Informed Faith
My Goal is to Help You Understand the Bible and Strengthen your faith with a deep, accurate understanding of Scripture. This podcast offers clear and practical insights using the OIA (Observation, Interpretation, Application) Bible study method. Whether you’re new to Bible study or looking to deepen your knowledge, Informed Faith equips you with the tools to build a solid foundation for your faith.
Informed Faith
Breaking the Chains of Shame and Secret Sin In Your Life
This foundational episode was pulled out of the archive of my original "Integrity Talks" podcast. Through my personal testimony, I identify the dangers of living a secret life of sin, and the freedom that comes from embracing consistency and honesty.
Ever felt pressured to maintain a facade of perfection? This episode unpacks the crippling effects of hypocrisy and the intense shame and guilt that often accompany it. Drawing from my own experiences, we explore how the fear of being exposed can lead to emotional withdrawal and damaged relationships, especially within the sanctity of marriage. We highlight the importance of transparency in our connections with others and how hidden sins can create an insidious barrier between us and our faith communities.
But there's hope. By examining the themes of repentance, forgiveness, and redemption through the lens of Psalm 119 and the story of David and Bathsheba, we understand that genuine repentance brings immediate forgiveness, even if consequences remain. This episode offers practical steps toward living a life of integrity, including performing a personal inventory and establishing accountability within a supportive group of Christian men. Let's foster a culture of openness and sincerity, encouraging each other to walk securely with integrity, buoyed by the ever-present grace of God.
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Welcome to Integrity Talks, the podcast that takes you on a journey of purpose, authenticity and biblical wisdom. I'm Pat Siegel, your guide in exploring the path to living a life marked by integrity. All right, the maiden voyage, episode one of Integrity Talks. My name is Patrick, your host, and I am excited and thrilled to be with you here today. Thanks for listening, and in the first episode, we're going to just unbox and lay the foundation for the podcast the structure going forward and how we're going to interact with each other. We're also going to no, it's not sad. I don't know why we're playing sad music. Okay, this is exciting because we're a different podcast. We are not going to have deep theological debates and try and fix each other. Picture a small group setting of believers together, just talking and sharing together. I encourage people to share and we're going to have people calling in and we're going to have some experts on talking with us as well, but it's just going to be a time of us encouraging each other as believers should. Don't you think that's what our goal should be together to uplift each other, encourage each other, sometimes even admonish and convict each other of some things I think we need to have, as Christian men, real raw conversations about struggles that we are having and some practical tools to overcoming those struggles as well.
Speaker 1:But let's first talk about integrity and what it means. I'm a keep-it-simple type guy, so for me integrity is doing what you say. Just doing what you say. Just doing what you say. If your wife asks you to take the trash out and you say I'm going to take out the trash after dinner, then you take the trash out after dinner, right. If your kids say, dad, are you going to be home after work to play with us, you say I'll be home at five o'clock, 530 to play with you. You're home at 530 to play with your kids. It's having integrity and in fact the root word of integrity it's Latin, it's integer, it's a mathematical term. It means it's an integer, is a whole number, it's not a fraction. So in terms of how I view that for myself and how I should live my life, I should live my life as a whole, complete person, not fractioned.
Speaker 1:In fact, a term that is used in clinical terms it's compartmentalized, meaning you've got a bunch of different sections of your life. Picture a closet and in the closet's a bunch of boxes. Each box is clearly marked with a label, and maybe you've got a label on a box that says home life and another one is church life and another one is work life. And maybe you've got a label on a box that says home life and another one is church life and another one is work life and another one maybe is your sin life, your secret sin life. And the goal of compartmentalization is to make sure that nothing that's inside the boxes spills over into the other. Does that make sense? Everything stays separate. So who you are at church is what people think of you stays separate. So who you are at church is what people think of you at church, and who you are at home is who you are at home and who you are at work is—they all stay separate, especially the one about that secret sin life that nobody knows anything about. That doesn't get out and get into the church life, of course, or your church life doesn't mix in with your work life, because when you're away on business, you want to be able to act the way you want to act and behave and drink and do whatever you want to do and talk how you want to talk. So you are a chameleon. If you are a fractioned person, you are different depending on what your surroundings are, and I think it's very prevalent today in Christian men. I know that it has been in my life many times. In fact, I want to use myself as an example to set this stage of the prevalence of inconsistent behaviors among Christian men.
