My Grace Journey…5

My Grace Journey…5

By Apostle Felix

Sin-Consciousness Vs Righteous-Consciousness

2  For then would they not have ceased to be offered? because that the worshippers once purged should have had no more conscience of sins. 

Hebrews 10: 2

Sin-consciousness is a spiritual state where one is persistently aware of the their faults and shortcomings, leading to feelings of quilt, self-condemnation and a focus on sin rather than God’s grace and righteousness. Man is persistently thinking of his faults by default. We have been trained to keep a record of wrongs than a record of good. We easily remember the bad one did to us. We easily forget the good. And the Bible calls the attitude of forgetting the good that has been done to you as unrighteous.

10  For God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of love, which ye have shewed toward his name, in that ye have ministered to the saints, and do minister. 

Hebrews 6: 10

To be sin-consciousness is to display an attitude that has forgotten what the Lord Jesus has done for us. Instead of focusing on His redemptive work, one focuses on what one have done. That attitude produces self condemnation. May be you have heard before, especially in a prayer meeting where a prayer leader asked everyone to confess the known and the unknown sins. The belief behind that is that God will not hear the prayers of someone whose has sin in his life and the hidden sin may grieve the Holy Spirit. Such kind of thinking makes cowards of men.

1  The wicked flee when no man pursueth: but the righteous are bold as a lion. 

Proverbs 28: 1

Just imagine, being in a relationship where you have to apologize for unknown faults before you engage in a conversation. That relationship will not last long. One will not be looking forward to meeting the individual because of the nature of relationship which is fault finding based.

In 2005, I attended a prayer meeting at a certain church. The prayer leader encouraged the congregation to confess the known and unknown sins before we began to pray. And the explanation was that God cannot hear a person who had committed a sin, whether known or unknown. Just about that time, the Holy Spirit spoke to me to stop her immediately. That was a very hard thing for me to do but I had stand up and stop the person. And the Holy Spirit gave me the words to tell the congregation. The following are the words the Holy Spirit gave me: ‘As long as you continue confessing unknown sins, the devil will have every reason to condemn you. He will keep you in perpetual quilt of sins you are not aware of.’ And the Holy Spirit told me that the attitude is an antidote for defeat. Sin-consciousness is a recipe for living a defeated life. One will be timid and fearful. You will not be able to serve the Lord with confidence. You will not be able to pray with confidence.

22  Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water. 

Hebrews 10: 22