Man a Moral Creature: August 2013
Table of Contents
Man, a Moral Creature
Man is a unique creature of God, made in His image and likeness. He is a moral creature composed of spirit, soul and body, receiving His life directly from God breathing into his nostrils the breath of life. How blessed and how responsible is God’s creature man! Being a moral creature, he is responsible, and being responsible, he is accountable to God for this behavior. Failing in faith and obedience, he disobeyed and morally degraded himself. He knows good and evil, but in his sinful condition, he refuses the good and chooses the evil. God now meets him where he is and, through the death of Christ, earnestly beseeches him to be reconciled. He who receives God’s offer of reconciliation enters a new creation with the promise of being morally like Christ forever. For the present, He “that hath this hope in Him purifieth himself, even as He is pure” (1 John 3:3).
Spirit, Soul and Body
“I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless until the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thess. 5:23).
The Word of God reveals that man is a tripartite being — spirit, soul and body. When God created animals, birds, fishes and creeping things, He said, on the fifth day of creation, “Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven” (Gen. 1:20). Then on the sixth day, we read, “Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind” (Gen. 1:24).
When it came to the creation of man, we read in Genesis 1:26, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing.” We then read in Genesis 2:7, “The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”
Position and Relationship
We can say, then, that all the lower creation have a body and a life given of God, but with mankind there was a special act of God when He breathed into man’s nostrils the breath (or “spirit”) of life, placing him in a relationship with his Creator (“for we are also His offspring”; Acts 17:28) and giving a command from Him as to man’s position and responsibility. This is what distinguishes mankind from the lower creation. The lower creation has a body and a life given of God, but mankind has spirit, soul and body. The “spirit” is the intelligent, God-conscious part of his being, the “soul” is the seat of his appetites and desires, and the “body” is the physical. Mankind is placed in headship over the creation and is responsible to his Creator. An animal is guided by God-given instincts, while man was to be guided by instructions from his Creator. This is why we speak of man as a tripartite being (spirit, soul and body) and responsible to his Creator as such. When an animal, bird, fish or insect dies, that is the end of its existence. It is not responsible to God for its conduct; it dies and that is the end, but the Bible makes it very clear that man must answer to God. “Every one of us shall give account of himself to God” (Rom. 14:12). Death is not the end for men and women, but they must meet God as living souls, either as their Saviour or as their Judge. If one has received Christ as Saviour, he or she is forgiven and justified before God through the finished work of Christ on the cross. If not, it is a solemn thing to die in one’s sins and meet God as a Judge. Every human being has a soul that will live on forever, either in eternal joy or in eternal punishment, as we read in Matthew 25:46, “These shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.”
If you are a child of God by faith in Christ Jesus, then you have the privilege of living to please Him, your Saviour and Lord. The Bible says, “Ye are not your own, for ye are bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body” (1 Cor. 6:20). The apostle’s prayer, as quoted at the beginning of this article, was his desire for those who were children of God by faith in Christ Jesus, and he desired
that every part of their being — spirit, soul and body — would be devoted to the Lord and that they would live to please Him.
The Order of Importance
The order given here is important — ”spirit and soul and body” — and all our decisions in life should be made in that order. Too often, even as believers, we put our “bodies” first; we go places and use our bodies as we wish, without considering whether our decision is pleasing to the Lord. Would it not be better and pleasing to the Lord to ask first, “Is it the Lord’s will that I make this plan to do this or that?” It is putting our “spirit” first when we intelligently seek the Lord’s mind in accordance with His Word, saying as Paul did when he was saved, “What shall I do, Lord?” (Acts 22:10).
Next comes the “soul,” the appetites and desires. Having prayed and sought the Lord’s will for our path, our souls are thankful, peaceful and happy in choosing what is pleasing to Him. “Cause me to know the way wherein I should walk: for I lift up my soul unto Thee” (Psa. 143:8).
Then comes the “body.” When we have sought the Lord’s mind and will in the light of His Word (a “reasonable” or intelligent service; Rom. 12:1) and our “souls” are willing and happy in the path of obedience to the Lord, we present our “bodies” a living sacrifice to do His will.
