Good Monday morning, and thank you for listening. Today we begin the week with a really sharp and robust question from a listener named Arnaldo. Here it is. "Hello Tony and Pastor John. Thank you for your labors in this podcast. My question is one that I've struggled with for over two decades now.

It's this. How can I live with a good conscience? The Apostle Paul often talks about the conscience and how specifically a good conscience is something he always lived with, apparently even before he became a Christian." Acts 23 1 and Acts 24 16. We also see that a good conscience is a qualification for Christian leaders in 1 Timothy 3 9.

And having a good conscience is an important goal of the Christian life for all believers, according to 1 Timothy 1 5 19. When I read the way Paul uses the word conscience in these contexts, it seems like he's saying it means to be presently walking in obedience to everything God has revealed to him.

He does not seem to mean that he's trusting in Christ's blood to cover over his indwelling sin. I believe in both the doctrine of indwelling sin and of progressive sanctification, according to texts like Proverbs 4 18 and Romans 7 verses 21 to 23. God is always revealing to me new areas and sometimes old areas where I need to grow in holiness.

These are very real sin issues that I can't simply stop doing, like turning off a light switch. These are ones in which I am engaged in a long-term, ongoing struggle and fight. So I pray for daily forgiveness, according to 1 John 1 verses 8 to 10 and Matthew 6 12.

All this means that I literally never have a good conscience. I am always aware of important ways in which I presently need to repent and become more holy. So if a good conscience is a basic Christian issue, and Paul always had one, yet I will always know of sin areas in my life, and if I have to pray daily for forgiveness, how could I, or any Christian for that matter, ever attain to a good conscience?

Well, Arnaldo has done his homework. He laid out texts in that question, as I hear it, that contain all the pieces. If there's a solution, and I do believe there is, it's probably found inside those texts that he was just commenting on, but maybe drawing some inferences from them that were not necessarily accurate.

I feel the force of the question. Experientially, walking in a good conscience is not easy for me, since I share Arnaldo's deep awareness of my ongoing indwelling sin—that's Paul's term in Romans 7 17, 7 20, 7 23, that's his term. We all have remaining corruption and indwelling sin, and so the more keenly you are aware of that, the more you will feel embattled at the level of needing a good conscience.

So I get it. I mean, I think that's a serious question. The whole New Testament does assume that in this life nobody attains sinless perfection. We need to just settle that. That's one of the premises. Nobody attains sinless perfection in this life. Jesus said that we would pray, "Forgive us our sins right after, give us this day our daily bread." They go together every day.

Say both of those. Paul said that I have not already attained perfection, but I press on to make it my own. He referred to the sin that dwells in him and cried out in dismay, "Who will deliver me from this body of death?" Romans 7 24. Jesus pointed to the publican who said, "God, be merciful to me, a sinner," over against the Pharisee who was thanking God that he had such a clear conscience, and said that the one who cried out for mercy about his sin went down to his house justified.

So it was good for him to own his sinfulness, not say, "Oh, it doesn't exist. I've got a clear conscience. I don't have any sin to repent of." So we feel the force. Now I think 1 John 1 is not only especially illuminating, but gives us a category alongside good conscience that may provide the solution.

So here's my reading of 1 John 1 6-10. If we say we have fellowship with God while we walk in darkness, we lie. We do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, cleanses us from all sin.

Now that is staggeringly amazing. If we walk in the light, the blood of Jesus cleanses us. Wow. Here's verse 8. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. So now he's reeling it back in and saying, "Oh, whoa, whoa. Don't assume that when I say walk in the light, I mean sinlessness." Huh.

Verse 9. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and the word is not in us. Now what's amazing about this passage—there are a bunch of amazing things about this passage—but what's amazing about this passage is that it says we must be walking in the light for the blood of Jesus to cleanse us from our sins.

But then he says that this walking in the light doesn't mean sinlessness. We are liars if we say it does. Then he explains, "When we walk in the light, we see clearly enough"—we have light—"see clearly enough to know sin." See sin as what it is and hate it and confess it, and then we enjoy ongoing cleansing and forgiveness.

So here's what I would draw from this if I use the category of conscience to explain this passage. A good conscience is virtually the same as walking in the light. Christians should be able to say, "I'm walking in the light," and mean it, and mean by that, "I'm walking in a good conscience," which means I don't think we should equate having a bad conscience with having indwelling sin.

