Silence Accusations of Conscience

Introduction: The Purpose of Our Study – Keeping a Good Conscience

0:01 This sermon was preached on Sunday morning, October 10th, 1982, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey.

0:11 As we approach the study of the Word of God this morning, I want to ask a very simple but very pointed and personal question of each one of you sitting in this building.

0:24 And the simple but personal question is this. What are you doing here this morning? You say, did I hear aright? Yes, you heard aright.

0:36 What are you doing here this morning?

0:41 Well, in a very real sense, many of you could answer that question in at least three ways, and you would be truthful and accurate in any one or all three of your answers. For many of you, the answer to the question, what are you doing here this morning, could be this. I am keeping the Lord's Day as a special day of rest, worship, and fellowship with the people of God.

1:13 Or, you might answer, I'm obeying the mandate of Scripture not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together, and therefore, what I'm doing is this. I am gathered with the people of God in a building in Montville, New Jersey, on Horseneck Road, in the morning worship service. And that would be true. And then, for others of you, you might say, well, what I'm doing is this.

1:39 I'm listening to the rather odd introduction to a sermon by one of the elders of Trinity Baptist Church. Now, you see, for many, even most of you, all three of those answers would be correct. And the only way to see them in their proper relationship to one another is to view them like the circles on a target. The outer circle, the middle circle, and then the inner circle.

2:08 The outer circle, which is the broadest answer to the question, what are you doing here, is that you are keeping this day unto the Lord, His day, remembering Him in it, and in the ways of His appointment. The middle circle, more specifically, you are gathered for a service of worship in obedience to the biblical injunction not to forsake the assembling of yourselves together. And then the inner circle, the bullseye, more specifically, and more limited, you are listening to a rather strange introduction to a sermon by one of your elders. Well, I want you to think in those terms, in response to this question, what are we doing in our morning study of the Word of God? What are we presently engaged in in our study of the Scriptures? Well, the outer circle of the answer to that question is, we are engaged in a study of the biblical injunction. Well, the outer circle of the answer to that question is, we are engaged in a study of the biblical injunction.

3:09 That doctrine in the Word of God which asserts both the certainty and the necessity of God's people continuing in faith and holiness and obedience all of the days of their life. But now the middle circle is that we are considering in our studies of the Word of God the means which God has ordained in order to, but now the middle circle is that we are considering in our studies of the Word of God which asserts both the certainty and the necessity of God's people continuing in faith and holiness and obedience all of the days of their life. But now the middle circle is that we are considering in our studies of the Word of God the means which God has ordained in order to, but now the middle circle is that we are considering in our studies of the Word of God the means which God has ordained in order to, but now the middle circle is that we are considering in our studies of the Word of God the means which God has ordained in order to, but now the middle circle is that we are considering in our studies of the Word of God the means which God has ordained in order to, but now the middle circle is that we are considering in our studies of the Word of God the means which God has ordained in order to, Secure their continuance in faith, holiness, and obedience. And then the tiny circle in the middle is we are presently studying how a good conscience is essential to our perseverance. So in that way, I can very quickly review, so the introduction was not so off the wall after all. All right? We are considering together the relationship between a good conscience and our perseverance in faith, holiness, and obedience to the end of our days.

Review: The Nature and Acquisition of a Good Conscience

4:18 And thus far in our study of that specific aspect of the larger concern of the means of perseverance, which is part of the larger concern of the doctrine of perseverance, we have demonstrated from the scriptures that there does exist an inseparable relationship between a good conscience and perseverance. No one perseveres to the end who does not have as his ordinary companion all along the way a good conscience. Leave off the companionship of a good conscience and you will ultimately leave the faith. 1 Timothy 1, 18-20.

5:02 Then I have sought to give you a definition and a description of the function of conscience. Conscience is...

5:09 Conscience is that built-in moral monitor who passes sentence upon all of our actions and either excuses them as being right or accuses them as being evil. Then having done that, we addressed ourselves to the question, how does one get a good conscience initially? Since sin has so influenced the totality of our being, no one by nature has a good conscience. And the scriptures make it plain, if we would ever get a good conscience, we must do at least two things.

5:46 We must listen to its accusing voice with judgment day honesty. As that voice stands under the light of nature, under the light of the law, and under the light of the gospel, we must listen to its voice with judgment day honesty. And then we must embrace the one divinely appointed means for silencing its actions. And that means, is the blood of Christ.

6:14 Hebrews 9.14. Now we're concerned with the question, if you've got it, how do you keep it? How does one keep a good conscience?

