The Ashley Madison name leaks that have taken the world by storm shouldn’t surprise us. For those not familiar, Ashley Madison was a website where people who wanted to cheat on their spouses could privately post profiles of themselves in order to link up with other cheaters. A hacker recently revealed all of the cheater names to the public (approximately 30 million names worldwide).
While many rail on gay marriage for destroying the institution of marriage, we fail to realize that the divine covenant of marriage has been missing from mainstream American culture for a very long time now. It’s convenient to fail to realize this because it allows us to continue dabbling in our sinful pleasures, while still feeling like we are good people as we point the finger at everyone else.
The names on Ashley Madison didn’t get there overnight. They got there from many viewings of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition, the Victoria Secret Fashion Show, the zoomed-in cleavage of NFL cheerleaders, movie after movie after movie with sex scenes, nudity and intoxicating plots about extramarital romance, readings of Fifty Shades of Grey and thousands of other smutty romance novels that line the bookshelves at Wal-Mart or Barnes & Noble. They got there from it being mandatory policy for boxes of condoms to be posted on Resident Assistant’s doors in freshman dorms at many major universities. You are 18 and your parents are gone, now go have sex! (Which many of you have already been doing since middle school anyway) No one raises an eyebrow to any of these things. In fact, to speak out about any of them is to be seen as prudish and old fashioned…no one pays much attention to you.
It’s all based on the American mantra of, “I can do what I want, when I want and don’t you, your God or your Bible dare tell me otherwise.” With the arrogance of thinking that there will be no consequences or repercussions that we aren’t able to cover up.
We are God.
All of these messages, all the brainwashing, morph us into people who think about sex like animals, not like human beings. Nothing from the above list is “innocent,” each one plays a role in shaping, discipling, conditioning and modeling our minds to think about sex like it’s all about us and all about pleasure, no strings attached.
All Ashley Madison is is some web developers who were clever enough to profit off of what the American media has been openly turning people into for a long time now.
You Train for what You Become
The fact is, you train for what you become. What do you think an Olympic gymnast trains for their entire lives, almost every hour of every day? They train for gymnastics! They practice flips and balance beams and stretching, not jump shots, dribbling and free throws. They are not training to play basketball every single day then showing up to the Olympic trials to vie for a spot in on the gymnastics squad.
You become what you train to become. We understand this when it comes to sports, but totally miss the boat when it comes to sex.
If you train to be a people-consuming, selfish monster, that’s what you become.
If you train to become a selfless, sacrificial, loving spouse, that’s what you become.
Put Down the Gavel and Pick Up the Mirror
I get tired of people talking about the Duggard kid who was on the list. Or talking about which politicians were on the list. This isn’t talking by the way, it’s called gossiping. Which is a sin.
A sin just as equal in separating you from God’s holiness as anything you’ll find on the Ashley Madison website.
Why do we love to gossip? We love to gossip because it makes us feel better about ourselves. We aren’t as bad as that Duggard kid or that politician. We love gossip because it makes us not have to look at our own sins because we are so busy looking at the sins of others.
As the lawsuits and yes, suicides, hit the news now that these 30 million Ashley Madison names have come to light, let’s take this time not to throw stones like Pharisees at those “on the list.” Let’s instead allow the Holy Spirit to convict us of Jesus’ words in Matthew 5:27-28, that even a thought of lust is the same as actually committing adultery. Why does Jesus say this? Because he cares about our heart. He wants his followers to have hearts that desire to give life, not dehumanize it. Hearts that desire to serve, not to be served.
We each have a lot of repenting to do.
Thank God he is rich in mercy.
Let the Ashley Madison headlines be a warning of the ditch you are heading toward, or are already in if you haven’t committed yourself to God’s design for sex.
You can either attempt to be God and think you can get away with anything you want with no repercussions, or you can let God be God and submit to His will.
Choose wisely.
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He is:
Author of Beyond the Battle: A man's guide to his identity in Christ in an oversexualized world
Host of the The Flip Side Podcast
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