Tormented by an Over-Sensitive Conscience

When Condemnation and a Tortured Conscience do not Respond to Intense, Bible-Based, Prayer-Soaked Counseling

Encouragement for Pastors, Counselors, Spiritual Advisors

This is for the spiritual advisors or friends and loved ones of someone who has asked you to read this either because he/she is more distressed than you realize or because, to your bewilderment, all your best, most spiritual efforts that work for everyone else, have not brought permanent relief to this tortured soul. I write because you deserve encouragement and I might be able to provide a new perspective on this perplexing matter.

A pastor e-mailed seeking my help. I have his permission to share some of what he wrote about the person he has been trying to help. It gives an indication of the depth of the problem that this webpage grapples with and how frustratingly resistant it is to normal biblical counseling.

For a little over a year now I have been working with a man. His father was a pastor and he has been in church much of his life. He has been free from participating in a particular sin for nearly a year now, but he still has thoughts of it. It is not such an horrendous sin, as some we might hear of, but to him it is the worst sin. He thinks he has lost his salvation and that he has worn out the grace of God. He lives in constant terror, with nightmares all night long, waking and going outside to plead with God, but he feels no love from God or for God. He considers that this lack of feeling has proven to him that he is completely separated from the love and grace of God and that he is under God’s condemnation.

The problem is that this keeps continuing, despite the fact that after a half hour of going over Scriptures with him he feels much better, will praise the Lord, will say, “I get it,” and has a complete change in attitude and outlook. This has been happening a few times a week for over a year.

I have also had someone from Neil Anderson ministries work with him. We spent five continuous hours in deep Scriptural therapy and prayer with this man we want to help and he was an active participant throughout the whole counselling session. He has also sought help from many other avenues, going as far as to sign himself into a mental ward at one point. All of this has ended up doing zero good. Within a half hour of any counsel and any help of any kind he is right back to where he was, and possibly even worse. Help!!!!

I identify with you if someone you care for has not responded to all your competent, patient, loving, Bible-based support. If you are like me, it is not because of the slightest deficiency in your approach, nor any spiritual or intellectual deficiency in the person. It is because this particular person suffers from a rarely understood condition that affects only a tiny percentage of people, even though the total numbers worldwide are in the millions.

Although what I will share is well known to experts, I don’t care to recount how many agonizing years of counseling hundreds of people tormented by guilt it took me before I learned it. If I can spare you some of the agony I endured, I shall be well pleased.

Many people I respect will be tempted to dismiss as unspiritual what I am about to say. If you are one of these, I can only suggest you keep using your methods that work well for other people until you are desperate enough to consider this dear person is a different category. In the meantime, however, I beg you not to take the cowardly way out of blaming the person.

Rather than keep saying “the person” I will call the person Victor. I chose this name because I am convinced that every struggling with this affliction and yet refuses to abandon God is truly a victor in heaven’s eyes. This affliction does not discriminate according to age or gender but to further simplify the writing I will use the male gender rather than continually writing he/she. Even though people like Victor typically give the impression of being weak in faith, they are not. Most Christians who seem faith giants would be floundering pathetically if they had to endure a trial like Victor’s.

This webpage addresses how to support two types of Christians:

1. Everyone plagued by blasphemous thoughts

2. Or those who, despite repeated assurances, keep worrying that God might not have forgiven them.

Worrying that God has not forgiven them and suffering unstoppable blasphemous thoughts might seem distinctly different but at the root of both dilemmas is devout Christians being plagued by the very thing they most fear. And it turns out that there is a common cause. A note at the end of this webpage will direct you to further help in understanding why the matters discussed in this webpage are of critical importance to devout Christians who suffer uncontrollable blasphemous thoughts.

Background

Starting at Feeling Condemned? There’s Hope! I have assembled a ludicrously vast amount of biblical and theological information and testimonies proving that no matter how gross a person’s sins or how often the sins were repeated before or after salvation, there is not a person on the planet who cannot be fully forgiven by God by simply looking to Jesus for forgiveness.

My store of information has grown so enormous (it would make a 300 page book) because, even after poring over all the proof and careful reasoning I had amassed, people kept writing to me year after year, tormented by the irrational fear that they could somehow be the sole exception to God’s promises or somehow disqualify themselves or that they had managed to find some sort of loophole in God’s clear promises. They seemed unaware that they were going to almost insane lengths trying to justify their needless worries.

