What Does Conscience Have To Do With Anything, Anyway? A Great Deal In Fact! Series

WHAT DOES CONSCIENCE HAVE TO DO WITH ANYTHING, ANYWAY? A GREAT DEAL IN FACT!

[A]. INTRODUCTION TO THE SUBJECT

The following is a November 2020 news item from a bone fide Australia Christian group – “The South Australian State parliament (Australia) is poised to legalise abortion right up to the moment of birth, for effectively any reason. It also sets up exclusion zones to prevent expectant mothers from being offered support that might change their mind about an abortion.”

That move is now repeated in most Australian States. In some like Queensland it is even more woeful and draconian.

Abortion is when an unborn foetus is killed inside the mother and removed, or sucked out in parts, or when it is taken from the mother then put to death. In either case it is the murder of the unborn; murder of a defenceless human being, being denied justice for its own existence, with no legal representation. Martin Luther King Jr said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

How can politicians act like that to think it is correct to murder an unborn human being? Do they have any conscience about this? If so, what type of conscience does each one have? The purpose of this article is to share a few thoughts on CONSCIENCE.

As a Christian, if something arose and I was convinced to commit a fraud, or had a liaison with another female, or crashed into the back of an unoccupied car, but fled the scene without leaving details or reporting it to police, then what happens? Do I get away with all that?

Firstly, some Christians might say that I am proposing a straw man, as a true Christian can’t do those things? I would disagree, and if you persisted, I would take you to King David and point out rape/adultery and murder, and what was worse than Peter’s denial of the Lord? The sad thing is that all Christians are capable of failure to a greater or lesser extent, for we still have the corrupt old nature, even though we now have the new nature. We all know that Christians fail, and if it becomes public knowledge, then the media and world are down on the person like a ton of bricks trying to play the hypocritical line.

Christians are capable of sinning just as badly as the non-Christian in the world but there is vast difference. Sinning, to an unredeemed sinner, is like water off a duck’s back. (More on that later). Their sins resonate with a fallen sin nature but they are behaving normally. It is normal for an unconverted person to sin, to lie, cheat, falsify, steal, sin sexually, get drunk and behave in atrocious ways, and most don’t have any conscience about it anymore. We have all seen that, and some reading this probably lived that way before becoming Christians. The unsaved person is generally not troubled by sin.

However, sinning for a genuine Christian, is something different. A Christian who falls and sins has the witness of the Holy Spirit in the new nature to cause conviction, grief, and guilt in a Christian’s life. He may carry that guilt around like David did for 9 months. However there is a moral sense of failure and conviction of sin against the very Lord who owns that person. There is a complete lack of peace in his/her life for there has come a division between the Lord and His servant. As Christians we are different – we are in God’s family, family members at His table.

Everyone has a conscience. In an earlier message, I spoke on “The Candle of Humanity” where I pointed out that everyone has a human candle as his moral compass but it fails because we actually need the Light of Christ to see our way in the dark and to walk in the way. The conscience in an unsaved person is either dead or greatly impaired. The conscience in a Christian has been enlivened and he/she has a much greater sense of right and wrong and of morality.

A Christian in sin is convicted in his spirit and conscience by the Holy Spirit who empowers the new nature we have in Christ. That conviction will lead to confession and restoration, which is the work of the Holy Spirit, for when He was sent by the Lord Jesus, the Lord said He would convict the world of sin, of righteousness and judgement. There is something very wrong when a professing Christian is away from the Lord year after year, because in that time the conscience has grown cold, and all links with the Saviour appear to have died.

We must be so sensitive to the guiding and leading of the Holy Spirit. Conviction, and subsequent confession which must be unreserved, leads to a restored joy and peace, and although it may seem a strange thing to say, some Christians are strengthened by the experience and walk closer to God than they formally did. Remember what the Lord said to Peter before he denied Him about what he would do after he was restored.