Sunday School Today: The Law and Your Conscience

Today we discussed the origin of the law that we read about in the Bible. Reasonable discussion of this would conclude that the law originates from God Himself. How do we know that the law has a relevance and is importance to us? It starts with our awareness of the presence of good and evil and right and wrong from the fall of man (Genesis 3:1-19). In that passage, the evidence of the Tree of Knowledge and the reference that the serpent (Satan) makes to Eve about having knowledge of both good and evil confirms that there has always been a “right” and a “wrong,” which means that there has always been a law to distinguish between them. Adam and Eve had free reign of the garden of Eden as they worked and watched over it, but God had established that there was a rule that had to be followed or there would be a consequence. “And the Lord God commanded the man, ‘You are free to eat from any tree of the garden, but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for on the day you eat from it, you will certainly die'” (Genesis 2:16-17). It was when Adam and Eve had actually eaten the forbidden fruit that they soon after realized that they had a conscience. They realized that they were naked and sewed together fig leaves to cover their nakedness (Genesis 3:7). They also hid from the Lord because they were afraid (Genesis 3:10). Their consciences were the result of their knowledge of the sin that they committed. The law defines what is sin in our lives in addition to defining right and wrong. Our conscience let’s us know when we have done something wrong. The law was not intended to be a restriction for mankind, but God also knew that without the presence of the law there would be no need for a Savior.