January 7

God alone is the source and sustainer of all life; therefore, it is His constant regenerating power that keeps the conscience alive.

Conscience may be defined as the divine influence at work in man to restrain him from sin. One evidence of its orgin is that it always speaks against sin and for righteousness. Therefore, it cannot be the product of our own hearts, which in their fallen state are "deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked" (Jeremiah 17:9). God uses the conscience to give some knowledge of His righteousness to all, so that no one can stand before Him on the Day of Judgment to plead ignorance (Romans 1). When you become a Christian and consecrate yourself-- conscience and all-- to Him, the Holy Spirit begins in earnest to perfect you in Christ.

It is sad when God made the world He ended His work of creation-- that is, He made no more new species of creatures. Yet to this day He has not ended His work of providence. "My Father worketh hitherto," Christ said (John 5:17). In other words, He continually preserves and empowers what He has made with strength to be and to act. A work of art, when complete, no longer needs the artist, nor a house the carpenter when the last nail is in place. But God's works on behalf of both the outer and the inner man are never of His hands.

If the Father's work is a preserving one, the Son's is a redemptive one. Both acts are perpetual. Christ did not end His work when He rose from the dead, just as the Father did not end His work when He finished creation. God rested at the end of creation; and Christ when He had wrought eternal redemption and "by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high" (Hebrews 1:3). From there He continues the work of intercession for the saint, and thereby keeps him from certain ruin.

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