The Means of Distrust

     Recently a friend of my started encouraging me to learn when to say no. My tendency is to say no whenever someone pushes me too hard to do something I'm unsure of. Ironically this friend also was somewhat pushing me to do something that while in and of itself was beneficial, when faced with other burdens and being pressured I felt I had to say no to.

     If I don't feel safe with the way someone is trying to convince me I tend to doubt them. I don't like to feel as though I'm being sold on something, and pressure makes me feel that way. If I cannot have adequate time to sit and think about something I'm unsure of then I feel like I may have missed something. I'm not sure I really want to change this habit of mine. In many cases it has served me well and kept me out of trouble.  Sometimes though, my reason for not making a decision quickly is that I just don't want to be direct and say no right away, because that seems rude (to the other person) and scary(for me, not for the other person). It is difficult for me to tell in the moment if my reason for delaying is because I don't like being pressured or because I don't want to say no directly.

     For me means is an implied form of content. I guess I agree with Marshall Mcluhan, "The medium is the message." Pressure or guilt to convince, imply a lack of other more substantial means, or more careful means to persuade which causes my distrust. 

    This is one of the reasons I sometimes have a hard time with some sermons I hear. They are sometimes just presented as an argument from authority. Even though I know arguments from the Bible could be brought to bear on the topic, they are not put in and it is just left as the pastor's word. This deeply troubles me. The message this sends is "the Pastor's word is on par with the Bible". There is a difference between expositing the meaning of a text, and just adding things you know to be true without citing a single Bible reference, or other reference. If a pastor wants to introduce a new assertion into the sermon, it ought to be cited. "Everyone knows that's true", "all the other people at the church have no problem with this idea", or "I am the pastor and know more than you do" is a very poor way to convince people you know what you are talking about.

     Perhaps it is time for me to go back to calling people on chapter and verse. I was rather surprised how one friend I know suddenly squirmed a bit when I challenged his assumption about the Christian worldview with the question "Where is that in the Bible?" It made me think people are not doing this enough, and the Bible commends the Bereans for doing that very thing. I realized I had also stopped asking the question, or stopped searching, and simply blamed the pastor for not citing. Time to "search the Scriptures".