6:24 And in our study last Lord's Day, we established from the scriptures, first of all, the possibility of keeping a good conscience. 1 Peter 3.16, Hebrews 13.18, 1 Timothy 3.9, Acts 23.1-24, 1 Timothy 3.16, The keeping of a good conscience is not an unattainable but noble ideal. These passages establish beyond a shadow of a doubt that imperfectly sanctified sinners who must daily confess their sins may nonetheless have a good conscience before God. And then we began in the second place to give you a prescription for the keeping of a good conscience.

7:09 And all of you, if you have a good conscience, all we got to was the first ingredient last week. And the first ingredient of keeping a good conscience is simply this. Don't ever violate its present dictates. Don't ever violate its present dictates.

Ingredient 1: Do Not Violate Conscience's Present Dictates

7:28 And we established that principle from a careful study of several passages in Romans 14. And I would simply buttress that review and then we'll press on. And by reading a choice paragraph I found in one of my old Puritan volumes.

7:46 Sibbes, in volume 6 of his works, says this concerning this matter of a good conscience in relationship to listening to its dictates. If you would preserve tenderness of heart, by all means take heed of the least sin against conscience. For the least sin against conscience is the least sin against conscience. For the least sin in this kind makes way for hardness of heart.

8:16 Sins that are committed against conscience do darken the understanding, dead the affections, and take away life. So that one hath not the least strength to withstand the least temptation. And so it comes to pass by God's judgment. For when man will live in sins against conscience, he takes away his spirit, and gives up the heart from one degree of hardness to another.

8:45 For the heart at first being tender will endure nothing, but the least sin will trouble it. As water, when it begins to freeze, will not endure anything, no, not so much as the weight of a pin upon it, but after a while will bear the weight of a cart. Even so at the beginning, the heart being tender trembles at the last moment, the least sin, and will not bear with any one sin. But when it once gives way to sins against conscience, it becomes so frozen that it can endure any sin, and so becomes more and more hard.

9:28 Men are so obdurate, having once made a breach in their own hearts by sins against conscience, that they can endure to commit any sin, and therefore God gives them up from one degree of hardness to another. What will not men do whom God gives up to hardness of heart? What will not men do whom God gives up to hardness of heart?

9:52 Would you keep a good conscience? Then determine that under no circumstances

Ingredient 2: Immediately Silence Every Accusation – Occasions of Accusation

10:00 will you violate its present dictates. Now we come this morning to examine the second ingredient of keeping a good conscience. If the first is don't ever violate, violate its present dictates, then the second ingredient is immediately silence its every accusation. Don't ever violate its present dictates, but if you have, immediately silence its every accusation. Now as I attempt to open up this line of thought, bringing various scriptures to bear upon it, consider with me first of all the occasions of its accusations. What are the occasions of accusation that come to a conscience that has been made good initially in that initial work of grace, but now that conscience has been compromised and it is accusing? What are the occasions of its accusations? Well, conscience always looks to its present understanding of the will of God, and on that basis it accuses or

11:21 excuses our actions. So if we fall short of the standard that conscience knows to be the will of God or thinks to be the will of God, conscience condemns. If we transgress what we know to be forbidden, then conscience accuses. So this is what you need to do in order to stop that semua accusation.

11:44 Let me describe the situation. hear a believer who awakes on monday morning with a good conscience goes to his place and his season of being alone with God before he goes out to face the day and in the midst of his prayers and reading of the word of God he pleads that during that day in the Spirit of the Lord's Prayer he would not be led into temptation but would be kept from evil he asks God that he might have a sensitive conscience to the approach of any sin and grace to withstand that temptation, that he might not be overtaken with surprisals and with sudden eruptions of his remaining corruption. And he's enjoyed real communion with God. He's asked the Lord to cleanse him from sins that he's not even aware of. And he rises from his knees to go out to his place of business with a conscience void of offense to God and toward man. He has a good conscience as he begins the day. He gets in his

12:45 car. He goes down the end of his street, turns left, makes his way out into the freeway. He may be even singing some hymns. It may be that things are so crowded that he dare not even have the luxury of thinking of the words of a hymn. He's concentrating on his driving, and all of a sudden some poor fool that is half asleep or half something else he knows not was, does the most stupid, selfish, inconsiderate thing cuts him off. He has to swerve, slam on his brakes, comes within inches of perhaps a serious accident. And immediately there flares up in his heart a consciousness of anger. And he mumbles under his breath, you dumb fool, you stupid idiot.

