Romans 51

My Conscience Bearing Me Record in the Holy Ghost

Brian Kocourek

 

ROMANS.9:1 ¶ I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost, …   What does the Apostle Paul mean here when He says, I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost,… What is this word conscience mean?  And why does He say, In Christ and in The Holy Ghost?

 

Well, first of all who is Christ? The Word Right? And who is the Holy Ghost? The Word Right? Then when he is speaking of the Truth in Christ, then He is speaking of the Truth not just in a man called Jesus, but the Truth as evidenced by the anointed One, the Truth as evidenced or manifested in Christ the anointed One, and then he says, my conscience also…

 

Therefore, Paul is tying together what is taking place in his conscience with that which took place in the conscience of Christ, the Anointed One. , my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost, By saying My conscience is also tell us that he is saying, that his conscience is doing just like what happened when the truth bore witness in Christ, by showing forth it’s evident control over Him, in the same way my conscience is bearing witness, or telling me that the Holy Ghost is in full control.

 

In other words, our conscience then is something that God placed within us to tell us if we are lined up with His Word of not.  The word conscience comes from a Greek word, Suneidesis  which is translated as conscience and – comes from a compound Greek Word, sun which simply means with, and oida which means to know, hence suneido means to know with.  In other words, your conscience is “a co-knowledge within yourself,  a witness within yourself, placed there by God to show you whether your conduct is in line with His Word or not.

 

Brother Branham named the conscience as one of the inner 5 senses that fall in the realm of our spirit.  These five inner senses make up the attributes within your spirit just as you have five outer senses that make up the attributes of your body. These five outer senses God placed within you to contact your earthly home. If you did not have these five senses of see, taste, feel smell and hear, your presence on earth would be without meaning and significance. Therefore, these outer senses are attributes of life, needed to contact our earthly home and to enjoy and appreciate life. You may get by in life without a few of these but certainly your life would have no meaning without any of these. In fact you would be considered just a vegetable without these senses.

 

Can you image not having taste? Oh, you may get by without taste, but what if you could not feel, how would you even swallow. How would you even know if you were drinking or eating. You would drown trying to take a drink of water. And what if you could not see, nor hear nor smell, nor feel, how could you communicate. If you were blind, you might be able to hear and communicate. If you were blind and deaf it makes it more difficult, but you could learn to feel things, like the shapes of the objects or faces. You could learn Braille and still communicate.  But what if you were blind, and deaf and had no feeling at all. You would not be able to walk, nor eat, nor drink, nor get up or sit down. You could not stand or walk… You would be totally helpless, and with no way to communicate, you would die quickly.

 

Now, what if Satan didn’t want you to see? How do you think he would cause you to go blind? BY an accident? Maybe! When I was in Australia, there was a sister who had been in a bad accident 25 years ago who the doctors told her she was deaf. Her hearing had become muffled for years and years, she could not hear well. After we prayed for a little boy who was deaf in both ears, she received her healing and suddenly could hear things clearly for the first time in 25 years. Now, what happened that she could not hear right, and simply by prayer her hearing was made whole again?

 

I’ll tell you what happened. The accident was caused by Satan to cause this woman injury. After the accident she could not hear well. Her hearing was muffled. But something happened through simple prayer that unstopped her ear and allowed her body, her sense of hearing to function once again… A devil was cast out, and when it left the nerves in her ears were no longer blocked and muffled and her body was once again able to function as God had made her to function. The doctors could only look at the nerve damage, or the loss of hearing which is the attribute shown in her body just like a tumor is only an attribute that manifests itself in the body. But The tumor is not the sickness, it is only a manifestation of the sickness.

And so was her hearing loss only a manifestation of something else impairing her free expression of life. It was a demon. An evil spirit that was inflicting her that way. And when I told that demon that was in the boy to come out, I did not say, “Thou demon in this little boy, I adjure thee to come out”… No, I said, thou deaf spirit come out , and it did from her, … that demon was told to come out, and the demon in the woman responded, obeyed and came out. Now, I would like for you to hear what brother Branham said about a woman who was blind…  Now, why is it then that some people are healed and others are not?

