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Conscience – The Natural Man’s Conscience, Part 2

[Study Aired October 21, 2023]

I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that I have set before thee life and death, the blessing and the curse: therefore choose life, that thou mayest live, thou and thy seed (Deu 30:19).

A law, dependent upon one’s honour and respect for its creator, results in a spiritual phenomenon called “conscience” having chosen to comply or defy.

This series of approximately 20 parts on “Conscience” began with my personal and biblical character’s memoirs, identified the meaning of conscience and is a teaser introduction to this serial in-depth study. This examination deals with the Natural Man’s Conscience.

Part 1 – Summary:

The underpinning for mankind at the Lord’s hand acquiring a “conscience” was established in Eden, and Adam and Eve told not to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Breaking that first indication of a law evoked the new and devastating emotion of an evil conscience and the torturous path to sustaining a good conscience.

A conscience, according to the Greek translations and spiritually abridged, means the soul’s God-given observance of a Law that points to either life or death that is morally rendered as good or evil. ‘Choosing’ either life or death unwittingly unleashes the new emotional awareness of obedience or disobedience. Experiencing that imagined choice of choosing good, we feel peace and unity with our Lord while choosing evil unconsciously opens a Pandora’s box of cascading evils. The pursuit of the knowledge of “good” produces a clear and uncomplicated inner state of peace and joy, universally experienced as a ‘good conscience’ resulting in an upward eclipsing spiritual bloom of ‘good.’ Ultimately it means access to the Tree of Life that is Christ. Conversely, the pursuit of the knowledge of “evil” results in a plethora of dichotic emotions, producing physical and spiritual turmoil via lawlessness and resulting confusion (Babylon), ensuring those in its grip are chained in the depths of decay and resulting death. It essentially means remaining with our first father, Satan, to be refined (not eternal torture) with him in age-lasting element melting fire and brimstone (sulphur), the Lake of Fire (2Pe 3:10-13, Rev 20:11-15).

Man’s God-given default from Eden is to magnetically choose evil. In choosing evil, the spirit placed in man pricks his conscience since evil produces pain and suffering, evoking a still small voice within both the Elect and unelected, even to the heathen saying, “This is the way; walk ye in it” (Isa 30:21). Yet, because mankind hasn’t more than a dull ember of the holy spirit, he is frustrated most damnably and succumbs to the chains of darkness as the easier option. Being highly sociable beasts, misery loves company, just as Joseph’s brothers bonded in spirit and couldn’t speak peaceably to him.

One locked and stricken with an evil conscience, and seeing Lazarus afar off, is a temporary prison darkness of the ‘deep’ with seemingly no means of escape ~ a perceived eternity; their conscience accuses and swiftly blames, haughtily excusing them to mollify their pain while semi-conscious of their hiding. If their conscience isn’t seared from giving up, either way, the deadly loop seems maddeningly endless with no means of escape…

Rom 7:18  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.
Rom 7:19  For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
Rom 7:20  Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. 
Rom 7:21  I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me. […and around and around the most frustrating loop goes condemning such to prison]

Those very few chosen by God in this age, known as the Bride of Christ, are given a small but potent measure of the holy spirit that evokes “good.” Exercising good increases the holy spirit to exponentially produce more good and combusts evil. Joyously, it is an escape from the deep to the brilliant light above and proportionally a good conscience.

Rom 7:22  For I delight in the Law of God after the inward man: 
Rom 7:23  But I see another law in my members, warring against the Law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the Law of sin which is in my members.
Rom 7:24  O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the Body of this death? 
Rom 7:25  I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind [exercising a good conscience] I myself serve the Law of God; but with the flesh the Law of sin.

Rom 6:6  Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the Body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. 

Rom 6:14  For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the Law, but under grace [that burns up an evil conscience teaching us a good conscience!].

A good conscience is one of the most vital elements to being an Elect of God since it certifies an honest heart. If we “know” Christ, we are in spiritual union with our Husband, just as a carnal wife knows her husband.

1Jn 2:3  And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments. 
1Jn 2:4  He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.

