Confession, Prayer and Healing

Recently news broke that a major telecommunications company had been hacked and millions of account details had been stolen.  The company has primarily come under fire, not only for alleged "human error" that allowed the breach to occur, but for not promptly notifying their customers the theft had occurred.  News agencies reported millions of phone numbers and details up for sale on the dark web before the company alerted affected former and current customers.

When these sorts of things happen that have the potential for bad press, whether in companies or personally, one common response is to keep quiet for damage control.  Instead of voluntarily telling the truth to protect the interests of others, it withholds details to protect itself.  This approach aims to maintain the the outward appearance of professionalism while an internal investigation is underway.  This provides means to pin the blame on a person or group to avoid soiling the brand as a whole.  Should these tactics fail, another approach is that of spin.  It seeks to justify self as actually having done the right thing in response to criticism leveled:  it was not a mistake when customers were not immediately notified because it was all in the grand plan of communicating through media first.

Everyone makes mistakes, people and corporations comprised of people included, but we don't enjoy admitting when we make mistakes ourselves.  From articles I have read, there is very broad support for telecommunication companies to be required to notify their customers of known breaches as soon as possible--even though this would be potentially embarrassing and does not foster confidence in a brand.  I would feel more comfortable with a company that is willing to say there could be a possible breach as well as known breaches if every time it happened there was improved oversight and steps taken to mitigate future mistakes.  I would rather a company admit their fault and take prompt action to revamp their security rather than pretending to be perpetually perfect when no one is.  Companies comprised of people ought to be accountable to the law of the land, consumers, and care for their fellow employees.  If this is reasonable, isn't it also reasonable the church and members of it are accountable to God and one another in love?

James 5:16 affirms this:  "Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much."  "Confess" means to "to agree," that our words we say would be consistent with truth and in agreement with our conscience.  If we are angry and offended on the inside because we have refused to forgive someone, we should not pretend or act like we are faultless.  We aren't to spread a report of how badly we have been wronged but to confess our trespasses to one another.  Sin always breeds in bunches.  The things that have offended us have merely scratched away the self-righteous, proud varnish to reveal our hearts in truth.  It is loving when someone else points out our errors, painful to our pride as it might be, but we are called to tell on ourselves to the end we would be healed as we pray together.  Let us be quick to admit our faults without damage control, blaming others or spin, for the God who holds us responsible to obey Him desires our healing and restoration.