How can a person cleanse his conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

Answer 1

Ask God for forgiveness and don't do it again. Then invite Jesus into your heart, it's as easy as A B C: Admit that you are a sinner. Believe that Jesus is God's son and died on the cross for you. Confess your sins. Hint. Heb9:11-14 in The Bible . also Heb9:16-23 look it up on biblegateway

The above verses are a good start. I believe this issue to be a defining paradigm between true and false religion. All 'religions' are ultimately man's search for God or devise some path of whatever is acceptable to please their respective deity. This is really even so for the Eastern religious tradition which speak of an 'inner light' or force and are in a sense enthroning this or our efforts to attain it as 'god'. I would also include here many who claim to be Christians who are really just following a system of works devised by man in an effort to please God and ultimately along with the rest earn their own salvation.

A major problem arises here. The person following this system cannot ultimately know if they have done sufficient no matter how religious or zealous they have been. Nagging doubt must exist at least subconsciously else there would not be such a vast amount of religiousness practiced.

Those who choose to believe what the Bible teaches know that they have had the very thing they could not do done for them. The once only all-sufficient sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross of calvary accomplishes all for the believer. Trusting in what has been accomplished there brings both freedom of conscience and cleansing and frees that person from trying to save themselves through dead works which can never provide true peace.

Thus, from the Christian perspective a person cannot cleanse his or her own conscience but only rest and trust in the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross of calvary - which was a 'once for all' sacrifice in contrast to the multitudinous and ongoing blood sacrifices necessary under an 'unfinished' religious system. If a person could cleanse their own conscience then Jesus' work would be unnecessary. If a person has a clear conscience without Christ, then they, in the Christian view have a false hope.

These verses, as was alluded to earlier in the answer, put a dividing line, not just between true and false religion in terms of Christian and non-Christian, but within so-called Christendom itself, where men have added things which amount to 'dead works', and so cannot provide satisfaction as they need to be repeated. True cleansing of conscience, on the other hand, depends entirely in simply resting on something that is finished viz. the work of Jesus who died 'once for all.' To add all sorts of religious works and trappings is to imply that Jesus' work was not finished and needs man to complete it somehow. Assurance can never be had under this system, as there is no way of knowing if enough 'satisfaction' has been paid for, whereas the work of Christ is perfect and complete.

This is a minor edit, and not part of PeteNco's excellent response above. I mean to stimulate insight, and not to offend. The idea of cleansing one's own conscience is, or can be, prideful. You want to maintain control, and what could be more human than that? As long as you feel justified seeking your own way to cleanse yourself, you will feel justified not stepping out in faith. If you have turned it over, just as you are, then be grateful and step out. Things fall in place little by little as you encounter them. Let us turn to James 2 in our Bibles. We start with verse 14. "What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? Can faith save him? If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, and one of you say unto them, 'Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled,' notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body, what doth it profit? Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone. Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works; shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works. Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble. But wilt thou know, I vain man, that faith without works is dead? Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he had offered his son Isaac upon the altar? Seese thou how faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect? And the scripture was fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed upon him for righteousness: and he was called the Friend of God. Ye see then how that by works is a man justified, and not by faith only. Likewise also was not Rahab the harlot justified by works, when she had received the messengers, and had sent them out another way? For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also."