Okay, let's turn in our Bibles
to the book of 1st Timothy chapter 1 1st Timothy chapter 1 The title
of the message this morning is love from a good conscience Love
from a good conscience, and I've taken that from verse 5 of 1st
Timothy chapter 1 Paul writing to Timothy. Timothy was in Ephesus
at the church at Ephesus helping and Paul had left him there and
as he had gone off to Macedonia as is said here in verse 3. He
wrote back to Timothy and he told him, he said that charge
some or command some, apparently this some there are people who
were veering or wavering or getting away from the doctrine of Christ.
He says in verse 3, charge or command some that they teach
no other doctrine. And I spoke of that a few messages
back. The doctrine of Christ, the teachings
of truth that identify and distinguish salvation by God's grace in Christ
and who Christ is, God the Son incarnate the God-man, the Word
made flesh, Emmanuel, God with us, and the teachings of His
finished work. In Doug's prayer he mentioned
that Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone
that believeth. The finished work of Christ,
the atoning work of Christ, the reconciliation, all that He accomplished
as the substitute and surety of His people, to put away our
sins. He came to put away our sins.
And I love that in that Hebrews passage that Brother Doug read,
where it speaks of that, and how Christ, by His one offering,
hath perfected. That means completed, finished,
nothing left to be done there. It's not He did all He can do,
now the rest is up to you. He hath perfected forever. I love that. Not just for part
of the time, but forever, them that are sanctified. Them that
are set apart by God. And He put away our sins. Remember
He said up here that the sacrifices of animals could never take away
sin. Christ was manifested to take
away our sins. And these are the doctrines of
grace. The doctrines of the gospel. Gospel doctrines. Paul told Timothy
here, he says, you tell them not to teach any other doctrine.
Don't bring in man's doctrine. Don't bring in these false doctrines
that exalt man and deny God and deny his Christ. Don't bring
in these doctrines that teach salvation conditioned on the
sinner by the works of the sinner in some way at some stage to
some degree. And he told him, he said, verse
4, don't give heed to fables and endless genealogies. Those
things mean nothing in the kingdom of God. They mean something to
man because they lift up man's pride. People telling their dreams
and their visions and not preaching the word of God. Trying to trace
their heritage back to this one or that one in order, as if that
means something to God. He said in Christ Jesus there
is neither Jew nor Gentile. We are all one in Christ. You
know, I know that among us there are a lot of differences. And
even among believers there are differences in growth, in grace,
in knowledge, in spiritual gifts, in offices. But when it comes
to standing before holy God, and our acceptance before God,
we have one righteousness, one holiness, one way of forgiveness,
and we are all equal in the sight of God in Christ. There's none
who are more accepted than another, because Christ is the Lord our
righteousness. We stand before God washed in
His blood and clothed in His righteousness imputed, which
by the Holy Spirit we've received Him by faith. And so don't give
in to these other things that minister questions, he says in
verse 4, rather than godly edifying, building up, which is in the
faith, so do. The text that I've been using
for three messages, I preached one last week. He says now the
end or the goal of the commandment. What commandment? To teach no
other doctrine. What is the goal of staying firm
in the gospel of Christ? Preaching the gospel of Christ
and not veering off into these other things. And he gives three
things here. And the common denominator is
love. He says charity or love out of a pure heart. We dealt
with that last week. That pure heart, remember what
it is? It's the heart cleansed by the blood of Christ. It's
the heart cleansed by faith. It's the circumcised heart, the
convicted heart, the broken, the contrite heart that looks
to Christ for purity. It's not a sinless perfection
within ourselves. That's not the pure heart. It's
not a heart, remember the heart being the mind, the affections
and the will, the inner man. It's not a heart that has no
impure thoughts because you have them and I have them. We have
to fight them. That's the warfare of the flesh and the spirit.
But it's the heart that continually by faith looks to Christ and
rests in Him and pleads Him. That's what the pure heart is.
We'll see how it's connected with the next one. The next one
I'm going to talk about today. of or from a good conscience.
That's the title of the message. Love from a good conscience.
