<p>10:22 <em>Let us draw near with a true heart in fullness of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water</em>-</p><p>There is a clear NT theme: that the believer always has a good conscience (Acts 23:1; 24:16; Rom. 9:1; 2 Cor. 1:12; 1 Tim. 1:5,19; 3:9; 2 Tim. 1:3; Heb. 9:14; 10:22; 13:18; 1 Pet. 3:16); this clear conscience is a gift from the time of baptism (Heb. 10:22; 1 Pet. 3:21; Heb. 9:14 cp. 6:1; Rom. 6:17), when &quot;our bodies were washed with pure water&quot;. It was not external things which are sprinkled, as they were under the law, but the innermost recesses of the human heart. Our bad conscience about sin is totally removed; because of our fullness of faith in the Lord's work for us. If a believer loses that good conscience, he has fallen from grace. The Hebrews were losing that good conscience and beginning to worry about their sins to the point of wanting to return to ritual and sacrifices as a way to deal with their bad conscience. Those who leave the faith have a conscience which is wounded (1 Cor. 8:12), defiled (1 Cor. 8:7; Tit. 1:15), seared (1 Tim. 4:2). It's hard to find a consistent Biblical definition of conscience. &quot;Conscience&quot; in the Biblical sense often refers to how God sees our conscience, rather than how we feel it.&nbsp; Therefore only rarely does the Spirit speak as if &quot;conscience&quot; is something which is good one moment, and bad the next; it is something which we have on a permanent basis. Thus to say &ldquo;I watched TV last night with a good conscience, but I had a bad conscience that I didn't give out any tracts today&quot; isn't really using &quot;conscience&quot; in its Biblical sense. Paul repeatedly emphasizes that he has <em>always</em> had a good conscience (presumably, from the time of his baptism, when he stopped kicking against the goads, Acts 9:5). &nbsp;</p><p>The good conscience is Biblically defined in Hebrews 9, 10. Here the writer is basing his argument on how those under the Old Covenant still had a guilty conscience after their sacrifices, because the blood of animals could not take away sin; the yearly Day of Atonement required them to confess their sins once again. Their conscience was not made perfect (Heb. 9:9). In his overpowering way, the writer drives his logic home: not only is our conscience cleansed by the one sacrifice of Christ, but we are in a more exalted position than the OT worshippers; we are in the very position of the High Priest who on that Day of Atonement entered the Most Holy; <em>we</em> can enter the Holiest with <em>boldness</em> (cp. the nervousness of the Priest) because our consciences are cleansed with Christ's blood. And because of this, &quot;let us draw near&quot; (Heb. 10:22), the language the LXX uses about the priestly serving of God; now <em>we </em>can do the priestly work, because our consciences are cleansed. We are not like the OT believers, who had a bad conscience because of their sins and needed to offer an annual sacrifice for them, as a result of their conscience. We, by contrast, have no more conscience of sins. According to this Biblical definition of conscience, the conscience is cleansed, and we partake of that cleansing by baptism. At and in that sacrament, we make a pledge to keep that good conscience (1 Pet. 3:21 NIV); perhaps we need to point this out more to baptism candidates. We are once and for all forgiven. Our emphasis must be on confession of failure, not feeling guilty and rushing off a quick prayer, as if this will get us forgiveness. We have been cleansed and covered, we are in the new covenant of grace. Only by breaking out of this can we lose the gracious position in which we stand: we have a conscience which is free of guilt, if we truly believe in the power of the cross and our relationship to it through baptism.</p>