Moved by the intensity of their anguish, I kept piling up the evidence; expecting these dear people to eventually accept the power of rational, Bible-based argument. Even when at last they seemed to grasp it, however, their relief was short-lived. In just a few days they would be back with yet another supposed reason for them continuing to doubt their salvation.

For years I prayed and prayed, seeking spiritual insight as to how these special people could have their breakthrough. Finally, I discovered that my approach would never work because these otherwise normal, intelligent people suffer from a condition that keeps undermining their ability to accept rational argument. In all other areas of their lives they are perfectly rational but not in whatever matter is of the greatest emotional importance to them. Not surprisingly, for Christians, this problem usually targets assurance of salvation, since this is the matter that is of supreme importance to them.

Victor – the name I’ve chosen for the typical sufferer – is in agony. God’s solution, however, is quite different from what Victor expects. Just as pain killers would not be the real answer to appendicitis, so assurance that Victor is divinely forgiven or ending his unwanted thoughts is not the help he really needs, despite it seeming that way to almost every sufferer.

If horrendously blasphemous thoughts against the Holy Spirit keep flooding Victor’s mind, he is being hit by torturously strong temptation, but the Tempter is hoping to get him so confused that he does not even recognize the temptation. Blasphemy is not the temptation. The spirit realm is amazingly unconcerned about that. Not even gross sin is the real temptation. The temptation is to stop believing that because of Jesus, God forgives, loves and delights in Victor.

Just as an addict yearns for a miraculous end to withdrawal symptoms, Victor yearns for a miraculous deliverance from his distress. However, Life’s Mysteries explains the surprising truth that although miraculous deliverances from temptation demonstrate God’s power, letting us struggle with temptation demonstrates God’s wisdom and ends up achieving far more in our lives. It is only by having to battle temptation that anyone can truly become Christlike and grow in faith. Miraculous deliverances are superficial. They leave us as weak as being carried everywhere would cause our muscles to waste away. Victor’s temptation is to fall for the Deceiver’s malicious lies that if Victor suffers disgusting thoughts or has done some other hideous thing and then sought forgiveness, then God no longer delights in him. No matter how agonizingly strong is, and how pathetic and ungodly it makes Victor feel , this oppression can become a springboard to spiritual greatness.

As surely as there is no quick or easy way to become an Olympic champion, so it takes enormous effort to become a spiritual champion. Because the road to spiritual greatness is long and hard, Victor needs all the insight and support and encouragement he can get. That’s what my webpages are about.

As an expression of the immensity of God’s love for people like Victor, I have devoted years and years and years of agonizing prayer, counseling, study, and wrestling with words; pouring my life into providing them with everything I can find to help them. If you wish to add to this by offering Victor your personal encouragement and support, that’s superb.

This webpage you are reading is a draft of a cut-down version of one of my pages for people like Victor (only slightly adapted for those who do not suffer like him). The full version is found at Scrupulosity: Tormented by Blasphemous Thoughts or Feeling Unforgivable.

The Mysterious Power of Anxiety

It turns out that all my enormous quantities of detailed information, carefully explaining all the biblical, spiritual and rational reasons why forgiveness is fully available to absolutely everyone who puts faith in Jesus’ forgiveness only helps normal people. There are those who require such a radically different approach that it usually flabbergasts people when they first hear it. To ease the shock I will try to gently prepare you. First, I must explain what it means to suffer excess anxiety and that it is common for people with an anxiety disorder to have no idea they are suffering from one.

Anxiety acts as an alarm, warning us that something needs urgent attention to avoid a disaster. An alarm triggered by a technical malfunction sounds exactly like the real thing and so we rightly panic when it occurs and feel compelled to check whether we are in danger. If we examine the most obvious source of danger and find no reason for concern but the alarm keeps going, we will feel compelled to check another possible source, and another, and another. If we finally convince ourselves that we have eliminated every possible source of danger, we will heave a sigh of relief and reset the alarm. Should the alarm be faulty, however, it is likely to go off again in a day or so, and again we will panic and feel compelled to investigate. If this happens day after day, it will get very tiring, but alarms are designed to be too irritating to ignore and each time it goes off we have no way of telling whether this time there is genuine danger.