This was the prayer of the Apostle for the Thessalonian believers, and though we are living over 1900 years later, it should be the desire of every believer today, in all our decisions in life. In choosing our friends, the kind of employment we take up for our livelihood, the company of Christians with whom we gather in Christian fellowship, the life partner we choose as wife or husband, indeed in everything in life, may we ask, first of all, “Is this the Lord’s will for me and in accordance with His Word (the spirit)?” I will enjoy that path because it is pleasing to Him (the soul), and that is the path my body takes because I want to glorify Him in my body (1 Cor. 6:20). “In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths” (Prov. 3:6).
Adapted from G. H. Hayhoe
Man: a Tripartite Being
Man, as God’s creature, is made up of three distinct parts — body, soul and spirit. Animals are said in Scripture to possess both soul and body, but not spirit. Thus in Genesis 1:30 we read of “every beast of the earth ... every fowl of the air, and ... everything that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life.” The word used for life is the Hebrew word nephesh, or soul. But when we come to man, God now consults as to the creature that is to have dominion: “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness.” “The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul” (Gen. 2:7). What an important and twofold difference from animals! Both the formation of his body and his inspiration were immediately from God — two things which we do not read of any of the lower creatures.
Further, Scripture tells us that “there is a spirit [rooagh] in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding” (Job 32:8). But we also read that the beasts “have no understanding” (Psa. 32:9), and the word used for “understanding” is the same as that used for “spirit.” In the same way we read, “Now the Egyptians are men, and not God; and their horses flesh, and not spirit” (Isa. 31:3). The first place we read this word rooagh in Scripture, it is applied to God: “The Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters” (Gen. 1:2). Later, Elihu applies this word to the spirit in man (Job 32), and he applies the same word to God in Job 33:4. Job also contrasts soul and spirit, when he asks, “In whose hand is the soul [nephesh] of every living thing, and the breath [rooagh] of all mankind?” (Job 12:10). It is clear that the “spirit” is the higher part in man, for the word rooagh is also used in reference to the Spirit of God. The beasts perish (Psa. 49:12), but as to man, both soul and spirit are immortal. That which may be destroyed by death (and even this, as to man, is only for a time) is merely this external shell, the house that contains both spirit and soul. The soul departs at death from its tenement, but it is not affected by death. Ecclesiastes also speaks of the spirit: “Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit [rooagh] shall return unto God who gave it” (Eccl. 12:7). It is by means of the body that the varied feelings and emotions of man manifest themselves. In Scripture, some of these are ascribed to the spirit, some to the soul, and some to both soul and spirit.
The New Testament View
When we come to the New Testament, we find that Old Testament truths are all established in the New and fully unfolded. But there are other truths revealed in the New Testament respecting “spirit and soul and body,” for now God has brought “life and immortality [incorruptibility] to light through the gospel” (2 Tim. 1:10). When the soul is spoken of, the Greek word psukee is equivalent to the Hebrew nephesh. For spirit, the Greek word pneuma is given as the equivalent for rooagh. In the Septuagint translation of the Bible, these words are used in the Old Testament as well as the New.
The three parts of which man is constituted — “spirit and soul and body” — may for a time be separated. Death is the condition of the body without a tenant, for the body is the man’s earthly house, the habitation of both spirit and soul. While in it, he is said to be “at home in the body,” but “the body without the spirit is dead” (James 2:26). But we also read that the death of the body does not affect the soul. “Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul” (Matt. 10:28). In man, only the body is mortal; it is capable of and liable to death and, after that, also to corruption.
Having seen that death is the dissolving of the tie that has kept together the man, “spirit and soul and body,” we can also see the wondrous way that Christianity triumphs over all the misery that sin and death have introduced into this world. The Lord says to the poor thief dying by His side, “Today shalt thou be with Me in paradise” (Luke 23:43). These words did not refer to his body, for it was doubtless cast into a common grave on earth. Rather, the words referred to his soul and spirit that would from that day onward be with the Lord in a state of conscious pleasure, rest and delight. Paul also could speak of this instant happiness of the believer after death, when he spoke of “having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better” (Phil. 1:23). On earth, Paul knew more of communion with Him than many, yet he says it is “far better” to be “absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord” (2 Cor. 5:8).
