A Clear Conscience
6/4/25 Bible Thought (Acts 24)
I’m sure all of us at different points in our lives have been able to look back at something we did that we regret. We find that the inner voice cries out, “Guilty!” and we have to agree, “Yeah, I’m guilty.”
The Scripture presents so clearly that all have sinned (Rom. 3:23) and everyone knows this to be true not just philosophically, but through their own experience. No one, apart from Jesus, has ever lived a perfect life.
Yet, despite our sins, there is a way to have a clear conscience.
In Acts 24, as Paul was testifying before the governor, Felix concerning faith in Christ, he declared,
“So I always take pains to have a clear conscience toward both God and man” (Acts 24:16).
Paul was diligent in maintaining a clear conscience, but how could this be done? Consider with me for a minute who Paul was.
Paul was the great persecutor of the church. He gazed approvingly upon the martyrdom of Stephen. He dragged people out of homes and committed them to prison. In his own words, of sinners, he was the foremost (1 Tim. 1:15).
Yet, the good news is, “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners” (1 Tim. 1:15). Saul of Tarsus, the biggest problem the early church in Jerusalem faced, could receive mercy at the nail-pierced hands of a merciful Savior.
Under the New Covenant, there is forgiveness of sins in Jesus Christ. As the Apostle John would later write,
“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 Jn. 1:9).
All sins that are under the blood are swept away in its eternal flow, never to return.
Under the Old Covenant, there was a continual reminder of sins. Every year on the Day of Atonement there would be sacrifices for the sins of the people and even sacrifices for the high priest and priesthood! Even the holiest men in Israel were sinners who needed a Savior.
Every year they were reminded of sins. Every year the imperfections of their lives and also of their system of atonement were remembered.
Yet, this is not so under the New Covenant.
As the author to the Hebrews would contrast,
“According to this arrangement [the old covenant], gifts and sacrifices are offered that cannot perfect the conscience of the worshiper, 10 but deal only with food and drink and various washings, regulations for the body imposed until the time of reformation” (Heb. 9:9-10).
And again,
“For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, 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” (Heb. 9:13-14).
The old system couldn’t perfect the conscience.
While there was a sense of reconciliation with God, it was partial. Why? Well, more sins would be committed and as such more sacrifices would be offered.
Yet, under the new, the Lord Jesus was a once-and-for-all-time sacrifice for our sins.
No more sacrifices will be offered. It is finished. The work is done. As a result, those who are forgiven can truly have a clear conscience. No longer does the inner voice need cry, “Guilty!” for God Himself, the Holy One, no longer cries, “Guilty!”
As Paul would pen in another place,
“Therefore since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:1, emphasis added).
Justification is once and done. It’s a declaration that the guilty is no longer guilty for their debts were paid by another.
So then, let us, like Paul, take pains to maintain that clear conscience—not abusing the grace of God as a license or justification to sin, and yet when we do, going to Him for the forgiveness He freely offers.
What a wonderful hope and what a wonderful Savior!