The Big Print Giveth and the Small Print Taketh Away

Q: Do Christians have to read the long documents following certain statements like this: "I acknowledge that I have read and accept the terms and conditions"?
A: Thank you for your question. As a Christian, do you think Christians should read the Bible? You would think the obvious answer is "Yes," but Christians are not obligated to read the Bible. But, it certainly would be of benefit to do so in order to determine what it says about our faith, our God and His plan of salvation through Jesus Christ. Is it any different when it comes to the statement you mentioned in your question? The statement is known as a disclaimer. A disclaimer is "a statement, document, or assertion that details responsibility, affiliations, etc." In other words, it defines the legal rights of the parties engaging in an activity. You often see these disclaimers accompanying the purchase or use of a product or service. They are designed to protect the party allowing use of their product or service. If you are like most people, you normally do not read the documents following the disclaimer. I assume this is why you are asking your question because you probably do not or have not read the "documents" following the disclaimer and are concerned that perhaps you are not acting in a manner consistent with being a Christian.

Let us take the Bible as an example again. Acts 17:11 reads, "Now the Bereans were of more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true." Notice how it says the Bereans studied the scriptures daily to see if what Paul was teaching was true. They wanted to know what they were getting themselves into by listening to Paul. It is no different with disclaimers. Many times people do not read the disclaimers, but acknowledge that they have, only to find out that when the product or service they are using does not deliver what it promised, they do not have any legal recourse. If they had only taken the time to read the documents following the disclaimer they might have saved themselves a lot of trouble. Unfortunately, many Christians do not read the Bible, our spiritual disclaimer, only to discover too late that they have been led astray by pastors and teachers. In our eagerness to "please" God, we often ignore the basic teaching of our faith to "test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world (1 John 4:1)."

If you do not read the documents following a disclaimer you are entering into an agreement at your own risk. By doing so, you may have relieved the other party of all responsibility as it pertains to the agreement you have entered into. "Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth (2 Timothy 2:15)." The Bible encourages us to "correctly" handle the scriptures. That means to read them, study them, understand the context of them and allow the Holy Spirit to discern their meaning to us. This helps us mature in our faith and guard our hearts and minds against those desiring to steal our joy and separate us from the truth. Therefore, we should have a similar attitude when dealing with legal disclaimers and the documents accompanying them. We all like to know what we can gain or lose when entering into a contract, as well as understanding what is expected of both parties involved. Therefore, I would encourage you to read the documents following the disclaimer. Granted, they can be long and difficult to understand, but you can lose more than just time if you don't read them and acknowledge that you have read them.

"Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming (Ephesians 4:14)." Who is it that falls prey to all kinds of teachings and schemes of deceitful men? It is infants. An infant is one who is ignorant of what is going on around them. They are naive and easily manipulated. Like the old saying goes, "It's like taking candy from a baby." Taking candy from a baby is easy because they do not put up any fight. At best they just cry, but that does little to get their candy back. And when you do not read the Bible, or the documents following a disclaimer, you are that proverbial baby getting your candy taken from you. Only in this context you can lose a lot more than a sweet treat. Biblically speaking you can lose time, money, knowledge of your God and much more if you do not study the Bible. In terms of disclaimers and their accompanying documents, you could end up losing much of the same things to go along with the fear, anger and embarassment that usually accompanies suffering a loss that could have been prevented if we had only just read those documents. Remember the old saying, "The big print giveth and the small print taketh away." Those documents you do not read are the "small print." Take heed to what they may take away from you if you do not read them. Grace and Peace.