For Conscience Sake

John Bunyan, The Pilgrim Progress

“Nothing can hurt you except sin; nothing can grieve me except sin; nothing can defeat you except sin. Therefore, be on your guard, my Mansoul.”

― John Bunyan, The Holy War

“Though there is not always grace where there is the fear of hell, yet, to be sure, there is no grace where there is no fear of God.”

― John Bunyan

“Not that the heart can be good without knowledge, for without knowledge the heart is empty. But there are two kinds of knowledge: the first is alone in its bare speculation of things, and the second is accompanied by the grace of faith and love, which causes a man to do the will of God from the heart."

-- John Bunyan, Pilgrims Progress

For Conscience Sake: My Failures

Sometimes, confession and transparency before others are good for the soul, especially when they can also be a way to bless others. As far back as the early 1970s, I began seeing things that were not right with the church. In the church I was a member of, there was in-house squabbling, deceitful preachers promoting a fake "revival," and many other corruptions that affected how people acted both when gathering together and in their personal lives.

Eventually, we went off to Bible school, where retired missionaries taught us. The perspective given to us from their point of view did not help me feel better about church; in fact, the best I could do for a very long time was to acknowledge that no one is perfect and to turn a deaf ear and blind eye to what I was hearing and seeing.

At present, I am spending a great deal of time trying to make sense of it all and to share what God has been showing me throughout my life. It may not be read much in my lifetime, but I hope that God will use it in the lives of others for His glory and their good.

For Conscience Sake: Conservative or Liberal

Much more now, I am being governed by a conscience that will not allow me to partake of those things that I now must see as sin by fellowshipping with others who view them as I once did. For now, I would like to clarify that my book will have nothing to say on the following subject.

In the past, I have left politics alone when discipling others. I now see that nothing is off limits when it leads to dishonoring our Lord, or displeasing Him by landing on the side of the devil. I may sound too simplistic with my following statements, but sometimes it is necessary to go back to basics.

How should we view conservative and liberal? Between these two political parties, there is a great divide. If you want to divide people, just bring up political differences, but my question is: do we know what is at stake? If you do and you're on the wrong side, why? If you haven't considered the full ramifications of their viewpoint, maybe you should begin to re-evaluate your bias.

First, a conservative by definition desires to conserve the values and moral principles that they believe made their country great. The liberal desires to liberate people from anything that hinders their total freedoms. However, in God's kingdom, authentic freedom is that liberty that people have to do what is right; it never frees people to sin. Sinful practices are bondage of the first magnitude.

Second, a small group of Puritans, who refused to allow the king to rule the church, decided to leave their native land to begin anew, seeking the freedom to live as God intended. It was a long and painful flight, as you can see in the documentary "Monumental" by Kirk Cameron, if you are not familiar. At least forty lost their lives the first year, mostly women trying to save their children, and upon their sacrifices, we experience our freedoms slipping away as they are.

Alongside these brave freedom fighters were, as always, opportunists and materialists. These people are as prevalent as the masses; they became slave owners and the like. I have learned much traveling through the New England states, for example, a community could not be considered a township without a church. The Puritans or Pilgrims have received a bad name, of course, over the years because of their zeal for righteousness, something no solid Christian would criticize, particularly in the name of Christian liberty. Protecting our moral purity can look like legalism, but protections against sinning in its purist form honor God best.

Here is the end of the story, and it will be the hardest to take for those whom the enemy deceives; he is a liar from the beginning and very good at it. In the early gatherings following Pentecost, there was much need to care for those who couldn't return home without being martyred. Care was given to them through the church. Hard work was necessary, building the family and in numbers was honorable, and business was to sustain not only one's own family but also others. It may sound like capitalism, but it is thoroughly Biblical. The conservative is right out of the first five books of the Bible, including all the morality therein.

The liberal has always been with us, but they upped their game beginning with the Civil War. It was at that time that control of our children's learning was given into the hands of the government. The Great Awakening, a true revival that lasted for thirty years in America, was losing its strength. Through "scholarship," higher criticism, and the continued growth in church division, the occult, and cults, the church began to lose all influence upon the American people.

Beginning in the 1940s and thriving in the 1960s, an overwhelming wave of liberalism began to fill the minds and hearts of the people, rendering all that came before obsolete and to be jettisoned from the minds of the American people. It was no longer the Pilgrim who held the weight of what was best, but the liberal who could set the people free from the prejudices caused by useless religion.

For Conscience Sake: Choose Your Side Wisely

If you are a liberal in your political position and you are holding tightly to the notion that all conservatives are prejudiced, you have been deceived. If you believe that people must be liberated in every possible way, which now even includes gender identity, you are deceived and you are being corrupted by satanic lies. The deceived liberal dishonors the Lord Jesus Christ, who never compromised with the Liberals of His day, the sufferings of our founders, those preachers and partakers in The Great Awakening, and even the martyrs who suffered mercilessly under the "holy" Roman Catholic Church, which promised true religion by butchering those who defended the faith.

I can no longer be silent or give heed to anything or anyone who professes Christ from the wrong side, be it religion or politics; my conscience will no longer allow me to do so. If it means criticism, rejection, or anything else, so be it. I can no longer value anything that will rob me of 'Well done good and faithful servant.' I have lost enough already; I can't lose anymore. For conscience's sake, I hope every reader will carefully evaluate their conscience, learn what God thinks of it, and decide only to follow a pure and undefiled conscience for Christ's sake.