13:31 And the moment he does so, conscience says, sin, wrong. And the world is in trouble. And the world is in trouble. And the world is in trouble. And the world is in trouble. And the words of jesus come to mind that whosoever shall say thou fool is of the very essence of the spirit of murder the words of god come to his mind the works of the flesh are manifest which are anger and conscience says you sinned by entertaining that spirit and by the words that you've mumbled in the privacy of your own car now his conscience is accusing what's he going to do or it may be that he arose that morning and as he was thinking of going to his place of prayer he noticed the paper out on the front steps and he said well i'll just glance to see what the

14:22 weather is before i have my devotions and he picked up the paper and lo and behold he ended up getting engrossed in the paper didn't have his time with god and you know sooner gets in his car and starts down his street when his conscience smites him men ought always to pray and not to think and he knows that he is sinned by failing to have a season of prayer conscience accuses and smites him or it may be it's the young housewife who's risen in the morning to the cry of her child whose alarm clock went off a half hour earlier than usual and so the time that she would normally be up to have her own little quiet time she can't have it that morning because the little one has been crying and she must attend to his needs or her needs and he knows that he has sinned by failing to have a season of prayer and as she's going about her work during the day because her own night of rest has been cut short and she did not have her usual time to be alone with god and seek strength from god she finds herself unusually spiritually and emotionally fragile and by two o'clock in the afternoon mommy this mommy that is just too much and she just burst out in frustration and anger will you kids all shut up and she no sooner does it when conscience is you and she knows she's sinned as a mother she's sinned as a christian conscience is accusing

15:47 it may be the student who's gone off into his classroom and he's sitting there and the teacher gives an assignment and the student begins to grumble why in the world do we and then the verses come do all things without murmuring and disputing and that christian student's conscience smites him now do you see have i given you enough examples so nobody is out in no man's land what in the world is pastor he always uses big words act and say i don't know what my friend you know exactly what i'm talking about and if you don't it's because you don't want to so when we say that the second ingredient of a good conscience or keeping a good conscience is immediately silencing its every accusation i'm speaking of the occasions of the accusation in this context whether by a sudden surprise accusation in this context whether by a sudden surprise accusation in this context whether by a sudden surprise of sin a subtle intrusion of sin a deliberately sinful action conscience is accusing because we have violated the standard of righteousness we have either failed to come up to it a sin of omission or we have transgressed it a sin in that sense we say of commission now at that very point the good conscience has become a condemning evil accusing conscience and the good conscience has become a condemning evil accusing conscience and

17:12 that's the sense in which the term is used in hebrews ten ten twenty two having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience it's an evil conscience not in the sense that it's evil that it's accusing us but the fact that it is accusing us makes it an evil conscience a conscience stained with the accusation of evil done this is beautifully described in that incident to the life of david in first samuel twenty four verses four and five of the life of david in first samuel twenty four verses four and five When you remember David was in the cave and Saul came in and did not know that David was there and he was seeking David's life. And David cut off just a little part of the garment of Saul and it says no sooner had he done that than his heart smote him. He had done something to demean the Lord's anointed and God had said that this was not to be done. His heart smote him. There was an accusing conscience or in the language of 1 John 3.20

Ungodly Responses to Conscience's Accusations

18:13 if our heart condemn us. That is if we are in the state of having an accusing conscience. Now what are we to do? Well I'm suggesting that if you would keep a good conscience I'm asserting you must silence its every accusation.

18:34 But now it is precisely at this point that we are to do the same thing. We are to do the same thing. That we are tempted to make efforts to silence it in an ungodly way rather than in a godly way. So having considered the matter of the occasions of its accusations now consider with me the ungodly responses to its accusations.

19:03 And I want to mention four that are very common. And I didn't read them in a book. I've read them. And I've read them again and again in my own heart.

19:12 The first is the attempt to ignore or to despise its accusations.

19:20 It's the attitude which reasons well conscience is really not saying anything. Though his voice is speaking like a broken record. Guilty. Guilty. Guilty. Guilty. Guilty. Guilty.

19:33 Sin. Sin. Sin. Sin.

19:37 What do we do? There is that attempt to ignore. Or to despise its accusation. In so doing we hope by ignoring and despising its voice conscience will grow weary and shut up after a while.

19:55 Sort of like the anxious kid who sits in the back row of school trying to get the teacher's attention. And he's flopping his hand away. And he's flopping and the teacher goes on. And he's flopping and flopping.

