Exception-Based Christianity

On one occasion, after I had introduced the concept of probability to my junior high math class, students began quizzing me about the lottery. We first calculated the astronomically small probability of winning with one ticket. The next idea was that of purchasing enough tickets to ensure a win. After two days of exploring the investment in time, labor and money to pull off such a feat, we all agreed that it was next to impossible. And yet, we all marveled that local and national lotteries announced winners. In each case, the winner appeared to be an exception.

The big take-away for my students was that if you really 'expect' to win the lottery, you are boldly (or foolishly) asserting that you think you will be the exception to the huge improbability.

(I don’t think my mathematical proof for the foolishness of speeding was as great a success.)

Young people often live as if they will be the exception. They will not be the one to...

• Get caught (shoplifting/speeding);
• Get hurt (diving into dark water);
• Lose money (on risky investments); or
• Fail (at an unlikely endeavor).

Life seems to be full of exceptions. Just look! People are winning the lottery all the time!

Let me insert here that the marketing of the exception (intentionally or otherwise) can easily skew one’s sense of reality. So, a person’s keen skills of observation might be based on incomplete or inaccurate information.

So, what does all this have to do with Christianity? Some people carry over into Christianity the same exceptional mentality. In other words, some Christians live as if they will be the exception to the clear teachings found in Scripture.

Let me continue with an example…

Have you ever read Bible verses about lying?

• Is lying ever approved? Is lying good?
• A lying tongue is found on a list of things that God hates. (Proverbs 6:17)
• “Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord.” (Proverbs 12:22)
• “A false witness will not go unpunished, and he who tells lies will perish.” (Proverbs 19:9)
• God’s people believed the false prophets but called Jeremiah a liar when he spoke God’s word. (Jeremiah 27, 28, 29, 43) God held them accountable for their foolishness.
• Jesus referred to the devil as the father of lies. (John 8:44)
• Lying is explicitly condemned three times in the book of Revelation (21:8, 27; 22:15).
• It is impossible for God to lie (Hebrews 6:18); it is against His nature.

So, how strong is a defense for lying by pointing to Rahab the harlot who lied about hiding the Israelite spies at the time of Joshua? (See Joshua 2:1-7) Does Rahab the exception teach us that there are times when lying is justified?

Even if we think we can justify Rahab’s lie, it does not justify your lie. Lying is sin. That is the consistent teaching in Scripture.

To teach our children that it’s ok to lie (even sometimes) would be no different than teaching that there is no right and wrong, that life is full of moral exceptions. An exception-based approach to Scripture would inevitably call for a whole new branch of moral instruction on how and when to apply exceptions.

We must not go beyond what is written in scripture. 

Would you risk your soul on a perceived exception???

Think...In what other areas would this kind of reasoning apply?

Mark Stinnett

November 6, 2022

Your Conscience: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

What kind of conscience do you have??

Everyone has a conscience. Since we have a conscience, we make moral decisions, unlike animals which operate on instinct. So, we are able to choose to follow our instinctive animal nature, or pursue the nature of God.

The conscience has two primary functions:

• Provide moral guidance; and
• Evaluate moral behavior.

The trouble with the conscience is that it may not function properly!

A good conscience is able to identify things that are morally good as morally good, and likewise, morally bad things as bad. For example, when Joseph was seduced by his boss’s wife, he refused her, remarking that such a thing would be a sin against God (Genesis 39:7-9). His good conscience identified sin as sin, and that was good.

Years later, after King David had committed adultery with Bathsheba, he was confronted by Nathan, a prophet of God. In his guilt, David confessed his sin against God (2 Samuel 12:1-15). David expressed the effect of his guilty conscience in the 32nd Psalm:

When I kept silent about my sin, my body wasted away through my groanings all day long.

—Psalm 32:3

This was an example of a good conscience that had been violated. Yet, his good conscience did its job by making David feel guilt for his sin until he had properly addressed his sin.

Solomon described the hearts of sinners. They devise evil plans, yet speak about their evil as if it is a normal or good thing. Their consciences interchange good and evil, so, an example of a bad conscience. (Proverbs 1) As a result, their consciences do not alert them to sin and stop them from sinning. Also, after committing sin, their consciences do not cause guilt feelings.

In Scripture a good conscience may be described with the words pure, clean, blameless, or perfect (i.e. mature, complete), but never clear, at least, not in the Greek text of the New Testament.

However, some translators interpret the text and use clear conscience in passages such as 1 Timothy 3:9 and 2 Timothy 1:3 where the Greek adjective is pure; or Acts 23:1, Hebrews 13:18, 1 Peter 3:16 & 21 where the Greek adjective is good; or Acts 24:16 where the Greek adjective is blameless.

Why all the fuss? Why suggest in the title that a clear conscience is ugly?

[Pardon the connection to the old spaghetti western.]

A clear conscience is unpredictable, and therefore, unreliable. When a person has done what is morally right and the conscience is clear, everything is fine. There are no guilt feelings, nor should there be.

