Please read all of
the following and look up the Bible verses when they are given. There is so
much truth in what is said here. If we truly desire to be Spiritual Men and
Women we can be -all by the blood of our Savior, Jesus Christ, through His
will, by His grace.
'A believer’s
conscience is quickened when his spirit is regenerated. The precious blood of
the Lord Jesus purifies his conscience and accordingly gives it an acute sense
that it should obey the will of the Holy Spirit.
The sanctifying work
of the Holy Spirit in man and the work of conscience in man are intimately
related and mutually joined.
If a child of God
desires to be filled with the Spirit, to be sanctified, and to lead a life
wholly after God’s will, he must adhere to the voice of conscience.
Should he not grant
it its rightful place, he shall fall inescapably into walking after the flesh.
To be faithful to
one’s conscience is the first step toward sanctification. Following its voice
is a sign of true spirituality. If a Christian fails to let it do its work he
is barred from entering the spiritual realm. Even if he regards himself (and is
so regarded by others) as spiritual, his “spirituality” nevertheless lacks
foundation.
If sin and other matters contrary to God’s
will and unbecoming to saints are not restrained as dictated by its voice, then
whatever has been superimposed through spiritual theory shall ultimately
collapse because there is no genuine foundation.
Conscience testifies
as to whether we are clear towards God and towards men and as to whether our
thoughts, words and deeds follow the will of God and are not in any way
rebellious to Christ.
As Christians
advance spiritually the witness of conscience and the witness of the Holy
Spirit seem to close ranks. This is because conscience, being fully under the
control of the Holy Spirit, daily grows more sensitive until it is attuned
perfectly to the voice of the Spirit.
The Latter is
thereby able to speak to believers through their consciences.
The Apostle’s word
that “my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 9.1) carries
within it this meaning. If our inward monitor judges us to be wrong we must in
fact be wrong. When it condemns, let us repent immediately. We must never
attempt to cover our sin or bribe our conscience. “Whenever our hearts condemn
us” can we be less condemned by God, since “God is greater than our hearts” (1
John 3.20)?
Whatever conscience
condemns is condemned by God. Can the holiness of God pursue a lower standard
than our conscience? If conscience insists we are wrong, we must be wrong
indeed. What should we do when we are wrong? Cease proceeding to do the
incorrect thing if we have not yet done it; repent, confess, and claim the
cleansing of the precious blood if we have done it already.
It is to be
regretted that so many Christians today do not follow these rules. Immediately
after the reproof of their inner voice, they lay plans to quench its protest.
They usually employ two methods. One is to argue with it, trying to marshal
reasons for their action. They suppose that anything reasonable must be God’s
will and will be condoned by the conscience.
What they do not understand is that conscience
never argues or reasons.
It discerns God’s
will through intuition and condemns everything which is not according to Him.
Conscience speaks for God’s will, not for reason.
Christians ought not
walk by reason but by God’s will as disclosed in their intuition.
Whenever they
disobey any movement there, conscience raises its voice to condemn.
Explanation may
satisfy the mind but never conscience.
As long as the issue
condemned is not removed it shall not cease condemning.
During the initial
stage of a Christian’s walk conscience only bears witness to right and wrong;
as spiritual life grows, it bears witness as well to what is of God and what is
not of God. Although many things appear good to human eyes, they are nonetheless
condemned by conscience because they do not originate with God’ revelation but
are initiated instead by the Christians themselves.
The other method is
to ease conscience with many other works. To solve the dilemma of refusing to
obey their inner voice of accusation on the one hand but continuing to be
afraid of its condemnation on the other, believers resort to many good works.
They replace God’s will with laudable deeds. They have not obeyed God, yet they
insist that what they now do is just as good as what He has revealed—perhaps
even better, broader in scope, more profitable, greater in influence. They
highly esteem such works; God, however, deems them of no spiritual account
whatsoever. He looks neither at the aggregate of fat nor at the number of burnt
offerings but solely at the sum of obedience to Him.
Nothing, regardless
how commendable the intention, can move God’s heart if the revelation in the
spirit has been neglected.
