Is your conscience backing you up or accusing you? Or have you lost your conscience?

[Leonardo Von]

Is your conscience backing you up or accusing you? Or have you lost your conscience?

•    “And in this we shall know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him, that if our heart accuses us, God is greater than our heart and knows all things. Beloved, if our heart does not accuse us, we have confidence toward God. And whatever we ask, we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do those things that are pleasing in His sight.” (1John 3.19-22). 
•    “who show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and the thoughts between one another accusing or even excusing one another,” (Romans 2.15).

We are in a world wherein most of the people don’t like to hear the truth (as Paul prophetized – 2Timothy 4.3,4). In fact, as the writer of Hebrews said, “Now chastening for the present does not seem to be joyous, but grievous.” (Hebrews 12.11). Nevertheless, our angry in virtue of someone gainsaying or scathing us, or even uttering some obloquy against us is, in a way, the Creator contending with our spirit (see the Creator doing this in Genesis 6.3; Genesis 32.24-29).

Of course, it would be better if we were always humble and sensible to the voice of the Creator (James 4.7) and we had a broken and contrite heart (which the Creator loves – Psalms 34.18; Psalms 51.17; Isaiah 57.15; Isaiah 61.1). We would ward off many problems and please Jesus if we didn’t need to be stifled or reproved by someone (see Exodus 16.28; Numbers 14.11,27).

Nevertheless:

•    If we still feel our conscience weigh down, it's a sign that the Creator is being able to surpass the hardness of our heart;

•    If we are being gainsayed or opressed by someone, this means that Jesus love us and didn't do away with us, Rather, He is working His salvation in us (see 2Thessalonians 1.4-8; 1Peter 4.12-19) and giving us opportunity to repent and convert (see 2Timothy 2.25,26)

The worst thing that can come about us is when we are in mistake and everything go right. To be leaded into temptation (Matthew 6.13) is a sign that our heart turned into diamond (Zechariah 7:11, 12), what make us reproved, incapable of being touched by the Peace (see Isaiah 57.19-21):

•    “speaking lies in hypocrisy, *being seared in their own conscience*,” (1Timothy 4.2).

May Jesus have mercy on us, may this day never catches up to us. Otherwise, this can come about us:

•    “Judah went into captivity because of affliction, and from great slavery. She dwells among the nations; she finds no rest; all her pursuers have overtaken her between the narrows.” (Lamentations 1.3).

So as Judah went into captivity because of the turpitude between them, many times we are bring affliction and serfdom  (or, if you prefer, we are a heavy burden) to people around us and we even not realize that.

So, what is it better: someone to tell us off (even so this person copes with us such as Paul dealt with Peter – Galatians 2.14), or to be convicted by Jesus and become a cursed object (Deuteronomy 28.16,19)?

Have a nice day accepting the correction of the Creator, which make you partake of His holiness (Hebrews 12.10).
 

[missmuffet]

A seared conscience?

 

The Bible speaks of a seared conscience in 1 Timothy 4:2. The conscience is the God-given moral consciousness within each of us (Romans 2:15). If the conscience is “seared”—literally “cauterized”—then it has been rendered insensitive. Such a conscience does not work properly; it’s as if “spiritual scar tissue” has dulled the sense of right and wrong. Just as the hide of an animal scarred with a branding iron becomes numb to further pain, so the heart of an individual with a seared conscience is desensitized to moral pangs.

Paul identifies those who have a seared conscience in 1 Timothy 4:1–2: “The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Such teachings come through hypocritical liars, whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron.” In this passage, we learn three things about false teachers who lead others into apostasy: 1) they are mouthpieces for evil spirits, since they promulgate “things taught by demons”; 2) they are hypocritical liars, since they wear a mask of holiness but are full of falsehood; and 3) they are unscrupulous, since their consciences have been cauterized. This explains much. How can false teachers lie with no shame and spread deception with no compunction? Because they have seared consciences. They are past feeling that lying is wrong.

Earlier in the epistle, Paul speaks of the “good conscience” as opposed to the seared conscience. “Advancing God’s work,” he says, comes by faith, and love “comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith” (1 Timothy 1:4–5). A good conscience has the capability to tell right from wrong and is free from guilt. A person with a good conscience maintains his integrity. He enjoys fellowship with those who “walk in the light, as [Jesus] is in the light” (1 John 1:7). The lies of the devil are anathema to the one with a good conscience. Rather than follow the lies of apostates, he will “fight the battle well, holding on to faith and a good conscience” (1 Timothy 1:18–19).

Proverbs 6:27 asks a rhetorical question to illustrate the consequences of adultery: “Can a man scoop fire into his lap / without his clothes being burned?” To paraphrase the question in relation to false teaching, “Can an apostate dispense the fiery lies of hell without his conscience being seared?”

 

https://www.gotquestions.org/seared-conscience.html

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Edited October 14, 2021 by missmuffet