Fear and a guilty conscience

Do you have a holy, healthy, and happy conscience? A Christian should have, but often can be loaded up with shameful guilt just like the world, or worse. One of the most important blessings you should pray for and receive is a holy, healthy, and happy conscience. A healthy conscience comes through faithful obedience by magnificent and benevolent grace. Receiving grace establishes confidence and rids us of fear.
This is the core of what it means to be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. Our devotion book, the Psalms, puts it this way, “Oh that my ways may be established to keep Your statutes! Then I shall not be ashamed When I look upon all Your commandments.” In another place, but it’s all over the Psalms it says, “For I wait for Your ordinances. So I will keep Your law continually, Forever and ever. And I will walk at liberty, For I seek Your precepts.” He is saying that he will be able to walk in a wide place, with an enlarged heart of confidence and joy because of the perfect law of liberty that gives him hope and security in this troubled world with troubled souls.

Every day, in the world out there, we buy things from people, we sell things to them, we hold conversations with folks who have severely troubled consciences…. Many more than we realize could be labeled “mentally unhealthy” if you included the sickly, dirty, and depressed guilt and shame through disobedience (instead of a holy, healthy, and happy conscience) that people carry around on themselves through every level of society.

We live in a sea of people laden with guilt. There are many Christians on Prozac and many more that are drugged on the addictive substance called, “Worried conscience Level 5.” Every morning we, Oooopsss! I mean they get up and pop in the 6 pills they have neatly laid out besides their bed in order, mind you: 1) disobedience and laziness (that’s one pill) 2) the pill “guilt therefore” and pill # 3) “shame because you’re guilty,” and feeling bad from the side effects of pills 1 and 2. 4) And this pill is by prescription only, you can get the rest easy from the over-the-counter store called “I am having a pity party in my heart. The 4th pill is called “1000 milligrams of mando worry.” This pill is great for illusions of grandeur and doing great feats of obedience but the unfortunate side effect are sometimes frequent day-dreaming of Satan doing all sorts of evil things to you and your family. You really need the 5th pill to balance it all out. It’s called, “Fear-morphine” and it allows you to daydream all day long about bad things that have never happened and you can sit around and watch movies all the time on the comfy couch and not worry about all the lions roaming around on the street.. Be careful with these pills brethren. They are addictive, and the following side effects can happen, but do check with your doctor: feelings of selfishness, self-disillusionment, bed-wetting, anxiety, zero creativity, muffled laughter, the refusal of the facial muscles to stretch into a smile, complaining about the cold weather, and an overall depression….but don’t worry, these side effects are rare,

Signed your affectionate and loving Uncle, Screwtape.