As to death for the unbeliever, we read those solemn words, “After death the judgment” (Heb. 9:27). According to Luke 16:23, the unbelieving rich man who died was “in torments,” although there only in soul and spirit. He was able to feel, see, and speak — how awful! More than this, there is a “resurrection of damnation” (John 5:29). At the great white throne, we read that “death and hades gave up the dead which were in them” (Rev. 20:13 JND). Death delivers up the body, while hades delivers up the soul, and man is reunited — body, soul and spirit — to be judged. Eternal judgment, called the “second death” (Rev. 20:14), is the fulfillment of Matthew 10:28, “Fear Him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.”
The Lord’s Coming
Of the believer we read, “We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed” (1 Cor. 15:51), for the proper hope of the believer is the Lord’s coming for him. The spirit and soul are not changed, but rather the body. “We await the Lord Jesus Christ as Saviour, who shall transform our body of humiliation into conformity to His body of glory” (Phil. 3:20-21 JND). For those alive when He comes, there is no separation of spirit and soul and body, for Christ has broken the power of him who had the “power of death”; “in a moment” they are to be caught away in the power of life. They do not die, but “mortality” is “swallowed up of life” (2 Cor. 5:4).
As Christians, we should remember that the affections and desires of the soul must be kept under control, if we are to grow in divine things. The Word of God must at all times be allowed to come in “quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart” (Heb. 4:12). The word “sensual” in Jude 5:19 is psukeekoi and may be translated “soulish”; that is, they were controlled by it. Similar was the desire of the man in Luke 12:19: “Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry.” This has been the language of very many since then. The natural affections also, though formed of God, are strikingly referred to in many places as possible hindrances in the path of faithful discipleship, if allowed to govern us.
Fitting in the midst of all the snares that surround us is the prayer of the Apostle: “I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thess. 5:23).
H. C. Anstey, adapted
Moral Elevation
We know from Scripture that man was created in the image and likeness of God. It was God Himself who breathed into man’s nostrils the breath of life, thus giving him a spirit that elevated him above the beasts of the earth. The spirit in man enabled him to interact with his Creator and to have fellowship with Him. The fall has spoiled all this, and sin has degraded man morally to the point where Scripture tells us that “man that is in honor, and understandeth not, is like the beasts that perish” (Psa. 49:20). His character, morals, and behavior eventually become little better than that of the lower creation, who do not have a God-conscious aspect to their being.
Appreciation for
Moral Uprightness
However, even in his fallen state, man appreciates moral uprightness in others, even if he does not display it himself. His conscience is still there, and his soul and spirit are exercised by contact with moral dignity. When a world leader recently acted in a manner beneath the dignity of his position, a TV host remarked, “When you are actually powerful, you don’t need to be petty.” The French phrase “noblesse oblige” (nobility obligates) conveys a similar thought, for the world holds to a higher standard those who are in positions of respect and honor. This is where Christian testimony comes in, for it is our walk before the world that has the greatest effect upon it. Man may deny the believer’s message, but he cannot deny a walk that is on a morally high plane. It was so with our blessed Master, the Lord Jesus Christ, in His walk down here. The world hated Him because He testified to it that its works were evil (John 7:7), yet was compelled to admit that “never man spake like this man” (John 7:46). Their anger at His preaching might provoke them to try to throw him headlong from the brow of a hill (Luke 4:29), but they also “wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of His mouth” (Luke 4:22). The believer today is called to walk in that same moral elevation that characterized the Lord Jesus.
Life and Walk
We may well ask how this is possible, in a world full of sin and pollution of every kind. First of all, it is important to see that repentance before God and a new life in Christ are absolutely necessary if there is to be any moral change in man. Such things as philosophy, culture, education and government may curb man’s natural tendencies for a time, but they can never rise higher than their source, which is fallen man. Mixed with all these will be the same degradation as before, although perhaps with a veneer of respectability. Man must turn away from his sin and have a new life in order to be morally elevated.
