You did a good job. Thank you. Let's go back to Hebrews chapter
9 and chapter 10. I'm not going to
try to preach exposition from all of these. We'd be here until
Thursday, so I won't do that. But I want us to consider something
here this morning that I preached about and around, and I think
I actually preached one message on from one text from this several
years ago. I remember when I preached it,
I still had red hair and a red beard, so it has been quite a
while since I preached it. But this last week, actually
week four last, I began looking at this ninth chapter. This principle
stood out to me as a thing which is not only worthy of preaching,
but a thing necessary and needed in the day in which we live. In verses 9 and 14 of chapter
9, and in verse 2 of chapter 10, we have a word, and the word
is conscience. The word is conscience. Now,
generally when we think about conscience, we think about past
and present sin and deficiency of our life. Generally
speaking, when we consider conscience, that is what we think about.
This word is a common word in the English language and is found
often in the New Testament. And in the original language,
it generally means distinguishing between what is morally good
and bad. prompting to do the former and
shun the latter, commending one and condemning the other. That
is what we generally think of when we think of conscience.
If you were a Freudian psychologist, your definition of conscience
would be the part of the super-ego. the division of the psyche that
is formed through the internalization of moral standards of parents
and society that censors and restrains the ego. That sounds
impressive, doesn't it? Mostly unconscious, it is composed
of the ego ideal and the conscience. In psychoanalysis lingo, it is
that which judges the ethical nature of one's actions and thoughts
and then transmits such determinations to the ego for consideration. Basically, that's choosing between
what's right and what's wrong, or what's moral and what's evil. Two things need to be understood
that the word moral is not in the Scriptures at all. Nowhere
to be found. And the word conscience is nowhere
to be found in the Old Testament. It's only found in the New. And conscience, no matter how
it is used, has to do with guilt. That's what it has to do with.
It has to do with guilt, whether positively or negatively. If one speaks of not being able
to do something with a clear conscience, he is saying that
he could not do it and be guiltless. That's what he's saying. If he
says that he has a clear conscience, he is saying that he has no guilt. That's what that means. It all
has to do with guilt. Conscience has to do with the
knowledge, whether consciously or subconsciously, the knowledge
of good and evil. Politicians use this quite a
lot in the day in which we live. there's very little discussion
of compromise or of what's right and wrong in the world. If you
want to make somebody jump on your bandwagon, make it good
or evil. I heard Al Gore the other night
on a TV show, he had received an award, I think an Academy
Award for a movie he did on global warming. And he stood and he
said, this is a moral issue, as he received his, this is a
moral issue. That means it's either good or
evil. It's a moral issue. Now, if you want to make somebody
jump on a bandwagon, make an issue a moral issue. And those
who consider it good will pay a lot of money to keep the thing
going. And those who consider it evil
won't give you a dime. But it's a good way to work.
A moral issue. But the fact is, conscience has
to do with the knowledge, consciously or unconsciously. of good and
evil. That is where the conscience
works. And that fact automatically reveals the origin of the conscience. It has to do with good and evil.
Where did the conscience come from? The conscience came from
the fall of man. When Adam ate of the forbidden
fruit, he gained the knowledge of what? Good and evil. He got a moral conscience. That's
what that means. He gained, I started to say for
better or for worse, but it's not. He gained for worse a conscience. Up until that devastating deed
took place, there was nothing in his knowledge but good. Everything in creation was good,
save for Adam's loneliness, of which there is no indication
that he was aware. but that God was and made the
determination that it was not good that man should be alone
and made him a wife. Adam's knowledge was all good
and even very good. And when he disobeyed God, evil
entered into the world by him and a man has been plagued ever
since with conscience. With conscience. I know your
mom and dad said, you know, listen to your conscience, let your
conscience be your guide. And in the natural realm, I'm
not so sure that's a bad thing, except our conscience is defiled.