An anxiety disorder subjects a person to continual false alarms, each of which feels just like the real thing – terrifyingly so – and despite doing everything we can think of to put our minds at rest, the nagging, deeply worrying anxiety will continue. As if this were not disconcerting enough, anxiety feels like a guilty conscience (which makes it seem spiritual) and the inner alarm it sets off is so overwhelming that it drowns out our ability to feel peace or joy or God’s presence (which again adds to our worry that something must be spiritually wrong with us).

Christians suffering this will assume they must be in spiritual danger and jump to some conclusion as to what could be the cause. Even when they finally reach the point of being sure that what they initially thought could be sabotaging them spiritually is not a valid cause for concern, the alarm will keep blaring (anxiety) and so they will simply switch to assuming there must be some other spiritually valid reason for concern. The inner alarm feels so terrifyingly real that they get highly inventive in dreaming up reasons for believing their never-ending anxiety rather than believing the reality that God has forgiven them. In the version of this webpage written specifically for Victor (rather than for those supporting him) I list eighteen possible reasons (and there are no doubt more) people come up with for thinking they cannot be forgiven; such as believing they have committed the unpardonable sin.

I provided this list so that they will not suppose they have come up with something I am unaware of, but I was reluctant because it is like listing a thousand diseases never before considered by a hypochondriac who keeps needlessly fearing he is ill. The bottom line, however, is that Victor, no matter what he does, will keep being plagued by anxiety and the sooner he realizes it, the sooner he is likely to accept his need for an entirely different approach.

Evil spiritual powers can never touch God’s love for us, nor the infinite power of the cross. All they can do is meddle with our feelings, in the hope that we will start believing our changeable feelings rather than stick to believing in God’s unchangeable love and forgiveness. So anyone looking to his feelings to confirm that he is right with God is leaving himself wide open to doubting his salvation. In fact, until completely weaned off treating feelings as a spiritual barometer, every one of us is dangerously vulnerable to spiritual deception. Moreover, if anyone with an anxiety disorder looks to his feelings to confirm that God accepts him, doubt will always win because, no matter how close he is to God, highly unsettling anxiety will keep dominating his feelings.

I have provided a salvation prayer for Victor that emphasizes refusing to be swayed by feelings or supposed signs. I suggest he prints it out, as he will need to keep returning to that prayer. This is not because Victor is weak but because this commitment is enormously difficult for anyone to maintain when plagued by relentless, torturously strong anxiety and/or well-meaning preachers who unwittingly wreak havoc in Victor’s life by speaking as if feelings matter.

The great illusion for anxious people is that they will at last find peace if they resolve a particular issue. The truth is that an anxiety disorder means that anxiety will continue no matter how many issues are resolved. Just like a faulty alarm that keeps going off no matter how safe the situation, the anxiety will keep on going and it will keep on feeling as if there must be some genuine reason for concern and so their mind will stay in overdrive trying to find some reason, rather than accept the fact that it is a false alarm.

It often takes years of agony before they finally realize it but it turns out that, for Christians like Victor, nothing – with the possible exception of medical help – is capable of easing their anxiety (the source of their doubts, fears and overwhelmingly strong guilt feelings). Like a thirsty man chasing a mirage, these genuine Christians sincerely believe there must be some assurance that would finally satisfy them. They will temporarily feel better after receiving a full explanation of why their fears are spiritually, biblically and rationally groundless but the devastating worry that they are doomed will soon return. Despite the mirage seeming so real, the truth is that this side of heaven there is literally no experience or proof, no matter how stupendous or spectacular that could permanently quell their fears. To illustrate, let’s go to extremes.

Suppose not just one but hundreds of gigantic angels in dazzling white clothes and supernatural glory appeared to Victor and declared that Almighty God is pleased with him and will reward him eternally. Victor would be on Cloud Nine; flooded with peace and joy. He would finally feel certain that he is saved and that he will never doubt again. Within a few days, however, he would yet again become aware of the anxiety incessantly gnawing at him; inducing panic and causing his mind to go into overdrive wondering why he cannot rid himself of this strong gut feeling that something is seriously wrong. Rather than accept that the feeling itself must be wrong, one’s mind dutifully seeks to ensure one’s safety by assuming that for as long as the anxiety continues, a real threat might be present. In a protective frenzy it keeps seeking any way in which there could be danger despite that supernatural confirmation that all is well. Before long, under the relentless scrutiny of Victor’s intellectual powers, possibilities will begin to emerge, such as, “What if that divine visitation were just my imagination or a dream or wishful thinking or a false memory or a psychotic episode? What if what I experienced were someone playing a clever prank with lasers and holograms? What if it were demonic deception?

