On one of the opinion pages of The Herald newspaper recently, the headline over two letters to the editor was: “Clearly, Trump knows no moral compass”. In many respects it would not be easy to defend the morality of the United States, but to say that any individual is altogether without a conscience is not accurate; everyone has principles of some kind by which they, at least to some extent, guide their actions. Yet these principles may be thoroughly selfish and wicked.
John Dick speaks of conscience as what “distinguishes right and wrong in actions, approves and disapproves, and anticipates the consequences whether good or evil. . . . It often exposes the vanity of our most specious pretences, and convicts us of sin, at the moment when we are employing our eloquence and sophistry to justify our conduct.”
Dick, Lectures on Theology, Tentmaker Publications reprint, 2004, vol 1, pp 480-1.
On 23 November 2018.
A literal compass may not be well made and may therefore not be accurate; accordingly it may send people in the wrong direction; it is liable to lead those who use it into danger rather than keep them safe. So it is with a moral compass. God created mankind with a conscience; it functioned perfectly at first, until sin entered the world. One very serious result of the Fall was to damage the human conscience; it then pointed in the wrong direction; it became unreliable. A Hindu’s conscience may keep him from eating beef although there is no proper authority behind the prohibition; a Roman Catholic’s conscience may impel her to continue attending mass, although the mass is blasphemous. If conscience is to point in the right direction, it must be well informed; it must distinguish right and wrong on the basis of the Bible. Otherwise it is dangerous.
The issue of The Herald already quoted reported on a decision by the Students’ Representative Council (SRC) at Glasgow University to ban an anti-abortion group, Glasgow Students for Life, from affiliating with it. This prevents the group from, among other things, using rooms in the Student Union buildings for meetings. The SRC president claims that “it would be contrary to our ethos to endorse a society which calls for limited rights for women”. Now clearly she is using a moral compass which points her in the direction of promoting the right of women to have abortions, possibly without any restriction – to have their unborn children killed, even when there is no danger to the mother’s life. There are moral principles in operation here, but they are wrong. The Bible precept, “Thou shalt not kill”, applies to children in the womb as well as to older children and to adults.
Similar bans have been put in place in other Scottish universities, at least one of which has been reversed.
People advocating unnecessary abortion – and the vast majority of abortions are unnecessary – need to have their moral compass reset. In other words, their conscience needs to be put right, to be aligned with true, scriptural principles. One can imagine a literal compass having to be sent back to its maker to be repaired; with a moral compass, only its Maker can realign it; only the Creator can change it so that it will function properly.
In fact all who follow the ways of the world need to have their moral compass reset – indeed all who are unconverted, no matter how religious they might be. So Saul of Tarsus, who was later to confess, “I verily thought with myself, that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth” (Acts 26:9). In particular, he explained, “many of the saints did I shut up in prison, having received authority from the chief priests; and when they were put to death, I gave my voice against them. And I punished them oft in every synagogue, and compelled them to blaspheme; and being exceedingly mad against them, I persecuted them even unto strange cities.”
He did have a moral compass, but it was corrupted; his unbelieving heart was rejecting the evidence that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah. He was acting according to his religious principles, but these were seriously flawed. He needed to have his moral compass reset; he needed not only his conscience to be renewed but his whole heart. And that is what the risen Christ, working through the Holy Spirit, was to do for him – in an amazing display of mercy – when he was on his way to Damascus to continue his wicked, persecuting work against the followers of Christ.
With a renewed moral compass and a drastically-changed understanding of the Scriptures, Paul – now a sincere apostle of Christ – could say, “Herein do I exercise myself, to have always a conscience void of offence toward God, and toward men” (Acts 24:16). Previously his desire to have a clear conscience tied him to the traditions of the Pharisees, which Jesus had so strongly condemned. But if a conscience is to function properly, it must, like Paul’s, become submissive to Scripture and remain submissive to Scripture in all sorts of circumstances.
Likewise we have the example of Joseph’s conscience working in subjection to God’s revealed will. When he was tempted by Potiphar’s wife to commit adultery, his moral compass was functioning properly – he had a new heart – and he replied, “How then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?” (Gen 39:9). He might have said that this wickedness would have been against Potiphar – which would have been true – but far more significant in Joseph’s thinking was the sinfulness of adultery in relation to God. This view of the matter will be foremost in the thinking of all whose moral compass is working properly.
The principles on which a properly-functioning conscience is to operate are summarised in the Ten Commandments, but all that is said throughout the Bible by way of moral teaching – expanding on the principles outlined in the Ten Commandments – is also part of what God has revealed so that conscience may be well-informed and so be able to distinguish right from wrong on a proper basis. Likewise the biblical accounts of what people both godly and wicked did are intended to help our conscience distinguish between right and wrong. We are to absorb these principles, seeking that the Holy Spirit would apply the truth made known to us in these various parts of Scripture – and so improve the accuracy of our moral compass. We should pray with Psalmist: “Teach me, O Lord, the way of Thy statutes; and I shall keep it unto the end” (Ps 119:27). And with Elihu: “That which I see not teach Thou me” (Job 34:32).
Clearly many of President Trump’s statements show that, while he does have a moral compass, it does not function as it ought. Yet many of his most vocal opponents have a moral compass which is badly in need of major correction on issues such as abortion. The various nations very much need rulers who would rule in the fear of God – whether as a result of present rulers being converted and going on with their responsibilities but with their moral compass reset in line with the Bible, or else as a result of others being raised up who, already converted, have a well-informed conscience.
Yet we must bear in mind that rulers, particularly in a democracy, can only continue in office with some degree of consent from the governed. What need for us then to pray for the spread of the Word everywhere and that the Holy Spirit would apply it so that the consciences of very many people in all parts of society, in every land, would expose the vanity of their pretences and convict them of sin – even when these people have been most earnestly seeking to justify their conduct. We should also pray that the Spirit would be further poured out on those awakened, in connection with the gospel, so that they would be brought to submit to Christ as the Saviour of lost sinners. Then people and governments will submit to God’s revealed will. Among many other blessings, children will be safe in the womb.