 

MARK 9:23       Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things [are] possible to him that believeth.  24    And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief.  25    When Jesus saw that the people came running together, he rebuked the foul spirit, saying unto him, [Thou] dumb and deaf spirit, I charge thee, come out of him, and enter no more into him. 26    And [the spirit] cried, and rent him sore, and came out of him: and he was as one dead; insomuch that many said, He is dead.  27  But Jesus took him by the hand, and lifted him up; and he arose.  28    And when he was come into the house, his disciples asked him privately, Why could not we cast him out?  29    And he said unto them, This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting.

 

Some healing comes only by prayer and fasting…

 

MESSIAH THE   61-0117  E-18   018   Now, for instances when a man gets saved, he's just about like... The Light that comes into him is about like this little white button on my shirt. That's when God comes into the inner part of a man. In the inner part of a man or... A man is made up in the system of a tabernacle: in the outer courts, then holy place, and the holiest of holies; the Shekinah glory on the inside, the veil.    Now, on the outside gates of a man is his five senses that enters to his body. On the inside, which is his soul, or the... The  soul is the nature of the spirit that's on the inside of his heart; produces his soul, which makes the atmosphere around him. He has also five entrances. Then on the inside he has only one gate, one entrance to go into the Shekinah glory, where God can enter into him and take over in the control tower. And that way is through self-will. Whether you will to or not, that's up to you. But that's the only avenue that's open to the man that God can come into his heart, is by self-will. Puts him right back like Adam and Eve on free moral agency again. You can choose right or wrong, either one you want to.

      E-19   019   Now, self-will... Then God comes into the man, into the heart, which is the spirit. Then the spirit makes the soul, and then the soul dwells in the body. Now, when a man is converted, say, just like that little white button starts in his heart. Now, that part is God. God... When he's born again with the Spirit of God, God's Spirit dwells in him. Now, as... He can let that Spirit grow and take out all the roots of bitterness, and press God's way through him again; he can become back in the same condition that he was when he was in the garden of Eden. Jesus said in Mark 11:24: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, if you say to this mountain, 'Be moved,' and don't doubt in your heart, but believe that what you have said will come to pass, you can have what you said." That puts him right back supreme again. It puts him right back in the condition.

      E-20   020   Now, we're made up of light meters. Inside of us is cosmic light. Now, that cosmic light is a light that they can take an x-ray with. The x-ray doesn't come from the x-ray light; it comes from your own light. And then if that cosmic light, say, could be pushed to a place to where not cosmic light but Eternal Light... God could dwell supremely, to do our thinking, do our walking, do our talking, then it's no longer the man; it's God in the man.  Now, he's got Light, Life. Eternal Life is the Light of God that dwells in the man. And if he will yield to the Spirit, more he becomes unman-sinner-like, and becomes more God-like.

     E-21   021   Here not long ago they took an x-ray of a man praying for a sick man ("Reader's Digest" wrote it up), and found out a ray of light coming from one of the men (not all of them), but one of the man's hands reflected a ray of light when they put a piece of lead foil beneath the man's hand. I guess you read it yourself.  In England they turned "the healers" (they called them) loose to all the hospitals, and there was eighty percent more healing done by Divine healing than medical cures had performed. "Reader's Digest" picked it up over here. That was in "Newsweek," and "Reader's Digest" picked it up and tried it. And they find that there is a ray of light. When this man sincerely, not knowing they were doing it, put his hands upon a man and prayed an earnest prayer, they was putting the x-ray down, and found out a light coming from his hand. God knew what He talked about when He said, "Lay hands on the sick and they shall recover." He knows what He was speaking of. Oh, I want to see the church press into that place where it can come like God wants it to be.

    E-22   022   Then when God was made flesh and became the Messiah, then if we can yield ourselves to be the anointed like He was, we become Messiahettes, little Lights. That's what the church is supposed to be: lights, little anointed ones. That's God's church. His standing Light is the Light of Messiah, risen Christ in His people, the anointed ones, carrying forth His Light into all the church ages. Sometimes It almost goes completely out; then It comes back again. God's anointed One, God's Messiahic church... If Messiah means "the anointed One," and means "King," then if the church is anointed by the Messiah Spirit, it becomes a lesser but still a Messiah; because it has His Light, reflecting His power, reflecting His glory, reflecting His dominion. So it is Messiah. Oh, how it reflects Him in His Kingdom in His domain.  The trouble today, we've organized the church to death, and we got organization instead of Messiah Light. We've got Russellite, proselyte, and all other kinds of light. But we need Messiah Light, what the church needs today: the Light of the Messiah. Oh, I love Him for His goodness.