However, moral decisions and moral behavior are good or bad. There are no such things as clear moral decisions or clear moral behavior. In reality, a clear conscience does not provide moral guidance before deciding or acting. It only renders a “Not Guilty” verdict after acting. For that reason, a person could commit a sin, yet feel no guilt because of a clear conscience. Sin without guilt feelings from a clear conscience is indeed ugly, and actually a bad conscience in disguise.

A clear conscience promises guilt-free living, but not godly living. If we sin, we need a good conscience to pierce our hearts with guilt so that we are driven to God confessing our sin.

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 

—1 John 1:9

Yet, a clear conscience will confess no sin!

What kind of conscience do you have?

Mark Stinnett

October 30, 2022

Don't Violate Your Conscience!

(The Conscience, Part 4)

The conscience is one of the most important aspects of your being. It is of such great importance that the Apostle Paul taught Christians that they should never violate their conscience.

Paul was addressing an issue in the church in Rome concerning the eating of certain foods. (See Romans 14.) He writes about one person who ‘has faith’ that he can eat all things. Yet another person who is ‘weak in faith’ eats only vegetables. Paul is addressing not only an issue of eating certain things, but more broadly, the convictions of the heart, that is, the conscience.

One Christian ‘has faith’ (i.e. confidence) that he can eat all things, so his conscience is not bothered by what he eats. He feels no guilt for eating anything.

On the other hand, another Christian feels that there are moral restrictions on what he can eat. (For example, a Christian with a Jewish background might feel guilty for eating pork, an unclean food according to the Law of Moses.) Though it is not morally wrong under the new covenant, his conscience has been trained to avoid pork out of a moral response to the Law of Moses. So, to eat the pork would violate his conscience and make him feel guilty.

The key to understanding and dealing with the conscience is found at the end of the chapter:

The faith which you have, have as your own conviction before God. Happy is he who does not condemn himself in what he approves. But he who doubts is condemned if he eats, because his eating is not from faith; and whatever is not from faith is sin.
—Romans 14:22–23 (NASB95)

The phrase, “Happy is he who does not condemn himself in what he approves” is another way of saying, “happy is he who does not have an evil conscience.” Someone with an evil conscience labels morally bad things as good. His evil conscience approves of evil actions. So, his conscience is clear, though he has done wrong.

Still addressing the food issue, Paul writes that “he who doubts is condemned if he eats.” The doubt is his conscience warning him to stop. In his conscience, he believes it is morally wrong to eat food which he considers to be restricted. So, to doubt his own conviction is to go against his conscience. Or, as Paul puts it, his eating is “not from faith.” Stated succinctly, he doesn’t believe that he should eat the food he perceives to be restricted, but he eats it anyway. That is “not of faith.” It IS a violation of his conscience. So, to violate his conscience is to sin.

The odd thing in all of this is that Paul actually resolved the moral issue. He said that in reality, there were no longer restrictions on food as there had been in the Law of Moses. So, technically, the person who still felt guilty about eating certain foods was not guilty...of eating unclean food. Yet, if he ate, he was guilty of violating his conscience.

This might seem a little confusing until we focus on the heart of the matter: the conscience.

The conscience functions in two ways:

• Moral guide (before we act); and
• Judge and jury (after we act).

Paul simply taught that whenever a person goes against his moral guide (conscience) he sins, even if his moral guide is more restrictive than God’s standard. God does not want us to get into the habit of violating the moral standard embedded in our mind. So, don’t violate your conscience; that is sin. 

Train your conscience with God’s word, and follow it...ALWAYS!!

Mark Stinnett

November 3, 2019

How Important is Your Conscience?

(The Conscience, Part 2)

Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, 
  whose sin is covered. 
Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity, 
  and in whose spirit there is no deceit. 
For when I kept silent, 
  my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. 
For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; 
  my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. 
I acknowledged my sin to you, 
  and I did not cover my iniquity; 
I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,” 
  and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. 
—Psalm 32:1–5 (ESV)

King David had sinned and his conscience had convicted him of sin and caused guilt feelings. That is very thing the conscience is supposed to do; our built-in judge and jury of morality.

Vitally Important
The conscience is a vitally important aspect of our humanity. The presence of the conscience is one way in which man is distinguished from animals and all other things on the earth.

Animals operate solely by their instinctive nature. Dogs, for example, behave in a way that is unique to dogs. Trainers and breeders depend on the consistency of the nature of dogs in general, but also the uniqueness of the different breeds of dogs. They capitalize on the fact that dogs cannot choose to change their nature.

Because animals operate solely by instinct, we do not accuse them of sin. So, if a dog digs up your tulip bulbs, you might become angry and even discipline the dog, but the dog feels no guilt and you do not read scripture to the dog to point out his moral obligation.

So it is with all other kinds of animals. The simple reason is that animals do not possess a conscience and are not subject to a moral standard. Unlike mankind, they were not made in the image of God and are not expected to operate beyond their instinctive nature.

In great contrast, mankind was created in God’s image and can actually choose to rise above his instinctive fleshly nature to embrace the nature of God, or godliness (i.e. God-like-ness).