And then love of faith unfeigned, or sincere or genuine faith,
which I'll talk about next week. But let's talk about this love
from a good conscience. This love, remember, is this
godly love. It's not human love. It's not
emotionalism. It's not sentimentality. And
it's not even being kind to everyone. Now listen, we ought to be kind
to everyone. We ought to be congenial. We
ought to be forgiving. All of these things. But the
love that he's talking about here is love in the truth that
honors God. And binds true believers together
in fellowship despite all of our differences. Not differences
in the teachings now. Not differences in the doctrine.
but differences in personality and desires and preferences and
all of that. So this is love that no man has
by nature. Herein is love, not that we love
God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation.
Well, the goal of this commandment is that love out of the pure
heart and love from a good conscience. Now, that's what I want to talk
about, this conscience. And I really have just two points. Number one, what exactly is the
conscience? And then number two, how can
an evil conscience be made good? That's what we're going to talk
about. Well, let me give you several words here that help
us to understand biblically what the conscience is. And the first
thing that we would understand about the conscience is the words
morality and guilt. Morality and guilt. What is the
conscience? Some say it's our moral compass
that distinguishes what we hear, what we see, what we judge as
to be good and evil or evil, good or bad. That which prompts
us, motivates us to do the good and shun the bad, whatever our
standard of goodness or badness is. We all by nature have some
sense of morality. Turn over to Romans chapter 2
with me. Here in Romans chapter 2, you
know, what Paul is doing, when you
read the book of Romans, he starts off talking about the gospel
of God, that the gospel concerns a person, God's Son, the Lord
Jesus Christ who was made of the seed of David according to
the flesh, and declared to be the Son of God with power. And
then he talks about how the gospel is the power of God unto salvation. That's the gospel truth preached
and empowered by the Holy Spirit to bring a sinner in the new
birth to faith in Christ and true repentance and love. And
he shows how that gospel is the revelation of the righteousness
of God. Not the righteousness of men.
In other words, what he's telling us is this. We don't need the
righteousness of men for salvation. Number one, because men have
no righteousness before God. That is according to God's standard
and that's important in this thing of the conscience. And
number two, whatever we call the righteousness of men, I can
tell you right now, the Bible teaches it's not good enough. Whatever we do, as far as righteousness
is concerned. It may be good in the eyes of
men and our peers, but it's not good enough to save us. It's
not good enough to keep us saved, and it's not good enough to bring
us to glory. Whatever it is, the best of the
best. We don't even have to talk about
the worst of the worst in that area. I don't believe anybody
in here would say the worst of the worst would get you into
heaven. But the best of the best is not good enough. That's what
the scripture teaches. So we don't need the righteousness
of man. We need the righteousness of God. And where are we going
to find that? Well, we find it in Christ. He is the righteousness
of God. He's the Lord our righteousness.
But from Romans 1.18 all the way over to Romans 3.20, what
he's doing, he's bringing the whole world in guilty before
God by the standard of the law. In other words, he's answering
this question. We need the righteousness of God, why? Why is it that I
need the righteousness of God? Well, because I'm a sinner. And
by deeds of law shall no flesh be justified. Well, in Romans
chapter two, he's bringing both Jew and Gentile in guilty. The
religious Jew, the immoral Gentile, doesn't matter who it is. We're
all guilty before God. And listen to what he says in
verse 14. Now the Gentiles didn't have the law of Moses, but does
that mean they didn't have a conscience? Does that mean they didn't have
any law? He says in verse 14, for when
the Gentiles which have not the law do by nature, that is naturally,
the things contained in the law. Now if you went to Gentile cultures
back during those days, you'd find that they had laws of morality. They had laws against murder. They had laws against stealing.
They had laws against adultery. They had all kinds of laws. They
had rules and regulations of society by which they would either
exonerate people or indict them and put them in jail. even the
death penalty. So it says, they do by nature
the things contained in the law, verse 14, these having not the
law, that is the law of Moses, are a law unto themselves. Now
what's he talking about? Verse 15, that shows the work
of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing
witness. and their thoughts the mean while
accusing. You see they have rules by which
they accuse each other or even themselves and excusing they
can excuse one another. So they have a conscience you
see. We all by nature have some standard by which we judge the
ethical nature of our actions. And that's what he's talking
about. Now what is the most powerful principle of the conscience?
