He Said It Once And Very Fast

He said it once, in about eleven seconds, and then he looked at you.

And you said right, okay, thank you.

And you have not understood one word of it since, and it was four days ago, and the thing he told you to do has not been done because it is not possible to do a thing you did not understand.

Now here is what happened in the eleven seconds, and it is worth taking apart slowly because it happens to people constantly and almost nobody names it.

He used four words that are ordinary to him and meaningless to you. He assumed a piece of background knowledge that you do not have and that nobody could have expected you to have. And he went at the speed a person goes when they are describing their own work to somebody they assume is following.

And you did what nearly everybody does, which is say right, okay, thank you, because stopping somebody mid sentence takes a kind of nerve and because there was a small worry about what stopping him would reveal.

You are a woman who was spoken to too fast and not a woman who is slow, and a sentence you could not follow has never once been a report on the person listening to it.

Words easy to be understood

There is a passage where Paul deals with people speaking in a way nobody can follow, and he is completely clear about whose problem it is.

So likewise ye, except ye utter by the tongue words easy to be understood, how shall it be known what is spoken? for ye shall speak into the air. (1 Corinthians 14:9, King James Version)

Except ye utter words easy to be understood.

The whole burden of that sentence is on the speaker. Ye utter. Not: except the hearer try harder, or listen better, or ask more questions. The person doing the talking is the person responsible for the talking being followable.

You are holding a burden that Scripture placed somewhere else entirely, and a listener who did not follow something has never once been the one that verse holds responsible. 1 Corinthians 14:9 puts the whole obligation on the one speaking, and the Holy Spirit is the one present with somebody who has not understood anything for four days.

And then the question he asks: how shall it be known what is spoken.

He does not say it is a shame when people do not follow. He says nothing has actually been communicated. An unfollowable sentence is not a partial success. It is a thing that did not happen.

You were not present at a communication and so you did not miss one, and words that could not be understood have never once counted as information anybody received. The written word says the thing was not known, and the Spirit of God is the one who lets a woman stop looking for something in her memory that was never put there.

And then the line at the end, which is the memorable one: for ye shall speak into the air.

Speaking into the air. That is a picture of words leaving a mouth and going nowhere at all. It is not a criticism of the room. It is a description of what happens to a sentence that was not made followable.

You are not missing something that landed, and a sentence spoken into the air has never once been a sentence a listener failed to catch. 1 Corinthians 14:9 calls it speaking into the air, and the Holy Spirit is the one who takes a failure off a woman who was standing there listening properly.

Ringing back is not the second attempt

Something practical, and it is about what the phone call actually is.

The call has not happened because it feels like a second attempt at something that should have worked the first time, and second attempts feel expensive.

But there was no first attempt. That is the thing the verse just established. Nothing was communicated, so nothing is being repeated. This is the first time this information will actually be handed over.

You are making the first attempt rather than the second, and a conversation that communicated nothing has never once counted as the time it was explained. The written word says nothing was known, and the Spirit of God is the one who lets a woman pick up a phone without it costing what she thought it would.

Now the words, because the words matter here and there is a version that works.

Say: I did not follow what you told me. Could you say it again slower, as though I know nothing about machines.

Three things in that sentence are doing work. I did not follow is a plain report with no apology in it. Slower is a specific and easy instruction. And as though I know nothing gives him permission to go right back to the start without feeling that he is talking down to you.

You have a sentence available that makes the second telling easy for both of you, and asking somebody to slow down has never once been an accusation about how they explained it. 1 Corinthians 14:9 wants words that are easy to be understood, and the Holy Spirit is the one in the room when a plain request gets made.

And here is the thing about people who are good at something: most of them are glad to be asked. Explaining their own work slowly to somebody who genuinely wants to understand is one of the more pleasant parts of a working day, and he has no idea he lost you because nobody ever tells him.