The Middleman

“And what do you have that you did not receive?” 1 Corinthians 4:7. 

Business people know about the middleman.  He is the person, or company, who buys a product from a wholesale manufacturer and passes it on to you, with a slight markup added on.  He doesn’t produce the product and he doesn’t use the product.  He only handles it in your area or neighborhood for your convenience.  Most of the time, it makes good business sense to “cut out the middleman.”  We see him as an unnecessary expense.  But there are some things you cannot get on your own.  You don’t have the time, the equipment, or the know-how to make it happen.  We must have somebody who will be the bridge, the connecting-point, the mediator between the manufacturer and the consumer.  

Jesus Christ, is our Mediator between the Producer (God) and the consumer (sinners).  The Son of God, the incarnate flesh that we know as Jesus Christ serves as the only mediator for us to receive salvation. “For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.” 1 Timothy 2:5.  We don’t have any other mediator than Jesus Christ for our salvation.  Only Jesus can save a soul.  But this world needs a mediator, a middleman who can bridge the gap between the world and God. 

Who is this middleman?  It is the church of the Lord Jesus Christ.  “Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation…and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ.” 2 Corinthians 5:18-20. This explains the profession of Paul to the elders in Acts 20:24. “But none of these things move me; so that I may finish my race with joy, and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.” 

The church is the middleman, representing Christ on this earth.  The church is: The agency chosen to dispense the gospel message; the vehicle of missionary service; a soul-saving station; the tower of salvation; the city set on a hill; the light which cannot be hidden; the body of Christ; the hands and feet of God; the voice of truth.  But instead of being the middleman, sometimes we could be better described as the “bottleneck!”  We have the riches, the wealth, the abundance of God’s blessings flowing unrestrained into our lives, but how much of it is flowing out?  

You can either be the reason someone serves God, or the reason they don’t. Are you the accelerator or the brakes? A giver or a taker? A door or a wall? A road or a roadblock? The hand that serves or the hand that steals? The sweet refrain or the sour note? The encouraging smile or the scary scowl? The stepping-stone or the stumbling block?  A following sheep or a cantankerous goat? Judge yourself by the parable of Jesus in Luke 12:16-21.  There are eleven personal pronouns in the rich man’s words to himself. (Check it out.) Moreover, he decided without consulting God; he believed that the harvest was his, not God’s; and he thought that there would be no end to his self-indulgence. 

We operate as the repositories of truth. Will the blessings of God flow through you to the world, or will you misappropriate God’s blessings and waste them on selfish interests? If God saved you, he wants to use you for His purposes. If God called you, use the call for His gain and His glory.