The singular result of conscience, what is the singular result of
conscience? Guilt. It's guilt. That's the singular
result of conscience. This is also clearly revealed
in the action of Adam in the Garden of Eden. Once conscience
became his guide, when he gained the knowledge of good and evil,
he immediately tried to assuage what? His guilt. He felt guilty. He felt unclean. He didn't feel
like he did before he ate of the fruit of the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil. He immediately tried to assuage
his guilt, first by covering it with the fig leaf apron, which
he sewed together. That did not work. Then, hiding
from the guilt of it, for when the Spirit of God moved into
the garden in the cool of the evening, he hid from God in some
bushes. And when that did not work, He
finally blamed someone other than himself for his problem. He said, ìThe woman which you
gave me.î Now, all those three are acts of conscience, and they
all have to do with one thing, to try to cover up this guilt,
I feel, to try to cover it up. Conscience, no matter how beneficial
it might be in making moral and ethical judgments concerning
behavior, can neveróand listen very carefully hereócan never
bring a person closer to God by the exercising of it. Conscience
will not help you on that road. Never. Never, ever. The conscience is
either an accuser or an excuser, and this is always the case.
Look at Romans chapter 2 just for a moment. Romans chapter
2. When our Lord talked about the
difference between the Jews and the Gentiles, the Jews having
a law written on stone outside them, there was kind of an arbiter
of their actions that always said, well, this is wrong and
that's wrong. The Gentiles didn't have laws written on stones outside
them. They had something in their heart that they received when
Adam fell in the Garden of Eden. That thing was called a conscience.
The Lord calls it here a law within. In verse 14 it says,
For when the Gentiles, in chapter 2 of Romans, which have not the
law, Do by nature of the things contained in the law, that is,
they don't kill, they don't steal, why don't they do that? Because
something is going on inside. It's a matter of, you know, if
I did this, I'd be guilty. I'd have conscience. They having not a law, or a law
unto themselves, which show the work of the law written in their
hearts. And this is not talking about the same law that's written
in the hearts of regenerated men and women of Hebrews 10,
but it's talking about a conscience. Because it says, their conscience,
that's the law written in their heart, their conscience also
bearing witness and their thoughts the mean while accusing or excusing
one another. That's the way it always is.
You excuse or accuse. That's what the conscience does.
That's how it operates in the world. It is in this major realm
in which works, free will, religion operates and can never be perfect
before God. operates in the realm of consciousness. Religion operates on the conscience
with the nature that man has inherited from Adam, and though
religion may and often does blind the mind to the effects of the
conscience, men continue in it nonetheless. Our Lord spoke to
the conscience in 1 Timothy chapter 4 when He said, ìThe Spirit speak
expressly that in the last days men shall Listen to seducing
spirits. And these seducing spirits will
tell them to do things and not to do things, forbidding to marry
and such. And thus their conscience will
be seared with a hot iron. When he wrote the letter to Titus,
he said that men profess to know God, but their conscience is
defiled. by the good works that they do,
or what they call good works, by the works that they do in
religion. That defiles the conscience. Though religion may cauterize
the conscience, it can never perfect it. It may quiet it down. If you do enough and work hard
enough in your false profession of religion, your conscience
may go to sleep. It may go to sleep, but it has
not benefited you at all. Not benefited you at all. You
see, conscience operates. You know where the conscience
operates? It operates in the realm of the broken law. It operates in the realm of the
broken law. In the realm of transgression.
Never in the realm of the Spirit. operates in the realm of transgression.
Adam tried to assuage his guilt knowing that he had broken the
law of God, for God had said, ìIn the day that ye eat of the
fruit of that tree, ye shall surely die, and dying ye shall
die.î And once the deed was done, Adam proved that any effort of
religion was dead works, didnít he? Thatís what he proved. He
did not know that he was spiritually dead. He did not know that. He surely felt the pains of natural
death because he began to immediately do what? Stress. That's how we
would say it today. He began to stress. When you
stress and I stress, what do we stress about? Guilt. Just say it. That's what it is. He began to stress and his body
began to change because stress changes your body. It changes
your mind. He began to stress over this
new thing that was in his bosom. And that new thing was the fear
of judgment for his guilt, which is the true fear of death. Most
people don't fear dying because we don't know anything about
it, do we? But we understand the principle
of getting justice to some degree. We understand that I don't really
want to die because then I've got to face God. But if I die,
I didn't have to do that. Do like an atheist and go die
like a dog. That'd be alright. But if I die, I've got to face
God. And so men fear death because of what follows. And that's what
happened in the Garden of Eden. Adam said, I'm naked. Well, he was naked before that.
Happy as a lark. Skinny dipping. in the river
Euphrates and having a good time with Eve. They were multiplying
and replenishing the earth. They were happy, joyous. This is the woman you give me.
