In the previous chapter we saw a full sketch concerning the heart. The heart is a composition of four things: the mind, the emotion, the will, and the conscience. In order for the heart to be proper, the mind must be clear, enlightened, and transformed; it must be as crystal, transparent and not opaque. Then the emotion must be loving and caring toward the Lord. In addition, the will must not be weak but strong, yet not stubborn but soft and pliable. Then the conscience must be right; it must be a good and pure conscience, a conscience without any offense. With these four together we have a proper heart. If the mind is transparent, the emotion loving toward the Lord, the will pliable, and the conscience good, pure, and without offense, then the heart is proper. Now we must see something more concerning the conscience. There are many things spoken in the Scriptures concerning the conscience, which is very important, not only to the heart but also to the spirit.
It is hard to find a verse that tells us what the source of the conscience is, where it came from, and how it came into function. Before the fall of Adam, man was innocent. To be innocent means that there was no need for the function of the conscience. If there were the function of the conscience, it would mean that man was not innocent. However, we do not dare say that there was no conscience, because the conscience is a part of the created human being. In God’s creation the conscience was there already, but its function was not there; before the fall of man its function was not yet developed. We may compare this to certain functions of our body. The medical doctors can tell us that when we were born of our parents, we had everything in our body, but certain functions still needed to be developed.
Bible students agree that the first of the so-called seven dispensations was the dispensation of innocence, the dispensation without sin. The second dispensation was the dispensation of the conscience. This is because before the fall man had no sin, so there was no need for the function of the conscience, but after the fall man was in sin. From that time, therefore, man began to need his conscience. This dispensation was the period of man living under the government of the conscience. The conscience was created by God, but the function of the conscience was developed after the fall of man.
In order to know the position of the conscience, we need to know the whole human being. A person is of three parts-spirit, soul, and body. The three parts of the soul are the mind, the emotion, and the will, and the spirit has the three functions of the conscience, the fellowship, and the intuition. Then as we have seen, the heart comprises all three parts of the soul and one function of the spirit, the conscience. By this we can see the position of the conscience. The conscience is the very means to control the spirit and the heart. It is the most important part of the spirit as well as of the heart. When our conscience is wrong, our heart is wrong, and our spirit is also wrong. Both our heart and our spirit depend on the conscience.
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