Speaker 1:I, for many years, lived a life—I had a secret life of pornography addiction for decades not just a few weeks or months, but for decades of my life Started when I was like age 10. And at the same time that I had this porn addiction that I kept secret from everyone, I was also telling everyone that I was a born-again Christian. I went to youth group when I was young. I was a part of the worship team. I even wrote worship music. I then taught Sunday school and youth group Bible classes and then, of course, got married and we had children and I had this job and I made good money and we had cars and a house that we built. On the outside it looked like we were the successful great American dream family. On the inside, I was hiding this life of porn addiction.
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Speaker 1:And now back to Integrity Talks. My life revolved around it. It maybe didn't seem like it did on the outside, because that was just this thin veneer I had built, but on the inside my life revolved around this porn addiction. I got up in the morning thinking about it and while I was on the way to work I would even look at porn. When I was in my office I would look at porn. Nobody ever was able to touch my phone. I don't know if you can associate with this, but I didn't let anybody touch my phone. I always had my phone with me. First of all, it was always either in my coat pocket close to me or was on the table next to me with my hand on it. But I protected that phone and my electronics because that's where all of my secret acting out was occurring. So it's that inconsistent behavior that I had. I want to make sure that we kind of set the stage by talking about the prevalence of those inconsistent behaviors among Christian men and kind of ask you if you talking about the prevalence of those inconsistent behaviors among Christian men and kind of ask you if you can associate with that, if you might have that going on in your life.
Speaker 1:There's a disconnect that we have between our outer appearance, that veneer that we have projected to people fake projection, I guess and the personal struggles. And I think that that happens sometimes, especially amongst Christian folks who have these very high biblical standards. Because we don't want to—we have a lot of shame and guilt about our sin and sometimes we get this feeling like we go to church and we have to look perfect or have to look apart. Right, you ever go to church and we have to look perfect or have to look apart, right? You ever go to church and you compare yourself to other people, just as a you know from one Christian guy to another. Maybe you're at church and you see another guy and you know that or you perceive anyway that he's got a lot in his life altogether. You know he's in his Bible a lot, he maybe leads the groups and he's able to quote Scripture really easily and it seems like he has a good marriage and good relationship with his kids. And you think to yourself man, I just come up short.
Speaker 1:Maybe as a couple, you go to church and you see other Christian couples and it looks like they're really in love and they're ministering together and they're happy. And you just think to yourself man, we have so many problems in our marriage. Do you ever compare yourself like that, these masks in our lives, especially at church and amongst other believers, because we are ashamed and we feel like we need to hide what's really going on in our lives? I think that church should be a place where we can approach the cross of Christ, dirty, broken. In fact it even says that that God delights in a contrite heart, a broken, humble heart. And yet we hear those words, we read in Scripture about that and we get to church and we kind of have to play a part so in setting the stage and talking about integrity. I think it's important to show the opposite of integrity, which would be a fractioned life of hypocrisy. You are saying you're one person, but you are really doing something else in a hidden life, and there's an impact to that hypocrisy in our lives and it affects our lives in different ways. I think it affects our personal faith and affects our relationships, and I'll use myself as an example again In terms of affecting hypocrisy, affecting my personal faith.
Speaker 1:I may have grown up a believer in saying I was a Christian, but I really struggled with whether or not God forgave me and loved me. As a person who dealt with addiction for decades, one of the most popular sayings or thoughts that I had to myself was if people really knew me, they wouldn't like me, and I thought that also about my relationship with God. I really did. If he really, you know, actually knowing that he knows everything, that he knows all of my secret sins, man, he just must be so disappointed and angry with me. I am just so far beyond his love.
Speaker 1:I felt that way that his love and his grace wasn't strong enough. Love and his grace wasn't strong enough to forgive someone like me. His death on the cross was not powerful enough for someone who had done so many things wrong. So my view, my belief about myself being a bad person and God thinking I'm a bad, flowed over, actually I should say, into me thinking, god thinking I was a bad person, not just a sinner, because I know I'm a sinner. Romans 3.23, right, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. But for someone who was a habitual sinner like me, who kept doing the same things over and over again man, I was just too bad of a person for God really to love me and for me truly to be saved. I really started to question my faith and my salvation. So that's a definite impact of hypocrisy in your life, of not living with integrity and being the same person in all situations. Another thing is the impact that it has on your relationships beyond God. It's relationships with those around you, and the impact on those relationships is just as huge and damaging, because when you are acting out, when you have hypocrisy going on in your life, you've maybe got that secret sin box in your life. You are pushing those you love away. You may not think so, but you definitely start pushing those people away the deeper you get into that sin, hidden sin in your life.