Second, now that he is a believer in Christ, there must be a walk with God. God desired this fellowship with man from the beginning, but all was spoiled by sin, so that man hid himself from God. Fellowship with Him is now restored, and on an even higher level, through the work of Christ. The hymn expresses it well:
“Though our nature’s fall in Adam
Seemed to shut us out from God,
Thus it was His counsel brought us
Nearer still, through Jesus’ blood.”
Now the believer, having new life in Christ and indwelt by the Holy Spirit, can walk with God and display all the character of that new life — the same life as Christ Himself.
Privilege and Responsibility
This is at once a wonderful privilege and also a great responsibility for each one of us. Every believer possesses a new life, and “he that saith he abideth in Him ought himself also so to walk, even as He walked” (1 John 2:6). In the walk of our blessed Lord, there were two things that were kept in perfect balance. On the one hand, he always walked in the consciousness of who He was — the One in whom dwells “all the fullness of the Godhead bodily” (Col. 2:9). He could openly challenge His adversaries as to that walk, asking them, “Which of you convinceth Me of sin?” (John 8:46). Truly “in Him is no sin” (1 John 3:5). This perfection was manifested in all the varying circumstances of life, for Christ was the same, whether in the street, in the temple, in a private home, or with His disciples. There was divine perfection in His every act.
On the other hand, the Lord Jesus did not insist on the place that was rightfully His. He submitted to all the insults and hatred of man, while speaking to man’s conscience all the while. More than this, He endured even the ignorance and lack of courtesy to which He was so often subjected, saying nothing unless the glory of God demanded it. He did not complain when the Pharisee failed to show Him the common courtesies of the day, such as washing His feet and anointing His head (Luke 7:36-50). But when that same Pharisee dared in his heart to condemn the poor woman who anointed Him, our Lord made reference to this lack of courtesy in order to teach a lesson.
Humility and Dignity
In every situation in our Lord’s life, we see this perfect balance. He displayed a moral glory in His submission to the Father’s will and to all that man could do, while at the same time walking in perfect moral dignity and showing out the character of God. The believer is called to walk in this same path and to show forth this moral glory in a world of sin. There is a beauty in this to which nothing can compare. We get something of the thought in John 17:22: “The glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them.” While this surely does allude to the display of glory that will be seen in us in a coming day, there is the sense in which that glory is displayed now in the saints of God in this world, who walk in humility and lowliness, yet in a moral dignity that is fitting to children of God. Surely “it doth not yet appear what we shall be” (1 John 3:2), but one of the strongest testimonies to an increasingly corrupt and violent world is the exhibition of God’s character by the believer.
Another has expressed it well, and with examples from the Word of God:
“There is nothing in morals or in human character finer than this combination of willing degradation in the midst of men and the consciousness of intrinsic glory before God. We see it in some of the saints beautifully. Abraham was a willing stranger in the midst of the Canaanites all his days, not having a foot of land nor seeking to have it, but when occasion served, he would take headship even of kings, conscious of his dignity in God’s sight, according to God’s own counsel. Jacob would speak of his pilgrimage, of his few and evil days, making himself nothing in the reckoning of the world, but he would at the same moment bless him who at that time was the greatest man on the earth, conscious that, under God and before him, he was ‘the better,’ the greater man of the two” (J. G. Bellett).
As believers, we should seek to exhibit this same combination of virtues today. As we have already mentioned, the world is getting worse and worse, while things like moral uprightness and common courtesy are simply not common anymore. More and more, we need to walk in the company of our blessed Master and in the power of the Spirit of God, in order to show that we belong to Him.
W. J. Prost
Divine Perfection
It is the principle of moral perfection to enjoy things instead of accrediting one’s self with them in the eyes of others. Active Christian life is a common life of service, in contact with human passions, faults and weaknesses — in a word, in contact with the flesh. But to act in it, to introduce God into it (and this is what Christ was), there must be power. We must be really in communion with Him — participating thus in that nature that nothing encroaches on and which shines in its own perfection in the midst of all. We must seek to be above all that we meet with.