I'll tell you what, I don't even have a mama and daddy. But if
I had one, I'd leave my mama and daddy for her. This is what
a man will do for this. And now he says, something is
wrong. What is it? This is now evil. I feel guilty. What have I done? I better do
something about this. I better cover up. His conscience
accused him and his knowledge of good and evil made him endeavor
to make a moral and ethical choice to undo his aching dilemma, to
quiet his screaming or the screaming banshee, as one old Scottish
writer wrote, in his heart. And the end product was that
with each religious effort, whether covering, hiding, or assigning
blame, He showed for all who are spiritually alive that the
law, no matter what shape or form, can only define sin, assign
blame, determine punishment, and be expressed in guilt. That's
what the law can do. That's it. Can't do anything
else. Whatsoever the law saith, it
saith to them that are under the law, that every mouth might
be stopped, and the whole world become guilty before God. That is what the law says. Therefore
by the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified in His
sight. Shakespeare said, conscious makes cowards of us all. No matter
the effort to reform or change behavior, conscience, the knowledge
of good and evil, will always bring you to despair. Did you
know that? Your conscience will always bring you to despair.
If you want to understand what a man spending some time in conscience
is, considering his conscience, look back at Romans chapter 7.
Here Paul is dealing with The natural guilt that accompanies
us. A natural guilt. Verse 15, he
says, ìFor that which I do, I allow not, or I donít know. For what
I would, that I do not. But I hate what that I do, if
then I do that which I would not. I consent that the law is
good, the problem is not there. Now then, it is no more I that
do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. For I know that it 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. The good that I would, I do not,
but the evil which I would, that I would not, that I do. Now if
I do that which I would not, it is no more I that do it, but
sin that dwelleth in me. I find in a law, a principle,
that when I would do good, evil is present with me. There they
are. They said good and evil is always there. And so if we
are going to go to conscience, we are going to be in a fix.
I'm going to be in such a fix that Paul the Apostle, a man
who met Christ on the road to Damascus, was miraculously saved
by Jesus Christ, taught the gospel by a man named Ananias, and three
years on the back side of the desert by Christ. That man, when
he deals with this, says this, O wretched man that I am! That's
where conscience is going to end up. It's always going to
end up there. Who shall deliver me from the
body of this thing? You would never think that the same man
who said those things about himself, can't do what I want to, what
I don't want to, that's what I do, what I hate, I end up doing
what I love, I can't do, there's a struggle, a war going on, good
and evil, good and evil, good and evil, that's immoral and
ethical decisions of conscience. We're in to death. It's amazing
that a man like that could say just a few verses later, There
is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ. What
happened? Somewhere along the way, Paul
got that guilt removed. He got guilt removed. What a
thing! Where there is sin, there is
the law. There is the law. And where the
law is, there is sin. There is sin. Look over at 1
Corinthians chapter 15. Look at verse 56. The sting of death. What is death? It's a punishment for sin, isn't
it? Now what God said in Adam and the Garden of Eden, ìIn the
day ye eat of the fruit thereof, ye shall surely die. The soul
that sinneth, it shall die. The wages of sin is death.î The
sting of death is what? Sin. Whatís the reason for it? What makes it so bad? Well, look
what it says, ìAnd the strength of sin is what?î The law. The strength of sin? Most religions say the strength
of holiness is the law, wouldnít they? The strength of righteousness
is the law. He doesn't say that. He says
the strength of sin is the law. Why? Because that's all the law
was ever designed to do. Show you what sin is. Show you
what sin is. Where there is sin, there is
guilt, and where there is guilt, there is conscience. And any
preacher who tries to bring his hearers to the law for righteousness
is entirely discounting the work of Christ. making it of no effect
to his hearers. He, operating in conscience,
addresses the conscience of men and women, reminding them of
their guilt. He then takes them to the law
so that they might make moral and ethical choices to cover,
hide, or blame someone else or something else for their guilt.
That is why sin today is in a box, or a bottle, or a bordello, or
on a TV tube, or on the Internet. That is where sin is to men's
minds. Because that you can feel guilty
about. Those things, they operate in the realm of guilt. Unbeknownst
to such a preacher, because he is operating from the conscience,
is that he is actually declaring to his hearers that there is
no remedy for sin. The man who preaches to your
conscience is anti-Christ. The man who would have you come
back under the law is anti-Christ. Because Paul said there are some
men who believe they are teachers of the law. He said they are
vain janglers, but they believe they are teachers of the law.