In dreadful humourous intrigue, I ‘love’ the Pharisaical demeanour of these fellows in Dante’s Divine Comedy (see link below), appearing to wryly note in affected tones as they morbidly clutch their breasts, “Oh, dear! Look, the skin is slothing off that poor wretched sinner’s legs; yes, yes… let’s go now and have a cup of tea; the smell of sulphur is tickling my throat.”

https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Ftse2.mm.bing.net%2Fth%3Fid%3DOIP.ERH4RGXhGYSmxhgqD0jRWQHaJV%26pid%3DApi&f=1&ipt=d1bf54ca86c9f00e95d0cd5751cfbde6f16818f4f2985d5b0481f35dfa263175&ipo=images

The details of every Law in the Old Covenant prompt an inherently evil conscience, undisturbed enough to consistently choose death.

Upon the gift of the holy spirit, all Old Covenant laws emerge from the deep to be unwittingly seen in the brilliant light and fullness of spiritual understanding (Isa 9:1-7) in Christ, resulting in good conscience.

Mat 4:12  Now when Jesus had heard that John was cast into prison, he departed into Galilee; 
Mat 4:13  And leaving Nazareth, he came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is upon the sea coast, in the borders of Zabulon and Nephthalim: 
Mat 4:14  That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, 
Mat 4:15  The land of Zabulon, and the land of Nephthalim, by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles; 
Mat 4:16  The people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up.
Mat 4:17  From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. 

Our eyes cannot function without light. An evil conscience represents darkness, and almost no life exists in darkness. Conversely, a good conscience is represented by light and produces physical and spiritual growth.

Mat 6:22 The light of the Body is the eye: if therefore thine eye [G3788] be single, thy whole Body shall be full of light.
Mat 6:23 But if thine eye be evil, thy whole Body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!

Eye being evil – G3788: Ophthalmos- Phonetic: of-thal-mos’- Definition: 1. the eye 2. metaph. the eyes of the mind, the faculty of knowing. [In other words, knowing good and evil and upon taking action, inducing either a good or evil conscience.]

Joh 3:19  And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
Joh 3:20  For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. 
Joh 3:21  But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.

Conscience – Further Spiritually Defined

This study, Part 2, is the investigation of the many unconscionable nuances of man’s conniving heart, which is food to fertilize the Bride’s growth. It is juxtaposed with probably one of the best studies mainstream Christianity can compile called (incidentally) “Conscience” by Thomas Baird of the University of Virginia, USA (1914) and the accompanying link:

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uva.x001793390&seq=1&view=2up

Mr Baird and all those exceptionally and genuinely hard-working scholars in the heat of the day since Christ, have laid a phenomenal amount of material for the Body of Christ’s service. Yet, there is one vital element missing, and at best, vaguely seen in some of their studies and pinpointed in the following verses.

Joh 6:63  It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.
Joh 6:64  But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who should betray him.
Joh 6:65  And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.

Subsequently, Mr Baird’s work only reflects what the natural man perceives.

The following verses aren’t pompous on the Bride’s account since she, too, has been a whore and is now dragged by the Father to understand her Lord’s Commandments. Seeming to double down again and again on her presumed conceit, she is given to “know the mysteries of the kingdom of God” that her sisters remaining in Babylon don’t know. She worships in spirit with a good conscience in truth.

Joh 4:24  God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.

Luk 8:10  And he said, Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God: but to others in parables; that seeing they might not see, and hearing they might not understand.

As seen in Part 1 of this study, we are grateful to Adam and Eve for setting us on the path to partaking of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and thus making us aware of our conscience. We saw that disobedience to our Lord’s word instantly indicts us with an evil conscience. If exposure looks imminent, and consciously knowing that we haven’t a leg on which to spiritually stand, we default to accusing and blaming someone else. Our pride pricks our conscience to retain self-righteousness and subsequently to hide our sin. The Lord’s Elect are delighted to individually judge within, that is, to accuse themselves of sin that disarmingly exposes brightly the sin before God without blame and lying.

Jer 3:13  Only acknowledge thine iniquity, that thou hast transgressed against the LORD thy God, and hast scattered thy ways to the strangers under every green tree, and ye have not obeyed my voice, saith the LORD.

1Jn 1:8  If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 
1Jn 1:9  If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 
1Jn 1:10  If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. 

