1.5 - 2.5 Seconds

That's how long the average teacher waits after asking a question.

Notice that's not the average person. That's a teacher in a classroom purposely giving a question for students to think about and actively waiting for them to process it and come up with an answer.

1.5 to 2.5 seconds.

When that time has passed, either because they can't wait or the silence is too awkward the teacher will burst in, give the answer, change the subject, elaborate, whatever they do that derails allowing the student to keep thinking about what the answer would be.

Years ago I wrote about how we seem to prize being first over being right, be the first to report the news before fact-checking and making sure it's right or be the first to put up your hand with the answer maybe even before you've had time to think about it. Because we have to be quick. We need to have the answer now. We need to be Google.

When it comes to faith do you allow time for others to think and contemplate and wrestle with the question before you burst in with the answer? For your own questions are you willing to wait for an answer or are you impatiently waiting for God to juts give you the answer to the question He's asking?

Sometimes an answer that has taken time to come up with is far superior to the one that was just shouted it out in less than 1.5 seconds...

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