And they would try to bring men back under the law, not realizing
what they are actually doing. By preaching the law, they are
saying to the man whom Christ has made righteous, you are not
righteous. By preaching the law, they are
saying to the man whose sins have been put away, your sins
have not been put away. That is anti-Christ! Stand fast
in the liberty wherewith Christ has made you free, and be not
under the yoke of bondage again. You seek righteousness by the
law. Christ is nothing to you. You cannot have it both ways. You cannot have it both ways. And this is specifically what
Paul is dealing with in Hebrews chapter 9 and 10. The service
performed toward God by observing the rites and ceremonies of the
law cannot make the comers thereunto perfect pertaining to conscience. That's what he says. These services
cannot remove guilt and in fact incite further guilt. If they were able to remove guilt,
they would have ceased to be offered. That's what he says
in chapter 10 and verse 2. Because the magnitude of the act of removing
guilt is such that once it is done, it never needs to be repeated. Once guilt is gone, it's gone. And he describes it this way.
I'm back in Romans. For then would they not have
ceased to be offered, because that the worshippers once purged
should have no more conscience of sins." What does that mean? No more guilt. No more guilt. Paul makes a remarkable statement
in verses 8 and 9 of chapter 9. He says, This signifying that the way
unto the holiest of all was not yet made manifest while as the
first tabernacle was standing, which was a figure for the time
then present in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices that
could not make him that did the service perfect as pertaining
to conscience." None of these things removed guilt. None of these things answered
sin. Say, well, that's just some antinomian view. Yeah, if you
want to call the Holy Ghost an antinomian, you go right ahead,
but the Holy Ghost is the one who signifies this. Taking the entire matter of service
to God, and that's what we want to do, isn't it? We want to serve
God. We desire in our hearts to serve God. Every believer
wants to serve God. The Holy Ghost takes the whole
matter of service to God by the law and setting the law to represent
the Old Covenant. He says the Holy Ghost teaches
precisely that all those efforts were designed to fail in removing
guilt. In the performance of these things,
the conscience was indeed incited to guilt. Verse 3 of chapter
10 says, For in those sacrifices there is a remembrance again
made of sins every year. There is a remembrance in those
things. These all operated in the realm of the flesh, and therefore
could not please God. Look at verse 10 of chapter 9,
Which stood only in meats, and drinks, and divers washings,
and cardinal ordinances imposed on them until the time of reformation,
or until the time of Christ. Now I want you to look at two
words there. The Holy Ghost signifies that these rites and ceremonies
in order to please God, in order to serve God, are actually carnal
ordinances. Carnal ordinances. All these rites, according to
the Holy Ghost, God the Spirit, were carnal. And that is hardly
an adjective that men would apply to holiness, would they? Or justice? Or justness? Or righteousness? Yet men stand in pulpits and
preach the law as a means of righteousness. And what they
actually produce in men is a carnal holiness. Now think about that. Roll that over in your mind.
A carnal holiness. A holiness of conscience. A holiness
that lives off guilt. A performance of the knowledge
of good and evil. The Holy Ghost simply does not
teach, now listen very carefully, the Holy Ghost simply does not
teach that a man should go to the law for righteousness, ever,
under no circumstance, in any form or for any reason, because
to do so is carnal, is carnal, and not spiritual because it
only results in works that are born from death. Look at Romans
chapter 7. Romans chapter 7, Paul makes
the distinction between being married to Christ and being married
to the Law, being under Christ and under the Law. Romans chapter
7 verse 4 says, ìWherefore, my brethren, ye are also become
dead to the Law,î what does that mean? Just exactly what it says, ìby the body of Christ, that
ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from
the dead, that ye should bring forth fruit to God.î Well, what
about before when I was under the law, trying to be righteous,
keeping all those ceremonies? Verse 5, For when you were in
the flesh, the motions or the passions of sin, which were what?
By the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto what?