Gen 3:2  And the woman said unto the Serpent, Of the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat: 
Gen 3:3  but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.
Gen 3:4  And the Serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die:
Gen 3:5  for God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as God, knowing good and evil.

Yet, and to his credit for honesty, Mr Baird says, “The almost [bold Grant’s] absolute silence of the Old Testament on the subject of Conscience must remain throughout all time an impenetrable mystery. Only once in the whole range of Old Testament revelation is it referred to, and then it is mysteriously relegated a marginal position ‘Curse not the King, no not in thy thought’ (margin – conscience Eccles 10:20)'”

My purpose is not to discredit Mr Baird’s extensive work; nonetheless, he, along with the world, isn’t given along with Adam and Eve to see their alarming spiritual experience with their new-found conscience ~ all they feel is the devastation of disobeying their Father.

Mr Baird’s scripture:

Ecc 10:20  Curse not the king, no not in thy thought [H4093]; and curse not the rich in thy bedchamber: for a bird of the air shall carry the voice, and that which hath wings shall tell the matter.

Thought H4093, which is akin to Conscience in G4893 and G3894 in this study Part 1 and Adam and Eve ‘knowing’, that is conscious that they were naked because of disobedience.

Transliteration: Madda`
– Phonetic: mad-daw’
– Definition: 
knowledge, thought 
knowledge 
mind, thought, place of knowledge
– Origin: from H3045
– TWOT entry: 848g
– Part(s) of speech: Noun Masculine 
– Strong’s: From H3045; intelligence or consciousness: – knowledge science thought. 
Total KJV Occurrences: 6 
knowledge, 4

2Ch_1:10; 2Ch_1:11; 2Ch_1:12; Dan_1:17 

science, 1
Dan_1:4

thought, 1
Ecc_10:20

Notice that “knowledge” is connected to knowing and perceiving, and it wouldn’t have taken Mr Baird much academic research to look further back than Ecclesiastes to see that “knowledge” is directly linked to a “conscience” in the first case of an upcoming conscience experience in Genesis:

Gen 2:9  And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

That scripture IS the first time the essence of conscience for man is to be revealed! When later activated by choosing to obey or disobey that new Law, Adam’s “knowledge” of that Law is dynamically triggered. If he chose to obey rather than disobey (hypothetically), he wouldn’t have known his conscience! God wasn’t wringing his hands in despair over this momentous event. Adam had to know that he was in darkness and naked through the God-designed bitter experience of the flesh to know evil juxtaposed with good, as his newly acquired father, Satan, delightedly ‘blessed’ him. 

Adam and Eve, upon eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, now possessed a conscience; they were on the torturous path to becoming as God is, knowing the vastness of evil and the simplicity of good. The key is to consistently walk in good and not evil, thus retaining a good conscience.

Jer 14:20  We acknowledge, O LORD, our wickedness, and the iniquity of our fathers: for we have sinned against thee.

Col 1:9  For this cause we [Apostles] also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; 
Col 1:10  That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God; [… and, of course, in good conscience]

Since Adam, every man and woman, past, present and future, inherently judges good from evil. The many chosen have a slightly, nonetheless frustratingly, better ability to do good, yet mostly fail, and the chosen Elect are given to exponentially increase in good over evil that sustains a good conscience.

Let’s now explore in more detail how we accuse and excuse our conscience.

The Natural Man’s Conscience

1Co 2:14  But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

God doesn’t exist in a dichotic state of spiritual confusion that requires a conscience to choose good from evil. If the Lord hadn’t created the Serpent, no negative concepts would have existed, and therefore neither would man’s conscience. As such, the statement in the heading of this study declared, “A law, dependent upon one’s honour and respect for its creator, results in a spiritual phenomenon called “conscience” having chosen to comply or defy.”

Rom 5:12  Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:
Rom 5:13  (For until the law sin was in the world [‘sinful flesh’ is sin]: but sin is not imputed when there is no law.

Rev 21:3  And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. 
Rev 21:4  And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things [including the Law and our conscience] are passed away.

God will not allow man to serve the two masters of a good or evil conscience. Man must choose, and it is not in the natural man’s choosing to sustain a good conscience.

