How can we truly live a life free from condemnation? This episode guides listeners through Paul’s teachings from Romans, unraveling the complex relationship between law, grace, and conscience. We discuss the often misunderstood role of the conscience in condemning and justifying us, and how turning our faith to Jesus allows us to speak truth into our souls. With practical insights, this episode encourages believers to engage in the spiritual battle of fighting back against false guilt and to affirm their righteous standing in the eyes of God.
So Paul’s now talking about freedom from the law, dead to the law. And he’s talking, remember, in the larger context of what it’s like to be in the kingdom of grace. To be in the kingdom of grace and free from law? That’s an odd concept, isn’t it? Because we think of law, as I said yesterday, we think of law as controlling us, as helping us to be obedient, as keeping law and order and some degree of consistency in society. But here we are, we are told we are freed from the law. Paul says in verse 4, Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you might be married to another, to him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God. Well, you remember the last time we talked about this, I referred to chapter 6 and verse, let’s see, 18. I speak in human terms, for just as you presented your members as slaves of uncleanness and of lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves of righteousness for holiness. So now Paul speaks about lawlessness, that when we were in the world, away from God, we just did our thing, and we were lawless. But so this verse clearly in chapter 6, verse 18, reveals that Paul is not talking about lawless witness when he talks about freedom from law. Freedom from law, in the way Paul is teaching it, does not lead us to lawlessness. It does not lead us to anarchy. What we mean when we are talking about freed from law is that there’s something going on in our minds that is very, very destructive when we’re in law, under law. It is the guilt and the shame and the fear that we all experience because we are in our natural fallen humanity. Even as Christians now, we’re in that natural humanity. We feel guilty over things we shouldn’t feel guilty about, and we feel guilty about things that we should feel guilty about, but we don’t know always how to deal with it. That law, you see, is in our minds. It’s not simply the Ten Commandments on two tables of stone, as I mentioned the other day. Paul clearly makes it clear in chapter 2 when he says, “…Gentiles who do not have the law by law by nature do the things in the law. These also, having the law, are a law to themselves who show the work of the law written in their hearts.” And so, we are recognizing that the law of God is what is in our conscience too. Now, you’ve heard me say this before, and you need to be reminded of it, and so do I. Conscience is not the law of God. Conscience can be sick. Some people feel guilty over things they shouldn’t feel guilty about, because they have obsessive-compulsive disorder. And when you have that condition, that state of mind, you feel guilty for not having done this and done that and done the other. And so you repeat doing it again and again and again. Like I mentioned the other day of washing hands. Some people have obsessive compulsions to wash their hands. There’s nothing wrong in that they are not doing it, but they feel guilty. falsely guilty. So there we have a false conscience. What do we do about that? Well, you need to take note of a very, very interesting verse in the letter to John. It’s the first letter to John, chapter 3, and it says, “‘My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth.’ And by this we know that we are of the truth and shall assure our hearts before him. For if our hearts condemn us, God is greater than our heart and knows all things. Now isn’t this a fascinating verse? Here John is telling us, that sometimes our heart condemns us. Now obviously he’s using the word heart here for conscience, because it is conscience that condemns or declares innocent. So if our heart or conscience condemns us, God is greater than our heart. wow, then there’s something higher than our conscience, and it is God himself. And he is greater than our heart, and he knows everything. Well, what does he know that we don’t know sometimes? That he is having mercy upon us, that he is loving us and applying the atoning work of his Son to our lives so that his judgment, that is the Son’s judgment, is counted as ours, and therefore God in his great grace and the sacrifice of his Son and the application of mercy to us is greater than we realize our conscience realizes. Our conscience is very often wounded. It doesn’t know the truth. Until… By faith, it is told the truth, and so you and I need to tell our conscience the truth. You’ve heard some horrendous stories of people who were truly emotionally sick. and were told to kill their children, of all things. And they thought they had to do that to obey their conscience. Now, whether they were telling the truth or not is another matter. But the point is, with a sick conscience you can do bizarre things. Well, now, how do we get a healthy conscience? This is what Paul is telling us here. We have become dead to the law because the law speaks in our conscience. You have done wrong. You are in God’s disfavor. You may hear yourself saying, what’s wrong with me? I can’t do anything right. I’m no good. And all these statements are using your conscience to harm yourself. Now, once you have faith in Jesus, and knowing that he loves you with all his heart, that he came to the world to die for your sins, to take all the judgment upon himself, and that he counts you righteous in his righteousness, not yours, then you have something to fight back with, don’t you? And that fighting back is the fight of faith. Let’s read this verse again. Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law. How did you die to the law? Not by squeezing out every last longing for sin. Not by eliminating the final vestiges of lust. not by having no temptations anymore. No, that’s not how you become dead to the law. You are declared dead to the law in that Christ is the sacrifice for your sins, that he took the judgment of sin upon the cross. so that the law has no more judgment against him, and thereby no judgment against you, because he died on behalf of your humanity. And so you can speak into your conscience. Now, most people have no such concept of speaking into their conscience. They think of their conscience speaking into them. Your conscience is telling you this and don’t do this and don’t do that. And if you’re emotionally wounded and sick at the moment in life, your conscience will be endlessly nagging you. And you will think that that conscience is the Holy Spirit sometimes. In fact, mostly, because, you know, if the conscience is telling you what is right and wrong, well, who but the Holy Spirit tells you that? And so if you confuse the two, you will be being nagged by your conscience constantly. Well, only long enough until you can’t stand it. And then what do you do? You walk away from God because it’s just too unbearable. It’s just too impossible. God is demanding too much. This is how the mind that is emotionally wounded thinks. So your conscience is speaking lies into your heart. And that is why so many people have turned away from God because they haven’t known that their conscience is emotionally wounded. full of guilt and shame and fear. They think their conscience is the voice of God. But now, instead of your conscience speaking into you, you speak into your conscience. How? By faith. By faith in what? By faith in Jesus Christ. You are able to say, conscience, I’m not listening to you. You are accusing me of condemnation, and I do not accept condemnation because I am counted as dead to the law. You speak into me as if I were no good and just trash. And I will not listen to you because Christ has declared me righteous in his righteousness. I know I’m not righteous in myself, but in him I am counted as if I were dead to the law and therefore innocent and righteous before him. Do you see how this goes? I’m telling you this is not merely a religious idea. It is not merely a technique. What I’m teaching you here, based upon the Word of God, it’s not my teaching, it is the teaching of the Gospel in the book of Romans chapter 7, What I’m teaching you here brings mental and emotional health to you. It may not happen overnight, but you keep affirming the truth. If you are obsessive-compulsive and your conscience is nagging you to wash your hands or do this or remove that little bit of dirt over there and you can’t get it out of your mind, You say, Father, I lift my heart up to you and I thank you for this nagging conscience because this is an opportunity for me to assert my faith in Jesus that I am not condemned. So you use every obsession to transform it, to turn it inside out, to turn it back to front and lift your heart up to God in praise to thank him that you are not condemned. gradually over time, maybe days, maybe weeks, maybe months, you will find your conscience calming down. You will find that your faith is stronger than your conscience and that it is greater, as 1 John said, if our conscience condemn us, that is, if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart and knows all. And what does God know that your conscience doesn’t know? God knows that he has mercy for you. God knows that he has sent his Son as a sacrifice for you. God knows that he is counting you as innocent in Christ’s innocence. That’s how it works, you see. You look to God who is higher than your conscience, and you start agreeing with God towards you. But you say, Colin, I thought I was always agreeing with God, that God was judging me. Yes, but you got the wrong angle on God. You didn’t get the truth on God. Now, don’t condemn yourself for that, but just accept the beautiful truth now. Lord God, I thank you so much. You are revealing the truth about yourself, that you love me, that you are not here to make me feel bad endlessly, that you are wanting me to assert the fact that I’m now dead to the law, that I have been executed. as it were, by substitute in Jesus Christ, and so now the law has no condemnation for me, and therefore I will not accept my damning conscience. I will speak into my conscience the truth of the gospel, that you have accounted me in your Son’s righteousness. When you get there. And if you would kindly think and consider sending a donation, it would help so much. It’s listener-supported radio. You can make your donation online at faithquestradio.com. Well, thanks so much. I’ll see you next time. Cheerio and God bless.
