verse 9, Then those who heard it, now Christ, again, he told him that he was without sin cast the first stone. So, it's very likely Christ was writing something on the ground that convicted them. And it wasn't just this one sentence that did it. It must have been something else, but we don't know what that was. When they heard what Christ said, being convicted by their conscience. Their conscience convicted them, I believe, that they too were sinners because they were not going to cast their first stone. They went out, one by one, beginning with the oldest, even to the last, and Jesus was left alone. And the woman was standing in the midst, and Jesus had raised himself up and saw no one but the woman. And he said, Woman, where are your accusers? Has no one condemned you? She said, No one, Lord. And Jesus said to her, Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more. So, Christ was very clear that she shouldn't go on sinning. That adultery wasn't okay. He wasn't giving her a pass to go on and commit adultery. He was basically showing her that if she repented, she would be forgiven her sins. Go and sin no more. So that was the instruction that was given to her. But these men were convicted by their conscience. No doubt, they were sinners too. So they realized that they were being hypocritical at the time. And there's no doubt, these were scribes and Pharisees that were trying to trap Jesus Christ. It's very likely that they slunk away, having made the right decision that time, but probably plotting to come back and trap him in some other way. And that's how the human heart can be. It's deceitful above all things. It's desperately wicked. But also, we're smart enough to know when someone has us, so to speak. Jesus Christ had him over a barrel to some degree. Exactly how he managed that. The Scripture doesn't tell us. But they did do the right thing. In that instance, they did listen upon the urging of their conscience, and they left the woman alone with Jesus Christ.

Now, the Apostle Paul, after his conversion, was one who endeavored, who strove. That is a real word, by the way. I looked that up to make sure it's... Strobe is a word. He strove to have a good conscience. He strove to have a godly conscience. No doubt, before his conversion, he also strove to have such a conscience, because he was a Pharisee, remember? And a very dedicated one. A very dedicated Pharisee who tried to kill God's people, thinking he was doing God a service. So, in a very real sense, Paul was a terrorist, wasn't he? He was terrorizing God's church. He was terrorizing the true people of God. He thought he was doing God a service when he was doing this, and he was ignorant, until he was struck down on the road to Damascus. So, here's a Pharisee, a believer in Judaism, and the Old Testament, of course. He'd grown up that way. He knew the Bible, the Scriptures, but he wasn't yet enlightened about some of the Scriptures in the Old Testament that talk about the Messiah, Jesus the Christ. But God struck him down on the road to Damascus, so his eyes were opened spiritually at this time, even though he was blinded physically. His eyes were opened spiritually, and he did show a desire to have a clean conscience.

But it was only when Paul's eyes were opened to the true God that he really began to obey and please God. Before that, he was even killing God's people. So, the true God wants us to treat all men and women with genuine love and respect. That's what God says. He's not a respecter of persons because he loves all people. That's the difference. He loves everyone. So, he's not a respecter of any particular individual because he loves all of us.

He wants us to learn to love our enemies, to pray for them. So, we have to have our conscience built upon the true God and what God says. And we have to accept Christ as our personal Savior as well. So, Paul came to realize that he was a terrorist. He repented of that. And he became a true vessel for good, a true vessel of the true God. When we respond to God's calling, our conscience takes a new orientation. We begin to recognize a new authority. I remember when I was just a young man, I was only 18 years old when God began to open my mind to call me. My mother had gotten the Plain Truth magazine, which was a forerunner of a long time ago. We don't have a Plain Truth magazine any longer. But in the old days, back in the 30s and 40s, the Plain Truth began, I think, in the 30s. It was even called the Messenger of Truth before that. I've seen a few copies of the Messenger of Truth, but the Plain Truth became very well known. It had a circulation of 8 or 9 million people, I think. It was pretty well known. Mr. Armstrong was all over the radio, and certainly in Mexico and the United States. So, I was 18 when God began to call me. When I was moving toward baptism, there was a real change in my life, because I finally started submitting to the true authority in my life. I thought it was me up until that point. As a teenager, I thought, surely, I could just listen to whatever it is I wanted to do. But then I realized that I wasn't the only source of authority. Granted, our parents are supposed to be our authority, but as teenagers, we don't always listen to our parents the way we should. The reality is that we look to our own selves as our authority, and we basically try to do what it is we want to do, rather than submitting to the authority that God clearly says, honor your father and mother, which should mean obey your father and mother. Do what they want you to do, even when you're 17. You should still, if they tell you, well, I want you to stay home tonight. Then you really should listen to that authority and submit yourself to it. That's God's way. Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long on the earth. There's a blessing in obeying your parents.