20:04 She doesn't see him and he flops his hand. And after a while he just gets discouraged and says well, well, nobody's paying attention to me, I'm just being ignored, so he quits. And we hope conscience will be like the little kid flopping his hand on the back row. On the freeway, in the living room where the young mother blew her cork, in the secrecy of her own heart where the single woman entertained hard thoughts about God, why don't you give me a husband?

20:32 Wherever it is, conscience says, sin, listen to me, sin, pay attention to me. I'm telling you, sin!

20:43 And we try to go right on as though conscience is not waving his hand and speaking, hoping that if we carry that on long enough, conscience will get discouraged and shut up.

20:54 That's an ungodly way to attempt to silence the voice of conscience. But then there is, in many occasions, the attempt to debate his accusations. At times, we recognize that it's useless. It's useless to hope that he'll shut up.

21:14 So we enter into debate with him and say, well, conscience, can't deny you're talking, but you ain't talking straight. So you and I are going to have us a debate. You're telling me that I sinned when I mumbled those words at that character that cut me off. The Bible teaches that such a thing as righteous anger.

21:36 The Bible says be angry and sin not. That man did a stupid thing, and it is proper. And what are you doing? You're starting a debate with conscience.

21:46 You're telling conscience that he's making a false judgment about your moral activity.

21:55 You're telling conscience that he ain't speaking straight. And so you enter into debate with conscience. You attempt to tell him he has no business censoring that particular sin.

22:09 My friends, that is an ungodly way to attempt to silence the accusations of conscience. But then there is. There is a third way that is ungodly, and that is the attempt to drown out his accusations. He speaks, and he speaks with authority.

22:26 He speaks with unrelenting, non-debatable certitude. So we figure, well, we'll shift our ground since he's going to speak, and he's going to keep speaking the same thing, and I can't talk him down and reason him out of it. Well, then I'll drown him out.

22:46 And that's why some Christians. Christians have always got to have the radio on.

22:51 Christians always got to have the radio on. That's why they always got to be talking, always got to be joking, always got to be doing anything other than letting conscience do his work. And so they try to drown him out by hilarity and by jocularity and constant jabber-mouthing, constantly listening to music, constantly having something come in the ear gate, because if they allow themselves. If they allow themselves the luxury of five minutes of mental silence, the voice of conscience makes them excessively miserable, and they can't stand it.

23:31 That's what happens. You know anything about that? That's an ungodly way to attempt to silence conscience. But then you add to that the fourth ungodly way, the attempt to appease his accusations.

23:47 Say to conscience, look, you are the most unreasonable fellow. I try to ignore you, and you keep on talking. Then I enter into debate with you, and you don't change your line. And I try to drown you out, and you keep on speaking.

24:02 Say, how about a little bribe? Can I pay you off? And so we try to bribe conscience. We try to appease his accusations.

24:12 We try to give him some payola under the table. So he accuses me of the sin of dishonesty in making out my tax forms. So what do I do? I give more in the offering next Sunday.

24:29 Oh, I'm not really a dishonest, tight-fisted man. I mean, we all know the government cheats us all the time. I'm just being a good steward by cutting the corner here and there and not reporting this or that. And to prove it, I'll even give more to the work of God.

24:46 You know what God says about your money? It stinks, and I don't want it. He regards it the same way in the old covenant when he said, Don't bring in the hire of a harlot. Don't bring in the worship of God.

24:59 God doesn't need money at the expense of the sanctity and sanctions of his law. But oh, the foul way that our hearts attempt to do this. That was the Pharisees' problem. Remember in Matthew 15?

25:13 Jesus talked about them, and he says, You people, so clever. Here you've got destitute parents. And you should honor them and meet their needs. And what you do is you say, Well, the money I should give to meet their needs has been given unto God, so mom and pop, you'll just have to starve.

25:30 I'm so pious. And when conscience screamed out, Honor thy father and thy mother, they appeased conscience by giving to the work of God. Now brethren, do you think I take any delight in even mentioning these things? I feel inwardly and spiritually sick even describing them.

Godly Responses to Conscience's Accusations: Eagerly Listen

25:52 But I'd venture to say there's not a person here who's been in grace any length of time if he or she is honest in the presence of God, but will say, Pastor Martin, you've given a transcription of my own heart. And I freely acknowledge I've done that because it's a transcription of mine. And if you're to have a good conscience, you must silence its every accusation, but not in these or in additional ungodly ways, but by a godly response to its accusation. And here's where it's a delight to preach. What is the essence of a godly response to the accusations of conscience by which they can be justly and righteously silenced? Number one, eagerly listen to the initial voice of accusation. Eagerly listen to the initial voice of accusation.

