CONSCIENCE

It was your great American wit, Mark Twain, who once said, "Man is the only animal that blushes, and the only animal that needs to." We are ashamed, are we not, of things we've done in the past. Nobody is free who is unforgiven. Instead of being able to look God in the face or to look one another in the face, we want to run away and hide when our conscience troubles us.

John Stott

The Up-to-the-Minute Relevance of the Resurrection, Preaching Today, Tape 79.

The real and true work of Christ’s passion is to make man conformable to Christ, so that man’s conscience is tormented by his sins in like measure as Christ was pitiably tormented in body and soul by our sins.

Martin Luther

A Meditation on Christ’s Passion.

You should not believe your conscience and your feelings more than the Word which the Lord who receives sinners preaches to you.

Martin Luther

It is neither safe nor prudent to do anything against conscience.

Martin Luther

Persistent yielding to the inordinate desires of the body against the voice of conscience is a life of misery!

John Piper

I Will Not Be Enslaved By Anything, 1 Cor. 6:12-20, September, 1, 1985. www.DesiringGod.org. Used by Permission.

Romans 2:14-15 indicates that the conscience is your ally in teaching your children to understand their sin. The conscience within man is always either excusing or accusing. If you make your appeal there, you avoid making correction a contest between you and your child. Your child’s controversy is always with God.

Tedd Tripp

Shepherding a Child’s Heart, Shepherd Press, 1995, p. 199. Used by Permission.

There is a conscience in all men by nature. Let this never be forgotten. Fallen, lost, desperately wicked as we are all born into the world, God has taken care to leave Himself a witness in our bosoms. It is a poor blind guide, without the Holy Spirit. It can save no one. It leads no one to Christ. It may be seared and trampled under foot. But there is such a thing as conscience in every man, accusing or excusing him; and Scripture and experience alike declare it (Rom. 2:15).

J.C. Ryle
Commentary, Matthew 14.

A good conscience will save no man, wash away no sin, not lift us one hair’s breadth towards heaven. Yet a good conscience will be found a pleasant visitor at our bedside in a dying hour.

J.C. Ryle

Even as he who is troubled with a burning fever is hotter than he who is parched with the sun; so is that man more troubled who hath a guilty conscience than a good man by all outward afflictions.

Daniel Cawdray

A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 60.

The Lord God hath set [the conscience] as His deputy in the breast of man, which, though it be oftentime a neuter when the act is doing and while sin is a committing, yet afterwards it will prove a friend and faithful witness for the Lord, but an adversary against man.

Nehemiah Rogers

A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 60.

There is a conscience in man; therefore there is a God in heaven.

Ezekiel Hopkins

A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 27.

Conscience is God’s spy and man’s overseer.

John Trapp

A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 59.

God has given each of us a conscience, a moral compass within our hearts, bearing witness to His Law. In sinful or self-righteous people (that is, people whose dominant characteristics are either obvious sin or obvious self-righteousness) the conscience is to some degree “hardened.” That is, it is relatively insensitive to sin or its own self-righteousness. But in a growing Christian the conscience becomes more and more sensitive to violations of God’s Law. As a result, our consciences continually indict us, accusing us of not only particular sins, but, more important, of our overall sinfulness. We recognize more and more that specific acts of sin are simply the expressions of our still-wicked hearts.

Jerry Bridges

It is better to have a sore than a seared conscience.

Thomas Brooks

The conscience is a built-in warning system that signals us when something we have done is wrong. The conscience is to our souls what pain sensors are to our bodies: it inflicts distress, in the form of guilt, whenever we violate what our hearts tell us is right.

John MacArthur

The Book on Leadership, 2004, p. 78.

Suppressing the conscience or deliberately violating it is deadly to our spiritual well-being. To disobey the conscience is itself a sin (Romans 14:14, 23; James 4:17), even if the conscience is ignorant or is misinformed. And to suppress the conscience is tantamount to searing it with a hot iron (1 Timothy 4:2), leaving it insensitive and thereby dangerously removing a vital defense against temptation (1 Corinthians 8:10).

