400 Church Leaders Are Resigning This Weekend (The Case for a Skeleton-Free Closet)

Approximately 400 church leaders are reportedly resigning this weekend  because their names surfaced in the Ashley Madison hack.

That’s sad and at the same time it’s a relatively small number compared to the 37 million people who had Ashley Madison accounts. Still, even one church leader is too many.

"Life is short. Have an affair." It's the slogan of Ashley Madison, the site that reportedly has more than 124 million visits per month, and is ranked number 18 among adult sites on the web. Their 37 million users had an expectation of privacy, but this hack is just one more example of the fact that nothing is absolutely airtight.

The church has yet to realize how damaging secrets are.  We need to deal with sin, and we also need to address the issue of secrets. There are those who believe they can actually get away with sinful behavior. And then there are others who believe secrets are warranted at times.

Unfortunately I run into a lot of the latter, even among Christians. 

What purpose do secrets serve at all? No good one.

One of the best pieces of wisdom I ever received was from a Christian counselor who said that family secrets are among the most damaging things ever. "Avoid them at all cost," he said. I'm sensitive to secrets for many reasons, two of the biggest being that both of my families, [natural and adoptive] were destroyed by secrets. Yes, there were other issues, but secrets were a big part of it -- and unfortunately, continue to be.

One of my personal core values is to live without secrets. No matter what comes up, I want to be transparent about it. Admittedly this personal core value makes me stop and think very hard before I do things. With my wins and losses, successes and failures, good choices or sinful ones -- I'm determined to own up to it and live transparently. And I've noticed that people who also live transparently don't mind a bit that I do. [Side note: When someone gets angry that you choose to live transparently, that should be an alarm bell. Just saying.]

Secrets lose their power when brought to the light. A person once said to me, "But Deanna, we all have skeletons in our closet." No. No we don't. Some people do. Okay, many people do. But there are those who choose to live transparently.  It's a wise choice. It's said, "You're only as sick as your secrets."  The Bible says those who conceal or cover their sins do not prosper. I’m a firm believer in a skeleton-free closet. We need all the room we can get for shoes and purses.

The Bible says that everything hidden will be brought to light eventually. Why not be honest about it now, before it is exposed? It’s all going to be shouted from the rooftops eventually. That’s what God says. It WILL come out. If you live a transparent life you don’t have to worry about anything coming to light or being shouted from a rooftop.

 If it's not something you want everybody finding out, don’t do it. And if you did it –come clean about it – sooner rather than later.   

There’s so much to be said for living in the light, openly and real.