Pet Peeve: Keeping Bibles Behind the Counter

I'm not as hard on Christian bookstores as I used to be. It's a tough business to be in, and the products offered (or not offered) on the shelves are just as much a reflection of the evangelical consumer as the bookseller's personal taste, if not more so. The last thing I want to do here is gripe that Christian bookstores aren't perfect. Of course they're not. And with Internet sales taking a chunk out of the pie and big box retailers stocking more and more Christian books, things are not getting easier. Still, there are some things I would love to see change, and this might be a forum for putting them out there. More than once, I've entered an unfamiliar bookstore only to find that the books I'm looking for -- Bibles -- are tucked away behind the counter, inaccessible without the assistance of a clerk. If the store isn't busy and the clerk is easy-going, this doesn't present too much of an inconvenience, although I can't help feeling some cognitive dissonance. Bibles behind the counter? You need permission to touch? Doesn't seem right somehow.

Unfortunately, stores are sometimes busy and clerks aren't always easy-going. I remember a big store in Houston that stocked hundreds of Bibles, one of the best selections in town, but kept them in a series of tall bookcases cordoned off from the rest of the store by a tall wooden counter. To take one off the shelf, the salesperson had to walk about twenty feet back. The distance was such that there was no way I could make out individual items.

"Which one would you like to see?" they asked.

In frustration, I replied: "All of them!"

This arrangement wasn't an accident of geography, either. The store had relocated from a smaller building, where they'd had precisely the same kind of hands-off layout. I've seen it in a number of places. I believe the thinking is that Bibles are expensive and therefore shouldn't be on a shelf where they're easy to snatch. Maybe there's a Bible heist ring that boosts deluxe editions when nobody's looking. Perhaps wear and tear is also a consideration: by putting the goods behind the counter, you insure that only serious buyers handle them, which reduces the likelihood of someone damaging a $100 edition.

Whatever the rationale, I wish it would stop.

I bumped into the ultimate example one afternoon while driving from store to store in search of a particular like of study Bible. There was a place on the west side of town I'd never visited before. After ten minutes inside, I still hadn't managed to locate the Bible section, so I went to the front counter and asked. This was Saturday and the place was busy, so I actually had to wait in line a bit to reach an employee.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I just can't find where the Bibles are."

She nodded sympathetically, like this had happened before, and then pointed over her shoulder. On a high, shadowy shelf up behind the register, hanging at about the height that a flat-screen TV would in a sports-themed restaurant, I spotted a row of nondescript Bibles. This actually tapped into two of my pet peeves: not offering quality editions as an option, and keeping Scripture carefully screen off from the public. The lady offered to have one of the male clerks get the step-ladder that was apparently needed to take a Bible down for inspection, but I declined.

Out in the parking lot, I stood a moment gazing up at the store sign. A wave a surreality washed over me. the words read "The Such-and-Such Bible Bookstore," and the logo features an open Bible.

J. MARK BERTRAND

J. Mark Bertrand is a novelist and pastor whose writing on Bible design has helped spark a publishing revolution. Mark is the author of Rethinking Worldview: Learning to Think, Live, and Speak in This World (Crossway, 2007), as well as the novels Back on Murder, Pattern of Wounds, and Nothing to Hide—described as a “series worth getting attached to” (Christianity Today) by “a major crime fiction talent” (Weekly Standard) in the vein of Michael Connelly, Ian Rankin, and Henning Mankell.

Mark has a BA in English Literature from Union University, an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Houston, and an M.Div. from Heidelberg Theological Seminary. Through his influential Bible Design Blog, Mark has championed a new generation of readable Bibles. He is a founding member of the steering committee of the Society of Bible Craftsmanship, and chairs the Society’s Award Committee. His work was featured in the November 2021 issue of FaithLife’s Bible Study Magazine.

Mark also serves on the board of Worldview Academy, where he has been a member of the faculty of theology since 2003. Since 2017, he has been an ordained teaching elder in the Presbyterian Church in America. He and his wife Laurie life in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

http://www.lectio.org
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