 

Now, I want you to notice that Jesus was declaring that the deafness in this man was caused by a spirit. He said, [Thou] dumb and deaf spirit, I charge thee, come out of him, and enter no more into him. 26    And [the spirit] cried, and rent him sore, and came out of him…

 

I also want you to notice what did this…Jesus said to the man who wanted healing for his child, “If thou canst believe, all things [are] possible to him that believeth”… all things [are] possible to him that believeth… He said, ALL things. If you just believe… The word he used was a Greek word,  Pisteuo – believe - commit unto - commit to (one's) trust - be committed unto - to think to be true; to be persuaded of; to credit, place  confidence in – if you will just believe and commit this thing whatsoever it would be, just commit it unto God then all things are possible…”

 

Believe it to be true, and just commit it unto God for the results, and you will be healed…

 

In the Message, “WHO IS THIS MELCHISEDEC 65-0221E” brother Branham said in his opening statement,  “Let us bow our heads for prayer. Dear heavenly Father, we hear this song of "Only Believe"; it makes us to know that that's all we have to do to inherit any of God's promises, just believe them. For it is written, "All things are possible to them that believe." As we cry as the man who had the epileptic child, "Lord, I believe, help thou my unbelief!"...

 

Therefore, our believe is all that stands in the way of every divine promise of God being made manifest to us in this hour.

 

MY COMMISSION  51-0505  E-68   068   Howdy do, sister. Come forward. You want to be healed of your eyes also, don't you. Do you believe God? If He could make that woman who was almost plumb blind, and that one last night totally blind, can He give you your sight, sister? Now, what I want you to do, is to believe that This which is near now is to bless you. Now, if you will believe with all your heart that God will do it, He will flow right down to you and heal you, and bless you, and take that away from you. Your eyes are--are going bad. They're getting worse constantly. Isn't that right? That same thing. It's a power of the devil, sister, that's shutting off... Doctors can do no more about it, because (See?), it's--it's over; he's even said so. Now, when that... It's just shutting off the nerve there, the optical nerve. The energy won't flow through it no more. Now, the nerve's not shut off in your hand, or not nowhere else. It's in your eye. If it was in your ears, then you couldn't hear. Now, the doctor would say the nerve is dead. Course, he just works on the five senses. But Jesus said, "When the deaf spirit went out of the man"--the deaf spirit. "When the blind spirit went out of the man." See? He... It's a spirit, supernatural. Now, do you believe, that upon the authority of God's Word, that I have been sent here to pray a prayer of faith for you that'll cast that spirit away from you, and you'll get well? Come forward, my sister.

   E-69   069   O God, think, a white cane in her hand on the street. This is the hour. O God, seeing a vision there that they'd turned her down and nothing can be done. But Thou can heal her. Satan, leave the woman. Thou blind spirit, come out of her in the Name of Jesus Christ. Amen. You believe now? Why, remove your glasses and go on. Uh, huh. There she goes without her glasses. And she was... All right. Everyone come forward now. Everyone believe with all your heart. 

           

Therefore, these five senses are given to us not only to contact our earthly home, but they are given to us to express the life that is within us. They then are manifestations or attributes of life.

 

Then what about the inner senses that God gave us?  Brother Branham told us we have five inner senses.  And what if they are not functioning right. What if they are not channeling the energy to the right place? What causes that? I believe it is the same thing. Something has stopped up the channel as well and has stopped the energies of God from working properly in the inner man.

 

GREATEST BATTLE EVER FOUGHT 62-0311  058   Well, that's what's the matter with our Pentecostal faith today. We've let too many things hinder it, the faith that we've been taught, the Holy Spirit that's been living in us. We've let too many things: looking at somebody else. And the devil's always trying to point you to somebody's failure, but he tries to keep you away from the real testimony that's genuine. He will point you to a hypocrite sometime, who went out impersonating something. He didn't do it, because he was impersonating. But if it come from the true source of the Word of God, "Heavens and earth will pass away but My Word cannot pass away." It's got to stay. You see it, sis?