Speaker 1:I had Christian friends that I grew up with, one or two in particular that were very, very good friends, who tried to keep in my life. They were trying to contact me and were calling and leaving messages or sending me texts and saying hey, patrick, what's going on? Haven't heard from you in a long time. Love to catch up with you, or maybe they'd send me a verse. But they wanted to try and embrace me and talk to me about what was going on in my life and I wanted nothing to do with them because number one, I was feeling really convicted. I knew I'd have to tell them what was going on and I didn't want to. I was ashamed about it, but I also was wanting to continue to sin. I enjoyed my sin, wanting to continue to sin. I enjoyed my sin, and I don't know how many people absolutely hate their sin, but I think that's part of the lure of sin is that it is enjoyable. So I was wanting to continue to sin and if I talked with them, I would feel convicted and I'd feel like I had to stop.
Speaker 1:There was also a huge impact on my relationship with my spouse Because when I was acting out in my sin, I was not as interested in being intimate. I don't mean intimate as in just sex, I mean intimate period. Intimacy is on many different levels in a relationship that I came to learn that after, you know, enduring my recovery. But I wasn't nearly as engaged with my spouse. On many different levels emotionally, physically, spiritually, sexually I just wasn't as interested in her and she could feel that I didn't know or notice that I was doing that to her, that I was pushing her away. But I was definitely pushing her away and she was getting damaged and was suffering because of that. And my relationship with my kids, my relationship with my kids, was also crumbling around me. I was making promises to them that I didn't have any intention of keeping, you know, showing up to events, spending time with them, just talking with them, praying with them, spending time with them, just talking with them, praying with them.
Speaker 1:And I also had a lot of angry outbursts. That was occurring especially at home with my wife and children, just out of the blue, angry outbursts. And these were occurring because I was stressed out when I was at home. I wasn't able, when I was at home with them, to act out as I wanted to. I wasn't able to get on my phone or get on my computer or just let loose like I wanted to and be able to spend time with pornography focused on that. I had to spend time with them and I was angry about that on the inside. I didn't want to tell them why I was angry, but I would show them in little ways or in big ways, and it would be over little things, dumb things. Somebody would spill something or somebody would say something and I would launch on them.
Speaker 1:In these angry outbursts or being overcritical about certain things is also very common. When You're dealing with hypocrisy in your life, a secret sin that you don't want anybody to know about the people that you love, you are definitely overcritical of them while you are acting out in secret, so you might be overcritical of their spiritual life and point those things out to them. I know that's something that I did is I would point out areas in their lives my wife and my children where they needed to improve, and I would even be critical of the cleaning that my wife was doing at home, like why isn't this clean and why aren't my clothes cleaned this way or that way, why isn't dinner ready when it's supposed to be ready? I was just showing all kinds of being overcritical and rude and angry outbursts. I was definitely pushing away my loved ones, my wife and my children, my friends, my parents, and there's a huge impact on your personal relationship with God and how you think he views you, how you view him and the relationships with other people.
Speaker 1:If you feel like you've got hypocrisy in your life, if you're a fractioned person, you put on masks and you're kind of like a chameleon, I encourage you to do a real deep dive, an examination of your life. You know, it says in scripture that we should examine ourselves in that way. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 11, verses 28 through 32, he says Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup, for anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill and some have died. But if we judged ourselves truly, if we were honest with ourselves, we would not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world.
Speaker 1:Here's another one, psalm 119. When I think on my ways, I turn my feet to your testimonies. When I think on my ways, I turn my feet to your testimonies. It's like that turning of the feet is turning back towards God. When we turn our feet back towards God in a true act of repentance, that means turning from our sin and back to God. He immediately forgives us of our sin. He shares that grace with us. Right, that unearned grace that's imputed. That's an accounting term, it's a gift that would be in the gift column if you were looking at an accounting ledger. It's a gift to us that we do not deserve. But he shares that with us because of his son dying on the cross for us. And if we believe in his son dying on the cross for our sins, then we join with him in that death, in the resurrection of the new person, and that is a grace upon grace. My friend, that is not just a one-time go, and then if you sin again, then you're done, for it's for sins that you will continue to commit, because we are sinners and we do fall short of God's glory.
Speaker 1:And there's a beautiful picture of this in 2 Samuel, chapters 11 and 12. We probably all know the story of David and his adultery with Bathsheba. Then he, on top of that, murders her husband, uriah. He orchestrates his death in a battle and in chapter 12, then a prophet, nathan, is sent to David by God to rebuke him of this sin. Nathan beautifully orchestrates and tells this story of this rich man and this poor man this rich man having many lambs, this poor man only having one. And this rich man wanted to have this banquet. Instead of using one of his lambs, he uses the one lamb that this poor man had and took it. And David was just absolutely incensed by the story. He thought it was a true story that was occurring and he got so mad.
