The Only Conscience-Cleanser

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. (Hebrews 9:14)

Here we are in the modern age — the age of the Internet, smartphones, space travel, and heart transplants — and our problem is fundamentally the same as always: Our consciences condemn us and make us feel unacceptable to God. We are alienated from God. And our consciences bear witness.

We can cut ourselves, or throw our children in the sacred river, or give a million dollars to charity, or serve in a soup kitchen, or a hundred forms of penance or self-injury, and the result will be the same: The stain remains and death terrifies.

We know that our conscience is defiled — not with external things like touching a corpse, a dirty diaper, or a piece of pork. Jesus said it is what comes out of a man that defiles, not what goes in (Mark 7:15–23). We are defiled by attitudes like pride and self-pity and bitterness and lust and envy and jealousy and covetousness and apathy and fear.

The only answer in this modern age, as in every other age, is the blood of Christ. When your conscience rises up and condemns you, where will you turn? Hebrews 9:14 gives you the answer: “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.”

The answer is: Turn to the blood of Christ. Turn to the only cleansing agent in the universe that can give you relief in life, and peace in death.

John Piper 

Bible Study

1 John 1:7

[7] But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.

Revelation 7:14

[14] I said to him, “Sir, you know.” And he said to me, “These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

Romans 6:13-14

[13] Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. [14] For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.

1 Peter 4:1-8

[1] Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, [2] so as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for human passions but for the will of God. [3] For the time that is past suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do, living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, and lawless idolatry. [4] With respect to this they are surprised when you do not join them in the same flood of debauchery, and they malign you; [5] but they will give account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead. [6] For this is why the gospel was preached even to those who are dead, that though judged in the flesh the way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does.

[7] The end of all things is at hand; therefore be self-controlled and sober-minded for the sake of your prayers. [8] Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.

God Wants Your Obedience

PRAY OVER THIS

“‘For whom the Lord loves He chastens, and scourges every son whom He receives.’”

(Hebrews 12:6)

 

PONDER THIS

As God confronts your sin, first comes conviction. When you’re convicted of your sin, if you confess and forsake your sin, you’ll receive mercy. But if you do not respond when God convicts you, the next step is chastisement. And that chastisement may take many forms. God will chastise you, not because He doesn’t love you, but because He does love you. God chastened David, and that’s what Psalm 32 is about. The hand of God was on David.

In today’s verse, the word scourge is a strong one. A scourge was a whip, like a cat-o'-nine-tails. The writer was not talking about a slap on the wrist. God is more interested in your obedience than He is your temporary happiness in the world. God will deal with you with chastisement as He confronts your sin, and He will do so because of His love for you.

When have you experienced the Lord’s chastisement over your sin?

What does it tell you about God’s love that He refuses to let you be content with your sin, even if you don’t desire change on your own?

PRACTICE THIS

Take a walk today and dwell on the truth that God refuses to let you stay the same and will pursue your nearness to Him in every circumstance.

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

The Root of Ingratitude

Although they knew God, they did not glorify him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. (Romans 1:21)

When gratitude springs up in the human heart toward God, he is magnified as the wealthy source of our blessing. He is acknowledged as giver and benefactor and therefore as glorious.

But when gratitude does not spring up in our hearts at God’s great goodness to us, it probably means that we don’t want to pay him a compliment; we don’t want to magnify him as our benefactor.

And there is a very good reason that human beings by nature do not want to magnify God with thanksgiving or glorify him as their benefactor. The reason is that it detracts from our own glory, and all people by nature love their own glory more than the glory of God.

At the root of all ingratitude is the love of one’s own greatness. For genuine gratitude admits that we are beneficiaries of an unearned bequest. We are cripples leaning on the cross-shaped crutch of Jesus Christ. We are paralytics living minute by minute in the iron lung of God’s mercy. We are children asleep in heaven’s stroller.

The natural person, apart from saving grace, hates to think of himself in these images: unworthy beneficiary, cripple, paralytic, child. They rob him of his glory by giving it all to God.

Therefore, while a man loves his own glory, and prizes his self-sufficiency, and hates to think of himself as sin-sick and helpless, he will never feel genuine gratitude to the true God and so will never magnify God as he ought, but only himself.

Jesus said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners” (Mark 2:17).

Jesus did not come to minister to those who insist they are well. He demands something great: that we admit we are not great. This is bad news to the arrogant, but words of honey to those who have given up their charade of self-sufficiency and are seeking God.

John Piper 

Bible Study

2 Kings 17:14-15

[14] But they would not listen, but were stubborn, as their fathers had been, who did not believe in the LORD their God. [15] They despised his statutes and his covenant that he made with their fathers and the warnings that he gave them. They went after false idols and became false, and they followed the nations that were around them, concerning whom the LORD had commanded them that they should not do like them.

Jeremiah 2:5

[5] Thus says the LORD: 

    “What wrong did your fathers find in me

        that they went far from me,

    and went after worthlessness, and became worthless?

Ephesians 4:17-18

[17] Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. [18] They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart.

Ephesians 2:12-16

[12] remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. [13] But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. [14] For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility [15] by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, [16] and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.

Are You Covering Your Sin?

PRAY OVER THIS

“He who covers his sins will not prosper, but whoever confesses and forsakes them will have mercy.”

(Proverbs 28:13)

 

PONDER THIS

Some are reading this who once walked with God. And you’re truly saved, but rather than confessing your sin, you’ve been covering your sin. There used to be a time when you praised God continually and experienced deep fellowship with Him. Jesus Christ was nearer and more real to you than the members of your family. But it’s all gone now, and sin is in your heart because you have failed to confess. You’ve covered your sin. How do we cover our sins? We cover our sins today by rationalization. We explain them away and reason that it really isn’t our fault. Or maybe we cover our sin by activity. We get busy, but we won’t confess our sin. We may even be busy with church work. David continued to be the king of God’s people, but he was covering his sin. Some cover their sin by hypocrisy. They act like nothing is there and nothing is wrong. But when we cover our sin, there’s no joy. There’s no peace. There’s no victory.

Is God speaking to you about ways you might be covering your sin or about specific areas of sin you might be attempting to hide?

How do you need to respond to Him today?

PRACTICE THIS

Invite the Lord to help you assess your heart rightly. Ask Him to show you clearly any place you are covering your sin, and then confess fully before Him.

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers

How to Magnify God

I will praise the name of God with a song; I will magnify him with thanksgiving. (Psalm 69:30)

There are two kinds of magnifying: microscope magnifying and telescope magnifying. The one makes a small thing look bigger than it is. The other makes a big thing begin to look as big as it really is.

When David says, “I will magnify God with thanksgiving,” he does not mean, “I will make a small God look bigger than he is.” He means, “I will make a big God begin to look as big as he really is.”

We are not called to be microscopes. We are called to be telescopes. Christians are not called to be con-men who magnify their product out of all proportion to reality, when they know the competitor’s product is far superior. There is nothing and nobody superior to God. And so the calling of those who love God is to make his greatness begin to look as great as it really is.

That’s why we exist, why we were saved, as Peter says in 1 Peter 2:9, “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.”

The whole duty of the Christian can be summed up in this: feel, think, and act in a way that will make God look as great as he really is. Be a telescope for the world of the infinite starry wealth of the glory of God.

This is what it means for a Christian to magnify God. But you can’t magnify what you haven’t seen or what you quickly forget.

Therefore, our first task is to see and to remember the greatness and goodness of God. So we pray to God, “Open the eyes of my heart!” (Ephesians 1:18), and we preach to our souls, “Soul, forget not all his benefits!” (Psalm 103:2).

John Piper