     059   It must be accepted in the mind; then it's believed with the heart; then the Word of God becomes a reality; then every senses of soul and body is just scoured out with the Holy Spirit. Then you're sense of God; you're conscience of God; everything that's godly flows through you. There's not a doubt anywhere. There's nothing can rise up. There's nothing can come up in the memory and say, "Well, I remember Miss Jones tried to trust God. Miss So-and-so, Miss Doe tried to trust God for healing one time, and she failed." See? But if that channel has been cleared out, and been purged, and been filled on the inside with the Holy Spirit, that don't even come in memory. No matter about Miss Jones and what she did; it's you and God together, and nobody else but you two. There you are; there's your battle.

     060   Kill him at the beginning; stop him dead in his tracks. It ain't how long you can make the war linger; it's stop it right now. If you'll come, and you'll keep them memories, and conscience, and everything thinking about, "Well, I might fail, It might not be right."  Don't you do that at all. You throw aside everything and open up the channel and say, "God, Your Word is eternally true, and It's for me. If the whole church fails, if the whole world fails, yet I can't fail, because I'm taking Your Word."

     061   There's the battle; that's the thing. Why would Almighty God remove a cancer from a woman's breast without a scar and let a child lay and die? No, sir.

    062   A little girl come here not long ago from the high school. Her mother called me up, said, "Brother Branham, my girl's got Hodgkin's disease." (That's cancer that forms in lumps.) And the doctors took a piece from a break on her throat, sent it away, and it was perfectly Hodgkin's disease. So he said, "The next one breaks may break over her heart; when it does, she's gone." Said, "She hasn't got... The way they're breaking, she's got anywhere about three months to live." The mother said, "What shall I do, send her back to school?" Said, "Let her go because she'll go probably suddenly." And said, "Just let her go and live a normal life as she can. Don't tell her nothing about it." So the lady said to me, "What must I do?" I said, "Bring her up and put her in the prayer line." And I said, "You come with her." (I felt a little funny feeling.)

   063   And when the little girl come by that morning with blue-looking lips from makeup, and as the school has them, and  the little thing come by (I didn't know who she'd be, was going to call me on the phone.) I took a hold of her hand; I said, "Good morning, sister." There she was; that was her. Just in a few moments looked down to her mother and seen both of them without God, without Christ. I said, "How can you expect healing on these grounds? Will you accept Jesus Christ as your personal Saviour?" I said, "Will you come to this pool here and be baptized in the Name of Jesus Christ for the remission of your sins?" They said, "We will do that." Oh, you know what happened. The woman may be setting here this morning. Many of you know the case. Brother Mike Egan, one of the trustees here, watched the case; that's been about four, five years ago. The little girl was took back to the doctor; not even one trace of Hodgkin's disease was found in her.

   064   What was the matter? You had to open the channel first. You've got to get the Soldier, the Holy Spirit, placed at the battle front to take God's Word. He is the Word, and He stands there; and there's nothing going to stop it then. There's nothing can... Every one of the other channels is cleared out. Just like on old boiler with the flue stopped up; you put a fire, and it'll blow your thing up. That's what's the matter with so many blowed up Christians is because that they don't clean the channels out; they don't go down to the inside. You've got to clean it: conscience, memory, thoughts, laying aside everything and coming from the inside out with that unadulterated Word of God, that It's the Truth. No matter if ten thousand died on this side today trusting, ten thousand died on that side tomorrow trusting, that has nothing to do with me. I'm the individual; I'm the one that's trusting; I'm the one that believes it.

   065   And we see back yonder, if we want to open up our channels then, if we can and see, we find this one and that one, and this one and that one, thousands of them testifying, but the devil will try to come right back. See, if he could get in there at all, he's got your army routed right then. If you've got your senses, see, taste, feel, smell, and hear, they're all right, but don't trust them unless they agree with the Word. They're all right, but if they disagree with the Word, don't you listen to them. Now, imaginations, conscience, memories, reasons, and affection, they're all right, if they agree with the Word. But if your affection doesn't agree with the Word, get rid of it; you blow a flue right quick. See? If your reason disagrees with the Word get away from it. That's right. The engine... If your memory, if your imaginations, if your conscience, anything disagrees with that, what's on the inside, get rid of it.

