Secondhand
I was reading this week about the centuries leading up to the Reformation, when access to Scripture for the average person was remarkably limited.
Books were rare and expensive. Literacy was low. Scripture was largely encountered through the church, read aloud and explained by someone else. Most ordinary people simply did not have the opportunity to open a Bible and wrestle with its words for themselves.
Eventually that began to change.
The printing press made books more accessible. Reformers fought to put Scripture into the language of ordinary people. Literacy spread. Over time, something once available to relatively few became available to almost everyone.
Today, we have more access to Scripture than any generation in history.
I probably have several Bibles within a few steps of where I am sitting. I have dozens of translations on my phone. In seconds, I can compare passages, read commentaries, study the original language, or listen to the Bible being read aloud.
Yet somehow, I wonder if we are finding our way back to secondhand faith.
Only now the gatekeeper may be a twenty-second TikTok reel.
Someone looks into a camera, quotes part of a verse, confidently tells us what it means, and twenty seconds later we are watching a recipe, a political rant, or somebody remodeling their kitchen.
And somehow we think we have studied Scripture.
There is tremendous value in pastors, teachers, authors, podcasts, and devotionals. I have learned much of what I know from people who have spent their lives studying the Bible.
But there is a difference between allowing someone to help us understand Scripture and allowing someone else to do our understanding for us.
I love the Bereans in Acts 17.
Paul preached to them, and they eagerly listened. But afterward, they examined the Scriptures every day “to see if what Paul said was true.”
Think about that.
They checked Paul.
They respected the messenger without surrendering their responsibility to know the message.
Maybe we need a little more of that.
So the next time we hear some inflammatory biblical statement delivered in a drive-by video, maybe we think twice before accepting it as truth.
Open the Bible.
Read what comes before the verse and what comes after it. Understand the context. Ask questions. Sit with passages that are difficult. Pray over them. Think about them. Let God speak to you and reveal what He is saying in your life.
We have something generations before us could scarcely have imagined: almost unlimited access to the Word of God.
It would be a strange tragedy to have the Bible everywhere and still know it mostly secondhand.
“They received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.”
Acts 17:11
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Truth Brother