Divine philosophy, supposing it to be real and to meet with no opposition when displayed before others, is an easy enjoyment, and, as I have said, one clothes one’s self with it; one displays it to admiring eyes. To walk in Christian life, we must be what we admire; that is another thing. We must be divine, in the sense of the communion of His nature. And this is why Jesus was the most isolated of men and, at the same time, the most accessible, the most affable: the most isolated, because He lived in absolute communion with His Father and found no echo, no sympathy with the perfect love which was in Him; the most accessible, the most affable, because He was that love for others.
How many needs, hidden even in the most degraded souls, would confess themselves, would come to light, if a love, a goodness which could give them confidence, were presented to them: But for this, one must be content often to find one’s self in the midst of such degradation, being preserved from it only by what is within, and this was the life of the Lord. How many souls are whirling in pleasure, in order to silence the moral griefs which torment them! Divine love not only answers needs; it makes them speak. It is delightful to see the opening out of a soul and, at the same time, to see the entrance of spiritual intelligence. One may not exactly seek the degradation I speak of, but we find it in the world, knowing that is the truth as to what is found there, and its external forms do not rebuff the soul.
But it is a life of labor, of patience and of happiness, the like of which cannot be found. Christ could say through all, “That they might have My joy fulfilled in themselves” (John 17:13). Without doubt, there are diversities of gifts, but even when God opens this path before us in His grace, how slow we are to follow the track of the One who draws us there!
Adapted from J. N. Darby
Purpose of Heart: the Great Moral Regulator
“These words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart” (Deut. 6:6) — at the very source of all the issues of life. This is peculiarly precious. Whatever is in the heart comes out through the lips and in the life. How important, then, to have the heart full of the Word of God, so full that we shall have no room for the vanities and follies of this present evil world. Thus shall our conversation be always with grace, seasoned with salt. “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.” Hence we can judge of what is in the heart by what comes out of the mouth. The tongue is the organ of the heart — the organ of the man. “A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things: and an evil man out of the evil treasure of the heart bringeth forth evil things.” When the heart is really governed by the Word of God, the whole character reveals the blessed result. It must be so, inasmuch as the heart is the mainspring of our entire moral condition; it lies at the center of all those moral influences which govern our personal history and shape our practical career.
In every part of the divine volume, we see how much importance God attaches to the attitude and state of the heart, with respect to Him or to His Word, which is one and the same thing. When the heart is true to Him, all is sure to come out right, but, on the other hand, we shall find that where the heart grows cold and careless as to God and His truth, there will, sooner or later, be open departure from the path of truth and righteousness. There is, therefore, much force and value in the exhortation addressed by Barnabas to the converts at Antioch: “He exhorted them all, that with purpose of heart they would cleave unto the Lord” (Acts 11:23).
How needful, then, now, always! This “purpose of heart” is most precious to God. It is what we may venture to call the grand moral regulator. It imparts a lovely earnestness to the Christian character, which is greatly to be coveted by all of us. It is a divine antidote against coldness, deadness and formality, all of which are so hateful to God. The outward life may be very correct, and the creed may be very orthodox, but if the earnest purpose of heart be lacking — the affectionate cleaving of the whole moral being to God and His Christ — all is utterly worthless.
It is through the heart that the Holy Spirit instructs us. Hence, the Apostle prayed for the saints at Ephesus that the eyes of their hearts might be enlightened. And again, “That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith” (Eph. 3:17).
Christian Truth, 6:72
Conscience
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. 1:20). 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. 2:14-15). 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. 3:22). 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. 4:22-24). 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. 7:18). 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
We Live in a Moral Universe
It is an inescapable fact that we live in a moral universe, although men have constantly tried to evade this reality. At least from the time of the Greeks, and even before, there have been philosophers who sought to prove the possibility of a universal morality without God. In our day, a professor at an American college recently tried to convince his students that it was possible to have a system of ethics without a belief in God. Arguments without number have been adduced to support this position, all of them basically saying that a workable morality can simply be based on a universal consensus of right and wrong. However, this will not work. Lord Devlin, a British judge who eventually left the bench and became a strong critic of the legal system, was forced to admit, “No society has yet solved the problem of how to teach morality without religion.” A man who was commissioned some years ago by a U. S. university to try and draft a sample constitution without reference to a code of morality not only found it impossible, but almost lost his sanity in the process.
