Cut out the Middleman
I really do NOT like car dealerships. I have had 13 cars over the course of my driving and family life (I had to think hard to count them up) and only 4 have been from dealerships. Of the four, none of those experiences have gone as promised or were enjoyable. Whether it was a bait and switch attempt, an agreed-upon price being changed at the last minute, or the "quick signature" becoming a 3 hour event, only one has been an easy experience.
Probably the element I despised the most was dealing with the salesperson- always maneuvering, consistently misleading, and almost no authority to close a sale.
"Let me check with the manager." may be one of the most annoying phrases in our culture. I always feel like saying to a salesperson, "Why don't we save ourselves some time and just let me talk directly to whoever has the answers I want and the authority needed to make it happen.”
In essence, I want to cut the middleman out every time. I do not want him or her giving me their interpretation of the manager's words nor do I need them giving a shaded impression of mine. I desire clarity (and the control that comes from clarity) to accomplish the important task in a proper manner as a steward.
Let me parallel this over to a concern I continue to monitor in Christian culture in our country and active in most churches. Followers of Jesus seem to regularly be dependent upon "middlemen" for their personal spiritual development, particularly in regards to their Bible.
In the sincere desire to get people into the Bible and prayer, we have crafted apps, plans, daily prayers to recite, podcasts, devotionals, videos, and songs. Many of these items are not heretical or even steeped in false teaching BUT are detrimental when they become the means of spiritual development.
How? How could "Bible" stuff become detrimental? Isn't exposure to truth what the Spirit uses to craft our sanctification? YES! Having stated that, we want to think long-term about how we are going about that to ensure stable, healthy growth over the course of our lives.
A few quick concerns to consider:
- We need to know the Bible, not about the Bible. What seems to happen so often in a culture that has access to education, church services, and the BIble is that folks end up becoming lackadaisical rather than hungry. A few years back, Lifeway conducted a survey of Americans and found 9% of people have read through the entire BIble. Pew Research asserts that 60% of Americans identify as Christians. While both surveys are very broad, the implications could be that less than 18 million American Christians have ever read their entire Bible through AT BEST! That said, as a pastor, I have regularly found that people claiming the name of Christ rarely lack opinions about the BIble, God, church, sermons, their life choices, etc. Sincere people live self-led, semi-obedient lives but are quick to deny what the Bible does teach or believe what it has never taught. Why? Because we have become a people who know about the Bible but who do not know it. To be clear, I am not equating simply having "read it cover to cover" as an end game solution but it is certainly a necessary first step for any Christian with access to it. (https://research.lifeway.com/
2017/04/25/lifeway-research- americans-are-fond-of-the- bible-dont-actually-read-it/) (https://www.pewresearch.org/ religion/2025/02/26/religious- landscape-study-religious- identity/) - We must recognize that each additional voice adds interpretation due to bias. One of the beauties of God's creation is our brain; it is always processing based upon what it has learned, is learning, and what it is around. As such, we form a worldview and interpret our lives through it; we make our decisions weighted by it. When we invite another voice into the conversation through a devotional, a video, a plan, a book, a song, or some other means, we are adding a layer of interpretation to the process. That may not be an issue necessarily BUT when we consider the above concern (knowing about but not knowing the Bible), it creates a scenario where the one taking in the material is not mature enough to discern what the "extra voice" is adding or subtracting. Maybe you have experienced this before- someone you know is excited about this book or that podcast or that author or this song...but you recognize it as incredibly unbiblical or problematic but they did not. I once had a new believer excited they had found a great Bible teacher online...named Joel Osteen. Each voice adds a layer and we must be so grounded in the Bible that we can discern the difference between doctrine, principles, practices, preferences, spectrum issues, false teaching, and heresy.
- We should give time to the Spirit to do His intentional work. All I have stumped for previously brings us to this point- let the Spirit comb the depths of your mind to accomplish His intentional work with His Word. With the usage (or even dependency) upon everything beyond "you and a Bible", we have maybe added some aids but have subtracted a pivotal moment we cannot let slip- meditating upon what God's Word said to the original hearer, what it teaches you about God, and why it matters for today. This is not accomplished by watching a quick video, reading a page of a devotional, or listening to a podcast. It requires reading or listening to the Word, pausing, praying, and practicing it through obedience. It is not simply enough to know about God's Word, it must "know us" and then change us. Let us stop the microwave approach to our walk with Christ and adopt a slow-cooker method for our personal time in the Word and prayer.
To be clear- I am not ANTI many of the items I have addressed, I am just not PRO them as a starting point (think supplement rather than surrogate).
In short, cut out the middlemen. Reduce the voices and wrestle with the Word in your own mind. Hear His voice through the pages of the Bible instead of someone else's.
We have access to the Author, we do not need to live dependent upon His agents.
Serving together,
Pastor Paul