  066   What you got then? You've got a solar system. Hallelujah. God set the stars in order and said, "Hang there till I call you." They stay there. Nothing's going to move them. When God can get a man in His hands, till he can get senses, conscience, everything cleaned out, until it stands with God behind it in the Spirit, there's not a devil in the world can poke a doubt in there. That's right.

    067  If he come around and say, "You don't feel any better," your conscience is even gone to that. The flue's so clear it shouts, "Hallelujah." The outlet blows a whistle; "Glory to God," it sounds out, certainly, just as clean and clear for the Word of God to work through, the power of God. See? That's the main thing; there's your battleground. Your battleground is back here at the beginning, back here in the soul, back in your mind, that opens. The  mind is the gate to the soul, the gate to the spirit, rather. Your mind opens up and accepts the Spirit or it rejects the Spirit.

    068   You can have little consciences, and little feelings, and little sensations, all these things; that has nothing to do with it. That's just little sensations and things. But when it comes to reality, your mind opens it up. Your mind either accepts it or rejects it. That's it, friends. God, let none of them miss it. See? It's your mind that opens up the door, or closes the door, and listens to your conscience, listens to your memory, listens to your affections. But when your mind closes itself to these things and let God, the Spirit of His Word, come in, It blows the rest of the stuff out. Every doubt is gone; every fear is gone; every sensation of doubt is gone; every feeling is gone. There's nothing standing there but the Word of God, and Satan cannot battle against That. No, sir! He cannot battle against It. Now, we know that's Truth.

    069   These battles has raged since the day of the garden of Eden, the battle in the human mind. Satan started it. What did he do when he met Eve? He didn't deny God's Word, but he whitewashed It. He stopped up some little channels here somewhere. He said, "But surely God... (Genesis 3:1. See?) Surely God... All these things that he  promised..." He knowed the Word was right, but he knowed he couldn't just come right out and blast It out blarry like that, but he sugar coated It.

 

But Paul said, ¶ I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost, …  His conscience was so filled with God’s Word, that it bore record within Him in his own spirit and in his conscience.

 

And our conscience was given to us to be a conduit of God’s Word in order to keep us in the path of his Glorious light. The way our conscience is to work is that when something that comes up that is not of God, the conscience is to light up and tell us so that we do not go that wrong way. But as we have seen this morning how satan works, what if our conscience has been stopped up. What if satan has blocked off the free flow of light in our conscience. Then how will we know when we are leaving the word of not? How will we know if it is right or wrong that which we are about to do?   We saw today how satan comes in a will press a nerve to the point that the energies will not flow freely to the eyes or the ears, or the hand as Brother Branham said. That is caused by a demonic presence. But what about the conscience?

 

What causes the coscience to be shut off from the operational flow of light, of Truth?  Paul said, , my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost,… That is the way Paul always conducted himself…

 

In ACTS 24:16  And herein do I exercise myself, to have always a conscience void of offence toward God, and [toward] men.  But what would cause the conscience to not bear witness to the Word of God?

 

Now, in the medical profession, sometimes they intentially will cut a nerve to stop pain, or in cancer treatment they are testing a new way of killing growth to tumors by cutting of the supply of blood tot he tumor itself. In order to do this they cut the veins that supply the tumor with blood. If they were to just cut the vein you would bleed to death so they cauterize it. They can do this through laser which is a high intense light. It cuts and seals off the flow of blood this way. Therefore, the flue can be  blocked. And Paul said satan blocks off our conscience using the same method.

 

I TIMOTHY 4:1        Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils; 2  Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron;  So we see that opening ourselves to these lies by these seducing spirits will cauterize the conscience, searing it shut.

 

TITUS 1:15    Unto the pure all things [are] pure: but unto them that are defiled and unbelieving [is] nothing pure; but even their mind and conscience is defiled.   16    They profess that they know God; but in works they deny [him], being abominable, and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate.

 

HEBREWS 9:13      For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh:   14    How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?   Hebrews 10:21-26     

                          Let’s wing that song, what can wash away my sin, nothing but the blood of Jesus…