John MacArthur

The Book on Leadership, 2004, p. 79.

Our sensitivity to personal guilt is a fundamental trait of our humanness that distinguishes us from animals. To try to suppress the conscience is in effect to diminish one’s own humanity.

John MacArthur

The Book on Leadership, 2004, p. 79.

Our culture has declared war on guilt. The very concept is considered medieval, obsolete, unproductive. People who trouble themselves with feelings of personal guilt are usually referred to therapists, whose task it is to boost their self-image. No one, after all, is supposed to feel guilty. Guilt is not conducive to dignity and self-esteem. Society encourages sin, but it will not tolerate the guilt sin produces. But the answer to dealing with guilt is not to ignore it – that’s the most dangerous thing you can do. Instead, you need to understand that God graciously implanted a powerful ally within you to aid you in the battle against sin. He gave you your conscience, and that gift is the key to bringing you joy and freedom.

John MacArthur

As a Christian, you have the capacity to walk before God with a clear conscience:

1. Confess and forsake known sin. Examine your guilt feelings in light of Scripture. Deal with the sin God’s Word reveals (Pr. 28:13; 1 Jn. 1:9; Jas. 5:16; Psm. 32:5).

2. Ask forgiveness and be reconciled to anyone you have wronged (Mt. 5:23-24; 6:14-15).

3. Make restitution to those you’ve wronged (Num. 5:6-7; Lk. 19:8; Phile. 19).

4. Don’t procrastinate in clearing your wounded conscience. Some people put off dealing with their guilt, thinking their conscience will clear itself in time. It won't. Procrastination allows the guilt feelings to fester. That in turn generates depression, anxiety, and other emotional problems (Ac. 24:16).

5. Educate your conscience. A weak, easily grieved conscience results from a lack of spiritual knowledge (1 Cor. 8:7).

John MacArthur

If your conscience is too easily wounded, don't violate it. To violate even a weak conscience is to train yourself to override conviction, and that will lead to overriding true conviction about real sin. Moreover, violating the conscience is a sin in itself (Romans 14:23), bringing legitimate guilt for a real offense against God. So, respond to your conscience, even if it’s weak, and then continue to inform your conscience with God’s Word so it can begin to function with reliable data.

John MacArthur

You are certainly not to order your life according to your feelings. A conscience fixed on feelings becomes unreliable. If you are subject to depression and melancholy, you of all people should not allow your conscience to be informed by your feelings. Despondent feelings will provoke unnecessary doubts and fears in the soul when not kept in check by a well-advised conscience. The conscience must be persuaded by God’s Word, not by your feelings.

John MacArthur

Drugs, therapy, entertainment – they’re all used to silence a guilty conscience. But for the Christian, the conscience is the key to freedom.

John MacArthur

The conscience is generally seen by the modern world as a defect that robs people of their self-esteem. Far from being a defect or a disorder, however, your ability to sense your own guilt is a tremendous gift from God. He designed the conscience into the very framework of the human soul. It is the automatic warning system that cries, “Pull up! Pull up!” before you crash and burn.

John MacArthur

The conscience entreats you to do what you believe is right and restrains you from doing what you believe is wrong. But don’t equate the conscience with the voice of God or the law of God. It is a human faculty that judges your actions and thoughts by the light of the highest standard you perceive. When you violate your conscience, it condemns you, triggering feelings of shame, anguish, regret, consternation, anxiety, disgrace, and even fear. Conversely, when you follow your conscience, it commends you, bringing joy, serenity, self-respect, well-being, and gladness.

John MacArthur

Both the mind and the conscience can become so defiled that they cease making distinctions between what is pure and what is impure (cf. Titus 1:15).

