I Say Sorry Three Times Before I Ask

Listen to yourself the next time you do it.

Sorry to bother you. I know you are busy. This is probably a really stupid question. Sorry, one more thing. And then, finally, somewhere in there, the actual question, usually said quickly and slightly quieter than the apologies were.

You are not rude. That is not the problem here and nobody has ever accused you of being rude. What is happening is the opposite: you are being so careful not to impose that you spend most of the exchange on the imposing rather than on the question.

And here is what that preamble actually does, which is the reason to look at it.

It tells the other person how to receive you. Before they have thought about your question at all, you have informed them that it is a bother, that their time is more valuable than the asking, and that the question is probably stupid. Most people simply take the frame they are handed. So they answer a bother, quickly, in the way you would answer a bother.

You have been handing over your own standing before anybody had a chance to give it to you.

Let us therefore come boldly

There is a line in Hebrews about how a person is entitled to approach God, and the adverb in it is the whole point.

Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need. (Hebrews 4:16, King James Version)

Let us therefore come boldly.

Now think about the setting. This is a throne. Not a counter, not a colleague at a desk, not your son in the next room. A throne, and the one on it made everything there is.

And the instruction for approaching that is boldly. Not apologetically. Not with a preamble about how sorry we are to trouble Him. Boldly, which means openly, plainly, without a lot of hedging in front.

That is not permission to be arrogant, and nothing in the verse is casual about who is being approached. It is that hedging is not what He asked for. The approach He describes is a person coming in and saying the thing.

And notice the last part: grace to help in time of need. The need is assumed. Nobody is coming to that throne with everything sorted out. Coming with a need is the entire arrangement.

You are entitled to come plainly with what you need, and there has never once been a preamble required, at the highest place there is. Hebrews 4:16 sets boldness as the manner of approach and assumes the need rather than apologizing for it, and the Holy Spirit is the one who makes that transfer into an ordinary Tuesday.

Where the apology came from

Here is a thing worth naming, because you did not invent this habit and it did not come from nowhere.

Somewhere, probably more than once, you asked something and it cost you. Somebody was short with you, or explained it in a tone, or answered the question while making it clear what the question told them about you.

And the apologies grew after that. They are armor. If you say it is probably a stupid question first, then when somebody treats it as a stupid question, you had already said so, and it hurts less.

That is not foolish. That is a sensible thing to build after being made to feel small a few times.

But look at the cost. It works by making you slightly smaller every time, forever, in exchange for not being made smaller occasionally by somebody else. You are paying a constant price to avoid an occasional one, and you have been paying it for years.

You are able to put the armor down, and it has never once been protecting anything worth what it costs you. The written word describes the approach as bold and the need as ordinary, and the Spirit of God is the one who lets a person stop paying a daily price for an occasional wound.

The sentence, and nothing in front of it

So here is the assignment, and I am going to give you the actual sentence, because this is the row where a general instruction would be useless.

Ask one question this week with no apology attached.

The shape is: I want to do this thing and I cannot work out how. Then stop.

That is it. A plain statement of what you want, a plain statement that you cannot do it, and then silence. No sorry. No I know you are busy. No it is probably obvious. No small laugh at the end, which is the same apology with the words taken out.

The silence at the end will feel long. It will feel much longer than it is, and you will want to fill it with something self deprecating. Do not. Let them answer into it.

And if it comes out with an apology anyway, because it is twenty years of habit, that is fine and you try again another day. This is not a test.

Hebrews 4:16 says come boldly, and the Holy Spirit is the one who is present in the second where somebody does not say sorry.

You are able to say the thing plainly and stop talking, and it has never once required an apology to be a fair question. Hebrews 4:16 makes boldness the described manner rather than a personality trait, and the Spirit of God is the one who is with you in the pause afterwards.