Lessons From History
Aside from any reference to God’s Word, experience shows us that any such system is doomed to failure. For many years the U.S.S.R. tried to found its empire on atheism, and we all know that it failed miserably. During the years when the Nazis were in power in Germany, morality was again redefined by a tremendous shift in thinking, as men began to view themselves in the light of philosophies espoused by those like Nietzsche and Heidegger. (Nietzsche and Heidegger were German philosophers, both of whom challenged Christianity and traditional morality.) As we say, “The rest is history.” Today the world is trying to do much the same thing based on tolerance and enlightenment; again, such a system is found wanting.
Yet even these atheistic philosophers were forced to be inconsistent. They had to recognize that not only was there a moral law within man, but that this moral law must be tied to some kind of absolute standard. Immanuel Kant (an earlier German philosopher) dismissed the ideas of God and immortality earlier in his life, but later was compelled to admit them as being necessary to ethics and morality. He was forced to admit, “From such crooked wood as that which man is made of, nothing straight can be fashioned.” In his Critique of Practical Reason he remarked, “Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and reverence ... the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me.”
Nietzsche pointed out that Christianity is a whole, and that one cannot give up faith in God and keep Christian morality. He wrote, “When one gives up the Christian faith, one pulls the right to Christian morality out from under one’s feet. The morality is by no means self-evident. Christianity is a system, a whole view of things thought out together. By breaking one main concept out of it, the faith in God, one breaks the whole. It stands or falls together.”
Conscience
If we live in a moral universe and man is a moral creature, the question arises as to why the world is not governed by good moral principles. If man cannot get away from his conscience, why is the world so amoral? As always, we find that the Word of God settles these issues for us with clarity and authority. Man is a fallen creature — a truth that he does not want to face. When he disobeyed God’s one command in the Garden of Eden, he became a sinner. He also acquired a conscience — a knowledge of good and evil. His conscience does remind him that he is a moral being, but it needs a guide. Without that guide, conscience becomes the victim of public opinion and lust. Man’s conscience cannot guide him in a right way without the light of God’s Word, just as his eyes cannot see properly without natural light. Fallen man, having rejected God and His claims, tends to make for himself a moral vacuum. Satan then makes use of man’s sinful nature to fill that vacuum with what Paul wrote in Romans 1: “Even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful” (Rom. 1:29-31).
This is no mere theoretical saying. It has been played out many times in the history of mankind, for when man gives up God, God allows him to see the result of his foolishness. Indeed, one who had suffered much under an atheistic system made this comment in 1983: “The failings of human consciousness, deprived of its divine dimension, have been a determining factor in all the major crimes of this century.” If all this happened suddenly, it might excite a public reaction. However, the decay that arrives at this awful point may be gradual. If one generation holds to morality in religion, the second generation is often characterized by moral rigidity without the proper basis; then in the third generation there is complete moral breakdown. This process has happened more than once in the past, but today its course is being accelerated. For example, in the last few years there has been a tremendous change in the attitude of people in the West toward same-sex marriage. An article on this subject in a recent issue of Time magazine referred to this as “the swiftest change in public opinion in U.S. history.” This is only one example of a rapid moral breakdown that has affected society, not only in the U.S., but in many parts of the world.
A Moral System Without God
Many today are asking what has happened and why all this has come about. Some are ready to accept a new morality as it concerns such things as same-sex marriage, but are appalled at the corruption and violence that seems to be increasing in geometric proportions. The answer is that man is indeed still trying to work out a moral system, but without God. Of course, many of those in this position might well say that they believe in a God, but their attitude is much like those of whom David could speak: “The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God” (Psa. 14:1). They may acknowledge God in an abstract way, but refuse to admit His relevance to the way they live their lives. For many today God is viewed merely as a philanthropist who is there to facilitate their desires and pleasures, but not to be reverenced or obeyed. Secular humanism has taken over, and men are persuaded that the endpoint of everything must be the happiness of man. If God and His claims get in the way, they are simply disregarded.
