It seems that our consciences can be conditioned, trained if you like, by a number of different things. In a legalistic church for example, where it’s all about rules and regulations, rather than relationship with Christ, the conscience can easily become overactive. Outside of church, people pleasers are likley those whose consciences have been trained to please some significant dominating personality in their lives.
On the other side, our consciences can be seared. This can happen by being required by some authority to do something we know is wrong. This has to have happened to many who were involved in the Holocaust. We can also do this to ourselves. The first time we do something we feel is wrong our consciences may bother us deeply, but then they bother us less and less as we continue in the same course of action.
But can our conscience play a healthy role in living a good and guilt free life? The answer is yes, and the problem I have with the saying at the head of the post, is the word “always!” If it is true that our consciences can be conditioned, and I believe that it is, then it is important that we allow our consciences to be trained by some objective standard. For me, I seek to find this in the teachings of Christ, under the influence of the Holy Spirit and the universal church. I am thinking here of the universal church in both history and geography, not my own particular group or denomination. I am not saying that this is easy, nor that I have arrived!
Father, with the apostle Paul I can say that I know nothing against myself, yet I am not justified by this, for it is You who judge me (1 Corinthians 4:4). I know that before conversion my conscience was seared, and then afterwards for the longest time it became overactive. Help me Father to be guided by the two greatest commandments to love You with everything that I am and have, and to love my neighbour as myself. Thank You Father for Your forgiveness and cleansing when I fail, in Jesus Name Amen
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