I'll tell you exactly what it is. Guilt. That's the most powerful
principle of the conscience. It's in our conscience that we
either pronounce ourselves guilty or not guilty. That's what he's
saying there. Accusing or excusing. When a person says he cannot
do something with a clear conscience, what's he saying? He's saying
I can't do it without being guilty. Or feeling guilty. So there's
morality and guilt. Whatever your standard of morality
is. And that's different with different cultures. Now I know,
I know that there are people who spend their lives trying
to squelch that conscience. Isn't that right? And there's
some whom God allows to go that far and come to what he calls
a reprobate mind without conscience. That happens. But that's not
the way they were born. That's not according to this.
Naturally have a conscience. The next word, if we're going
to understand this thing of conscience, is the word knowledge. Knowledge. You know what the word conscience
actually means in its very basic form? It means with knowledge
or knowledge within oneself. Knowledge. I want you to turn
back to Genesis chapter 2. I want you to see something here
that I believe will be very helpful to all of us. Conscience, that's
what the word means. Conscience. It means with knowledge. And it has to do with knowledge
whereby our particular standard by which we judge good and evil
is known and used. Remember over here in Genesis
chapter 2, verse 16. Here's Adam in the garden. Here's
Adam in the garden. And verse 16, God gave Adam a
law. Do you notice that? He says,
and the Lord God commanded the man saying, of every tree of
the garden thou mayest freely eat. You can read of every tree
of this garden except one, 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. Now there's
the law. That's one law, but it embraces
every law. It's one law, summarize. That
way. And it's the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil. We'll look over at Genesis chapter
three. Now here comes the fall of man. Here comes Satan, the
serpent. Verse one, now the serpent was
more subtle than any beast of the field which the Lord God
had made. He said unto the woman, yea, hath God said, you shall
not eat of every tree of the garden. The woman said unto the
serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden, but
of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden,
God has said, you shall not eat of it, neither shall you touch
it lest you die. She sort of added to it. And
the serpent said unto the woman, you shall not surely die. There's
Satan's message right there. He has the same message all through
the ages. You shall not surely die. You
don't need Christ. You shall, you're all right.
Just worship God as you see fit. You know, how you feel. Go to
church where your felt needs are met. You shall not surely
die. That's Satan's myth. Peace, peace,
when there is no peace. Well, look at verse five. For
God doth know that in the day you eat thereof, then your eyes
shall be opened and you shall be as God's, knowing good and
evil. The knowledge of good and evil.
Now Adam, before the fall, he didn't know evil. All he knew
was good. That's all he knew. But this knowledge of good and
evil has to do with two things. Number one, it has to do with
God's standard of good and evil. And that's the key. And that's
why man's conscience is fallen, ruined by the fall. The heart
of man is born dead spiritually. The conscience of man, the natural
man, is fallen conscience. Because it doesn't know God's
standard of good and evil. God is the creator. We're the
creatures. And the ultimate standard of
good and evil is not our standard. Our standard is way lower than
God's standard, isn't it? Remember the rich young man that
came to Christ and he said, good master, what good thing must
I do to have eternal life? And the Lord said, why callest
thou me good? There's none good but God. You
see, that man's standard of good was way lower. That was a product
of a fallen conscience. The ultimate standard of good
and evil is God's, it's not ours. And this is why man always goes
wrong when he judges good or evil without the knowledge of
God. And that specific knowledge in Christ. Remember Acts 17 31,
God hath appointed a day in the which he will judge the world
in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained and that
he hath given assurance unto all men and that he hath raised
him from the dead. You see the standard of goodness that we
have to deal with in God's judgment is found only in one person and
that's the Lord Jesus Christ. You see man spends his life soothing
his conscience by comparing himself with himself and with others.
A fella told me one time, he said, I know I'm not perfect,
but I'm not as bad as some people. What does that help? As far as
salvation goes. Remember I told you about total
depravity. Total depravity doesn't mean
we're all as bad as we could be. Thank God. But it does mean
that sin has so affected us in every element of our being, that
we cannot produce righteousness before God and we have no desire
to come God's way in Christ. That's why we're so rebellious.