What if that angelic pronouncement were true at the time but I’ve since sinned and am now lost forever? What if . . . ?” Soon, all that relief and certainty he had just a few days ago will have vanished.

How the Natural and the Spiritual Interact

I am still cautiously inching my way to the part that initially staggers deeply spiritual people because on the surface, it seems unspiritual. Some readers might wish I would jump ahead – and you may skip this section if you insist – but most will need this introduction more than they currently realize. In fact, after proceeding through this webpage and ones that follow, many who have read this section will begin to discover that it is more valuable than they had thought and will want to return to read it again with renewed interest.

Often the natural and the supernatural are not opposed. Indeed, they frequently work hand in hand. After all, they were both lovingly created by the same infinitely good God, and both realms have been attacked by the same anti-God spiritual forces.

Not only is it not unspiritual to consider the natural; it is often unspiritual to ignore the natural. For instance, James 2:15-16 ridicules those who say spiritual things to people in physical need but do nothing to help them in a practical (natural) way. Likewise, Jesus emphasized the importance of caring for people’s physical needs, be it a cup of water, feeding and clothing the poor, welcoming a stranger, caring for the sick or visiting prisoners (Matthew 10:42; 25:34-39). Jesus’ earthly ministry was by no means exclusively focused on people’s spiritual well-being; healing their physical bodies was a high priority with him. To be so “spiritual” as to ignore the physical is to be more “spiritual” than God!

I so much believe in the Bible’s teaching about demons that I am convinced we all regularly deal with demons. For instance, since the devil does not have the divine power to be everywhere at once, it is not usually Satan who personally tempts us, but his underlings.

Typically, temptation is evil spiritual entities attempting to exploit any natural weakness they can find in a person. Temptation has a spiritual component but there is also a natural component. Let’s consider the holy Son of God. When he was tempted to turn stones into bread, the devil was exploiting a natural chemical imbalance within our Lord. He had not eaten for weeks. It is natural – inevitable – for any hungry human to keep thinking of food. Moreover, many of the stones in this wilderness were shaped like the loaves of bread that Jesus had eaten all his life. For perfectly natural reasons, his body craved food and his mind invariably kept reminding him that those stones looked like bread. Anyone with the ability to turn stones into bread would keep thinking how wonderful it would be to do so. Such thoughts would torment any person but they were perfectly normal, given the chemical imbalance in Jesus’ body. If anyone were to worry that having such normal thoughts would render a person unforgivable, it would not merely be theologically ridiculous but such an unfounded fear would turn an already unpleasant experience into something terrifying. Having one’s mind continually flooded with such thoughts is not sin, however. It would only have been sin had Jesus actually broken the fast.

Similarly, as I will soon explain, Victor’s fears, doubts and unwanted thoughts are actually as natural and physically-driven as a starving man craving food. Evil powers try to deceive people who suffer this natural weakness. They exploit human weakness not by trying to entice these people to do what happens naturally and is inevitable – having unwanted doubts, fears and thoughts – but by falsely accusing them for having these natural reactions and by trying to seduce these dear people into believing the lie that being subjected to this naturally-driven experience nullifies Christ’s power to love, cleanse and forgive them and grant them the gift of divine approval.

Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness was so intense only because his body was abnormally hungry. Likewise, any of us can have an abnormality in our bodily chemistry that renders us vulnerable to attacks that others simply do not suffer. Those free from such attacks might seem more spiritual or better Christians, but they are not. As unbelievable as it might initially seem, the only difference between the two groups of people is a slight deficiency or chemical imbalance within their bodies.