John MacArthur

The conscience…is not infallible. Nor is it a source of revelation about right and wrong. Its role is not to teach you moral and ethical ideals, but to hold you accountable to the highest standards of right and wrong you know.

John MacArthur

Both tradition and truth inform the conscience, so the standards it holds you to are not necessarily biblical ones (1 Corinthians 8:6-9). The conscience can be needlessly condemning in areas where there is no biblical issue. In fact, it can try to hold you to the very thing the Lord is trying to release you from (Romans 14:14, 20-23)!

John MacArthur

Your conscience reacts to the convictions of your mind and therefore can be encouraged and sharpened in accordance with God’s Word. The wise Christian wants to master biblical truth so that the conscience is completely informed and judges right because it is responding to God’s Word. A regular diet of Scripture will strengthen a weak conscience or restrain an overactive one. Conversely, error, human wisdom, and wrong moral influences filling the mind will corrupt or cripple the conscience.

John MacArthur

Your conscience is like the nerve endings in your fingertips. Its sensitivity to external stimuli can be damaged by the buildup of calluses or even wounded so badly as to be virtually impervious to any feeling. Paul also wrote of the dangers of a calloused conscience (1 Corinthians 8:10), a wounded conscience (v. 12), and a seared conscience (1 Timothy 4:2).

John MacArthur

Take time each day to inform your conscience by reading God’s Word. Never train yourself to ignore your conscience, but respond quickly to its warnings. And then cleanse your conscience through consistent confession as you seek forgiveness from those you've sinned against – whether God or others. Those things will strengthen your conscience so that you can enjoy the freedom and blessings of a clear conscience before God.

John MacArthur

Everybody who is created comes into the world with a sense of right and wrong. That is the law written in the hearts. In addition to that, God has put the conscience and the conscience is a warning device that sounds off when we violate that law, or affirms us when we obey it. The conscience is not that law; it is merely the warning device.

John MacArthur

Conscience is to the soul what pain is to the body. We would like to avoid pain as much as possible, but at the same time we recognize that pain is a gift from God. If you didn’t have pain, you would destroy yourself. Pain is critical to physical preservation. And so the conscience is critical to spiritual preservation.

John MacArthur

Our society under the prince of the power of the air has two objectives. Objective number one is destroy the moral law so that the conscience is misinformed. Train people against what is innately the law that is in their hearts when they’re born, give them a new morality, not the morality of the Bible, not God's law. We want people not to think biblically. We want them freed from that so we’ll construct another morality that will pour that into their lives through every means possible. That’s destructive. And then the second thing that society wants to do orchestrated by the enemy of your souls is to tell you that your conscience is a liar. That what’s wrong with you isn't sin, it’s a lack of...self-esteem. It isn’t that you’re bad; it’s that you’re good and you need to think better of yourself… The guilty conscience isn’t healthy, it shouldn’t be tolerated, switch it off.

John MacArthur

The conscience is at the core of what it means to be human, as opposed to being an animal. What distinguishes human beings and animals is self-consciousness; that is the ability of the soul to reflect upon itself. Humans are the only creatures in the material world who can think about their thoughts, who can contemplate why they think the way they think, who can understand their motives, who can make moral self-evaluations. And that is a God-given gift, the innate ability to sense what is right and wrong,

John MacArthur

It’s essential to understand…that the conscience doesn’t act independently. It can only act upon a belief system. It is not a belief system. The conscience is not the law of God. It is not the voice of God. It is not moral law. It is simply a mechanism.

John MacArthur

Your conscience works off your belief system. [So] the more you know about the Word of God, the more you're consistently in the Word of God, learning the Word of God, hearing the Word of God, meditating on the Word of God, the more informed your conscience is truly informed.

John MacArthur

[The conscience] either indicts you, accuses you, or it exonerates you and defends you.

John MacArthur

James 1 says, “Lust when it conceives brings forth sin”… If you don’t win the battle on the inside, it will show up on the outside. A pure conscience is more to be sought than a good reputation.

