Keep Your Conscience Clean

Acts 24:16
I strive always to keep my conscience clean before God and men.

As Parents, we stay on our children to keep their rooms clean. It’s nothing more embarassing than to have guests over and they walk into a dirty room and leave with the impression that you are a nasty housekeeper. My mother would always caution us with, “you never know when company might come over so keep this house clean!”

If we put as much effort into keeping our conscience clear as much as we do cleaning our rooms, life would be so much better. Our conscience is but one room in our psyche where we keep records of good and bad deeds we have done. When we live an unscrupulous life filled with compromise, we start accumulating old articles that make our room look like the worst house on “Hoarders.” It’s not enough to get rid of the stuff in the room or to clean the room. You have to make sure you don’t start hoarding stuff all over again. Hoarding starts with little stuff you think you can’t do without and before you know it you can’t move around your room because so much stuff is on the floor. The key after you clean it is to stop letting new stuff accumulate.

Paul says, “I strive to keep a clear conscience.” Why? Because Paul knew one day he would have guests. He believed that he would have to stand in judgment before God. He believed there would be a resurrection of the dead both the wicked and the righteous to stand before God. He believed one day he would have guests to visit the house of his soul and want access to that one room we don’t want anybody to see, the room of our conscience. It’s the room where we’ve stored all the sordid details of our hidden lives. The room where we’ve stored all the back room behavior we hope no one ever finds out about. One day, Jesus will walk through that room. In the meantime, the Holy Spirit walks through on a daily basis warning us to clean up before Jesus comes. Therefore, we should all strive to keep a clear conscience. How do we keep a clear conscience?

1. Don’t do anything in the dark that you wouldn’t want coming to the light.
2. Don’t tell lies, little or big. A lie is a lie.
3. Don’t whisper anything you wouldn’t want shouted from the roof tops.
4. Make sure your motives are pure.
5. Ask yourself, “if Jesus was here, would I be doing this?”

Dear God,
Give me a clean heart that I might serve you. Remove any junk from the room of my conscience and help me to keep it clean by making the right choices. Today, I’m keeping a clean conscience so when the Holy Spirit pays me a visit I will not be ashamed of my room.

In Jesus Name,
Amen