Powerful
The human conscience is also a powerful aspect of our humanity. King David’s guilty conscience caused physical and emotional misery. Yet, He found relief when he confessed his sin to God. Guilt is meant to drive us to God.

God designed man this way so that he would choose to embrace the nature of God. After all, good and evil are defined by the nature of God.

Now, there are three ways to find peace from the misery of a guilty conscience.

First, the conscience can be seared. The way people sear their conscience is to play the hypocrite. In other words, simply continue to do wrong in spite of the guilt feelings produced by the conscience. Over time, the conscience loses its moral sensitivity and no longer identify right as right and wrong as wrong. The Apostle Paul described the seared conscience in 1 Timothy 4.

Second, the guilty conscience can be justified. The person knows that his action was morally wrong, but he believes that he had good reason to do the wrong. He ‘justifies’ his action making it seem right. The end result is a clear conscience which is basically indifferent to right and wrong.

King David dealt with his guilty conscience the right way by confessing his sin to God. Even though he had violated his conscience, the powerful guilt feelings led him to confess his sin. The result was a cleansing of his conscience beginning with God’s forgiveness.

A seared conscience will sin again.
A clear conscience is morally indifferent and will sin again.
A clean/pure conscience possesses true peace and will guard you against sin.

Mark Stinnett
October 20, 2019

What is the Conscience?

(The Conscience, Part 1)

Every person has, at one time or another, violated his/her conscience. In other words, he/she has thought something, said something or done something believed to be morally wrong.

The conscience is that mysterious part of the human being that evaluates moral right and wrong. Regardless of how the conscience has been trained, it functions as an internal judge and jury. When choices are made that are perceived to be right, the conscience approves. Yet, when choices are made that are perceived to be wrong, the conscience disapproves. The conscience judges choices, but also thoughts, speech and behavior associated with choices.

It is important to understand that the conscience is concerned with morality. So, if a person shoplifts, his conscience acts as a witness and renders a verdict: “Shoplifting is morally wrong; you are guilty.” In contrast, if a store worker shelves an item incorrectly, it is a mistake, but not a moral wrong. So, his mind may acknowledge the mistake and even regret the mistake, but the conscience does not activate a sense of moral guilt.

The Bible tells us about a good conscience and a bad conscience.

A good conscience works correctly. It identifies good things as good and bad things as bad. It judges decisions and behaviors properly. In the Bible a good conscience is also called a clean, pure or blameless conscience.

In contrast, a bad conscience does not work properly. A bad conscience might consider something that is morally wrong and identify it as good or right. In a similar way a bad conscience might consider something that is morally good or right and identify it as wrong. A bad conscience is also called an evil conscience.

As an example of a bad conscience…

I had a friend in junior high who invited me to go to the elementary wing of our school during lunchtime so we could ‘push the little kids around.’ My friend said it would be fun. My friend’s conscience was bad; it approved of bullying. (I went a different way that day. )

A stark description of an evil/bad conscience is found in the Bible in Proverbs 1:8-19.

So, what about a ‘clear’ conscience? In reality, a clear conscience is most often a bad conscience because it is morally indifferent. When a clear conscience responds to something that is morally wrong, it does not call it wrong (or right).

The clear conscience is worthless in guarding the soul. The voice of the clear conscience says, “I don’t see anything wrong with that” or “I didn’t violate my conscience; I feel no guilt.”

For example: A boys punches another boy in the nose. He then justifies himself saying, “He deserved it.” There is a subtle admission that it was not right to fight, but that he felt justified by the circumstances. So, he feels no guilt; his conscience is ‘clear.’

The conscience operates at two key moments:

• Before you decide/speak/act its role is to evaluate by giving you approval to continue or by warning you to stop. It guards your soul against sin.
• After you speak/act its role is to evaluate by approving or causing guilt feelings.

A good conscience is good because it conforms to the standard that is defined by the character of God which has been revealed in Scripture. The Bible teaches us to follow our conscience. 

Make sure yours is a good conscience.

Mark Stinnett
October 13, 2019

“I Understand . . . But . . .”

Have you ever had anything stolen from you?
Do you remember how you felt?

Imagine this: Two thieves are caught, their circumstances described...
In desperate circumstances a man breaks into your car and steals some electronics. He then sells them at a pawn shop so that he can have some money to buy food for his starving wife and two small children.

A second thief breaks into your home and steals your laptop, TV system and jewelry. He later pawns his heist for quick cash. When he is caught it is discovered that he had been on a crime spree for quite some time. He's just a thief; no family; in it for the money.

One steals for need;
The other for greed.

If you are like most people, you have some degree of understanding, perhaps even sympathy toward the man who stole out of need. Solomon wrote:

   Men do not despise a thief if he steals 
      To satisfy himself when he is hungry;
   But when he is found, he must repay sevenfold; 
      He must give all the substance of his house.
   --Proverbs 6:30-31

It is important to understand that right and wrong do not change with circumstances. While we might be more understanding in one situation than another. Right is still right, and wrong is still wrong...ALWAYS.

Be wise. Do right.