A Clear Conscience
A clear conscience is a wonderful asset for any of us. It is one of the contributing factors to living a life of real peace. When our conscience condemns us, we can never escape it, so we are in constant turmoil. That is a miserable way to live. However, if we live a righteous life before the Lord, as Job did, then, we can have a clear conscience as long as we live. (Job 27:6) I believe this is a lesson many of us need to remember, and we need to see the different aspects of having a clear conscience.
Most people are not living righteous lives before the Lord, so their conscience is condemning them for their sins. This is true for sins of commission, the things we do wrong, and sins of omission, the right things we fail to do. Either way, the Holy Spirit convicts our conscience that we have sinned, and we need to make it right before God and others. Until we make it right, we will suffer from a guilty conscience. No matter what we do, we will not be able to escape the nagging awareness of our guilt. However, the opposite could happen for us the way Job experienced it in his life. We could be righteous before God, and yet others, do not think we are righteous, so we are tempted to say that we have failed the Lord, when we haven't. I know that is not nearly as common, but it does happen. If we fail to cling to our righteousness, and we act like we are not walking in God's will, so others will accept us, then, we will still have a guilty conscience. We will be lying by denying our righteousness. I know that may seem unusual, but it does happen.
Let me give you one example of the later. If we have a daily unhurried time with the Lord, because God calls on us to begin our day with Him in prayer, Bible reading, and confession of sins, so we are clean before Him and doing His will, we can walk in righteousness. Then, if we run into other people who don't think it is possible to meet with the Lord daily or to walk in His will, we can fail to show them our righteousness, so they will accept us. In essence, we are denying God's goodness to bless us when we obey Him. I believe, we will have a guilty conscience in that case, because we did not cling to our righteousness.
Tomorrow, I intend to read Job 28-30.
Most people are not living righteous lives before the Lord, so their conscience is condemning them for their sins. This is true for sins of commission, the things we do wrong, and sins of omission, the right things we fail to do. Either way, the Holy Spirit convicts our conscience that we have sinned, and we need to make it right before God and others. Until we make it right, we will suffer from a guilty conscience. No matter what we do, we will not be able to escape the nagging awareness of our guilt. However, the opposite could happen for us the way Job experienced it in his life. We could be righteous before God, and yet others, do not think we are righteous, so we are tempted to say that we have failed the Lord, when we haven't. I know that is not nearly as common, but it does happen. If we fail to cling to our righteousness, and we act like we are not walking in God's will, so others will accept us, then, we will still have a guilty conscience. We will be lying by denying our righteousness. I know that may seem unusual, but it does happen.
Let me give you one example of the later. If we have a daily unhurried time with the Lord, because God calls on us to begin our day with Him in prayer, Bible reading, and confession of sins, so we are clean before Him and doing His will, we can walk in righteousness. Then, if we run into other people who don't think it is possible to meet with the Lord daily or to walk in His will, we can fail to show them our righteousness, so they will accept us. In essence, we are denying God's goodness to bless us when we obey Him. I believe, we will have a guilty conscience in that case, because we did not cling to our righteousness.
Tomorrow, I intend to read Job 28-30.