When we are sharing the gospel with the lost we can never forget that our point of contact with them is their conscience. We are often tempted to be led down many "rabbit trials" as we confront people with the gospel and my advice is to never leave the conscience, until there is some conviction of sin. I do believe we can discuss other matters, but we should always know that we are going back to the conscience. We are not properly loving the lost unless we are bringing them the truth and their conscience is on our side. We should always realize that their conscience is screaming against them and is warning them of the coming judgment. In Romans 1:18 the Apostle tells us that the natural man is not ignorant of the coming judgment but that he is suppressing the knowledge of it. Romans 2:14-15 For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these having not the law are a law unto themselves: which shows the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another. We are not doing the unbeliever any favors by "telling them about Jesus" before we have seen some evidence that their conscience has been pricked. And the conscience is pricked (feels the weight of sin) when the law is understood in light of the law giver. What I mean is that the law must be viewed in light of God. I ask you to count the number of times God is mentioned between Romans 1:18-2:16 and what you will see is that sin must always be veiwed in light of the holiness and omniscience of God. We are to preach the law and preach it in light that, one sin, will condemn a man to eternal hell (God's holiness) and in the light that God even judges the inward sins (God's omniscience) in Romans 2:16 in the day when God will judge the secrets ( inner workings) of men. So in conclusion: let us preach the law, but also let us preach the holiness and omniscience of God with the law so that men will fall under the conviction of their sin and when we get sidetracked I pray that we will continually come back to the conscience because that is where the battle for souls is won and lost.
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