Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Mark Twain once wrote, “An uneasy conscience is a hair in the mouth...” (Notebook, 1904).

A pretty evocative description, wouldn’t you say?

In fact, Twain wrote quite a bit about the conscience—and none of it was complimentary.

In A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur’s Court, he wrote,

If I had the remaking of man, he wouldn't have any conscience.

It is one of the most disagreeable things connected with a person; and although it certainly does a great deal of good, it cannot be said to pay, in the long run; it would be much better to have less good and more comfort...

I have noticed my conscience for many years, and I know it is more trouble and bother to me than anything else I started with.”

As we have spent the past couple of weeks in our series, we have begun to see why this is so—our conscience is a gift given to us by God as part of our humanity, an innate ability to understand the difference between right and wrong, and a powerful voice that will either accuse us or excuse us depending on how we follow what we understand to be right and wrong.

We saw that we will answer to God someday for how we followed the compass of our conscience (even though perfectly following it can’t save us), and last week we learned that a clear conscience can only come about as we walk with Christ and are transformed by His Spirit working in us.

And yet, we still find that we struggle with our conscience, don’t we? Christian and non-Christian alike, everyone can identify with Mark Twain’s assessment of his conscience:

All the consciences I have ever heard of were nagging, badgering, fault-finding, execrable savages!

Yes; and always in a sweat about some poor little insigificant trifle or other--destruction catch the lot of them, I say!

I would trade mine for the small-pox and seven kinds of consumption, and be glad of the chance.

(The Facts Concerning the Recent Carnival of Crime in Connecticut)

So what is going on here?

If Christian and non-Christian alike both struggle with an accusing conscience, then what’s the difference between being a believer and being an unbeliever?

What I aim to show you this morning is that while Christians and non-Christians alike both struggle with a convicting conscience, their struggle comes from very different directions.

But whatever the source of the struggle, there is only one cure:

The BLOOD of CHRIST is the only CURE for a convicting conscience

Look with me at the passage that I read a few minutes ago, from 1 John 1 and 2. I think God has given us here a good summary of how Christians and non-Christians alike struggle with a conscience that convicts them.

First of all, I think we see here in verses 8 and 10 a description of

I.

The REBEL Conscience of an UNBELIEVER (Romans 1:19-21)

As we have said, the conscience is an innate part of what it means to be human, and everyone on earth—whatever their religious state—is possessed of a knowledge of God’s character and power:

Romans 1:19–21 (ESV)

19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.

20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made.

So they are without excuse.

21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.

So when someone refuses to honor God or give thanks to him, they become futile in their thinking.

And here in 1 John 1, I think we see two different types of futile thinking—two ways of trying to ignore God’s revealed character and truth but failing… First, your conscience

Tries to DENY your sin (1 John 1:8)

This is what we read in 1 John 1:8:

1 John 1:8 (ESV)

8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

This is perhaps the most-often used tactic of someone who refuses to acknowledge God—they deny that they are sinners: “I have nothing to repent of—I haven’t done anything deserving punishment from God…” We hear it all the time from the world around us, don’t we?

The prevailing attitude is that the whole concept of “sin” has just come from judgmental, angry religionists who want to use guilt to get people to obey them.

But the Scriptures tell us that even if every last scrap of religion or spirituality—even if Christianity and Biblical faith itself—were somehow completely removed from the world, and the late John Lennon got his wish (from his song Imagine that there was “no religion”), people would still wake up the next morning with just as guilty a conscience, because they cannot escape the innate knowledge that they are in fact guilty of sin against His power and nature!

In John 4, Jesus met a Samaritan woman who was trying to insist that she had not sinned (she wanted to debate with Jesus that her people were worshipping rightly on Mt.

Gerazim, for example)—but her conscience wouldn’t let her get away with it!

No matter how much she insisted that she was innocent, she knew that she was guilty before God (and Jesus didn’t let her get away with it, either!)

But by tenderly exposing the truth of her sin, He opened the way for her to repent and put her trust in Him!

The rebel conscience of an unbeliever tries to deny your sin, and in 1 John 1:10 we see its other main tactic: If it can’t deny your sin, it

Tries to DEFEND your sin (1 John 1:10)

1 John 1:10 (ESV)

10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

When you can’t deny the fact that you have sinned, the next step is to defend it, to say that it really wasn’t a sin at all—it isn’t sinful because you had no choice, it isn’t sinful and God can’t hold it against you because you were “born that way”, you’re not guilty of sin because what you did you did for a good or noble purpose, and on and on it goes.

“It’s not what it looks like!” (Here’s a tip—whenever someone says “It’s not what it looks like!!”—it’s always what it looks like!)

The rebel conscience of an unbeliever torments them because it tries to defend sin—but it can’t.

It’s like using your clutch to stop your car instead of your brakes—you can do it, but you run the risk of burning out your conscience!

In John 8, we read of a woman caught “in the act” of adultery—in other words, she had no defense for her actions; her conscience convicted her because there was no way to tell her accusers (or her own conscience) that “it wasn’t what it looked like”.