We have already cited Scriptures that whether it be in the realm of temptation or how we show love, we should pay attention not merely to the spiritual but to the natural. For one last example: 1 Corinthians 7:3-5 says that husbands and wives should meet each other’s physical needs “so that Satan will not tempt you”. Even the great apostle Paul, who had denied himself marriage, insists that it is spiritual and right to consider the physical side of temptation and to lessen a spiritual problem by attending to a physical need if a morally acceptable way is available. Likewise, if, for example, medical researchers were to discover a healthy, morally acceptable way of healing a physical abnormality and thus rendering ourselves less vulnerable to spiritual attack, then we would have a spiritual obligation to avail ourselves of it.

The staggering truth I’ve been so cautiously trying to prepare you for is that many people are tormented incessantly by what feels exactly like a guilty conscience and inability to feel God’s love, and yet it turns out that the cause is not spiritual at all. It seems initially unbelievable but for these people what drives intense feelings that are so easily mistaken for divine judgment – and it can even generate horrifically blasphemous thoughts as well – is a mild medical disorder that causes excess anxiety. None of my vast array of carefully written information provided elsewhere in this website will lower the deep concerns plaguing the millions of people whose anxiety has a medical basis – a slight imbalance in their brain chemistry.

I completely understand you thinking I am mad, or at least unspiritual, to suggest such a thing. If you have not yet read many of my other webpages, you have not had the opportunity to discover how strongly conservative and into prayer and Scripture I am. If you need convincing, quickly scan You’re Forgivable: A Sample of the Bible Proof and Life’s Too Short to Skimp on Prayer for just a couple of sample webpages, and then immediately return to this page.

For very many years, if anyone had suggested that there could be a medical component to this spiritual matter, I would have thought they were crazy or ungodly. Large numbers of people kept e-mailing me seeking help, however, and as I kept pouring my life into trying to help them, I began noticing something peculiar. Anxiety disorders were astoundingly common among those who were not being helped by large numbers of faith-building Scriptures. Usually they regarded their anxiety disorder as irrelevant to their spiritual concerns, but as I kept conversing with more and more people, the link kept occurring far too often to be mere coincidence. Eventually, I discovered that a huge body of scientific research had already confirmed the link.

Like me, you will probably need a lot of convincing. That’s okay. I am so passionate about helping people who are suffering this horrific spiritual torment that I have gone to immense lengths assembling and carefully explaining the evidence in a logical, easily intelligible manner. All I ask is that you keep prayerfully reading it.

People afflicted by blasphemous thoughts or by continual doubts are among the surprisingly large number of people who are perfectly sane – and some are highly intelligent – except that their mind plays tricks in whatever narrow area of their life is of greatest importance to them. It is not because they have less faith, Bible knowledge, will-power or devotion than other Christians. In fact, they are usually above average on such measures. It is just that in this area of life, anxiety is almost literally driving them crazy. Contrary to what seems intuitively obvious, their fears are not spiritually or rationally driven but stem from a chemical imbalance that causes them to suffer from abnormal levels of anxiety. Because it has a medical basis, Victor cannot switch off this anxiety (and corresponding guilt feelings, worries about salvation, inability to control his thoughts, etc.) by more Bible reading, trying to worry less, working harder on building up his faith, or whatever. To suffer from medically caused anxiety is no more an indication that one is spiritually lacking than suffering a broken leg means one is spiritually lacking.

It boils down to the fact that the unfortunate people suffering this physical problem feel needlessly guilty, ill at ease or worry far more than average people about at least one thing (and it usually zeroes in on whatever is most important to them). And regardless of what they do – how much fellowship with God they have, how much faith they muster, how much theological knowledge they gain – that awful, unsettling feeling keeps gnawing away at them because the cause is not spiritual or rational but physical. No matter what they believe or think and how much God approves of them and delights in them, that horrible feeling keeps returning.

Our brain is designed to treat that feeling – usually called anxiety – as an alarm, warning us that something is seriously wrong. The problem is that when a chemical imbalance sets off a false alarm, the very alarm we rely on to alert us to physical or spiritual danger has been triggered. As hinted at previously, the part of our brain designed to respond to the alarm cannot distinguish a chemically induced false alarm from the real thing. As the alarm keeps on and on, the brain keeps frantically hunting for some danger that set off the alarm. No matter what reassurances come from God, Scripture, spiritual authorities, past experiences or whatever, the alarm keeps blaring and so the worry keeps persisting that there must be some genuine spiritual danger.