Death. That's all it produced. I lived
my life in religion producing dead things. And if you don't
know Christ is born, that's what you're doing in religion. It's
dead. I'm telling you, it's just dead. Operating in the realm of conscience
is not spiritual. And all works that exude from
the conscience produce dead works and cannot ever be regarded as
service to God. You make a moral choice throughout
your life. You do make moral choices. Don't
ever think that any of that has to do anything with your relationship
with God. Just the opposite of true. If you think that your
moral and ethical choices, and I hope they're good ones, but
if you think that that is service to God, you are horribly mistaken. And if you think that, those
moral and ethical decisions you make are dead, corrupting corpses. They're dead works. of conscience is the broken law. The impetus of conscience is
this. I'm a transgressor. That's it. That's what conscience
has got to tell you. This is what the Holy Ghost teaches.
And the Holy Ghost, we know, wrote the Scriptures through
the use of men. Well, is there any such thing as a good conscience? Can the accuser that we are born
with in our bosom ever be silenced? Can he be silenced? It is clear
that it cannot be silenced with the deeds of the law according
to this passage of Scripture, for such deeds actually only
increase the volume of his voice. Religious service designed to
keep the law and render service to God is dead. Graveyard, dead. Twice dead and plucked up by
the roots. And guilt is the incentive for religious service to ease
the conscience. That's what it's designed to
do. The only problem is, and I speak from many years of experience,
the only problem is it never works. I've practiced religion
all my life. And conscience always told me,
you don't have anything. You're a transgressor. And conscience
was right. That's what I was. But what does
the Holy Ghost signify that will silence the conscience? A perfect
sacrifice. That's what He says. A perfect
sacrifice. A spiritual sacrifice. We've got to leave the realm
of the flesh and the realm of the natural and go into the spiritual
realm. A sacrifice must be offered that
has nothing whatsoever to do with yours or my religious service,
yet produces true and acceptable service to God. The conscience is only silenced
when, now listen very carefully, when there is no grounds upon
which it may accuse. That's when it's silent. If it
ain't got nothing to say, it can't say nothing. That's what
I'm saying. If it's got something to say, you can rest assured
it's going to say, and say, and say, and say, and say. The only
way it will stop its accusations, which are true, but the only way it will stop
its accusations is if it is brought to a place where it can find
no thing at all to accuse you of. This means that there can be
no law to define, no sin to record, and no guilt to condemn. That's what's got to take place.
Listen very carefully. No law to define it, no sin to record,
no guilt to condemn. All those have got to be taken
care of if the conscience is going to shut up. How's yours
doing this morning? And that sacrifice is the substitutionary
sacrifice of Jesus Christ the Lord. Look at a few verses of
Scripture beginning with verse 12 of chapter 9. ìNeither by
the blood of goats and calves, but by His own blood, Jesus Christ,
He entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal
redemption for us.î He did it. And listen, the language of that
is that He already had it when He went in. He had already obtained
it. He entered in having obtained.
When did He obtain it? He obtained it on the cross.
when He died in our room and stayed. That is eternal redemption. So eternal redemption has something
to do with the quieting of the conscience. Look at verse 15.
For this cause He is the mediator of the New Testament, that by
means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were
under the first covenant, they which are called might receive
the promise of an inheritance, or an eternal inheritance. Look
at verse 22. For almost all things are by
the law purged with blood, and without shedding of blood there
is no remission of sin. Verse 26, Then must he often
have suffered since the foundation of the world, but now, once in
the end of the world, hath he appeared to put away sin by the
sacrifice of himself. Look at verse 12 of chapter 10.
But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever,
sat down on the right hand of God, from henceforth expecting
till his enemies be made his footstool. For by one offering
he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified, whereof
the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us. for after that he said
before, this is the covenant I will make with them after those
days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws in their hearts,
and in their minds will I write them, and their sins and their
iniquities will I remember no more. Now where remission of
these is, there is no more offering for sin. It is not necessary
where remission takes place. The conscience is purged. silenced when every basis for
condemnation is removed. And only then. Notice the allusion that Paul
makes in verse 13 to an Old Testament sacrifice. The red heifer. Verse 13, For if the blood of
bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean,
sanctify it to the purifying of the flesh, How much more does
the blood of Christ do? He uses the heifer here. Do you remember our study in
Numbers on the red heifer whose ashes mixed with water symbolically
cleansed the defilement of the flesh? Do you remember what defilement
those ashes symbolically cleaned? The sin of touching a dead thing. That's what it was about. If
you touch something dead, you've got to be washed. And listen,
if you touch dead works, you've got to be washed. But the ashes
of a heifer won't do you any good. Won't do you any good. I say to you, when conscience
says, do something, don't touch it. Don't touch it. The ashes of
a heifer cleanse the defilement of the flesh. The blood of Christ
purges the conscience from dead works. That's what it says in
verse 14. How much more shall the blood
of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without
spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works? What does that mean? What does
that mean? Look at verses 1 and 2 of chapter 10. For the law,
having a shadow of good things to come, 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, if they
had been made perfect? Because that the worshipers once
purged should have no more conscience of sin." Perfect as pertaining
to conscience. No more conscience of sins. What
does that mean? It means that there is no basis. If you are a child of God this
morning, if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, there is no
basis upon which the conscience can accuse you. No basis for
it. There is no more conscience of
sin. What a word! It doesn't say consciousness. Same word all the way through.
