The New Church idea of conscience is very different from the popular conception. One might expect conscience to be portrayed by such stories as the inner voice that tells Abram to go into the desert to worship God by sacrificing his son. Or perhaps conscience is to be illustrated by the prophet Nathan who comes to David and, by means of a story about a poor man and his only lamb, exposes David’s sin in having Uriah killed in battle so that he could have Uriah’s wife, Bathsheba.
Human beings all seek joy in their life, although there are many who don’t know what genuine joy is. And all humans desire to be favored by others, although too many of us do not seek the favor of the Lord. And you are here today in part because deep in your spirit is the desire to have the Lord present in your life.
What are you afraid of? The dark? Walking down a dark street at night? What your future will be? That you will die in a horrible way? Do you fear the loss of honor and reputation, or the loss of your material possessions? These are fears perhaps shared by us all. But there is another class of fear that is represented in the Word by the expression “fear of God.”
From the Word: “After saying all these things, Jesus looked up to heaven and said, ‘Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son so he can give glory back to you…. Now I am departing from the world; they are staying in this world, but I am coming to you. Holy Father, you have given me your name; now protect them by the power of your name so that they will be united just as we are.
We all have goals, some larger and long term, some smaller and short term. We are willing to make sacrifices to achieve our goals. We are willing to give up self-gratification; and our point of view; even our opinion, if it will make the difference. We spend a great deal of energy figuring out how to achieve our aspirations, noble and base.
The Lord encourages us to be spiritual people and, for instance, talk to Him. He urges us also to be active in this world and, as spiritual people, thus be useful. We cannot be conscious of the Lord every moment of our day. And we cannot be talking to Him constantly. What the Lord asks us to do is make the quality of our spirituality and our relationship with Him our first priority, our first concern.
Right at the moment Jesus Christ could have set us all on the straight and narrow path to heaven, He was silent. All He had to do was take advantage of a perfect opportunity. All He had to do was answer one simple question. Pilate asked Him, “What is truth?” If Jesus had given us that answer, surely the world would be wonderfully different today.
In such simple, clear words, the Lord gives us an incredible gift: an understanding of the origin of conjugial love. Think what your life would be like, whether you are married or not, if you did not have this information.
Perhaps you know someone in this unfortunate situation. How can an unmarried person explain their urge to be in a relationship? Without this knowledge many people seek union on only the lowest levels of life, because they know none higher.
