One of the most misunderstood areas of our psyche, from a Biblical standpoint, is our conscience. This was an area that I was affected in for a number of years, because I heard and believed the lie, and it led me down a very dark path, which served to place an artificial barrier between myself and God and ministered condemnation and death to not only my soul, but my physical body as well.
This extremely destructive lie, was that I had to be constantly aware of and conscious of my sin; to do otherwise would mean that I would have a seared conscience – which I was told meant that I would not be able to “feel bad” about my sin any longer, and God would give me over to destruction. The only remedy for this was to constantly remind myself of sin and constantly be aware of my sin and keep myself from ever forgetting it.
Many people have heard this same lie and believed it like I have, and if that describes you today, then you are going to be very glad that you are reading this today, because this is not only totally backwards from the truth, and quite wrong, but it is also very damaging to our relationship with God, and has kept people bound in chains, sometimes for their entire lives. However the truth will make us free, and that is what I want to share with you today… the truth regarding your conscience.
How aware are you of your sins? You may have been taught in the past that to be more humble you must maintain a constant awareness of your own sins and shortcomings; and that to do otherwise would be a sign of arrogance and pride. I had been taught that before, and that teaching led me down a very dark road of pain and despair, as I would constantly remind myself of how bad I was and all of the ways that I was not measuring-up to God's perfect standard – all the while thinking that by me doing this, I was pleasing God by staying humble, when in-fact I was actually practicing false-humility.
Today in this study, we are going to be examining this common misconception and wrong belief of remaining sin-conscious, and how Jesus Christ has actually set us free from this bondage; free to be truly humble by exalting Christ instead of our own efforts.