I've been working on a lesson for our small group this week, dealing with the topic of transparency. My goal is partially to define what is really meant by transparency, and then to talk about why this is important for us as people in relationship with God and with one another. So, here are some thoughts:
In a nutshell, being transparent means being real. It means being authentic; not putting on airs or presenting a version of ourselves that is unrealistic or false. It means being honest and open about who we are and about our struggles. This does not mean airing all of our dirty laundry all the time. It is not sharing every detail about what's happening in our lives. But it is about being real.
This is true in our relationship with God; since God knows our hearts anyway, it is futile to try to deceive God about who we are. Often we do this without realizing it. But God knows who we really are. There's not much point in trying to fool Him.
This is also true in our relationships with one another. First, with other Christians: one of the purposes of the church is to encourage and admonish one another...to help each other grow in faith, in knowledge, and in love for God and others. But it's much harder to grow in faith when we aren't real about who we are. Second, with non-Christians. The effectiveness of our witness is directly related to how transparent we are. If we pretend to be perfect (or, pretend that Christianity is some "magic cure" for all of life's challenges), we are being disingenuous and people see through such phony-ness pretty quickly. Not only that, but when we mis-represent ourselves and/or Christianity, we end up being manipulative..."selling" something that people come to find out is not what we made it seem. People are attracted to transparency. They gravitate toward it. Perhaps this has much to do with the world we live in, where superficialities are far more prevalent than authenticity.
Being real is a crucial part of maturity...in faith and in life.
One final note, perhaps a bit random, but a thought that has convicted me personally this week: A truly honest person is motivated by love, not by an obsession with conveying accurate information. I know at times I've prided myself on being an honest, "frank" kind of person...but often that has, indeed, been motived by a desire to be accurate, rather than by a desire to love those around me. It's been a challenging thought for me.