But you compare yourself to others, that's okay. But when it comes
to your standing before a holy God, who's the standard? Not your neighbor, Christ is
the standard. And this is why men always go
wrong in that way. The second thing about conscience
is man's knowledge of good and evil. Now as I said, up until
the time of the fall, Adam knew nothing but good. He had no knowledge
of evil. And the moment he exalted himself
and sought to free himself from God's rule, Adam saying, I'm
going to set my own standard of good and evil. I'm not going
to go by God's. The moment he did that, he knew
evil. He had a familiarity with evil,
had an experience of evil, he had sin, and he gained a conscience
which accused him. Somebody said, let your conscience
be your God. Well, let me show you what happened
to Adam when he let his conscience be his God after the fall. Look
at verse 7 of Genesis chapter 3. What did he do? It says, and
the eyes of them both were opened, Adam and Eve. They knew they
were naked. That's an emblem of their shame.
They were ashamed. What does a guilty conscience
do? It makes you ashamed, doesn't it? And they sewed fig leaves
together. Alright, what did they do? And
made themselves naked. Then they tried to cover it up. They tried
to cover it up. They tried to hide it. And then
they blamed somebody else. Sounds like a good guilty conscience.
Adam blamed Eve. Eve blamed the serpent. That's
what we do. Letting the natural conscience
be your guide will not bring you any closer to God. Here's
where it brings you. Fig leaf apron religion. Works
religion. Blaming somebody else. It's not
my fault. You just made a mistake. God
wouldn't hold you accountable for that. He's too loving and
too good to you. He's the benevolent granddaddy
of us all. Huh? You've heard it. You've
heard it. Since the fall of man, now listen
to me, since the fall of man, every fallen man and woman has
a guilty conscience. That's right. That's what Romans
2 meant. They have a conscience whereby
they accuse and excuse. And you know, turn to Romans
7. Look here. I want to show you this too.
There's a close connection between the conscience and the law. A close connection between the
conscience and the law. Look at Romans chapter 7. Look
at verse 5. Paul writes, for when we were
in the flesh, that means when I was an unbeliever, unregenerate. That's what he's talking about.
The motions or the passions of sins, which were what? By the law, did work in our members
to bring forth fruit unto death. Now how does that work in the
guilty conscience? Well, it works one of two ways.
Here's a person who has a guilty conscience and he just tries
to wipe it clean, let it go, Katie bar the door as they say,
and just break every law I can break. A criminal. No shame, just soothe over that
conscience by ignoring it and become an out and out immoral
perverted rebel. Don't we have that today? What's
the other way it works? Well, think about old Saul of
Tarsus. He had a guilty conscience. What
happened to him? He got religion. He got him a
fig leaf. A fig leaf, and he covered his
shame. What was it? Well, he said, I was a Hebrew
of Hebrews. I was circumcised the eighth day. Today, what is
it? Well, I got baptized and joined
the church. I give my tithe. I never miss
a Sunday. What happened? You see what I'm
saying? Now what stirred up that conscience? The law! Just like
in Adam. Stirred him up to be religious.
Stirred him up to trying to produce a righteousness of his own, whereby
he could soothe that guilty conscience. Isn't that it? When Adam fell,
there was just one law. That law was given for the specific
purpose to define sin, to assign blame, and to designate punishment. That's why that law was given
back in Genesis 2, even before Adam fell. You see, the law was
not made for a righteous man, but for sinners. Paul wrote that
the strength of sin is the law. The power of sin to condemn is
the law. Where there is no law, there
is no sin. Where there is no law, there
is no imputation of sin, no charge of sin. Because where there is
no law, sin is not defined. Where there is no law, blame
is not assigned. Where there is no law, sentence
is not passed and punishment is not carried out. That law,
think about this. That law given in Genesis 2 preceded
the crime. That doesn't suggest that the
crime might be committed or might not be committed, but rather
that the crime and the purpose of God had already been set in
God's eternal purpose. How do you know that? Christ
was the lamb slain from the foundation of the world. Well, here's the thing about
what Paul is writing to Timothy now. Now, there's the conscience.