Doubling the
consecration will not silence the accusing monitor; its voice must be followed;
that and nothing else can ever please God.
Conscience simply
demands our obedience; it does not require us to serve God in any spectacular
way. Let us therefore not deceive ourselves. In walking according to the spirit
we shall hear the directions of conscience.
Do not try to escape
any inward reproach; rather, be attentive to its voice.
By constantly
walking in the spirit we are constrained to humble ourselves and to heed the
correction of conscience.
Children of God
should not make a general confession by acknowledging their innumerable sins in
a vague manner, because such confession does not provide conscience opportunity
to do its perfect work. They ought to allow the Holy Spirit through their conscience
to point out their sins one by one. Humbly and quietly and obediently they
should permit their conscience to reprove and condemn them of every individual
sin.
Christians must
accept its reproach and be willing, according to the mind of the Spirit, to
eliminate everything which is contrary to God.
Are you reticent to
let conscience probe your life? Dare you let it explore your real condition?
Will you allow it to parade before you one after another all the things in your
life as they are beheld by God? Will you grant conscience the right to dissect
every one of your sins? In case you dare not, in case you are not willing to be
so examined, then does not such drawing back prove that there remain many
elements in your life which have not been judged and committed to the cross as
they ought to have been: that there are still matters in which you have not
wholly obeyed God nor fully followed the spirit: that some issues continue to
hinder you from having perfect fellowship with God? If so, you cannot contend
before God that “there is nothing between You and me.”
Only an
unconditional and unrestricted acceptance of the reproach of conscience with a
corresponding willingness to do what is revealed can show how perfect is our
consecration, how truly we hate sin, how sincerely we desire to do God’s will.
Often we express a
wish to please God, to obey the Lord, to follow the Spirit; here is the test as
to whether our wish is real or fancied, perfect or incomplete. If we are yet
entangled in sin and not completely severed from it, most likely our spirituality
is largely a pretense.
A believer who is unable to follow his
conscience wholly is unqualified to walk after the spirit. Before conscience
has its demand realized, what else but an imaginary spirit will lead the
person, since the true spirit within him continues to petition him to listen to
the monitor within?
A believer can make
no genuine spiritual progress if he is reluctant to have his evil conscience
judged in God’s light and clearly dealt with.
The truth or falsity
of his consecration and service depends on his willing obedience to the
Lord—both to His command and to His reproach. After one has permitted
conscience to begin operating, he should allow it to perfect its work. Sins
must be treated progressively one by one until all have been eliminated. If a
child of God is faithful in his dealing with sin and faithfully follows his
conscience, he shall receive light increasingly from heaven and have his
unnoticed sins exposed; the Holy Spirit shall enable him to read and to
understand more of the law written upon his heart. Thus is he made to know what
is holiness, righteousness, purity and honesty, concerning which he had had
only vague ideas before. Moreover, his intuition is strengthened greatly in its
ability to know the mind of the Holy Spirit. Whenever a believer is therefore
reproved by his conscience his immediate response should be: “Lord, I am
willing to obey.” He should let Christ once again be the Lord of his life; he
should be teachable and should be taught by the Holy Spirit.
The Spirit shall surely come and help if a
person is honestly minding his conscience. Conscience is like a window to the
believer’s spirit. Through it the rays of heaven shine into the spirit,
flooding the whole being with light. Heavenly light shines in through the
conscience to expose fault and to condemn failure whenever we wrongfully think
or speak or act in a way not becoming saints. If by submitting to its voice and
eliminating the sin it condemns we allow it to do its work, then the light from
heaven will shine brighter next time; but should we not confess nor extirpate
the sin. our conscience will be corrupted by it (Titus 1.15), because we have
not walked according to the teaching of God’s light. With sin accumulating,
conscience as a window becomes increasingly clouded. Light can barely penetrate
the spirit. And there finally comes a day when that believer can sin without
compunction and with no grief at all, since the conscience has long been
paralyzed and the intuition dulled by sin.
The more spiritual a
believer is the more keenly alert is his inner monitor. ' Excerpt - 'The Spiritual Man' By Watchman Nee
