A Seared Conscience
Then Herod, with his men of war, treated Him with contempt and mocked Him, arrayed Him in a gorgeous robe, and sent Him back to Pilate.
- Luke 23:11
Talk about opportunity. Herod had the greatest Old Testament prophet ever, John the Baptist, locked up. He could call on him 24/7, but he had John executed-even beheaded. Worse yet, he later had standing before him God incarnate, the Creator of the universe in human form: Jesus Christ himself. But Herod just wanted Jesus to do a trick. Herod could have poured out his heart, confessed his sins, found pardon, and resensitized his seared conscience. But he did not. And Jesus did no miracles for him.
We read in Luke 23:11 that Herod, showing his true colors, "treated [Jesus] with contempt and mocked Him, arrayed Him in a gorgeous robe, and sent Him back to Pilate." Herod rejected Christ for fear of a woman, for fear of his reputation, and for fear of his throne. And Christ rejected Herod, because Herod had gone beyond the point of no return. Jesus, being God, could see Herod's heart. He could see it was futile. The irony is that Herod seemed to fear everyone and everything else. Yet because of his lack of fear for God, Herod damned his soul forever. It was the death of a conscience.
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How does this happen? How do you kill a conscience? You do it a little bit at a time. You know something is wrong. Your conscience is troubling you, and you are trying to disable it. You're thinking, How do I shut this thing up? How do I silence this? Where is the mute button? I don't want to hear it any more.
Then as time passes, your conscience gets more and more difficult to hear. It has been said, "When a man won't listen to his conscience, it is usually because he doesn't want advice from a stranger."