That may be the most important thing I say, Tony, so let me say it again. So I'm inferring from what I've said from 1 John 1 that having a bad conscience is not the same as having indwelling sin. They're not the same. That's my basic answer to Arnaldo's question.

He feels that as long as he is aware of the reality of indwelling sin, as in Romans 7, he cannot have a good conscience. Now, if that were true, I don't think Paul could ever have a good conscience, but he clearly says he does have a good conscience. In 1 Timothy 1.3, "I thank God whom I serve, as did my ancestors, with a clear conscience." And he expects the elders of the church to do the same.

1 Timothy 3.9, "They must hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience." And that's the goal for all Christians, according to 1 Timothy 1.5. "The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and sincere faith." So I don't think we should equate good conscience with sinless perfection in this life, nor equate bad conscience with the presence of indwelling sin or remaining corruption.

Rather, a clear or a good conscience is like walking in the light. In 1 John 1, "If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin." If we say we have no sin—in other words, if we interpret walking in the light as sinless perfection—we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

If we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. I think both Paul and John inherited this conception of ongoing, indwelling sin that nevertheless coexists with a good conscience from the Psalms in the Old Testament. For example, in Psalm 25, David confesses three times that he's a sinner.

Verse 8, "God instructs sinners in the way." Verse 11, "Pardon my guilt, for it is great." Verse 18, "Forgive all my sins." But the Psalm comes to an end in verse 21 like this, "May integrity and uprightness preserve me, for I wait for you." So in David's mind—and he's writing under God's inspiration, and this is not the only place in the Psalms—there's a lot of Psalms that distinguish the righteous and the wicked.

And the righteous are really righteous. They're walking in the light. They have a good conscience. In David's mind, there is an integrity and an uprightness that is aware of indwelling corruption that breaks out at times in sins—it does—and that ongoing reality of indwelling sin does not nullify what David calls his integrity and his uprightness.

I think Paul and John saw that. They were immersed in the Old Testament and used language that way. John used the language of walking in the light, though we are imperfect. Paul used the language of walking in a good conscience, though we are imperfect. And I think for all of them—David, Paul, John—the key that enabled them to think this way is that they all knew God had made a way for all their sins to be passed over—namely, the blood of the Lamb, Jesus Christ.

David knew this was coming, and Paul and John knew it had come. I do think Arnaldo is right to say that justification by faith is not the same as walking in a good conscience or walking in the light or having integrity. Those are real character traits, not imputed righteousness.

Nevertheless, it's the covering of all their sins by the blood of Jesus that enables them to look upon their conscience and walking and integrity with thankfulness and confidence that it really will be accepted by God as good, though imperfect. Here's one last implication. People might think, "Well, what does this really—how does this matter?" Here's a concrete illustration of how it matters.

Suppose a pastor is accused falsely of being unfaithful to his wife, and the reason he's accused is because someone in the congregation hates him and wants him to be dismissed. And when he comes before the church or the elders to state the truth with his children present and his wife looking on, that is not the time for him to say to the church, "Well, yes, I am a sinner like everybody else.

I'm no better than adulterers. Everyone has indwelling sin that crops out from time to time, and I shouldn't be put on a pedestal. I'm no better than anyone else." No! No, no, no. That is not the time to say that with your kids listening and your wife listening and the whole church wondering.

What you need to say at that moment is this, "My conscience is clear. I am a man of integrity. I have walked in the light. I have never touched that woman or any woman sexually besides my wife, and this accusation is not true." So I think that is one of the implications of what Paul is saying when he says to the elders and to the rest of us that we should walk in a good conscience, or as John would say, walk in the light.

Bingo. That is a great point, especially in 1 John 1, verses 7 to 10. "Walking in the light is not a life of sinless perfection." That's a profound connection. Thank you, Pastor John. And thank you for joining us today. Ask a question of your own, like Arnaldo did today, or search our archive or subscribe to the podcast hall at AskPastorJohn.com.

Well, I love to find sermon clips where Pastor John pastors his congregation by illustrating how he does certain things in the Christian life. From the pulpit, he will sometimes break into an example of, say, what it looks like for him when he meditates on the Word or focuses his heart on Christ.

And I just found another example of him doing this very thing. I'll share it with you next time. I'm your host Tony Reinke, and we'll see you back here on Wednesday. See you then.