John MacArthur

What happens when a person becomes a believer is that conscience is purified by the Holy Spirit; and, as a Christian, I believe conscience is giving pure information. I believe that the Holy Spirit, in conjunction with your conscience, is going to send pure impulses. That's why a Christian who sins is going to suffer far more intense guilt than a non-believer who's got a seared conscience... The Holy Spirit will operate in and through your conscience and make moral judgments on your action.

John MacArthur

Your conscience as a Christian is that tool in connection with the Holy Spirit which makes moral value judgments on your actions. Respond to it, because your conscience will not only make the judgment, it’s not only the judge, your conscience is also the executioner. If you don't listen to your conscience, you'll suffer from your conscience. Your conscience will continue to accuse you, and you’ll have a guilty conscience and a guilty complex.

John MacArthur

Conscience is that faculty in me which attaches itself to the highest that I know, and tells me what the highest I know demands that I do. It is the eye of the soul which looks out either toward God or toward what it regards as the highest authority. If I am in the habit of steadily facing toward God, my conscience will always introduce God’s perfect law and indicate what I should do. The point is, will I obey? I have to make an effort to keep my conscience so sensitive that I walk without offense. I should be living in such perfect sympathy with God’s Son that in every circumstance the spirit of my mind is renewed. The one thing that keeps the conscience sensitive to Him is the habit of being open to God on the inside. When there is any debate, quit. There is no debate possible when conscience speaks.

Oswald Chambers

Conscience tells us that we ought to do right, but it does not tell us what right is – that we are taught by God’s word.

H.C. Trumbull

The trouble with the advice, “Follow your conscience” is that most people follow it like someone following a wheelbarrow – they direct it wherever they want it to go, and then follow behind.

Author Unknown

Conscience is condensed character.

Author Unknown

Conscience is what hurts when everything else feels so good.

Author Unknown

Conscience is not a lawgiver. It does not teach us what is right and wrong. It functions as a judge to apply the law that has been given to it. Conscience is not an infallibly safe guide, because it can be trained to obey wrong standards. Some people can commit the most horrible deeds and feel they are doing what is right (John 16:1–3).

John Reisinger

Studies in Galatians – Part 24, Sound of Grace, April 2009. Used by Permission.

Conscience does not, and cannot, tell you what is, or is not, the right thing to do. That is the role of parents, society, education, and for the Christian, the Bible. All human beings have a conscience, but the law that a specific conscience uses to accuse or excuse certain actions or intentions will vary greatly according to the individual’s environment and background. Obviously, the higher the standard that trains the conscience, the more conscience will “accuse.” When the law of God trains the conscience, it is impossible for that conscience ever to approve completely, since that law demands sinless perfection.

John Reisinger

Studies in Galatians – Part 24, Sound of Grace, April 2009. Used by Permission.

I want a principle within of watchful, godly fear; a sensibility to sin, a pain to feel it near. Help me the first approach to feel of pride or wrong desire, to catch the wandering of my will and quench the kindling fire before the logs ever get lighted, let me quench it at the kindling level. From Thee that I know more may stray, no more Thy goodness grieve, grant me, I pray, the tender conscience give.

Charles Wesley

Conscience which should have been the sinner’s curb here on earth becomes the sinner’s whip that will lash his soul in hell. That which was the seat and center of all guilt now becomes the seat and center of all torment.

John Flavel

It is a good thing to have a heart within us smiting us for sins that seem little; it is a sign that conscience is awake and tender, and will be the means of preventing greater sins.

Matthew Henry

Commentary, 1 Samuel 24:5.

Conscience is the chamber of justice.

Origen

The torture of a bad conscience is the hell of a living soul.

John Calvin

The conscience of the Christian is obligated and bound only by what the Bible either commands or forbids, or by what may be legitimately deduced from an explicit biblical principle.

Sam Storms
Birth Control, November 6, 2006, www.enjoyinggodministries.com. Used by Permission.