In Part 1 of this study, we saw that God made man a little higher than the beasts of the field. How? By God’s spirit that directly links man, not the beasts of the field, to God for the process of being re-created in His image. For mankind to become as God is, he must grow by worshiping God in spirit and in truth.

Job 32:8  But there is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding [a conscience!].

Joh 4:23  But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him.
Joh 4:24  God is a spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. 

It is only by the Lord’s spirit in all of mankind that the two groups, the natural man and the spiritual man, perceive conscience. It is only the spiritual man who can rightly and by the Lord’s strength consistently divide, that is, judge truth from error.

1Co 2:11  For what man knoweth [aware of conscience by the Law] the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.
1Co 2:12  Now we [the Bride of Christ] have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
1Co 2:13  Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the holy ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
1Co 2:14  But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned [How? By spiritually judging good from evil, thus imbibing a good or evil conscience].
1Co 2:15  But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man. [it is impossible for a non-spiritual man to righteously judge the spirit of a matter!]
1Co 2:16  For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ. 

1Co 15:50  Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.

Mankind is given the knowledge of good and evil and is mostly destitute of being able to retain the mind of Christ. Christ’s spirit connects with His spirit given to man, particularly for those whom He chooses to increase in knowledge and spirit and become increasingly conscious of maintaining a good conscience; that is conscious of a law in his members that activates a moral conscience to choose good over evil. Of course, we know that it is God who provokes man to choose (anything) as He wills.

Dan 4:35  And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven [the Bride of Christ], and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?

In this age, it is only the Lord’s Bride who is given by Him to choose life over death and thus save her “seed”, the inhabitants of the earth.

Deut 30:19 I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that I have set before thee life and death, the blessing and the curse: therefore choose life, that thou mayest live, thou and thy seed.

In fact, Satan told the truth to Eve. If she ate of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, she would become as God, knowing the difference. If Satan speaks the truth, it always comes with a barb, and in this case, death.

Gen 3:4  And the Serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die:
Gen 3:5  For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.

The only problem is that Adam and Eve had no whit that they, without the holy spirit, would be incapable of choosing good. Upon their leaving Eden, Satan was delighted to do what he does best ~ deceive. Mankind was now contending with the dreadful dichotomy by the sweat of his brow, attempting to choose good only to consistently fail. Out of frustration, he throws up his hands and submits to the inevitability of failure. He semiconsciously and most frustratingly believes that it is impossible to please God, so we all have unwittingly sat on the throne of God and made rules to which he can submit and pervert for our own version of righteous living.

Rev 12:7  And there was war in heaven [in you and me!]: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, 
Rev 12:8  And prevailed not [in the Elect of God]; neither was their place found any more in heaven.
Rev 12:9  And the great dragon was cast out, that old Serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. 

Rom 7:18  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.
Rom 7:19  For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do. 
Rom 7:20  Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. 

… so, here we are…

The Bible is overflowing with examples of “the natural man’s conscience”. Having begun with Adam and Eve’s foundation, we shall choose a few other prominent examples of the natural man’s spirit-pricked and subsequently disillusioned conscience.

The next most outstanding example of an evil conscience is likewise foundational to man’s knowledge of good and evil and is murder.

We are very aware of the story of Cain’s murder of Abel, so we will only highlight the acts of their “natural man’s” righteous and unrighteous conscience.

Cain, having killed his brother, Abel, was approached by the Lord,

Gen 4:4  And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the LORD had respect [H8259 – “to look at, regard”; for moral integrity by a Law] unto Abel and to his offering: 
Gen 4:5  But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell.
Gen 4:6  And the LORD said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen? 

The above verse is a reference to God’s inherent nature of a good conscience, noted by the term “respect”, inferring conscious regard (H8259) for the differing spirits of Abel and Cain. In short, Abel’s offering was in accordance with a righteous blood offering, and his conscience was in harmony with his Lord’s, whereas Cain’s (and our conscience) were at odds, being in harmony with our ‘first father’, the Serpent’s mind.

Cain’s conscience got complicated by him “accusing” both Abel and God that he should be Abel’s keeper, thus imagining an “excuse” to exonerate his sin and vainly “hiding.” That very same accusing, excusing, and imagined hiding is the foundational pattern for mankind all the way into the Resurrection to Judgment (Rom 2:1-29).