So many people live their lives like that—they know that they are guilty before God, they have no defense for their deeds, and no matter how they try to defend or deny their guilt, their conscience torments them.

And this is why the Gospel of Jesus Christ is such good news for hopeless, tormented people who are stricken with a convicting conscience—that their conscience

Can be PURIFIED by Jesus' blood (Heb.

9:14)

The wonderful, life-giving, soul-restoring News of the Gospel is that Jesus Christ will cleanse that guilty, condemning conscience!

Hebrews 9:14 (ESV)

14 how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.

There is no other Savior, no other so-called “god”, no other philosophy, no other psychological or psychiatric therapy, no medication, “Twelve Step Program”, support group or anything else in all creation that can so completely, utterly and fully cleanse the conscience like the blood of Jesus Christ shed for sinners!

He took all of your sin—every last conscience-crushing word, thought or deed you have ever committed—and completely and totally paid every last atom of the penalty!

The perfect, spotless, innocent Lamb of God, Jesus Christ, suffered and died the death of the vilest sinner so that you (who really are a vile and wretched sinner) can be completely and totally purified before Him!

When Jesus Christ saves you, He washes and cleanses and restores you from all your guilt and shame and past so that you have a clear conscience before Him forever!

Romans 8:1 (ESV)

1 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

There is nothing for your conscience to accuse you of, nothing for your conscience to try to defend you over—all of it has been purified by Jesus’ blood, and your rebel conscience is put to rest forever.

And right now you’re sitting there, adding your “Amen” to God’s Word and the truth it speaks of your purified conscience—you know this to be true because it’s what happened to you when you put your faith in Jesus Christ for your salvation.

The blood of Christ is the only cure for a convicting conscience!

But at the same time, you’re thinking to yourself— “I know my conscience is clear about my past, but now that I am a Christian my conscience is still convicting me!”

Your life before you knew Christ no longer afflicts your conscience, but now your present life as a believer weighs on your conscience!

In his autobiography, Mark Twain wrote,

“Mine was a trained Presbyterian conscience and knew but the one duty--to hunt and harry its slave upon all pretexts and on all occasions, particularly when there was no sense nor reason in it.”

- Autobiography of Mark Twain

And Presbyterians aren’t the only Christians who have consciences that “hunt and harry”, are they?

Baptists can have the same experience as well, right?

So, what is going on here?

Does the Gospel really deliver us from a guilty conscience over our past, and then just introduce us to a life of guilt over our present life as a Christian?

This isn’t an academic question, is it?

Maybe you’ve been there—and maybe you’re there right now—feeling that you’re a “failure” as a Christian because of all the ways you don’t measure up to God’s standards.

You don’t pray enough, your language is still a little salty (or a lot) salty from time to time, you still have outbursts of your old temper, you still struggle with bitterness or lust or anxiety or laziness—those things actually bothered you less before you were a Christian, and now you just feel more of a convicting conscience.

But I want to suggest to you that the reasons your conscience convicts you as a Christian are polar opposite of the reasons you had a convicting conscience before you came to Christ: Before you came to Christ you were had a rotten convicting conscience because you didn’t want to obey God’s Law—and now your conscience convicts you because you can’t obey God’s law enough!! Before you were desperate to avoid God’s standards; now you are desperate to obey Him!

An unbeliever struggles with a convicting conscience because their conscience is trying to rebel against God—a Christian struggles with a convicting conscience because they want to obey God!

So where we looked a few minutes ago at the rebel conscience of an unbeliever, we can look into the Scriptures to see

II.

The SUBMISSIVE Conscience of the CHRISTIAN (Romans 7:21-24)

The Apostle Paul states the issue perfectly in Romans chapter 7 (it’s on page 944 of the pew Bible if you want to find it there).

In Romans 7:21-24 we read:

Romans 7:21–24 (ESV)

21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand.

22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.

24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?

Notice what Paul says in verse 22: “I delight in the Law of God, in my inner being!”

That is a condition that no unbeliever has—they hate the righteousness of God, and they hate the voice inside them that constantly reminds them of their failure to obey it.

But the believer has the mirror opposite problem—a Christian delights in the Law of God, but struggles to obey it as much as they want to!

We see evidence of this in 1 John 1, as well—look at verse 9:

1 John 1:9 (ESV)

9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Where the rebel conscience of the unbeliever fights against God’s truth about their sin, the submissive conscience of the Christian—that loves God’s truth—that conscience

AGREES with God about your sin (1 John 1:9)

The word “confess” here in verse 9 is the translation of the Greek word homologeo—it literally translates as “say the same thing”.

A Christian doesn’t try to deny or defend their sin—a Christian agrees with God that they are a sinner, and thus their conscience convicts them: “God is love, but I still hate my sister, God is gracious, but I still want to get revenge against my boss, God is pure, but I spend way too much time in the wrong neighborhood of the Internet...”