Romans 4: 15b  "…for where there is no law, there is no transgression."  I really like this verse I gave you yesterday.  Because it means that things that I did before I knew better don't count.   Because I didn't know the law about that thing.

That seems hard to believe.  But look at it this way.  The baby that rubs food in his hair is not accountable.  But the man who rubs food in his hair is.  The person who doesn't know a law is not accountable as far as God is concerned.  But it doesn't keep you from facing the consequences for what you have done.  There are behaviors that have consequences whether you know better or not.

I was picked up by a highway patrolman a few years ago.  "What did I do?" I asked him.  As far as I knew, I had obeyed the law.  "You didn't pull over when you went around me as I was parked on the right side of the road," he told me.  "You have to move to the left lane when I have someone pulled over on the right."

I Answered, "I'm sorry, but that wasn't in the rule book when I took my driver's test.  I didn't know."
He could have given me a ticket.  As far as the state was concerned, I had broken the law.  But as far as my conscience was concerned, I had done no wrong.

"It's a new law.  Next time, pull over."  From then on, I pulled over.  I now knew the law.  I had been accountable to the state all along.  The difference was that now I was accountable to God to do right.  I could have got a ticket either way. But my conscience was clear.

Not only does the Bible tell us about right and wrong, our heart tells us when we are wrong.  But if we persist in doing wrong, God gives up on us.  The most horrible scripture in the Bible to me is: Romans 1:28 "And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them  over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient."

I do not want God to give up on me.  I do not want a reprobate mind.  I want to do God's will.  That is one way I know His spirit is within me.