27:08 When conscience becomes your Nathan, listen to him immediately. The best friend in the world to David, when he had been entrapped and ensnared in his sin, was Nathan, the messenger of God who broke through to his conscience, saying, Thou art the man. Your best friend when you have sinned is an accusing conscience who speaks clearly and unmistakably. And if you would keep a good conscience, my dear Christian friend, eagerly listen to the voice of his accusation. Faithful are the wounds of a friend. And what a blessed friend is a healthy conscience that accuses when accusation is in order. Now again, listen to one of the old Puritans addressing himself to this matter.

28:13 In Brooks, in his fifth volume, he speaks of this whole matter, of the response that we render to conscience. And this is what he says. The fifth word of comfort and counsel is this. Be true to the light of your consciences and maintain and keep up a constant tenderness in your consciences.

28:38 A tender conscience is a mercy worth more than a world. Conscience is God's spy in our bosoms. Keep this clear and tender and all is well. Act nothing against the dictates of conscience.

28:55 Rebel not against the light of conscience. You were better that all the world should upbraid you and reproach you than that your consciences should upbraid and reproach you. Beware of stifling conscience and suppressing the warnings of conscience lest a warning conscience prove a gnawing conscience and a tormenting conscience. Take heed of a tongue-tied conscience for when God shall untie these strings and unmuzzle your consciences, conscience will then be heard and ten concerts of music shall not drown her clamorous cries. Hearken to the voice of conscience. Obey the voice of conscience and when conscience shall whisper in the ear and tell you there is this and that amiss in the house, in the habit, in the heart, in the life, in the closet, don't say to conscience, conscience, be quiet, be still, don't make any noise. I will hear you at a more convenient season.

30:04 The heathen orator could say, a man may not depart a hair's breath all his life from the dictates of a good conscience. Will not this heathen one day rise in judgment against those who daily crucify the light of their own consciences? Then another Puritan adds a dimension to this that is so vital. Clarkson, associate and then successor of John, Owen said this.

30:34 May God help us to hear and lay to heart this sober word from his servant of another generation. I picked up Sibbes again instead of my friend Clarkson. Listen to Clarkson. Conscience is in every way furnished to help you to the discovery of sin.

30:56 Make use of it accordingly. Get more and more enlightened that conscience may give true and full direction Beware that it be not corrupted with false principles that the rule be not made crooked and bended to favor you in any evil and in order that it may prove a true and faithful witness let it not be bribed. I read this after my preparation. So three hundred years ago he knew men tried to bribe and give payola to conscience.

31:28 Or overawed nor cut short hear it out! Give it liberty and encouragement to speak the whole truth. Let it not be baffled as modest witnesses are sometimes by wrangling advocates put in twentieth century Americanese. Don't let conscience testimony be baffled like a simple ordinary off the street person who gives testimony in the court and then some clever lawyer twists his words and gets him all fumboozled.

31:56 He says don't do that with conscience. All due respect to lawyers. Observe, observe its first words. Take them in their genuine sense before they be perverted, darkened, eluded by the arts and sophistry, the shifts and cabals and evasions of corrupt and deceitful hearts which would deal with the plain witness of conscience as cunning lawyers are apt to do with the evidence that the man makes against them.

32:29 You see what he's saying? You take the first testimony of conscience as probably its most accurate testimony. If you would keep a good conscience, dear Christian, settle it, settle it here and now that you must silence immediately its every accusation and you'll never do that unless it becomes a spiritual habit eagerly, eagerly to listen to its voice of accusation. Conscience is your John the Baptist to call you to face your sin.

Godly Responses: Freely Confess and Believingly Cling

33:03 That you might behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Secondly, the godly response to its accusations involves not only eagerly listening to its voice of accusation but freely confessing the cause of its accusation. Freely confessing the cause of its accusation. 1 John 1 and verse 9.

33:30 If we confess our sins He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. And that word confess though it is rich in its full-orbed biblical teaching has in the very essence of its etymology to say the same thing about something. Confession involves striking in line with the testimony of conscience not trying to silence him, debate him, pay him off, shout him down. It means that the voice of conscience is embraced and we then confess our sins. We come to God and say God, it was sin that I mumbled those words to that character that cut me off and it was sin that I felt murderous feelings in my heart. Lord, those derisive words according to your word are of the very seed of murder. It was a murderous spirit in my heart.

