The conscience

Sermon Notes from Sunday 22 March 2015

1 Timothy 1 verses 1 – 15

The apostle Paul was writing to the young man Timothy.  In Acts chapters 16 and 17 we read of Timothy’s testimony.  Paul sees something in him and takes him under his wing.  Timothy goes out with Paul on his teaching and preaching engagements and becomes a young pastor.  He is left in Ephesus to establish the church while Paul moves on to Macedonia.  Paul hears of things happening in Ephesus.  Timothy is being ridiculed, scorned, mocked, criticised because of his age and so many different things.  Paul wants to write to him to encourage him.  He wants to show the way ahead for him.  He shares some wonderful things with Timothy.  In light of all the persecution, difficulties, obstacles the old devil and those who profess Christ would throw in your face he says in verse 5 “Now the end of contentment is charity.”  That word charity means love.  “Out of a pure heart.”  A heart that knows the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, the only thing that can purify the heart.  Jesus said “out of the heart comes murderous thoughts, envy.  Once the heart is cleansed out comes the good things.  Timothy keep your heart right before God.  That is our own responsibility today.  To keep ourselves right before God.  Walk in the light as he is in the light.  “And of a good conscience and of faith unfeigned.”  They all go together.  This word “conscience” has been creeping up time and time again and especially in light of the Asher Bakery case.  The government are trying to add into law a conscience clause.  This will give special liberty to those in business that they might refuse to supply anything their conscience would not allow them to.  For the Asher Bakery they could not place on a cake the slogan that supported same sex marriage.  That was going against their conscience.  As a result they are being taken to court.  Conscience is that mechanism that God has placed in each of us.  God has given it to us.  It distinguishes between right and wrong.  The human heart is a wonderful thing.  The amount of veins that are connected to it.  We have so many parts in our bodies but at the back of it all we have a thing called conscience.  Decides if it is yes or no.  An old Pastor used to say to me ‘if in doubt kick it out.’  That is the conscience.  When we go to do something the old conscience kicks in.  Look at some of the consciences found in the scripture.

A sensitive conscience.  A time whenever you know something is wrong.  That is the time to step away.  Conscience says “it is ok.”  See it in the Old Testament when the midwives in Egypt decided what to do.  In Exodus 1 we see a new Pharaoh became king in Egypt who knew nothing about Joseph.  Joseph was the youngest son of Jacob.  One day he went out to see his brothers.  They hated him with a passion.  Joseph ended up in Egypt.  The new king did not know anything about the history of the Jewish people.  Fear gripped his heart about this nation rising up against his authority and rule.  What did he do?  He made them into slaves.  He treated them harshly but the one thing he found out was that the more he persecuted these people the more they rose up.  They multiplied more and more.  Then Pharaoh came up with a great plan, a mischievous plan.  He planned to kill all the male children at the point of birth.  To do that he called in the help of the midwives.  He said ‘when you do the office of a midwife to the Hebrew women, and see them upon the stools; if it be a son then you shall kill him; but if it be a daughter then she shall live.” (Exodus 1 verse 16)  Then we read “But the midwives feared God and did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them but saved the men children alive.”  Their consciences were sensitive.  Moses was a young man who grew up living in Pharaoh’s palace.  He was well educated, had great riches beyond measure.  He had everything the world could offer.  He had power, education, everything he could ever want.  He just had to ask and it would be given to him.  One day he went out into the forecourt and saw an Egyptian beating an Israelite slave.  He slew the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.  Exodus 2 verse 12 “And he looked this way and that way, and when he saw that there was no man, he slew the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.”  Moses questioned himself if it was right or wrong.  If he was not bothered why did he look either way?  His conscience was telling him whether it was right or wrong.  How many times have you heard God’s word preached and yet not accepted Christ?  How many times have you heard that you have sinned and come short of God’s glory and heaven will not be your home unless you come to the cross?  How many times have you heard the Holy Spirit speak to your heart, drawing you to the foot of the old rugged cross?  Your conscience has said yes that is right but you have set it on the back burner, gone out into the darkness of the night and turned your back on God.  If you were called out to eternity now you would be lost for ever.  You can be saved today though.

A stifled conscience.  It is suppressed.  You feel the Holy Spirit speaking to your heart but somehow you build up every difficulty and supress the conscience.  Joseph’s brothers hated him, planned and plotted his downfall.  At 17 years of age they wanted to sort him out once for all.  They devised that they would take and kill him.  They hated him so much.  They threw him into a pit, an old dry pit.  They shackled his hands and feet and then went back to the camp fire.  They listened to the cries from that pit, their own brother pleading with them to come and lift him out of the pit.  He must have been so scared and frightened.  They stifled their conscience but it came back to them many years later.  One day they stood before Joseph but didn’t know who he was.  “We are verily guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw the anguish of his soul, when he besought us and we would not hear therefore is this distress come upon us.” (Genesis chapter 42 verse 21)  Their consciences took them right back to that day when they had put him into that pit, now all these years later the brothers are down in Egypt looking for food and didn’t realise the man before them is their own brother.   Maybe there is something in your life at this moment in time coming back to your conscience.  It is telling you need to reconcile that in your heart, with God himself.  Your conscience is telling you what needs to be done.  The brothers felt their past feelings coming back to haunt them in the presence of Joseph.  They stifled their conscience.  It is dangerous to stifle the conscience, to set it aside.  If God is speaking to you don’t stifle the conscience, silence the voice of God.  Remember when John the Baptist came preaching the will of God through him?  John was imprisoned by Herod because he preached against Herod and his taking of his brother’s wife.  Herodius wanted John killed but Herod respected him for what he stood for.  One day Salome danced before him.  Herod became drunk and offered to give her anything she wanted up to half his kingdom.  She asked for John the Baptist’s head on a platter.  Some years later Jesus came before Pilate.  He was so excited to see Jesus and talk with him.  Jesus never spoke one word to him.  The voice of God was silenced for the last time.  Herod never heard the voice of God again.  Many people have got up from a gospel meeting, under the anointing of the Spirit of God and heard the invitation but have stifled their conscience.  They wouldn’t give in and closed their ears to the voice of God.  If God has spoken to you I would plead and pray with you come to Christ today.  Is your conscience sensitive to God?  Are you stifling your conscience to God today?

A seared conscience.  No longer hears, no longer feels.  Maybe there is an apology to be made, a debt to be paid.  God reaches down today – do not stifle God’s voice today.  Strive for a good conscience before God and men.