Romans 2:14-15 “for when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do the things in the law, these, although not having the law, are a law to themselves, (15) who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and between themselves their thoughts accusing or else excusing them.”
So what is the function of the will of man? Someone once said that our will is our “decider”, and that term is very descriptive of what our will is, for it is the will of man that decides what course of action man will take. For example, as an act of our free will we decide whether to accept the gospel of salvation or not. Nevertheless even though our will makes the ultimate decision as to which course of action we will take, the other parts of man all play a role in influencing the decisions we make. And so in the light of that truth the first part of man we will discuss is how our conscience influences our will. Before men are saved it is mainly their conscience that convicts them to do good and reject evil. Nevertheless even though their conscience convicts them to do the right thing, it is still as an act of their free will, that they choose to either obey their conscience or not. After people are saved however, it is no longer just their conscience that convicts them, for now the nature of their spirit has changed, and so it is both the conscience and spirit of the believer that together, convict them to do good and reject evil. In the above quoted passage of scripture the apostle Paul teaches us that both the conscience and spirit of the believer, either accuse them when they do wrong or excuse them when they do right. But even though both the believers’ spirit and conscience want to do the right thing, it is still the will of the believer that decides what they will do. And because their will is still free, they can choose to ignore both their spirits and their conscience and do that which is wrong i.e. committing sin. So how does the conscience communicate to our will what course of action we should take? In this passage the apostle Paul gives us the answer, for he tells us that the thoughts of the individual communicate the desire of the conscience. Thoughts originate in our minds. And so we see a very important truth in this passage, which is that the mind acts as the intermediary between the conscience and the will. We also saw earlier that our consciences can either be strengthened or weakened over time, depending on whether we obey or override the counsel of our conscience. And so obviously an individual who has a strong conscience will be far more likely to obey their conscience, as those thoughts are communicated loud and clear to their will. While an individual who has a weak conscience will very easily override their conscience, as those thoughts become more and more indistinct and are drowned out by opposing thoughts in the individual’s mind.
1 Corinthians 3:1-3 “And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual people but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ. (2) I fed you with milk and not with solid food; for until now you were not able to receive it, and even now you are still not able; (3) for you are still carnal. For where there are envy, strife, and divisions among you, are you not carnal and behaving like mere men?”
The second part of man we will discuss is how our spirit influences our will. As we have already mentioned, under the New Covenant our spirits are able to grow. When we come into the kingdom however our spirits are babes, because of which all new born believers are spiritually weak. In the previous passage of scripture we saw that, just like our conscience, our spirits also communicate with our wills through the thoughts they place into our minds. And so initially because their spirits’ are weak, the spirit of the believer is unable to exert a strong influence on their wills, for the thoughts produced by the spirit will be indistinct and can easily be drowned out by opposing thoughts arising in the mind of the believer. Nevertheless as believers begin to mature, their spirits become stronger and the thoughts they communicate to their minds become that much louder and that much clearer, and thus they are able to exert more influence on their wills in the decisions that they make. In the above quoted passage of scripture the apostle Paul contrasts the baby believer with one who is spiritual or mature, and he tells us that baby believers behave like the world does. As we have already seen it is always as an act of our wills that we choose to behave in a certain manner. And so the reason that baby believers behave in that manner is because their spirits are still weak, because of which they are unable to exert a strong influence on their wills. By contrasting the spiritual believer with the baby believer, Paul is implying that the spiritual believer no longer behaves as the world does. The reason for that is obvious, for it is because their spirits have become stronger and are thus able to exert a greater influence on the decisions of their wills.
Michael E.B. Maher
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