34:41 Lord, I confess it to you and you've said if I confess my sins you are faithful and just to forgive and to cleanse from all unrighteousness. The young mother in the midst of all of her duties she can't even step aside for 30 seconds to pray. But in the midst of all her duties when those words of anger and frustration broke from her mouth can take the testimony of conscience to heart and say Lord Jesus while her hands are busy her heart is in his presence Lord Jesus, forgive me for the terrible sin of that loss of temper that irritability that lack of self-control that lack of godly patience. Lord Jesus, I confess my sin I acknowledge it before you Lord Jesus wash me afresh in your own precious blood. That's what I mean by freely confessing the cause of its accusation. Freely confessing holding nothing back calling the thing what God has called it not saying but you know Lord that's all that extenuation I lost my temper Lord but you know that.

36:04 God knows that everything that follows the you know that is a lot of rubbish and a negation of the words of confession. The words of confession are straightforward and unqualified and artless against thee and thee only have I sinned and done that which is evil in thy sight. Freely confess the cause of its accusation. Thirdly, believingly cling to the promise of God with respect to his forgiveness.

36:42 Believingly cling to the promise of God with respect to his forgiveness. If we confess he is faithful and just to forgive and to cleanse from all unrighteousness and this is one of the great struggles in the daily Christian experience when the mind and sometimes when the entire inner psychology of our being still feels the shock of the sin done or thought or spoken to believe while our systems still feel the influence of the sin that if we have confessed it is forgiven and we are cleansed. That's where it takes what the writer to Hebrews says a drawing near with a true heart in full assurance of faith. Someone has so vividly said to come reeking from the very sin we've committed and come into the presence of God truly confessing and believe while we can still as it were smell the odor of the sin upon us that we are clean before God. Dear people it takes vigorous faith to believe that. But it's unbelief to believe anything else.

38:10 It's unbelief to believe anything else. If you would keep a good conscience then you must learn as a matter of spiritual habit to silence immediately all of its accusations. How? By eagerly listening to its accusations freely confessing the cause of the accusation and then believingly cling to the promises of divine forgiveness and then sometimes you've got to do a fourth thing not always but sometimes.

Godly Responses: Thoroughly Make Amends to Others

38:52 Thoroughly make amends where other people are involved in your sin. Thoroughly make amends where other people are involved in your sin. All sin is against God and that's the worst thing about any sin. Against thee and thee only have I sinned said David.

39:13 He had sinned against Bathsheba sinned against Uriah sinned against the nation sinned against his own soul sinned against his family but he said the worst thing about any sin is that it's sin against God. But it's not the only thing about any sin. Some sins are against our fellow men. If thy brother sinned against thee rebuke him.

39:36 If he repent forgive him. And you remember what Paul said in that classic text on conscience Acts 24 16 Herein do I exercise myself to have always a conscience void of offense to God and towards man. Towards man. Let's go back to those incidents.

40:01 The man has driven out of his driveway at the end of the street he picked up someone whom he takes to work with him. Is it enough that when he's cut off on Route 80 if he's cut off on Route 3 going into the Lincoln Tunnel is it enough that when he mumbles those words that reflect sinful passions of anger is it enough that driving on his way to work he should heed the voice of conscience freely confess the sin to God in his own heart believingly embrace the divine forgiveness? Is that enough to have a good conscience? No.

40:46 Because the moment he's done doing that and looks to the right of him there's his friend Jack and he can't look in his eyes with a good conscience because Jack has not seen the invisible actions of his soul. And he cannot have a good conscience to man until he says Jack you know I profess to be a Christian and I seek a good conscience within each of you. If you have a good conscience it means that Jesus is more than enough to do that. That's what it seems to be said to be in Jesus that when that character did what he did you heard me mumbling that was sin and I've confessed it to my God and I want to ask you to forgive me a good conscience as your most blessed companion next to jesus christ it's not silly it's instinctive and if that mother's children are old enough to have perceived and she's not going to be overly technical to make sure they've crossed that line she'll err on the side of maybe confessing when she didn't need to it's not enough that she says oh lord jesus forgive me for that outburst

