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Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Accountability in an Age of Transparency

Does it ever feel like the internet is getting scary? I was looking up information about motorcycle parts the other day. Now every time I go to a site with any banner ads, guess what ads I’m getting? You got it – ads for motorcycle parts.

Everything you do online might as well be printed in the Observer. I remember back in the mid 90’s (1990’s, that is) when our company began giving everyone e-mail addresses. They told us to not send anything via e-mail that we wouldn’t want published on the front page of the next day’s newspaper. It was sound advice.

Five years ago in China our friends cautioned us in sending e-mail back to the States that everything we did would probably be monitored. Of course there, even the snail mail we sent was likely to be opened before it ever left the Chinese post office.

It baffles me to read some of the posts and comments I come across on Facebook. Do these “friends” not know that any potential employer or college admissions officer or future spouse will likely be reading anything and everything they print? 

And what’s with all the surveillance cameras everywhere you go? Makes you think George Orwell knew something long before his time. Even a deer can’t walk through the woods in the middle of the night without being captured on a trail camera.

What I’m saying is not breaking news. We’re living in an age of transparency. Every word you speak, every keystroke you make, every thing you do and perhaps even every thought you think could wind up on tonight’s newscast. Or go viral on the internet.

Makes you want to be pretty careful about the way you live, doesn’t it? Shouldn’t it? But let me offer you an even greater motivation to live a clean and unashamed life. Ultimately you will not answer to your friends, to your boss, to your government or to the public. It would be bad enough if they all knew and judged everything about you.

But the Bible says that we all will one day answer to Almighty God, the Perfect and Righteous Judge. Hear the word of Lord from Hebrews 4:12-13: “For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.”

What that means is exactly what it says. Read it again. God is the One to whom we must give account. His word sets the standard by which we live, and by which the very thoughts and attitudes of our hearts are measured. You can’t hide anything from God. No careless word ever spoken has He missed. No deed done in secret has escaped His vision. No impure thought or harmful intent has ever gone unnoticed by the Judge.

Don’t know about you, but that’s pretty scary to me. In fact, if that were the end of the story, who among us would be able to stand before Him at all? But, praise God, the One enthroned as Judge is also the One exalted as Savior! We’d all be doomed to everlasting death in hell because of our sin, but Jesus took the Judge’s sentence for our crimes upon Himself! And He rose from the grave in dramatic victory over sin and death!

Friend, that victory can be yours today. Receive His salvation by repenting of your sinfulness and believing that Jesus died on the cross for the forgiveness of your sins. Believe that He rose from the dead to bring eternal life, and yield your life to Him by following Jesus in joyful obedience as Savior and Lord.

Then on the Day of Judgment you need not be ashamed nor fear eternal condemnation. Instead, you’ll be singing with the saints:

Jesus paid it all
All to Him I owe
Sin had left a crimson stain
He washed it white as snow

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