Speaker 1:Here it says that in verse 6 of chapter 12, it says he must make restitution for the lamb. Fourfold. In fact, david said he must die because he did this thing and had no compassion. And so David was incensed by this story. And Nathan, in the next verse, says you are the man I've been talking about you, moron. It doesn't say that of course he's talking to a king, but he says I've been talking about you, david. You've done these things, god has done all these things for you, and yet you have despised him, you've despised his word.
Speaker 1:And down in verse 13,. It shows here what David does. In God's response to what David does, it says then David said to Nathan I have sinned against the Lord. David immediately acknowledges his sin, immediately acknowledges it and repents to God. He says I have sinned against the Lord. And Nathan says to David the Lord also has taken away your sin. You shall not die.
Speaker 1:That was the next sentence, right after David says I've sinned against the Lord. How beautiful is that? That is the example of immediate grace, immediate forgiveness that God offers to us. And I want to make sure that you understand that that has to be emphasized that there's nothing you have done in your life that God cannot forgive. If you come to him and you ask forgiveness from God, from a holy God, and admit to him what you have done, and that kind of acknowledgement is the most important, the first important step in addressing hypocrisy in your life and bringing about redemption and healing.
Speaker 1:Now, that does not mean that you won't suffer some consequences for the hypocrisy that you've had in your life. I know I have suffered negative consequences from the decades of hidden sin and in fact, if you look at the same passage in 2 Samuel 12,. If you go down to verse 14, this is right after Nathan has said to David that the Lord also has taken away your sin. You shall not die, he says, however, because by this deed you have given occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme. The child also that is born to you shall surely die. So Nathan went to his house so there is David did suffer this consequence. The child that him and Bathsheba had together did pass away. That was a loss. That's explained, actually, in the passage right after this. And there were other losses that David had. But there were also many promises that God kept with David, david of course, the biggest promise being that the line of the Messiah would come through David's lineage. And God called David a man after God's own heart. He had a real love for David that continued throughout all of David's life. But there were negative consequences, of course, and there will be for us as well.
Speaker 1:James calls it a death and it says here, if you turn to James and you're in chapter one, and we can start here in verse 14, but each one is tempted, it says, when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Tempted, it says when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then it says in verse 15, when lust is conceived, it gives birth to sin, and when sin is accomplished it brings forth death. So that's not necessarily saying a physical death, although physical death can be a part of our sin, right, but what that's talking about is a loss here in this life that we can suffer, loss for the decisions that we make and the negative consequences that come from our sin. And David did deal with loss in his life.
Speaker 1:And you would think that after this experience with God that David you know probably, the story goes on and says David lived happily ever after and never did anything else wrong. Right, he was perfect after that. But actually that's not the case at all. There's stories as you go on. If you read in 2 Chronicles actually 1 Chronicles about David's life, that where he continues to have issues with trusting God and his faith and he doubts God. So David definitely continued to sin in his life and make mistakes, and we do as well.
Speaker 1:In fact, paul talks about that in Philippians, in Philippians 3,. If you start in verse 12, it says this it says Not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on. And what he's talking about is being like God, like Christ, and it's not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which, also, I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. So he's saying that I'm not a perfect person, but I press on. And that word for press on actually, when it's translated, means like a sprinter. It's not just someone who's kind of you know, lollygagging through and pressing on through life. I just you know, day by day. No, he's talking about he puts out the maximum effort. He's like a sprinter who is sprinting towards that goal of being more like Christ.
Speaker 1:And he said, brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it. There's more humility, which I think is a good example for us of how we should be. We should be humble and that we are not perfect. But one thing I do, one thing I do, so his focus in life can be summarized and kind of funneled down into this one thing. There's one thing I do forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead.
Speaker 1:I forget the things I've done, both bad and good. He meant it both ways I'm forgetting about all the things that I, the sins that I've committed, the ways in which I persecuted Christians and the church before this, because Paul, as we know, as Saul, was persecuting the church. So I forget about that stuff. But I also forget about all the great things I've done in ministry. And if you are like others and sometimes you think, yeah, I'm not like you, know, I don't have any secret sin or hypocrisy in my life. I have been just a great person. I do this, this, this, and lead this group and know all of this scripture, well, Paul says I even forget about the good I think I have in myself in the past and I just press on, he says again, like a sprinter, toward the goal, for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. So my goal, he says, is this prize of being more like Christ. That is my one goal. So we're definitely not perfect, but we are striving every day to be more like Christ. So I want to give you two practical steps towards authenticity. The first is when you are acknowledging your sin.