It's a guilty conscience. And listen to me now. That conscience,
you say, well, I don't feel guilty. Well, if it's in a natural way,
it's a temporary thing. Give it time. Some people's consciences
are seared over with a hot iron. We know that. What kind of iron? Well, it could be a religious
iron. It could be all kinds of different irons, but it's seared
over. But here's the thing. Now, second, how is the evil... That guilty conscience is an
evil conscience. Even the one that Saul of Tarsus
had in his religion, it was an evil conscience. Now, how is
an evil conscience made good? Well, first of all, a good conscience... Paul wrote about love from a
good conscience. A good conscience is the work
of God's grace in Christ. That's number one. A good conscience
is a work of God's grace in Christ. That word good there, when he
said love from a good conscience, that word good, you know what
it means? It means perfect. Love from a perfect conscience.
A good conscience produces peace, satisfaction, and a sense of
well-being. It's a self-judging faculty.
It responds to your heart, your mind, your affections, and your
will. In fact, that love from a good heart, and love from a
good conscience, and love of faith, they all go together.
You can't separate. You can't say, well, I've got
a pure heart, but I don't have a good conscience, or I have
a good conscience, but I don't have genuine. You see, they all
come together. And this conscience, listen. One old scholar said
this, he says, your heart is the engine, your conscience is
the flywheel. You see, whatever is in your
heart will activate your conscience. If your heart is full of self-righteousness
and pride, that's what's going to activate that conscience.
That's what calls that Pharisee to give more than his usual time. He said, I give tithes of everything
that I possess. That self-righteous, guilty,
evil conscience inspired him to do that. That's what caused him to do
above and beyond the call of duty. So whatever is in your
heart will activate your conscience, and if you have a pure heart,
that heart of faith, that heart cleansed by the blood of Christ,
you'll have a good conscience. Because there won't be anything
for your conscience to accuse you. You understand that? Your
self-judging faculty will pronounce that all as well. One man said,
my conscience tells me that I'm perfect. How? How? Well, listen. Your conscience
will provide you with peace, joy, and freedom from guilt,
because your heart is pure. Now remember, how is the heart
purified? By grace, by the blood of Jesus
Christ, by a perfect sacrifice, by a perfect righteousness. Look
over at Hebrews chapter 9. Think about this. Here Paul,
what he's doing, who I believe the Holy Spirit used to write
Hebrews, Here's the Old Covenant with all of its ordinances and
all of its sacrifices, the priesthood, the tabernacle, the temple, the
animal blood, the altar, all of that. And he says every bit
of that was a type, it was a picture. There was no salvation in that
Old Covenant in and of itself. The blood of animals can never
take away sin. They were types, they were pictures,
they pointed to something better, they were shadows of something
much, much greater and better. And he says that while those
things were in play, when they were active according to God's
revealed commandment, and that was like 1500 years from Sinai
to the cross. He says in verse 8 of Hebrews
9, now look, while those things were going on, the Holy Ghost
This signifying, this was a signification that the way into the holiest
of all, now that's the very presence of God, was not yet made manifest. Now let me tell you another way
of saying that. As long as those things were
active and going on according to the revealed will of God,
Christ had not yet come and done His great work. That's what that
says. He says, while as the first tabernacle
was yet standing, And he says in verse 9, which was a figure,
a type, a picture, for the time then present. That was for then,
not for now, you see. We don't sacrifice lambs now.
That was for then, that time then present, in which were offered
both gifts and sacrifices, now look at it, that could not make
him that did the service perfect. And what's the next line? as
pertaining to the conscience. Those things could not make that
worshipper, that offerer, perfect in his conscience. You see, those
were carnal ordinances. That's all they were. You see,
he shows us, look at verse 13 of Hebrews 9. He says, for if
the blood of bulls and of goats and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling
the unclean sanctify or set apart to the purifying of the flesh.
What he's talking about is how those animal sacrifices ceremonially
set Israel apart from the rest of the world. It didn't actually
make them holy. It didn't actually save them.