But as a young man, I wasn't a bad young man. Put quotes around bad. I was a pretty good guy. Everyone thought I was. In some ways, I was, compared to a lot of other things that other guys were doing. But I certainly was not perfect by any means, and I started to change my life. I remember when God was calling me, I was sometimes kind of mean to my brothers. I come from a large family, seven kids in the family. I'm the fourth of seven. I've got two younger brothers and a younger sister. It was the two younger brothers that were closest and aged to me that I was the meanest, too. I had an older brother, but he was stronger and bigger than I was. So I could only do so much to terrorize him. But I was a terrorist toward my younger brothers. I teased quite a bit. I remember when Mom and Dad were both away at work, and I was in charge. Then I was like the foreman. They had to do all the work. I would direct them. I had to make sure it got done, but I tried to do as little of it as I could get away with, which wasn't right. So I started changing my conduct. I think my brothers were probably shocked, because I started being nice to them. I'm sure I wasn't quite as mean, anyway. I was getting better. So we should change when God begins to work in our lives. Our conscience should feel guilty if we're trying to do something that's wrong. If we're trying to take advantage of someone, if we're being selfish, our conscience should speak to us, in a sense, that inner voice. Not that it's something that you can hear verbally. It doesn't speak out loud, but it will speak within you. As long as it's motivated by God's Spirit, then it's a good thing to listen to it.

So we need to change. In other words, my conscience was becoming more sensitive as I was becoming converted. So when we're converted, our conscience begins to witness to the will of God the Father and Jesus Christ, rather than just our own will. Now, Christ was completely perfect because He always did the Father's will. He was completely submissive, and He always obeyed His Father. So when we become converted, or when we're on our way to conversion, a change of sensitivity in our conscience takes place.

Our conscience was previously dull and insensitive in many ways, but at conversion, our conscience was newly awakened to a conflict in the authorities that we recognize. Remember, this first point is we have to recognize God the Father and Jesus Christ as our authority in life. It's not what we want to do.

There's a way that seems right to a man, but the ends thereof are the ways of death. So it's not smart to just do what you want to do. That's what this world tells you. If it feels good, do it. I'm okay, you're okay, just as I am. You don't really need to change.

You don't have to be different. But that's not what the Scripture says. In Hebrews 9, it shows that our conscience has to be purged. We have to clean up our conscience and we have to be purged. So in Hebrews 9, we see that it is through the blood of Jesus Christ that our conscience is purged, that our conscience is cleaned up.

Hebrews 9, verse 14, again, we're breaking into this thought about how the blood of bulls and goats and calves doesn't cut it. Those Old Testament sacrifices, they pointed to Jesus Christ, a much greater sacrifice, a perfect sacrifice. So the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, they sprinkle the unclean, according to the Old Testament, and the sacrifices that are listed there. So they served a purpose. They made people mindful that their sins caused the shedding of blood.

And it was pointing to Christ shed blood. Verse 14, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? So we're supposed to stop doing those things that lead to death. Again, there's a way that seems right to a man, but the ends thereof are the ways of death. So we need to stop disobeying God. We need to keep his commandments. That's how we cleanse our conscience, and we begin to serve the true God by being obedient.

And we'll talk about that more in the other points. So Christ, it says in verse 15, is the mediator of the new covenant. And of course, in the new covenant, we write God's laws in our hearts and in our minds. Alright, so accepting Christ as our Savior, again, that's part of this first point. We accept the true God and his Son, Jesus Christ, as our Savior. They are the primary source of authority in our lives.