To boot, Cain’s countenance fell, and he was very wroth ~ why? Because his conscience convicted him with the semi-consciousness of a law! I say “semi-consciousness” because Cain avoided a good conscience (excused) and sought his own will, an idol of the heart.

Satan was created a murderer, and unbeknown to Adam, Eve, Cain and Abel (we all!), instituted by God and Cain’s recently acquired father’s evil conscience was a new law ~ ‘do not kill.’ Their family was very familiar with sacrificially killing animals and knew what death looked like, and it didn’t take much imagination as to how it would feel if they were subjected to death and decay. 

The natural man, Cain, dismissed his conscience. He was fully aware that the Serpent’s deception was the reason his parents were cast out of Eden. Now, in one massive plot of an evil conscience, the Serpent spoke to Cain’s conscience to envy Abel and insensibly amplify his anger to the point of murdering his brother. The path for an increasingly inherently evil conscience for all mankind now is foundationally established ~ “O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (Rom 7:24).

Gen 4:9  And the LORD said unto Cain, Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not: Am I my brother’s keeper?

Cain’s natural-man conscience slammed him big time! He got angry about his nakedness being exposed.

Gen 4:10  And he said, What hast thou done? the voice of thy brother’s blood crieth unto me from the ground [… more and more pricking of Cain’s conscience…].

(Isa 55:11  So shall my word [spirit of truth; a righteous conscience] be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper [negatively that ultimately is a positive] in the thing whereto I sent it.)

Gen 4:11  And now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother’s blood from thy hand; 
Gen 4:12  When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth.
Gen 4:13  And Cain said unto the LORD, My punishment is greater than I can bear.

It is easy in our spiritual infantility to deride Cain for his juvenile response. However, without the holy spirit to strengthen us, our punishment is always imagined to be greater than we can bear! Without the holy spirit, the sweat from the heavy yoke of physically attempting to keep the Law is an overbearing burden. 

Joh 15:26  But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me: 
Joh 15:27  And ye also shall bear witness, because ye have been with me from the beginning.

Every Commandment of God, amplified in the spirit of Christ, is underpinned by one’s conscience of choosing good or evil. Death in the huge pot of human experience is rich in poisonous gourds (2Ki 4:38-44) for our enlightenment.

1Co 10:11  Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.

At this point in the study of “The Natural Man’s Conscience”, we could excitedly pursue endless biblical and personal examples. To conclude, we will briefly inspect three outstanding Old Covenant examples of a righteous conscience.

There is no greater biblical example of a righteous conscience than Job’s. The poor man suffered dreadfully without physical sin in good conscience to glimpse an earthquake precursor of its spiritual correlation for our correction.

Job 1:6  Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them. 
Job 1:7  And the LORD said unto Satan, Whence comest thou? Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it.
Job 1:8  And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil?

Of course, we are highly familiar with the entirety of Job’s account, so for brevity’s sake I will not recount the entire affair.

It is impossible to eschew evil without the knowledge of the Law of the ‘natural man’, which Job of all people knew and lived in physical perfection. As such, Job had the most perfect conscience a natural man could achieve. His life-altering event (personal earthquake) came when the Lord showed him his spiritually evil conscience, which would have, with increasing brightness, weighed in astonishment on his mind to see to his dying day. If anyone in Old Covenant days was adept at weighting spiritually all life’s struggles, it would have been Job. Yet we know that he wasn’t given to juxtapose all sins spiritually; only his self-righteousness. Typified by Solomon, Job would look upon every other Commandment in frustrating haziness as Solomon looked upon the Shulamite’s blackness veiling his understanding. Again…

1Co 2:14  But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. 

Act 13:11  And now, behold, the hand of the Lord is upon thee [Saul, who became Paul, and particularly you and I!], and thou shalt be blind, not seeing the sun for a season. And immediately there fell on him a mist and a darkness; and he went about seeking some to lead him by the hand. 
Act 13:12  Then the deputy, when he saw what was done, believed, being astonished at the doctrine of the Lord.

Not quite to Job’s level, King David was a man who testified a consistently ‘good conscience’ – a man after the Lord’s own heart, as seen in Acts 13:22. Yet, the curse of the Law persistently dogged David’s attempt for the natural man to remain in good conscience. He knew that it was against the Law to ponder longer than a furtive gaze upon Bathsheba’s blessed beauty, a symbolic tree of life, the Bride of Christ’s nakedness reserved for her Lord. 

