Let your conscience be your guide. They say. But should you?

Our conscience is our inner sense of right and wrong.

I’ve often wondered how God speaks to us. There are many different ways He speaks to us. And I know I’ve said that God speaks to us through our own conscience. But then, in the back of my mind, I wondered is that really true? Is our conscience from God? Do we get cues from God through our conscience? I wasn’t really sure about that.

But then earlier this week, I was reading my Bible. And this verse jumped out at me.

They demonstrate that God’s law is written in their hearts, for their own conscience and thoughts either accuse them or tell them they are doing right. Romans 2:15

This tells me that God created my conscience. He shapes my conscience if I allow Him to work in my life. The only way that my conscience will continue to be pliable is if I seek truth. By seeking truth, regardless of the cost, my conscience will be nudged in a way that lets me know right from wrong. My conscience will let me know if I have wronged someone through my words or actions. If I continue to follow my own path, I have exchanged my will for God’s order for my life. Is that what I want?

Romans 2:16 says a day is coming when God through Jesus Christ will judge everyone’s secret life. That means my own thoughts are known by God. And that if I have evil intent in my heart, but I don’t speak it or act on it, I still will be judged on it. Because from the heart, the mouth speaks. From the heart, the hand acts. What is within me comes out. My conscience can be the red flag that speaks up. In a sense, to say hey, wait a minute. You were wrong to think that. You were wrong to say that. You were wrong to do that. So my conscience plays a huge part in my relationship with God.

If I allow God to continue to speak to me and to work in and through me, my conscience has to be very pliable and moldable. My conscience is not my God. It’s from God. He made my conscience to know right from wrong. And if I make it a practice to lie. To gossip. To slander. To judge. To blame. To hold grudges. Bascially, if I make a practice of sinning, my conscience will harden. My conscience will be corrupt to the point where I don’t recognize evil as evil. Because over time, it will seem good to me to put down others. To slander others. To point the finger of blame at someone else when I’m the guilty party. When I’m the one who says those wrong things or untruths about someone else. My conscience won’t even move. It will be so stiff as a board that it will not recognize the truth. So the health of my consicence is the thermometer on my relationship with God. It shows how close I am to Him or how far I am from him.

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Cling to your faith in Christ, and keep your conscience clear. For some people have deliberately violated their consciences; as a result, their faith has been shipwrecked. 1 Timothy 1:19

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Now I may be a sensitive person, and my conscience may nudge me very easily. Even if I’m not a Christian. There are good people who aren’t Christians. There are concientious people who know right from wrong and choose to do right. But if their sins haven’t been forgiven, they aren’t Christians. If they haven’t asked God to forgive their sins, they aren’t Christians. Yes, they have a conscience but that puts them in a different category. They’re good people. Good people aren’t always Christians.

We need to be moldable. We need to regularly read God’s word. We need to demonstrate that God’s law is written on our hearts. So our consciences will let us know when we are doing right and when we are doing wrong.

Let’s listen for God’s voice. Let’s stop and wait for that nudge of our conscience to let us know if we are on the right track or not. Or if there’s something we should be doing that we aren’t. Sometimes we don’t do the things we should. Our conscience will let us know that. Because we know right from wrong. At the end of the day, we know right from wrong. It’s our choice what we do. It’s our choice what we say. It’s our choice what we think. We are moldable. We are made in the image of God.

Have we become so dull as people that we can’t recognize wrong when we see it? When we hear it? When we think it? Have we become such hardened people that we don’t want to know the truth? That we don’t want to hear the truth? That we don’t want to think the truth? When we read something, can we separate the truth from lies? If we say something, do we recognize if we’re lying or if we’re speaking truth? When we see an act, do we recognize it for truth or for lies?

Have we become so dull that we can’t separate truth from evil? What have we gotten ourselves into if we only see wrong as right and right as wrong. If we see only lies as truth and truth as lies. How have we gotten this far from God? Can we get back to him as a nation, as a people, as an individual? We need to fall on our knees and repent. It’s not too late yet. But there’s coming a day when it will be too late.

Let’s not wait.

Our actions are our outer voice. Our conscience is our inner voice. Since we are created in the image of God, we have an inner law that guides our conscience. We have a moral law within us that will either accuse or excuse our moral choices. Perhaps it’s time to perform a checkup on our consciences. How we would rate?

Those who are dominated by the sinful nature think about sinful things, but those who are controlled by the Holy Spirit think about things that please the Spirit. So letting your sinful nature control your mind leads to death. But letting the Spirit control your mind leads to life and peace. For the sinful nature is always hostile to God. It never did obey God’s laws, and it never will. That’s why those who are still under the control of their sinful nature can never please God. Romans 8:5-8