Man alone, of the creatures upon this earth, has a conscience. Doubtless some beasts can be instructed in obedience by their masters, but the intelligence and memory of the creature is not conscience. But to him who is conscious of his sinful being, it is a terrible reality. Conscience spoils the pleasures of sin, renders the prosperous, wicked man miserable, scares the skeptic, and forces many, against their judgment and feelings, to confess their crimes and yield themselves to justice.
We do not deny that man may harden himself, until, despite his conscience, he becomes like the beasts and shuns evil only because of its consequences. Worse still, his conscience may become seared as with a hot iron and be so dulled to every righteous influence that even his fellow-men consider him too brutish for their society. However, the conscience remains in spite of all this. We may well ask what conscience is and how man came by this mighty force within him.
The Moral Sense
of Right and Wrong
Conscience is the moral sense of right and wrong which is innate to man. It is as much a part of his present being as his reason or his will. We may describe conscience as the eye of man’s moral being, or liken it to a voice within him commanding him concerning right and wrong.
Conscience does not enable man to know abstractedly what is right and wrong; it is not in itself a standard of right. Rather, if man is given the law of right and wrong, conscience appeals to him according to the law he knows. Conscience needs instructing; it does not instruct, and according as the conscience is faithfully instructed, so will its utterances be more or less just. Just as the eye responds to natural light, so the conscience responds to moral light.
The conscience of a pagan does not address him as that of a man who knows God’s Word. The conscience of a Christian, instructed in the spirit of his Father’s will, speaks very differently from that of him who knows merely the letter of the Scriptures. Thus even among true Christians there is a vast difference in sensibility of conscience. Conscience is like a window, which may be clean or dirty. Some labor to keep the window clean; others are slovenly, and their whole body is not full of light.
Responsibility
Man’s responsibility is according to his knowledge of right or wrong. Having heard what is right, we are bound to obey, and conscience will speak upon the question. The heathen have the book of nature before their eyes. “The invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead” (Rom. 1:2020For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: (Romans 1:20)). More than this, “when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the meanwhile accusing or else excusing one another” (Rom. 2:14-1514For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: 15Which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another;) (Romans 2:14‑15)). Our moral instinct, our sense of right and wrong, bears witness to the unseen God.
How came man to have this voice within him? God made man upright and set him in a scene of good — the Garden of Eden, where there was no evil. Man lacked the knowledge of evil, his state was beautiful, and he was happy. But innocence is not perfection, and at present man has lost that simplicity; He is mature. He has a conscience, which is a good thing, but it was obtained in a bad way. Man now knows evil, but he is a fallen creature; he loves the evil and cannot do the good. When we say fallen, we mean fallen from that condition in which God set him. Man gained knowledge by his fall. “The Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of Us, to know good and evil” (Gen. 3:2222And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever: (Genesis 3:22)). The knowledge is unquestionable, but together with the knowledge there is a nature contrary to God which loves iniquity.
Righteousness and Holiness
To the Christian it is said, “Put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; and be renewed in the spirit of your mind; and that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness” (Eph. 4:22-2422That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; 23And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; 24And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. (Ephesians 4:22‑24)). This is not innocence regained, but righteousness and true holiness. Man has acquired the knowledge of good and evil, never to lose it, but in Christ he is no longer under the power of evil. And in the future the believer will possess the knowledge of good and evil, yet without a desire after the evil and rejoicing in the good; that will be perfection.
Thus man acquired his conscience by disobedience. He stole his knowledge, and when his eyes were opened to the fatal knowledge of evil, he feared and fled from God. Man’s knowledge condemned him, and it condemns him still. The one step over the boundary line set him where the darkness reigns. Man now is used to evil; it comes naturally to him without education, for he is born in sin and shapen in iniquity. It is only as he is instructed in right and taught of God that he becomes sensitive to wrong.
However, even the sensitive and refined conscience is not strength. It is a light to feet which are paralyzed: “How to perform that which is good I find not” (Rom. 7:1818For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not. (Romans 7:18)). Conscience makes man miserable. When the Spirit of God works within a man, He begins with the conscience, and the deeper the conscience work, the firmer will the building stand. Man’s first hiding from God was because of his conscience, and God begins with man where man left Him. That kind of gospel preaching which lets the conscience alone or only deals softly with it will produce either unreal or weakly converts. The conscience must be right with Him, and until the Spirit of God applies the living Word to the conscience, a man is no nearer to God than Adam was when he was hiding from God. So with the Christian; unless his conscience is right before God, he cannot have communion with God.
Christian Consciousness
Christian consciousness is the sensibility to right and wrong, and as the sense of the thing itself increases within us, so does our sensibility to it grow. As the believer grows in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord, he becomes more acute in his consciousness. He mourns over the sins of the soul. It is not punishment that he fears, but he grieves that he has done wrong against his God. It was this acute consciousness which made Paul exercise himself day and night in keeping a clear conscience before God and man. There is a danger of there being very little exercise in keeping the conscience clear. The blood of Christ has purged our consciences. We know good and evil, but do not fear God, for we know that the blood of His Son has satisfied the righteousness of God. We do not fear God since He is entirely for us. He gave His Son, who shed His blood for us. Our consciences, instructed by the Spirit of God concerning the death of Christ, know that God has not one thing whatever against us. Such clearness of conscience in the presence of our holy and gracious God surely leads to increased consciousness of every kind of evil thing. The window of the Christian’s soul is unshuttered; he wishes the light to shine in, and his earnest desire is to keep every speck and spot from off the glass of that window.
Adapted from H. F. Witherby