Innocuous lust is a very fast precursor to unrighteous lust when we ponder choosing to comply or defy the Lord’s Commandments. As stated earlier, Eve’s account of her eyes noting the location of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil wasn’t the problem; neither was Noah’s sons noting their father Noah’s naked location or David’s noting of Bathsheba bathing. The sin is pampering lust for its amplification that results in walking lawlessly.

It is ridiculous to believe that David casually sees Bathsheba from a hidden vantage point on his rooftop, impulsively, without his highly experienced good conscience kicking in, rushes off to her boudoir for a dopy Hollywood-style torrid encounter. Rather, he enquired about this beauty and, in evil conscience (we don’t know over what timeframe of maybe days or weeks), lusted more until he was overwhelmed by his evil conscience, as seen in 2 Samuel 11:1-3.

David would have tortured his good conscience by consistently dwelling and, possibly, over consecutive days, spying upon Bathsheba until he, with a fraction of the holy spirit, committed adultery.

Jas 1:12  Blessed is the man that endureth temptation [to comply or defy God’s word and invoke a good or evil conscience]: for when he is tried [to evoke either a good or evil conscience ultimately ending in a good conscience], he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him. 
Jas 1:13  Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man [because God exists naturally in a state of good conscience]:
Jas 1:14  But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed [debating to comply or defy his conscience].
Jas 1:15  Then when lust hath conceived [defied God’s Laws], it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.

King David’s evil conscience is our evil conscience in any other Commandment defying lust. His accusing conscience is now compelled to excuse his actions and immediately hide from his humiliations; he kills Christ, depicted as Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband.

David’s evil conscience and Uriah’s good conscience we scripturally know. Even though Bathsheba’s conscience isn’t announced, we likewise know it for sure since everyone is pricked by their conscience to know good from evil (Rom 2:12-29). 

Bathsheba, who represents the Bride of Christ, is just past ovulation and is at her peak of sexual lust and potential for arousal by her Lord, Uriah, as is the Bride by Christ.

2Sa 11:4  And David sent messengers, and took her; and she came in unto him, and he lay with her; for she was purified from her uncleanness: and she returned unto her house.

Fleshy, genuinely righteous Bathsheba, as is the budding Bride of Christ, remains subject to temptation. She is guaranteed to have mitigated her good conscience upon David’s lustful advances since she is not scripturally noted to have ‘cried out in the field’ for adultery; no palace guards came running to any cries for help (See Deuteronomy 22:13-30). Bathsheba and the Bride of Christ have been equally guilty of evil conscience. Of course, David, Bathsheba (inwardly) and the Bride all admit their evil consciences.

What about Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband, who dynamically represents Christ, the Bride’s Husband? Here is a man of peerless integrity, as seen in 2 Samuel 11. Uriah refused the temptation to sleep with his wife amid the trials of war. Christ’s love similarly isn’t awakened until He pleases at the end of this age when his Bride has endured and is purified by her fiery trials of her uncleanliness. 

Son 8:4  I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, that ye stir not up, nor awake my love [Bathsheba; the Bride of Christ] until he please.

The Bride, represented by Bathsheba, is at peak spiritual fertility to begin to bring forth her children of the world who, like Bathsheba’s child, die, just as Christ did.

Heb 9:27  And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: 
Heb 9:28  So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation.

For brevity’s sake, I’ve had to cut short this section on “The Natural Man’s Conscience” and leave the incredibly rich and seemingly endless corresponding biblical accounts of the natural man’s evil conscience for the Body’s personal study. For example, Achan hid the goodly Babylonian cloak, the two hundred shekels of silver and the wedge of gold because he had an evil conscience in his earth. Had he had a good conscience, he wouldn’t have hidden his unwitting sin (Jos 7:10-26).

At the Lord’s will, the next study in this series will be on “A Defiled Conscience”.

For the time being, may the Lord bless you with both an evil conscience consummated in an eternally good conscience ending with no recollection of either, since God is eternally “good”, just as Christ returned to that ‘natural’ Godly state.