They're only real source of authority that we need to listen to. Whatever they say, and of course they say, honor your father and mother, and they say submit to the civil authorities. So they tell us who we should submit to, and they say, you must obey God rather than man. So they give us instructions on who the authorities are in our lives. Remember what it says in Romans 6, verse 2, how shall we who died to sin still live in it?

We die to sin when we're baptized. When we go under the watery grave, we've repented of our sins, and we've accepted Christ as our Savior, and our sins are washed away. And now we have a clean conscience. We have a clear conscience, and it's a wonderful feeling when you come out of the watery grave, and you know that all your sins are forgiven, and they're all behind you, and you have a clean slate. And of course we realize that we will sin because we're still in the flesh, but now we have an advocate.

We have a high priest. We have Jesus Christ who shed his blood for us, and when we repent, then we experience that same cleansing every time. Our sins are forgiven, and it's wonderful to have the sacrifice of Jesus Christ because we don't have to have a guilty conscience.

When we repent, then our conscience should be cleaned up. It should be cleared again. And we should go and sin no more. That should be our goal. That should be our objective, is to go and sin no more. And if we happen to be tempted, and we're weak, and we give in, then we have to seek repentance. We have to go to God. We have to go before that throne of grace, asking, begging for forgiveness.

It says God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins. If we will repent of our sins, if we will admit that we sinned. When you don't admit you sinned, that's when you're in real trouble. When you can't own up to your sins. When you allow yourself to be deceived, sin is deceitful. And so you have to be careful that you're not sinning, thinking that you're okay. Sometimes we know we're sinning, but we push it away because we don't want to deal with it.

We want to do what we want to do rather than what God wants us to do. So that's the first point we've taken long enough. Yes, I've taken about half the sermon. Just as I told you I would. That's the first point. Now let's go on to the second point. And all of this first point leads into the other points. The second point is you must be committed to living by every word of God. By all of His laws, all of His commandments, all of His statutes. And remember, love is the fulfilling of the law. Love is keeping the law. Christ said, if you love me, keep my commandments. And also, it's very important that we realize love is the fulfilling of the law both toward God and man.

Toward God and man. And I'll show you a very important scripture here in Acts 24. This is a very, very important scripture. And I think too many times we think we're serving God while we're mistreating our fellow man.

And that happens in God's church way too much. Acts 24, verse 16. This being so I myself always strive to have a conscience without offense toward God and man. Now this is Paul speaking here in the book of Acts.

He says again, verse 16. This being so I myself always strive to have a conscience without offense toward God and man. So we should be careful that we don't try to offend man either. And that we should have a conscience that's right toward God and toward men. So the New King James says blameless here. That was his goal, to be blameless. Oh, I says the New King James says without offense, I guess, doesn't it?

I guess I didn't write this down, but one of the translations says blameless, I believe.

Strive to be blameless without offense toward God and men. So what about you? Do you strive to exercise your conscience to develop and maintain your conscience to be blameless before God and man? Now, certainly the Boston Marathon terrorists had consciences that were seared. And they were badly broken. Their consciences were just seared. They were badly broken or they could not have done what they did. They thought they were doing Allah a service while they were murdering their fellow man. Right? They were murdering their fellow man, but they felt justified in doing so, thinking they were doing Allah a service.

So we might... Let's go to 1 Timothy 4, where it talks about how our conscience can be seared. 1 Timothy 4. 1 Timothy 4, verse 1. Now, the Spirit expressly says that in latter times, some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared with a hot iron.

When someone is seared, what... You know, if you sear your flesh, what happens? It hurts, doesn't it? It hurts. It's painful, but a scar develops generally when you get seared and it's not as sensitive any longer. If you sear your conscience, then it's not nearly as sensitive as it once was. And we sear our conscience when we go against our conscience, when we don't listen to a godly conscience, and when we break God's laws and we don't repent of them quickly. Then we continue to sear our conscience. So it's a very dangerous cycle to get into is ignoring sin. When we ignore our sins, we are in danger of searing our conscience, making it less and less sensitive, less and less likely to repent. Sin must be met with true repentance, or one's conscience becomes seared. If we don't repent of our sin and we continue in our sins, then we sear our conscience. It becomes even easier to go on sinning. And so it's a very vicious cycle. And sometimes God has to really stomp on us, so to speak, or allow us to be stomped on through our own... We reap what we sow. If we're sinning against God, there are consequences. Be sure your sins will find you out. And there are certain things that will really get you into trouble quickly. Certain sins that will get you into deep trouble. Every sin will get you into some trouble. Some will get you into worse trouble.