Conscience. The law couldn't make you perfect
as pertaining to conscience. Christ has purged your conscience
from dead works. There is now no conscience of
sin. No conscience of sin. What does
that mean? I'm not guilty. No guilt. Well, if you believe that, you
just go out here and live like you want to, don't you? Anybody
got a gun to your head? So, well, you know, I know what's
right and what's wrong, and I know you do, and you make moral and
ethical decisions, but listen to me very carefully again. Don't
apply that to righteousness before God. That's dead works. That's dead works. There is therefore
now no condemnation of them that are in Christ. Isn't that what
Paul said? No condemnation. For what the
law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, through
my conscience. Christ, coming in the likeness
of sinful flesh, destroyed sin in the flesh. Whom shall lay any charge to
God's elect? It is God that justifies. Who
is He that condemneth? It is Christ that Yea, rather,
is risen again, who even sits at the right hand of the Father,
making intercession for us. Here is what I want to tell you
this morning. We serve the living God. Because Christ has purged
our conscience from dead works to serve the living God. We don't
serve Him by conscience. We serve Him by faith. We don't serve the living God
to cover or hide or assuage our guilt. If you're doing that,
it's dead worse. You say, well, I come to church
so people won't really know what I'm like. We know what you're
like. You know what I'm like. You ain't got nobody fooled.
Please. You might act humble. You might
even look humble. You might hold your head in a certain way, carry
your Bible in a certain way. I know what you are. I was watching this show the
other night on TV, and it was about these guys setting up these
internet porn sites for guys to have young children. And these
idiots would show up at these houses and get caught and get
put in jail, you know, and you think, well, don't they think?
And as I was watching, I said, them sorry and no good so-and-so,
so I'll just shoot them upside the head. And then I realized,
if it's in them, it's in me. I know what I am. I know what
you are. And listen to me. no matter what moral or ethical
decision you might make in this life, never attributed it to
serving God, because it ain't. We serve God by believing Jesus
Christ. By believing Jesus Christ. And
we serve God not to assuage our guilt or hide our guilt or blame
someone else for our guilt. We serve God because we are not
guilty. That's what it said. We have
no conscience of sin. We don't have the guilt of sin. Our works are not dead. They
are lively because they are spiritual and acceptable to God by Jesus
Christ according to 1 Peter chapter 1. We are lively stones, living
stones, a royal priesthood offering sacrifices unto God acceptable
by Jesus Christ. Looking to Christ makes the conscience
mute when I feel guilt. And I do,
and you do too. When I feel guilt, it is because I have breathed
life into my conscience. I have. And the result will be
that, I'll tell you what I'll do, I'll try to do something
to cover my guilt. I'll try. You know it. Isn't that what we do? Well, maybe if I pray more. Maybe
if I read my Bible more. Now, it's good to pray more and
read your Bible more. That's a good thing. Ain't nothing wrong
with that, unless you're trying to cover your guilt. I'll try to hide from God, or I'll blame someone else for
my sins. or something else. And you know what? I'll end up
in despair. Because it's dead works. And when I look at my Savior,
knowing that He has obtained eternal redemption for me, knowing
that He has purged my conscience from dead works, knowing that
my sins are remitted knowing that there is no ground upon
which I can be accused or condemned, knowing that I have been perfected
as pertaining to conscience, knowing that God will not remember
my sins and iniquities, I then and only then can serve the living
God, and I will. Any other reason results in dead
works. Any other reason? than look into Christ. So we
say, thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift. And it ain't the conscience. It's the blood and righteousness
of our blessed Savior. Father, bless us through our
understanding of prayer in Christ today. Today, God bless you.