Living With A Purpose: Having A Conscience

“And herein do I exercise myself, to have always a conscience void of offence toward God, and toward men.” Acts 24:16

There are many things that we could be praying concerning our country right now. Revival, peace,, unity, justice, and healing. But I think that the most important thing to pray about concerning our country, is the restoration of the conscience. You say why the conscience? Because that is where God speaks to us. If there is no conscience, then there is no hearing from God!

Paul said that he “exercises both day and night to have a good conscience toward God and man.” He knew that the line between good and evil ran through the human heart, and what brought triumph over evil, was the conscience knowledge of the word of God.

Today in our country, we have a generation that is void of a conscience. It is like what Paul said to Titus “Unto the pure all things are pure: but unto them who are defiled and unbelieving there is nothing pure; even their mind and conscience is defiled. They profess that they know God but in works deny Him, being abominable, and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate.” (Titus 1:15,16) The word reprobate means void of a conscience.

Another example is found in Romans 1:18-32. This is the condition of a culture who does not acknowledge God, or at most, has a distorted view of him.

For us, as God’s people, the way we exercise having a good conscience is by reading and hearing the word with a prayerful attitude daily, asking God to give us a teachable spirit and ears to hear what the Spirit is saying to the Church.

So, I think that the most important prayer that we can pray right now is first, for God to open the heart and conscience of our young people that they may be open to hearing the Gospel and responding to its call to salvation. Then second, that we would be ready to respond to that opening of the conscience with an answer for the hope we have in Christ with gentleness and respect.

Pastor