Your properly trained conscience actually may come to permit you to do some things that, before knowing God’s will, you felt were improper.

²⁰ What makes the difference in such cases is accurate knowledge. This is illustrated in Paul’s comments about meat that had been offered to an idol but that was later sold in a meat market or in a sort of restaurant connected with an idol temple. A person who had recently abandoned pagan worship and become a Christian might shun such meat, wanting to avoid anything at all related to an idol. Yet in time he might increase in knowledge and understanding. Paul wrote: “We know that an idol is nothing . . . and that there is no God but one.” (1 Cor. 8:4) Coming to appreciate this, the Christian might discern that publicly sold meat was not defiled or poisoned just because it once had been offered to a no-god. With this knowledge his strengthened conscience might permit him to buy such meat at a meat market or in a public restaurant.​—1 Cor. 8:10; 10:25.

22. What very important factor cannot be overlooked by one with a strengthened conscience?

²² Have you experienced such a strengthening and balancing of your conscience as you increased in knowledge of God’s Word and ways? If so, you likely also appreciate the importance of taking into consideration the feelings of the one whose conscience may differ from yours. This was the point that Paul was making in discussing meat that had been offered to an idol that actually was “nothing.” He wrote: “Nevertheless, there is not this knowledge in all persons.” (1 Cor. 8:4, 7) Because of their past devotion to idols, some Christians could not with a clear conscience eat such meat even though it was sold publicly. If a Christian having “knowledge” and a strong conscience went ahead and ate “everything,” it could ruin a brother “for whose sake Christ died.” So Paul declared: “If [such meat] makes my brother stumble, I will never eat flesh at all.”​—1 Cor. 8:10-13; 10:27-29.