Grace, Faith & Life

The Human Conscience
by Theophilos on Fri Apr 18, 2008 12:46 pm

The function of conscience is knowing right from wrong coupled with an expectation that we should act accordingly.

The first part of this function tends to make us feel autonomous. We don’t need any one telling us what to do,especially God, and we certainly don’t need, nor do we even believe in, absolute standards.This puts us right up there with God, doesn’t it? I mean all I need to do is be true to myself and I will…, will what?

The problem is that our concept of what is right is not even close to what God says is right. When the rubber hits the road, we are always going to look out for our own. God says, in the Bible, that in His ideal society, we should have an attitude which puts others first. It is our nature to do what pleases us.

Conscience is also coupled with the idea that we should always act accordingly. This is one of the problems. We may think that we know right from wrong in a limited sense, but we will not keep on doing the right thing. We do not have that power. That is not in our nature.

This leads to another function of conscience which is to produce feelings of guilt when we don’t act according to our conscience. Conscience not only responds to some wrong which we did, but also to something which we believe we should have done and didn’t, or even something which we believe we should have been and weren’t.

Conscience is that part of our nature which causes us to think that we don’t really need God, because we know what is good.Conscience coupled with pride produces feelings of autonomy.Conclusion: Conscience is not from God and it is not how God speaks to us.When we don’t do things consistent with who we believe ourselves to be, conscience produces feelings of guilt, shame, inferiority, anxiety, or fear; resulting in some form of defensive behavior, self-punishment, hiding, avoidance; or repression, rebellion, compulsive activity, or obcessive thinking. (Because of a function of the mind called imagination, what we believe ourselves to be may be completely unrealistic.)There is a difference between being guilty and feeling guilty. Our mind can make us feel guilty, due to unrealistic expectations from ourself or from others. On the other hand, we can also be guilty without feeling guilty.Conclusion: Guilt feelings should never be used to motivate others, whether it is preaching or parenting.

Following is scripture from the 2nd and 3rd chapters of the Bible, this is probably one of the best known passages in all of the Bible. I believe this tells about what happened to humanity. It also shows that God created Adam and Eve with freewill, the freedom to choose. They chose to be disobedient in the hope of becoming like God and thereby be independent of God.

Genesis 2:15-17
5 And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. 16. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: 17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

Genesis 2:24-25
24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh. 25 And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.

Genesis 3:1-6
1. Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? 2 And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden: 3 But of the fruit of the tree which [is] in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die. 4 And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: 5 For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. 6. And when the woman saw that the tree [was] good for food, and that it [was] pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make [one] wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.

Genesis 3:7
7And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they [were] naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons.

Genesis 3:8-13
8 And they heard the voice of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God amongst the trees of the garden. 9. And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where [art] thou? 10 And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I [was] naked; and I hid myself. 11. And he said, Who told thee that thou [wast] naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat? 12 And the man said, The woman whom thou gavest [to be] with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat. 13 And the LORD God said unto the woman, What [is] this [that] thou hast done? And the woman said, The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat.

It seems pretty clear to me that Adam and Eve changed, they were different and their relationship with God was different. I believe Adam and Eve received exactly what was intended, through their disobedience they realized a conscience. They obtained a degree of knowledge of good and evil. They did not, however, receive power over it.What was the last thing God asked them? Would He have asked that if He knew they already had a faculty for knowing it before they ate of the tree of knowledge of good and evil?

What was their feeling? They experienced shame, fear & anxiety.

What did they do? They covered themselves and they hid.

We should also note that this fear did not bring them to repentence.[1] This fear is not the same as how we are to fear God. The change described here is their death, the presence of God is no longer in them. The condition is still present in all of us, because we are born in the image of Adam. It is also our death. It is the death part of “Guilty and Dead”. We are not only guilty of disobedience, but we are spiritually dead, because, unless we have been “born again”, we are missing the image of God.

HUMANISM:

This new characteristic is the basis for people to think that they don’t really need God, because they are pretty good.

This new character (which is known as the “fallen” nature, or the “Flesh”) is the basis for all humanistic religious philosophies and systems. Even Christian humanism which uses a biblical vocabulary, to establish a system which teaches “If it is going to be, it is up to me”. Understanding our human nature, is one of the primary requirements to come to an understanding of our condition before God.

In this day, it is not difficult for us to imagine someone, even a neighbor, killing us over an argument, or cheating us out of our property, destroying our property for the fun of it, or saying things to hurt us. If we really think about it, it is not difficult to know that we have had, and responded to, similiar thoughts based on retaliation, envy or ways that we can succeeed at someone else’s expense. The Bible says everyone is like this. This is how we are born.

Our condition before God is all bad, but our conscience might have us believe otherwise.The whole biblical message is about this condition in humanity and what God did about it.

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SEARCHING FOR MEANING AND PURPOSE, STRIVING FOR SUCCESS:

Because of some part of our nature(conscience), we are driven to be accepted by others(no one wants to be rejected). Thus we are driven to do things which are expected by others in order to be accepted by them, or to get our way with them. There are two ways to look at this, we can be either the driver or the drivee. Relative to each relationship which we have, we are creating the expectations or we are responding to the expectations of others. We usually want to be the dominate person in a relationship. We want our way.

God’s way is just the opposite. We are to think about the well being of others and put them first. Down deep inside, we all yearn for this type of peaceful, noncompetitive life, but this is only found in the spiritual relationship with God.
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