Violence and Corruption
However, in spite of all this declension, man’s conscience continues to nag at him, and we can be thankful for this. Many today are sickened and revolted by the ever-increasing display of man’s fallen nature, often without regard to the consequences, even to himself. So-called “suicide bombers” are an example of this, where men (and women) are willing to sacrifice themselves in order to cause suffering and death to others. Violent acts such as armed robbery and murder are on the rise, while behind-the-scenes crimes such as Internet scams, credit card fraud, and stolen identities are becoming enormous problems for everyone, but especially financial institutions. As these things begin to affect all of society, some are beginning to look to God for answers.
We can be very thankful that one effect of the rising tide of evil is to make some consider eternal realities and recognize their responsibility toward God. On the other hand, we know from God’s Word that “evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse” (2 Tim. 3:13), and this trend will be reversed only by judgment. “When Thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness” (Isa. 26:9). But for those who are willing to come to Christ, He gives new life — a life that delights in righteousness. We as Christians must, of course, be continually on guard, for the tide of evil in the world does threaten to swamp us, but the Spirit of God indwelling the believer and the guidance of the Word of God enable us to rise above the conditions around us. More than this, we can look forward to spending eternity where sin can never enter. As to this world, one day there will be “new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness” (2 Peter 3:13).
W. J. Prost
Positional and Moral Perfection
The standing and place in Christ of a believer now is termed “perfection,” as dispensationally distinguished from that of a Jewish believer under the law, which “made nothing perfect.” To this Paul refers when he says that he labored that he “might present every man perfect in Christ” (Col. 1:27). This I would term positional perfection.
There is, however, a perfection to which even the established believer is urged to press on. But it is what may be termed a moral perfection; his positional perfection and completeness in Christ being the point from which he starts — likeness to Christ, even in body, being the goal towards which he runs and will eventually reach.
Surely it is meet and right, in seeking this moral state, that he who is perfected forever as to his conscience — cleansed from all his guilt, and saved from wrath to come by the blood of Jesus — should cleanse himself from all filthiness of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of the Lord. Surely, for him whose sins are put away by the sacrifice of Jesus, it is the reasonable service that he should present his body a living sacrifice, in order that in him might be seen the reflection of the glory of Christ on high, produced by the Spirit of God which dwells in him.
Words of Truth
The Moral Characteristics of Heaven
The air of a place is more important to us than the scenery. If we get both, the refined and tasteful sensibilities will be gratified, and our condition will be the more perfect, but if we must part with either and do with only one of these, the air of the place we dwell in will be far more important to our good and comfort than the scenery. So it is, not only with our converse with places, but with persons also. Their spirit will be of greater importance to us than their attainments. As brethren dwelling together, we find this continually. There is more real refreshment from the gracious, humble and fervent spirit of another than from any communications of intelligent ones who are not adorned and filled with that mind and spirit.
Adapted from J. G. Bellett
Man’s Moral Condition Before God
The motive that governs the heart is the true estimate of man’s moral condition before God.
H. E. Hayhoe
My Prayer
“That I may know Him.”
Philippians 3:10
I do not ask that I may steer
My bark by peaceful shores alone,
Nor that I linger, harbor-bound,
And sail no stormy seas unknown;
I only ask this boon of Thee:
Be ever in the ship with me.
I do not ask that I may dwell
From din of battle far removed,
Nor ever feel temptation’s force,
Nor ever know my armor proved;
I only ask, through life’s long fight,
Grant me the power of Thy might.
I do not ask that I may walk
Only on smoothly trodden grass,
Nor ever climb the mountain’s height
And trembling, through its dangers pass;
I only ask, on rocks or sand,
The sure upholding of Thy hand.
I dare not pray for any gift
Upon my pilgrim path to heaven;
I only ask one thing of Thee:
Give Thou Thyself, and all is given;
I am not strong or brave or wise;
Be Thou with me — it shall suffice.
A. J. Flint