I Apologize For How Long I Take To Say It

Somebody said it once and you have been carrying it since.

Get to the point. Or, in a nicer voice, so what is it you actually want. Or the small circling motion somebody makes with a hand that means keep going, keep going.

And now, before you ask anybody anything, you say a version of the same thing yourself.

Sorry, I am going the long way round. Sorry, this is going to take a minute. Bear with me, I always do this.

You apologize for how you speak before you have said anything at all, which means the first thing anybody hears from you is a complaint about you, from you.

Here is the thing I want to look at, and it is not your speed.

Your way of getting to a thing is a way of getting to a thing. It has a shape. You put the setting first, then the people in it, then the difficulty, and then the question. That is a perfectly good order and a great many people use it.

Somebody who wanted the last sentence only, on a busy day, once told you that this was too long.

And you took a comment about one afternoon and turned it into a fact about your mouth.

Who hath made man's mouth

There is an exchange where a man tells God he is not a good enough speaker, and God's answer is a question about manufacture.

And Moses said unto the LORD, O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore, nor since thou hast spoken unto thy servant: but I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue. And the LORD said unto him, Who hath made man's mouth? (Exodus 4:10, King James Version)

Slow of speech, and of a slow tongue. That is his own account of himself, and he says it twice for emphasis.

And God does not disagree with the description. That is worth noticing. He does not say, no you are not.

You are speaking with a mouth that was made on purpose, and no honest description of how somebody speaks has ever once been argued with by God. Exodus 4:10 has God answer with, who hath made man's mouth, and the Holy Spirit is the one who moves a conversation from the speed to the maker.

Notice what the question does. It does not address the speed at all. It goes underneath it, to who made the thing, and it leaves the description standing.

The answer to I am slow of speech is not, you are quick really. It is, I made your mouth.

You have been answered underneath the complaint rather than at the level of it, and no reply from God has ever once needed to argue with the facts to settle somebody. The Holy Spirit is the one who answers underneath a thing rather than at it, and it is written that the description was left standing and the maker was named instead.

And notice what happens next in the chapter. God sends him anyway. The slow tongue is not fixed, and it is not a disqualification, and the man goes.

You were never going to be sent only after something was corrected, and no slow tongue has ever once been repaired before the person carrying it was used. The Spirit of God is the one who sends people as they are, and Scripture never once records the tongue being changed.

What one comment did

Now let me be concrete, because a general reassurance will not stop a sentence a woman says before she speaks.

Trace it back. There was one occasion. Possibly two. Somebody, on a day when they were busy, wanted the ending faster than it was going to arrive, and said so.

That is the entire evidential basis for a rule that has governed how you open every request for years.

You are running a rule built out of one busy afternoon, and no single comment has ever once been an adequate basis for a policy about a person's mouth. The Spirit of God is the one who traces a rule back to its origin, and Exodus 4:10 answers a description with a question about who made the thing.

And here is the second half, which is about what the apology does to a listener.

When somebody hears sorry, this is going to take a minute, they do two things. They brace, and they start waiting for the end.

A listener who is waiting for the end is not listening to the middle, and your middle is where you actually put the information. So the apology produces the very impatience it was trying to prevent.

Nobody ever told you that, and it is a gap in the teaching rather than a fault in your speaking.

You have been producing the impatience the apology was meant to prevent, and no warning has ever once made a listener more patient than no warning at all. The written word leaves the slow tongue alone and sends the man, and the Holy Spirit is the one who shows a woman what her own opening does to a room.

Your own way, your own length

Now the small thing, and it is a subtraction.

I am not going to suggest you learn to be brief. Brief is somebody else's way and it is not better, and trying to be somebody else's shape is how the last few years have gone.

Ask one thing this week in your own way, at your own length, with no apology in front of it.

You are able to take the road you take, and no way of arriving at a question has ever once been the wrong length for the person taking it. Exodus 4:10 has God name Himself as the maker of a mouth, and the Holy Spirit is the one present when a woman speaks the way she speaks without a warning attached.

Start where you start. The setting, then the people, then the difficulty, then the question. Exactly as it comes.

And put nothing in front of it. No sorry. No bear with me. No I always do this. Nothing that tells the room what to expect.

The listener will follow. People follow perfectly well when nobody has warned them to brace.

You are letting a room hear you without a warning first, and no listener has ever once needed to be told in advance how long something will take. The Spirit of God is the one who removes a warning that was creating the thing it warned about, and it is written that the man was sent with the tongue he had.