So sin must be met with true repentance, or one's conscience becomes seared.

So what would sear a person's conscience? Again, when we sin, when we allow ourselves to be deceived, when we make excuses for ourselves, when we say, well, I'm just weak. Well, we all know you're weak, and I'm weak too, but God says you have to be an overcomer. So you have to put sin out of your life, so just using that as an excuse doesn't cut it. We're supposed to be overcomers, so we have to continue to fight the good fight. We have to continue to battle whatever sin is trying to get the best of us. So sin must be met with true repentance. A guilty conscience is a good thing. In many ways, I mean, if we sinned, then you better have a guilty conscience. Because if you don't, then you're in real trouble. That means you seared your conscience.

It's been said that a budget is like a conscience. You know, a personal financial budget is like a conscience. It doesn't keep you from spending. But it makes you feel guilty about it. If you have a budget and it tells you how much to spend and you break the budget, you know, it doesn't keep you from spending. The budget itself doesn't keep you from spending. You can still go out and spend. But you kind of feel guilty about it, you know, if you've really broken the budget. And it's a little bit like a conscience in that regard. When we do something that's wrong, then our conscience should convict us of sin. If it's a godly conscience.

This world doesn't want to accept guilt. Again, Satan the devil wants us to accept... He doesn't want us to accept guilt. He wants us to think that we're okay, that we don't need to change. It's also been said that a conscience is like a baby. It has to go to sleep before you can. You know how a baby is? If you have a baby that's crying and screaming, it's pretty hard to sleep, isn't it? It's pretty hard to sleep. We must deal with our consequences. Some people deal with it by searing it so they can sleep. That's how some people deal with it.

Of course, that's not a good way, is it? The way to deal with your conscience is to repent of your sin. Then you'll sleep a lot better. It's not a very restful sleep if we know we've gone against God, unless we really sear our conscience and we can sleep through anything.

Godly men and women deal with their conscience by repenting of their sins. That allows them to sleep more peacefully. Sin begets sin, and one's conscience is defiled as a result. So again, we need to repent of our sins. We need to spare our conscience.

It's been said, if it weren't for your conscience, you would probably do everything you want to do right away.

You'd do it immediately if it wasn't for your conscience. So your conscience will slow you down a little bit, but if you're not careful, you're still going to do what you want to do. And you will find reasons and justifications for doing so. So your conscience may slow you down, but unless you have a godly conscience, it's not going to stop you. So you have to really work with your conscience and put the right things in, and that's another point we'll get to in a moment. So it seems that people are different in regard to conscience to some degree. I mean, there are many, many similarities, of course. But it's been said that to remove the conscience from some people would only be a minor operation. It wouldn't take much because they don't have much of a conscience. You know, they've probably already defiled their conscience. They've seared their conscience, and so to remove it, it wouldn't take more than a minor operation. With others, it's more like a major surgery, but the fact is, Satan is determined to do minor or major surgery.

So even if we're doing well, that doesn't mean Satan's going to leave us alone, does it? You know, even if we're doing well, we have to be on guard because Satan would... He'll try to do major surgery if he can, so he'll try to mess up anyone. He was pretty effective with certain individuals in the Bible at times. Even godly men and women who were walking down the right path, for the most part, were at times tripped up. Abraham lied. David committed adultery. So don't think that you're not vulnerable, because as long as we're still in the flesh, we're vulnerable, and Satan will try to tempt us.

So again, we have to stir up our conscience through the power of God's Spirit. We have to stir up the Spirit. We're going to be observing Pentecost soon. We're supposed to be learning to walk in the Spirit. The day of Pentecost pictures the giving of God's Holy Spirit. God's Spirit is to guide us. It is to direct us. It should lead us, and it should help us have a more pure conscience as long as we're walking in the Spirit.

