He Will Not Sit For It Now

You offered three nights running and he said no three times, and then you stopped offering.

Not dramatically. He said no in the way a fifteen year old says no, which is not unkind and is completely final, and after the third one you did the arithmetic and concluded that this had run its course.

That was eight months ago. And it probably had run its course, in the form you were offering, and the form you were offering was: come and sit down and I will read to you, which is a thing a fifteen year old cannot say yes to in front of himself.

Two things are not coming here, and you have met them both.

Nobody is handing you a list. Not a title, not an author, not a genre, and no shelf of what anybody ought to have read by now. Being handed one has never once opened a book.

And nobody is saying one word about your phone. You know about the phone. Everybody knows. Being told again by a stranger returns nothing at all.

What I want to look at is the form of the offer, because his no was aimed at the form and you took it as aimed at the thing.

We will not hide them from their children

There is a line at the front of Psalm 78 about passing something on, and the verb it uses is the interesting one.

We will not hide them from their children, shewing to the generation to come the praises of the LORD, and his strength, and his wonderful works that he hath done. (Psalm 78:4, King James Version)

Read the shape of the commitment.

We will not hide them. That is stated negatively, on purpose, and it is a much lower bar than most people notice. Not: we will sit them down and instruct them. Not: we will secure their attention. We will not hide them, which is a commitment about the parent's own conduct rather than about the child's posture.

And then: shewing to the generation to come. Showing. Which happens in the vicinity of somebody rather than requiring them to be seated and facing forward.

You are committed to not hiding it and not to securing his attention, and three refusals have never once ended what you are actually charged with. Psalm 78:4 states the commitment as not hiding rather than as instructing and puts the burden on the parent's conduct, and the Holy Spirit is the one saying that over a kitchen table eight months on.

There is one more thing in that psalm worth having.

It goes on for seventy two verses. It is one long retelling, in public, of what God did, and the children in the picture are not described as sitting attentively anywhere in it. They are simply within earshot of a people who kept saying it.

You have a charge that is about earshot and not about attention, and a boy who will not sit down has never once been out of earshot in his own house. It is written shewing to the generation to come the praises of the LORD, the showing happens in the vicinity rather than in a seated arrangement, and the Spirit of God is saying that plainly here.

His no was about the form

Here is the mechanism, and it is worth being precise because it is easy to get wrong.

What you offered was a posture, and the posture was the problem.

Come and sit down and I will read to you. Every word of that is fine except what it asks of a fifteen year old, which is to accept the position of the one being read to, in a lit room, in front of his own idea of himself. He cannot do that. Not because he does not want the story. Because the posture is unavailable to him at fifteen.

So his no was accurate and it was about the arrangement, and there was no way for him to say that, because a fifteen year old does not have the words for I would like the thing but not in that shape.

You are looking at a no about a posture and not about a page, and three refusals have never once been a verdict on the reading. Psalm 78:4 makes the commitment not hiding rather than seating anybody, and the Holy Spirit is present with a father who stopped offering eight months ago.

And there is a second layer, and it is the one worth being hopeful about.

There is a form he can accept, and it has one feature: he does not have to be the recipient. If you are reading out loud to the younger one, or to the room, or to nobody in particular, then he can be in the kitchen with his back to you eating something, and he will hear all of it, and he does not have to have agreed to anything.

That is not a trick. It is the only shape a fifteen year old can take a good thing in, and every parent of a teenager discovers it eventually.

You have a form he can accept without agreeing to it, and a boy with his back turned has never once been a boy who is not listening. The written word commits the parents to not hiding and describes showing rather than seating, and His Spirit is the one who hands a man a shape that works.

One page out loud tonight

So here is the assignment, and the direction of it is not at him.

Read one page out loud to somebody in your house tonight.

To the younger one, at the table, or to the room, or out loud to nobody in particular from whatever chair is nearest. Not to him. Do not look at him and do not ask.

One page, at a normal volume, in a room he is in or passing through.

You are charged with not hiding it and never with seating him, and three refusals have never once been a verdict on the reading. The Holy Spirit is the one at that table with you, and Psalm 78:4 states the commitment as not hiding and then describes showing rather than gathering anybody.

Here is why not at him.

An offer requires a yes, and a yes is the thing he cannot give. Reading out loud to somebody else in his hearing requires nothing from him at all, which means there is no no available, which means the page happens.

And he will hear it. That is the entire point and it is not a small one.

You are able to read one page in his hearing without asking him anything, and a page he did not agree to has never once failed to reach him. Psalm 78:4 says we will not hide them from their children, and the Holy Ghost is the one present with a man reading out loud at a table while a fifteen year old stands at the counter.

Do not comment on it afterward. Do not ask whether he heard it. Nothing about tonight gets mentioned to him, tonight or ever, and that is what makes it available again next week.

You have a charge that only ever asked you not to hide it, and eight months of not offering have never once been eight months of losing him. It is written and his strength, and his wonderful works that he hath done, the psalm goes on for seventy two verses of saying it in public with nobody seated, and the Spirit of God is saying it at that table tonight.