42:11 she puts her little ones upon her knee and says kitties mommy sorry mommy sinned by talking harshly to you that way and she's asked the lord jesus to forgive her will you forgive mommy you said that's ridiculous you might have to do that 10 times a day i don't care if you got to do it a hundred times a day you want a good conscience you'll get it and keep it god's way at any cost one of the biggest biggest shocks that has come to me as a pastor is to find how few men live this way before their families they don't confess their known sins to their wife to their children and they wonder why they have no grip on the consciences of their kids and can't lead them with authority they don't confess their sins my friend if this seems ridiculous to you may i say very pointedly i so deeply seriously question whether you know anything of communion with god because your experience if

43:37 you've known communion with god is is such that you can affirm in your heart of hearts it doesn't matter how quote big or little the issue may be any point of tension in your conscience between you and god and your fellow men is a clog to any progress in grace until you deal with it i well remember i will remember i will remember i will remember i will remember i will remember i will remember when god was burning this truth in my heart very early in my christian experience saved as a senior in high school a family of 10 children living in a relatively small home and in that situation there were times when irritability and less than christ-like actions and reactions broke forth and i can remember wrestling saying lord my sister so and so she's done this and that and the other thing and she'd never come and said i'm sorry to me and all i did was speak a little harsh word lord do i have to go confess to her it doesn't seem fair she's got this whole mountain of garbage that she ought to confess and she ain't said a word and so the lord said what is that to thee you want a good conscience with me eat crow

44:56 my son and you go and fess up your sins and i got to college and in the general interaction as fellows will do i'd go to bow over my son and i'd go to the church and i'd go to the church and i'd go to the church and i'd be leaving you and i'd pretend as if i was the recommend anna yeah a its like the lord said i never heard voices i'm talking about the like the lord said he'd planned games with his own port one is as you know what it is there yes lord i do that but it's not passing that the table tonight could Biden summarize beats itself over there at dormitory seek them out which you make that many a time i had to leave my dormitory room spend time tracking down a fellow student Nine times out of ten, they looked at me like I was crazy. I don't care. I don't care! With my God!

45:55 If I've got to be thought crazy, so be it. And I want to have a good conscience God's way at any cost. And I only bring in that personal testimony, which those of you who frequent this place know is very rare. But I want to affirm and bend over that I'm not giving you preacher's talk.

46:23 Now, I ask you sitting here this morning, if sitting in this place next to wife and daughter, husband, children, relatives, and fellow saints, do you have a conscience void of offense not only to God, but to man? Do you?

46:48 Do you? If you don't, you better get it, and you better get it quick, quickly. And there's only one way to get it.

The Liberty of a Good Conscience and Constant Communion with Christ

47:00 That's to welcome its voice of accusation, freely to confess, the cause of its accusation, believingly to cling to the promise of God of forgiveness, and thoroughly to make amends where this is necessary. Now someone says, but Pastor Martin, living like that will create terrible bondage. My friend, you could not be more wrong.

47:27 Is it bondage to have to be driven to Jesus Christ again and again, to feed upon him as bread, and as drink for our souls? Is it bondage to go to my Savior, if necessary, a hundred times a day, saying, Lord Jesus, wash me in your precious blood, cleanse me of that sin I trust to the efficacy of your death upon the cross, and your advocacy at the right hand of the Father, Lord Jesus. Lord Jesus, show the power of your grace to cleanse, cleanse, and purge my conscience. My friend, if having heart communion with Jesus Christ as your Savior is bondage, then you must have a strange view of what liberty is.

48:21 How blessed to be bound to my Savior. How blessed to feed upon him. That's what he meant when he said, he who eats, present tense, eats my flesh and drinks my blood, has eternal life in him. He who lives upon me, has crucified for him.

48:40 He who feeds and drinks of me, has the Savior immolated upon the cross for the salvation of men. Such a person lives by me.

48:53 There's a classic work that's been reprinted in recent days, and it's ministered powerfully to my own soul by Alexander White, and it's an analysis of John Bunyan's spiritual experience as reflected in Bunyan's autobiography, Grace Abounding, and in this matter of conscience, he has a most perceptive word, and I read it for you from Alexander White. Bunyan said that he began to learn how to get a good conscience, and now White commenting says, I hope I've seen somewhat clearly, hoping I have seen somewhat clearly the right way to take off guilt. Let us also see the right way to keep it off. And then he quotes another old writer by the name of Halliburton. Here, in my opinion, is one of the greatest secrets of practical godliness and one of the highest attainments in a close walk with God. That is to say, to know how to come daily and hourly to the fountain open for sin and for uncleanness, never to be long, or indeed ever at all away from that fountain.

