1 Timothy 1:5 - But the end of the charge is love, out of a pure heart and a good conscience and unfeigned faith. -- World English.
WE are therefore to have clearly before our minds the fact that the ultimate object of all the divine dealings for us and with us, and the ultimate significance of all the divine promises made to us, is the development of love, which is Godlikeness, for God is love. And to have this love developed in us, in the sense and to the degree intended by [Jehovah], it is necessary that it shall come from a pure heart, in full accord with Jehovah, and His law of love, and wholly antagonistic to the Adversary and his law of selfishness. -- Based on an excerpt from "The Ultimate End of the Commandment is Love, Wa, December 1, 1900, page 360. R2735:1.
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In Bible times, when a king issued a proclamation it was to be taken as a matter of special concern. Our King, the Lord Jesus, has given us a proclamation concerning love. The apostle Paul qualifies how this love should be in our hearts, our consciences, and as related to our faith.
When we first consecrate ourselves to the Heavenly Father through Christ, though our intentions may be with a good heart, this does not necessarily mean that we have developed love out of a pure heart. Our hearts must be cultivated in practical experiences so that we may eventually reach perfection in such purity of heart. Our Heavenly Father permits His children to have a large variety of experiences that, if our hearts are rightly exercised by such experiences, will bring our hearts into the pure condition that Paul wrote about.
The word "good" as related to conscience in our text should probably be better understood as "right." Our conscience is "right" only if it has been trained in harmony with the Heavenly Father's righteous principles, as given in the Bible. It is a conscience that is regulated by what God has revealed to us through the written pages of Holy Scripture.
Our faith should be unfeigned; it should be genuine, A faith that is feigned is a disguised faith designed to appear to be faith in the sight of men. Such a faith leads one into very deceptive paths. A faith that is not feigned would be sincere before the Heavenly Father, regardless of what may be thought by others, and yet it, in harmony with love, such faith leads one to seek to help all within reach as the Heavenly Father permits, doing good to all, but especially to those of the household of faith. -- Galatians 6:10.
The love being spoken of in 1 Timothy 1:15 is that which is described in 1 Corinthians 13. This love is closely connected with a having pure heart, a heart fully in opposition to what God disapproves of and that seeks to be what God approves. The Christian's conscience is unburdened of guilt through faith in Jesus and his sacrificial offering for sin, but to have a good conscience before God appears to be referring to maintaining a conscience related to what God has proclaimed as good as opposed to what He has proclaimed as being "bad". Most people do not have such a conscience, as they often will think that what is good is bad, and what is bad is good. -- Isaiah 5:20.
Ronald R. Day, Sr. (ResLight)
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