It didn't actually make them righteous. But it set them apart. Their service, you see. But look
at verse 14. Now listen to this. How much
more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit,
not temporal and temporary, offered Himself without spot to God,
you see, He offered Himself without spot, that's the sinlessness
of Christ Himself, He was guilty based on sin imputed to Him,
charged to Him, He took our debt, But he says, he offered himself
without spot to God, purge your conscience, cleanse your conscience
from dead works to serve the living God. Now that's not the kind of conscience
false teachers have, false professors, religionists have. You see, how
is the heart purified? How is the conscience purified?
How is the conscience made good? by a perfect sacrifice, by a
perfect atonement, by a perfect righteousness. That's how the
conscience is made good. A perfect righteousness. Where
are you going to find a perfect righteousness? For Christ is
the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believe. You
see, When it comes to false, self-righteous, free-will works
religion, accusing and excusing is the particular arena in which
they operate. And they can never produce perfection
before God as pertaining to the conscience. What religion can
do is blind the mind to the effects of the conscience, soothe it
over for a while. Religion may cauterize the conscience,
but it can never make it perfect. Conscience operates in the realm
of the broken law. Over there in 1 Timothy, let
me just read this to you because I'm going to come back to Hebrews
here. But you ever notice there, he says in verse 8 of 1 Timothy
1, he says, but we know that the law is good if a man use
it lawfully. Verse 9, what's the next thing
he says? Knowing this, that the law is
not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless. Why was
the law given? To expose what? Guilt, sin, depravity. That's how we know that the law
given to Adam even before the fall, in essence, was a prophecy
of the fall. Because the law wasn't made for
a righteous man. Adam didn't need the law as a
righteous man. But God purposed before the foundation
of the world to save sinners by His Son. Now false religion
takes the law and does what with it? They use it unlawfully to
beat men and women down, to lift men and women up, to make them
feel guilty one day, to make them feel good the next day.
It's up and down, but it'll never make the conscience perfect.
Can't do it. You say, well, our offering is
down. Let's get them. Let's preach the law. Let's preach
tithing. Let's get them. Boom, boom, boom.
Use the law. Say, well, we've been growing.
Let's make them feel good. Use the law. That's false religion. That's not how the law was intended.
The law was given not for a righteous man. The law was given to show
us our sin and drive us where? To Christ for salvation. for perfection, for righteousness,
for the removal of guilt. All efforts at man's religion
are designed to make a person feel better about himself in
the flesh or make him feel guilty enough to get him stirred up
to do something. And you know what the Bible calls
it? Right there in Hebrews chapter 9. Dead works. Purge your conscience from dead
works to serve the living. What does it take to cleanse
my conscience? What does it take? Baptism, church
attendance, giving. Was there anything wrong with
any of those things? Oh, no. Those are all good things if
they're done from a good conscience. But they're not the thing that
cleanses the conscience, not truly. To have a good conscience
before God's law, and if it is by works, then what do I have
to do? I've got to keep the law. In
order to have a good conscience before God by the law, then what
do I have to do? I've got to keep it. Well, do
I keep it? No. Do you? Somebody said, well,
I try to. That's not what I'm asking. That's
not good enough. Trying to. Man at his best state
is altogether vanity. And you see, look back at Hebrews
chapter 9, remember? Remember what he's saying here?
Well, look over at Hebrews chapter 10. Let me move on. Look at verse 1. Now listen to
this. He says, for the law having a
shadow of good things to come. Now see, the law was not the
good things to come, it was a shadow of good things to come, shadow
of Christ, salvation by God's grace. And not the very image
of the things can never with those sacrifices which they offered
year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect,
for then would they not have ceased to be offered. In other
words, if they could make the worshiper perfect, righteous,
holy, cleared of all guilt, and cleansed that conscience, they
would have stopped. Why? Because that the worshippers
once purged, once cleansed, should have no more conscience of sin. Now what does that mean? No more
guilt. No more condemnation. Now don't confuse conscience
with conscious. We are all, we who know the Lord,
we who have a good conscience, we are very conscious of our
sins, aren't we? I know what I am. You know what
you are. We're aware. That's what conscious means.
