We all deal with guilt whether we admit to it or not. We either embrace it or we deny and repress it. For those of us who embrace it, it can lead us down a road of correction. Those of us who repress it can’t hide from the effects of doing so. We know in our hearts that we do wrong things, even when we rationalize why we did them. In the Church, we know what is wrong because we have the absolute goodness of God to measure our actions against. God’s Law He gives to us reflects His absolute goodness, which is fulfilled by loving your neighbor as yourself (Galatians 5:14).
In the times of Moses, Levitical laws dictated how we were to handle our guilt. We were to, according to the law, make an offering to the Lord (Leviticus 7:1-9). When Jesus who is God took on human nature, died on a cross, and rose again, He fulfilled the Law (Matthew 5:17-18). Our sins were forgiven through the shedding of His blood, and our only way to God is through the only begotten son who is an Icon of the Father (Colossians 1:15). Therefore, we no longer need to make a sacrifice as directed by the Levitical Law when we feel guilt. We need only pray, repent, and confess directly to God.
Post-resurrection of Christ, forgiveness is given by the blood of Christ and because He took on death when He didn’t have to by any means. Guilt still pervades our lives because we sin daily. Before the resurrection we had to give a guilt offering, now after the resurrection, we repent, we confess, and we pray to God, and by doing so, He takes away our sin and guilt, making them as far from us as the east is from the west (Psalm 103:12).
I don’t know that having a guilty conscious is necessarily a good or bad thing in and of itself. We have guilty consciences because we sin. The guilt is the effect of an action, and because we all sin, we will all at some point have guilt in some shape or form. We either recognize and embrace our guilt, confess, and be better, or we deny and suppress our guilt, leading to that guilt manifesting in other ways in our lives.
At some points in my life, I have had a guilty conscious and I chose to rationalize my actions and suppress the guilt instead of recognizing my sin and confessing to God. This led to anger issues and self-righteousness. I have at other times had a guilty conscious and recognized that I had done something wrong. I sought to correct my wrongdoing, I confessed to the person I had wronged, and to God. I asked for forgiveness from both God and the person I wronged. I know God forgave me, and I was thankfully forgiven by the person I transgressed against. In those situations of handling guilt, I was humbled and learned more about my own actions, why I react the way I do in some instances, and how the actions I choose affect other people, especially when I feel that I am justifiably right.