50:13 That is the only sure way to keep off guilt. Now to these two masters, Bunyan and Halliburton, I will only venture to add this. Singing and saying to yourselves day and night the great evangelical and experimental psalms and hymns will greatly help to keep off returning and recurring guilt. Another good and indeed indispensable lesson is to get your new conscience taken off immediately.

50:42 And now hear him. This is burning Christian eloquence. Even before it is well on you, get it taken off on the spot. If it's a sinful word that you have spoken, before that sinful word has lighted on your neighbor's ear, before it's had time to enter your neighbor's heart, and even before the recording angel has had time to get his pen into his inkhorn, go before him.

51:08 Go before him with confession. Be back at the cross in the twinkling of an eye. Be prostrate in soul before the mercy seat. And so with your other sins that so easily beset you and so continually load your conscience with new guilt, God has said greatly to love certain of our adverbs, and no adverb more than the adverb immediately, unless it be the kindred evangelicals, adverbs vicariously and believingly.

51:42 Isn't that precious? Christ died vicariously. Embrace the virtue of that death believingly. And, oh, Christian, whenever conscience smarts and accuses, do it immediately.

52:01 And in that way, you will keep a good conscience for the rest of your lives. And finally, just a quote from Ohalesby, who has written one of the few treatises on the subject of conscience. Speaking to this very issue, Ohalesby says, with simple and yet with pointed eloquence, distress of conscience is therefore not only the mother of faith, it also renews our faith and keeps it continually alive. It is that which preserves our faith as a living faith.

52:43 Distress of conscience is the mother of faith. Not a strange way of putting it, but it's true. If faith is feeding upon the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me, then I do not feed upon him as luxury but as bread without which I cannot exist. And as one who is a sinner and will be a sinner till I die, though not living in the dominion of sin as I once did, and as we heard from 1 John, though not a sinner in the sense of the unrighteous man, but as one to whom sin is a continual problem, the more I grow in grace an increasing problem, for as we shall see under the third ingredient of keeping a good conscience, as conscience is more and more educated to speak accurately by the word of God, then conscience has a greater statute book from which to accuse me. And as a young Christian he had a little eeny teensy bitsy statute book and the more I study the word his statute book gets larger and larger and larger and he has more and more an accurate basis to accuse me. So one of the marks of growth in grace is growth in being subject to the accusations of conscience. But then it is also growth in the appreciation of Jesus, in the fellowship of Jesus,

Conclusion: The Cost of a Good Conscience

54:12 in feeding upon our blessed Lord. How are we to keep a good conscience? I answer ingredient number one is never violate its present dictates. But if those dictates have been violated what are we to do?

54:32 Ingredient number two, immediately silence its every accusation don't attempt to silence it in that ungodly manner that we've described but truly silence it in the godly manner set forth in the word of God. Do you have a good conscience this morning? I pray that before you pillow your head tonight you will at any cost. And for some of you that good conscience will not be attained merely by heeding its voice of accusation freely confessing the cause of its accusation believingly appropriating the divine provision for cleansing. But you've got business to do with your husband, with your wife, with your children, with some people at work. You've got matters that you know you've got to make right and my friend time doesn't make them right. You've got to deal with them.

55:39 But you say, Pastor, I might lose my job. I might lose my wife if I told her what I did and she's never...

55:46 My friend, you come to the place where having a good conscience is valued as it ought and you're prepared to say at any price, at any consequence, I'm determined to have a good conscience. Are you in that place? Are you? If not, then you put a precious, you put a tragically little price upon the precious commodity of fellowship with God.

56:15 And if that's so, then you have grounds to question whether you're even a Christian. Let us pray. Our Father, we marvel that in your grace you have made such full provision for needy sinners. We thank you for that initial bath of regeneration, that initial cleansing granted to us on the threshold of passing into your kingdom of grace.

56:57 But we bless you for that daily washing of our feet, accomplished, effected by our Lord Jesus himself. And oh, how we pray that as your people we may learn what it is to keep a good conscience in the way of your appointment. Father, have mercy upon those who are hung up in one area or another of a conscience that rightly accuses them for sin that has not truly and righteously been dealt with. Oh, God, may the word prove effectual in every such heart today.

57:37 And for those who have never known a good conscience because they've never stood naked and stripped and undone and guilt-laden before you, and looked to your death as a dear son and trusted in him for salvation. Oh, God, we pray that this day they may know the joy, the delight, the sheer spiritual ecstasy of calling you Father with a conscience purged in the blood of the Lamb. Hear then our cry and seal the word to our prophet, we ask through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.