Another problem is...

Some people, however, it seems like they train their conscience like they would a dog. They train their conscience to roll over and play dead.

You know, that's pretty sad, isn't it? But it seems like some people try to train their conscience that way. Just, you know, roll over and play dead. Let me do what I want to do. That's not how we want to try to train our conscience. It's also been said that thousands of people become hard of hearing when their conscience speaks.

In other words, they don't want to listen to their conscience. So having a godly conscience is part of it, and listening to it is another part. In 2 Corinthians 1, verse 12, it says, For our rejoicing is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have had our conversation or our conduct in the world, and more abundantly to you. So this was from the King James that I just read. We must be committed to living by every word of God, in simplicity and in godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, again, not leaning to our own understanding, but by the grace of God. We need to be careful how we conduct ourselves in this world. So the second point is, you must be committed to living by every word of God, by all of His laws, His commandments, and His statues. So are you committed? If you accept the true authority and know that God exists, and you know that God is revealing Himself to you, then you have to be committed to doing what He says, by keeping His commandments. So the third point picks this up, and the third point is, you must put into practice your belief. It's not enough just to be committed, and to believe in it, you have to put it into practice. In other words, you have to be a doer of God's law. Not just to hear, not someone that just hears a sermon about a pure conscience, a godly conscience, but then goes out and does whatever he wants. So you have to put it into practice. You have to be committed and convicted, and you have to practice your belief in God. You have to practice your commitment to His ways. So this means exercising your conscience through obedience and through faith. Remember, faith without works is dead.

It's not enough just to have faith. You have to follow through and have the works that go along with it. In 1 Timothy chapter 1 verse 5, again it uses this word conscience, 1 Timothy 1 verse 5, where it says, Now the purpose of the commandment is love from a pure heart. And by the way, the new King James says, or the King James says, Now the end of the commandment. That's how it translates. It's translated as the purpose of the commandment. There are other verses where it says it's the end of the law. You've heard that, you know, the end of the law? Well, here it shows that it's talking about the purpose of the law. Not that the end of the law, not that we're trying to end the law, but the purpose of the commandment here.

So the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, or the purpose of the commandment is charity from a pure heart, or is love from a pure heart. From a good conscience and from sincere faith. That's the purpose of God's commandments. Is to learn to love, to have a pure heart, to have a good conscience, and to have sincere faith. It says, From which some, having strayed, have turned aside to idle talk, desiring to be teachers of the law, understanding neither what they say nor the things which they affirm. But we know that the law is good if one uses it lawfully. So we have to use God's law in the way God intended. We have to use it in the proper intent of the law.

It goes on to say, knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous person, but for the lawless and the insubordinate, for the ungodly and for sinners. Now we're all sinners, aren't we? So the law is made for all of us.

Alright, let's consider 1 Timothy chapter 1 verse 19. Here Paul says, Having faith in a good conscience, which some having rejected, concerning the faith, have suffered shipwrecked. You know, if we don't have a good conscience, if we don't have a pure conscience, then we're liable to be shipwrecked, of whom are Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I delivered to Satan, that they may learn not to blaspheme. So here were two men who no doubt were part of God's church at one time anyway, and Paul has had to deliver them to Satan, basically cutting them off from the body of Christ, because they were blaspheming God by their conduct. It doesn't say what they were doing, but they were obviously doing something contrary to God's law. So we need to have faith and a good conscience, which some have rejected. We have to be careful that we don't reject our faith, that we don't reject our conscience, and that we listen to our conscience as long as it's being led by God's Spirit. So love is the fulfilling of the law of God. True love is learning to keep God's commandments. Remember, again, if you love me, keep my commandments. And again, we're supposed to be blameless toward God and man.

You know, too often I see people who make certain decisions that harm the body of Christ.