It means we're awake to it. It means we're aware of it. Those
are two different things. He didn't say we won't have any
more consciousness of sins. Oh yeah, we're sinners. Paul
said in his old age, he said, this is a faithful saying worthy
of all acceptation that Christ Jesus came into the world to
save sinners of whom I am chief. I'm a sinner. Oh wretched man
that I am. That's the way we live our lives.
Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God
through Jesus Christ my Lord. But to have no more conscience
of sins. In other words, if guilt is removed,
it never needs to be removed again. Well, what does that mean? Now look over here in Hebrews
10 and look at verse 18. You see, sin is a debt. And if
Christ paid my debt, it doesn't have to be paid again. And that's
why no one for whom he lived and died and rose can't ever
be condemned. That would be unjust from God. The debt is paid. Law is satisfied. Justice is honored. Righteousness
is established. He took my sins. I have His righteousness
imputed, charged, accounted to me, so that who shall lay anything
to the charge of God's love? Nobody. Who can condemn us? And look here, verse 18. Now
where remission of these is. Now what is that remission? That's
forgiveness. That's pardon. Sin's remitted. How did it get that way? Well,
you remember back up here in verse 14, for by one offering,
he hath perfected forever them that are sinning, by the one
offering of Jesus Christ for his people, the Lamb of God.
Not by anything I've done, will do, try to do, can do, hope to
do, but by his work alone. Now where remission of these
is, there is no more offering for sin. You can't pay for your sins,
Christ paid for them. You may suffer some consequences
of sin. I'll tell you one thing, you
won't suffer all the consequences of sin, you couldn't handle that.
Neither could I. If we suffered in equal proportion
the consequences of all our sins, we'd be beat down so much all
the time. So we may suffer consequences,
but there is no more offering for sin where sin's remitted.
Verse 19, having therefore, brethren, boldness, liberty, confidence
to enter the holiest, the presence of God, how? By the blood of
Christ, not by your works, not even by your faith. Now you enter
by faith, but faith pleads the blood of Christ. You see what
I'm saying? He said, the blood of Jesus,
by a new and living way, which he hath consecrated, he hath
newly made for us, as our substitute and surety, through the veil,
that is to say his flesh, God in human flesh, offering himself
on that cross, and having a high priest over the house of God,
let us draw near with a true heart, there's that pure heart,
there's that sincere heart, there's that honest heart, convicted
over sin, broken and contrite, circumcised heart, In full assurance
of faith, what is the full assurance of faith? It's the full assurance
that I have looking to Christ, resting in Christ, pleading his
blood and his righteousness alone. And look at the next line, having
our hearts sprinkled. Anytime you see that word sprinkled,
what do you think? You think of the brush, the hyssop,
and the high priest sprinkling the blood of the lamb over the
mercy seat. And that's a metaphor for the
application of the blood of Christ to our conscience from an evil
conscience. What's an evil conscience? It's
a legal conscience. It's a guilty conscience. It's
a condemned conscience. What removes the legalism? What
removes the guilt? What removes the condemnation?
The blood of Christ. Sprinkled on that. I have a righteousness. that answers the demands of God's
law and justice, that cannot be diminished, cannot be corrupted,
cannot be contaminated, and cannot be taken away. It's the righteousness
of God in Christ, imputed unto me, which I receive by God-given
faith, and our bodies washed with pure water. That's the good
conscience, right? Now, one more verse and I'll
quit. 1 John 4, 17. Here's how that's connected with
love. Remember he said love out of a good conscience? Well, look at verse 17 of 1 John 4. Herein is our love
made perfect, made complete, mature, that we may have boldness
in the day of judgment. How do we have that boldness?
By the blood of Jesus, the blood of Christ. Because as He is,
so are we in this world. Christ is my salvation. Christ
is my sacrifice, my surety. Christ is my righteousness. And
out of that good conscience, God brings love. Love out of
a good conscience. That's what brings me to love
God. That's what brings me to love His truth. That's what brings
me to love His people. You see what I'm saying? That
love out of a good conscience.