Speaker 1:I encourage you to make a physical list, to write down an exhaustive and comprehensive list of kind of like a personal inventory of what you've done in your life. When I was going through recovery, it was one of the steps. I started as far back as I could remember my childhood and I started writing all the things on paper, all the things that I had done to others, all the sins that I committed. I wrote everything down as best as I could remember, and it took quite a while and it took up quite a bit of paper because of all the things that I had done. I also wrote down bit of paper because of all the things that I had done. I also wrote down names of people that had done things to me that I was upset about, that had hurt me. So it's not just a list of your sins, but it's a list of things that have been done to you, and you could write down lists of names of people that you hold resentment towards. You want to write all those names down as well. I've held resentment towards my father or towards my brother or this person in school who bullied me as far back as you remember. You write all of those names down as well, and then you take that and you read through it and you keep it for the future, put it in a box somewhere, somewhere that you can look at and you can access. So when you start feeling like you want to act out again or you are slipping back into some maybe repetitive sin in your life, before you do it not after you do it, but before you do it you can grab this piece of paper that has this personal inventory list and you can read it and look over it and remind yourself of the change, of this acknowledgement that you made about your sin, and it might help you not to continue in that sin.
Speaker 1:The other thing I would encourage you to do is to make sure you have layers of accountability in your life, that is, several people in your life, if it's possible. You might say I don't have anybody that I can go to. Well, you need to get to a church. If you're not at a church, then you should get involved in a church or in a men's group, something that you can go to, where there is other male believers. There you can get to know and can hold you accountable, and you might just want to walk in there and just be honest and say, hey, I need a men's accountability group. Can you direct me to whoever leads one? And if the church doesn't have one, then I would find a church that does, but most of them will Find some kind of group that you can get involved in with other men.
Speaker 1:And when you're having conversations with men about why you're there, there shouldn't be surfacy conversations, right?
Speaker 1:How are you doing Good?
Speaker 1:I'm doing good, good.
Speaker 1:How's your family Good?
Speaker 1:My family's fine, blah, blah, blah.
Speaker 1:Just you know how's work.
Speaker 1:Or you start talking about sports. Okay, that's not. That shouldn't be the focus of the conversation. The conversation should be more like hey, you know what? I need someone I can be accountable with. I am struggling with this, this, this, this and this. You need to be upfront and honest about it. Confess your sins to one another it says in James right and pray for each other, and that will bring about healing. So you know, have someone that you can have real and raw conversations with, and you want that to be reciprocal. Obviously, you want someone else too, you know, who can talk with you and share their struggles with you, because then that brings about real healing as well. So accountability, partners and support systems are very important. If you want to reach out to me, I would love to hear from you, to hear your thoughts, experiences and get your feedback. Reach out to me by email. It's psiegel6239 at yahoocom. Feel free to send me an email and share whatever you would like. I'd love to talk back and forth with you.
Speaker 1:So, to summarize, we set the stage by giving the definition of integrity, which was basically doing what you say and talking about how there was a prevalence of inconsistent behaviors among us, among Christian men, a disconnect between what we showed people on the outside and what we were really struggling with on the inside, and how sometimes the church that we go to can make it seem like we have to play a godly part. We also then, secondly, talked about the impact of that hypocrisy and I used some of my own personal experiences with it how my personal faith and my relationships were affected by my hypocrisy. And then we talked about the importance of recognizing our sin and I encouraged you to examine yourself, have self-reflection and acknowledge the personal inconsistencies in your life and just the importance of honest self-assessment for personal growth. And then we talked about the role of grace and forgiveness in that and emphasized that God is in his grace. It's imputed to you, it's a gift, it's powerful enough to cover all of your sins, things that you've done in the past. There's nothing that you've done that God can't forgive, and you will continue to sin, and God will forgive that as well. It's grace upon grace upon grace for you.
Speaker 1:We discussed how acknowledging and addressing hypocrisy is a step towards redemption and healing, and we used the story of David and how he was immediately forgiven when he admitted his sin. The last thing we talked about then was two practical steps you could take toward authenticity, and the first one was this personal inventory on paper that you could make a list of things that you've done wrong, people that have wronged you and those that you hold resentments towards. And the next was having layers of accountability in your life, a support group that you're a part of, a group of Christian men not just any men, but Christian men who can hold you accountable, and you can hold them accountable as well. As I mentioned before, our goal on this podcast is to foster open conversations about sensitive topics and encourage authenticity among Christian men. Just remember that the man who walks with integrity walks securely. Talk to you next week.