It really does harm the body of Christ, but they justify themselves. So we have to be careful that we're not doing something that would harm the body of Christ, believing that we're doing God a service, when we're actually tearing apart God's Church. We're dividing the Church and tearing it apart. So we have to listen to our conscience in these things. You know, the truth is out there. If you'll listen to it, you know, we shouldn't listen to lies and slander because a lot of people will get, you know, they'll get on the Internet and they'll use it to slander people. You know, we should reject that type of behavior. We should be able to see it as it's happening and reject it and not listen to it, not be deceived by it. So we must not become shipwrecked.

Another point along this line, it's been said that, unfortunately, to many people, conscience is the voice that tells you not to do something, but until after you've already done it. In other words, we don't listen to our conscience until we've done something wrong. Christians can do that. They can know something's wrong, but they'll push God as far away as they possibly can, thinking that he doesn't see what's going on. They try to push him aside. They do what they want to do, and then they feel guilty about it because they know they shouldn't have done it in the first place. But the key is to listen to your conscience prior to committing the act, not after you've done it. After you've done it, it's a bit late because you've sinned and you've brought a penalty upon yourself. And that's not how to treat the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, is it? To go ahead and do something, thinking that you can repent later. Human beings will play that game sometimes. We'll do something we know we shouldn't do, planning on repenting afterwards. There's something wrong with that. That's a very dangerous road to go down. It's a very dangerous road to go down.

Let's go on to the last point. Number four, again, number three was to exercise, to put into practice your conscience through obedience and faith. The last point is to dwell on those things that are of good report, that have virtue, that are pure and lovely. In other words, you train your conscience by dwelling on the good things in life and by seeking those things that are good and pure and right. When you put garbage in, you're going to get garbage out. That's the old adage. It's true. If you pollute your mind, if you defile your conscience, then there's a price to pay for that. There's a consequence for that. So we have to be careful of our choices. Don't dwell on things that are evil, things that are sensuous, things that are worldly. Don't dwell on those things. Pull apart. Pull away from those things. So exercise your conscience by actively thinking on the things that are mentioned in Philippians 4.8. This is one of my favorite scriptures, and I think it's certainly a very, very important scripture for all of us to put into practice in our lives. Notice that Paul is wrapping things up here when he says, finally, brethren, and this is the conclusion of other things that he's been talking about. He says, finally, brethren, he wanted to make a real point of this. Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy, then meditate on these things, the things which you learned and received and heard and saw in me. These do, and the God of peace will be with you. So if you will dwell on these things, if you'll meditate on those things that are right and good and pure and lovely, then God is going to be with you. God is going to strengthen you.

Paul also says in 1 Timothy 3 verse 9 that we should hold the mystery of the faith with a pure conscience. Now, God has called you out of this world. He has opened up to you the mystery of the ages, you know, the truth of God. We are not deceived by Satan the devil. I mean, we are at times, but in the largest sense, God has opened our minds to his truth. So we have the truth of God. We understand the commandments of God. God is calling us, so we need to have a pure conscience so we can hold on to that faith that God has delivered to us. And Paul also says in 2 Timothy 1.3 as we conclude the sermon here, he says, We should pray for one another. Night and day, we should, again, we should have a pure conscience toward God and man. We should be praying for one another. We should be united in our approach toward God and toward each other. Christ is the head of this church. There is no man that's the head of the church. Christ is the head of the church. And, of course, I realize that anyone who has God's Spirit is a part of the church, part of the true church of God. Anyone who walks in the Spirit of God and has God's Spirit dwelling in them is a part of the true body of Christ. But we know that God wants us to learn to be united and pure. So we should strive to do that in all things. So, again, the last point was to dwell on the things that are of good report, that are virtuous, that are pure, that are lovely, and exercise your conscience by actively thinking on those things. So, brethren, until Christ returns and until God's government and kingdom is established, we're going to continue to see terrorist acts like the Boston bombing. This isn't going to be the last thing. In fact, we'll see worse things that will come about in the future. It's simply because Satan has deceived this world and he has many instruments who are doing his bidding. They're void of a godly conscience. They don't have a godly conscience.

Thankfully, God has called you and me to develop and to maintain a godly conscience. So let us build character. That's what this is all about, learning to have godly character. Let's build godly character by not only developing, but also maintaining a godly conscience.