What confuses these people is that what some call their gut feeling – some call it one’s conscience and some even confuse it with the voice of God – has been seriously distorted by a condition well known to the medical profession. Unfortunately, in contrast to the experts, the implications are rarely understood by the general population.

With this deeply disturbing false alarm indistinguishable from the real thing blaring within a person day after day it is enough to seriously distort anyone’s spiritual perception. This devastating feeling keeps incessantly nagging; drowning out what for anyone not subjected to it would be more than enough proof of God’s acceptance. Although this highly unpleasant and confusing affliction troubles a relatively small proportion of people, the numbers add up to literally millions of people worldwide.

There is no space for a full explanation here – that comes further on – but once the process is carefully explained, it is readily understood by average people. Those suffering from this affliction, however, will have a much harder time accepting the truth because they find it so contrary to what feels intuitively right, and that dreadful feeling that something is terribly wrong keeps droning on as incessantly as ever. Everything within someone suffering from excess anxiety will scream against the truth. So despite trying to the point of utter exhaustion, those suffering this way will keep getting worse instead of better unless they totally change their understanding of the cause.

I hyperventilated once. I felt certain I was not getting enough air and so I breathed harder; totally oblivious to the fact that I was actually suffering from too much air and I needed to breathe less. So it is with those who are hounded by unwanted thoughts or yearning for assurance of salvation. They will only get worse until they learn to do almost the exact opposite of what they feel sure will help. They are so convinced that they need to be doing the opposite of what will actually help that they usually cannot even grasp what my webpages are saying, but keep misinterpreting them to line up with their mistaken views.

There is another approach. I discuss it further on but I should repeat it here in case this is all that you read. Research has proved that, through continual practice, our brains’ physical and chemical structure can be altered.

As a faulty alarm system needs at least part of it to be rewired, so if you have OCD, a part of your brain needs rewiring – new neural pathways need to be developed. This can be done by retraining your brain, just as certain neural pathways might no longer work because of a stroke but continual practice will establish new ones.

Consider someone who panics whenever he sees a spider. If you were to monitor his pulse, how much he sweats, and so on, you would find they suddenly peak at the sight of a spider. Such a person is not unintelligent or a nutcase; it is simply that something has caused his brain to be wired in such a way that seeing a spider triggers the alarm system in his brain. Through practice, however, that connection between the sight of a spider and his brain’s alarm system can be rerouted. This can be done, for example, by the person being exposed to a spider that is so far away that he feels calm, and over a long period of time he gets closer so slowly that his brain establishes a connection between seeing a spider and remaining calm, rather than seeing a spider and triggering an internal alarm.

Similarly, much patient practice can train one’s brain not to set off false alarms that seem like spiritual worries. Psychologists are able to guide people in this retraining process.

Whether it be through medication or retraining the brain or a combination of both, using any such means is exercising faith in God. It is clinging by raw faith to the belief that God loves and forgives through Christ and that any feelings or thoughts to the contrary – no matter how intense – are simply false alarms that need correcting. Exercising this degree of faith will be exceedingly difficult because the false alarms will so be so deeply disturbing that few people who have not suffered them will be able to comprehend the magnitude of the challenge.

How is an anxiety disorder related to being plagued by blasphemous thoughts? Uncontrollable blasphemous thoughts is a phenomenon powered by the fear of losing one’s salvation by blaspheming the Holy Spirit. This fear, in turn, is driven by excessive anxiety. The vicious circle connecting anxiety with being unable to stop having the very thoughts one fears is carefully explained in When a Christian Can’t Stop Thinking Blasphemous Thoughts and I won’t repeat it here.

As proved in The Unpardonable sin of Blasphemy Against the Holy Ghost and the page it leads to, if forgiveness is sought through faith in the saving power of Christ’s sacrifice, there is no sin that cannot be forgiven. The only unforgivable sin is to die still refusing to believe in the saving power of Jesus (which might happen if, for example, one dies genuinely believing that Jesus is of the devil). No matter how many hundreds of biblical proofs and assurances a person is given about the true nature of the unpardonable sin, however, uncontrollable blasphemous thoughts will continue if the anxiety driving the thoughts is not caused by a theological misunderstanding but by an anxiety disorder.

You Need More:This is just the introduction. I urge you to keep reading. The other pages are addressed specifically to you but to those suffering this affliction. Nevertheless, the pages will show you how to help dear people.